The Windsingers Series: The Complete 4-Book Collection. Megan Lindholm

on it. It was done. She rode alone. Through the swirled glass of her tiny window she picked up the tiny, bright points of a few stars. She must sleep now if she were to make her early start.

      She curled up under the worn blankets, nestling her body into the straw mattress. She forced her mind back beyond the painful memories. She took out her memories of Sven and fondled them. Almost she could touch again that long, pale body of his, the almost hairless chest drawn smooth against hers. His beard, when he had begun to have one, had been reddish, a little darker than the blond hair of his head. It had been softly rough against her face. He had been a head taller than she when first they made their agreement formal, and after he had grown even taller and filled out with manhood. His hands had been large upon her, but ever gentle. Ki closed her eyes tightly cradling herself in her memories. She slept.

       FOUR

      Morning poked gray fingers in the cuddy window, to stir Ki within the homey shelter of Sven’s blankets. Without, the sounds of early morning and the tiniest vapors of chill slipping in through the crack under the window. Within, semi-darkness and body warmth and immense comfort. Ki could hear his footsteps moving about, stirring up the embers of last night’s fire. Now he would be putting the kettle on. There was the chink of mugs, then the creak and list of the wagon as a man’s weight was put upon it. He would be moving silently so that the children would not wake. He fumbled at the door. It slid, then caught harshly on the hook Ki had latched the night before.

      Ki was jerked out of fantasy to wakefulness. She rolled off the edge of the bed and landed on her feet. She saw his fingers in the crack of the door, tugging, trying to open it quietly.

      ‘I’m awake.’ She spoke flatly, without fear, warning him.

      There was a motionless silence outside the door. Then she heard him jump lightly down from the wagon. Ki hastily refolded her blankets and pulled her boots on. She closed the door, unhooked it, and slid it open. As she climbed out onto the seat, she nearly upset a steaming mug of tea that rested there. The chill of morning hit Ki in the face. Vandien was unsuccessfully trying to coax Sigurd to the harness. The gray bared his big teeth snidely and put back his ears.

      ‘What do you want, man?’ Ki demanded of him as she climbed down off the wagon.

      The tone of Ki’s voice froze Vandien. When he turned slowly to face her, his eyes were hooded, his mouth humorless.

      ‘An early start, as promised. I’ve been over this pass before in kinder weather. I tell you that in this weather we shall need every scrap of daylight we can muster for traveling if we are to reach a safe stopping place tonight. The Sisters do not let any pass easily. The longer we take, the longer we shall be in their shadows. Now I shall ask you a question. Why do you snarl at me in such a suspicious voice?’

      Ki’s head was cocked, her smile thin. ‘Suspicious? Of someone who wanted to steal only one of my horses? I dislike being awakened by someone trying to enter my wagon.’

      ‘I was bringing you a mug of hot tea. That was all.’

      Vandien’s voice had become soft and very low. His arms hung loose at his sides. Everything about his posture spoke of offended innocence. Ki would not be taken in so easily.

      ‘What would stir your heart to such consideration for me?’ she asked acidly.

      Ki spun to keep her eyes on Vandien as he strode rapidly past her. He stooped suddenly and threw her the carefully folded shagdeer cover. It thudded solidly against Ki’s chest as she caught it. He had not tossed it gently.

      ‘I can’t imagine what would provoke me into relapsing into civilized behavior.’

      He moved to the fire, began to kick it apart with more energy than the task called for. Ki looked about. He had stored most of her gear already, incorrectly. The shagdeer cover was still clasped to her chest. Slowly she took it to the wagon and put it inside on the sleeping platform. As she came out of the cuddy again she looked down at the mug of tea on the seat. She sat down on the seat, and sipped at the tea thoughtfully. It was already lukewarm in the chilly air. She looked down into the mug as she spoke.

      ‘You didn’t want anything to eat?’

      Vandien stopped trampling the ashes. ‘I hadn’t thought about it,’ he admitted, a bit stiffly. ‘I’ve become accustomed to eating rather infrequently lately.’ He glanced up at the sky. ‘Sun’s already climbing.’

      ‘We’ll eat as we travel, then,’ Ki replied briskly. She hopped down from the seat, stowed her mug. She chirrupped to the team. Sigmund and Sigurd raised their heads. Sigurd snorted in disgust, but they both came ponderously to take their places. Ki moved between them surely, fastening straps become stiff with cold, warming the icy bits in her palms before slipping them into place. Vandien stood apart, watching. His one move to help had been met with a warning stamp from Sigurd.

      Ki clambered onto the wagon and picked up the reins. There was a moment of awkwardness; Vandien stood on the frozen ground beside the wagon, looking up. Ki looked down into his dog-brown eyes. His curly hair hung low over his forehead and stirred slightly in the chill wind. By daylight, he was a lithe, narrow man, hardly larger than Ki herself. He did not fit her experience. In time, she might grow to like his mocking ways and unpretentious stance. But she did not want to take the time. She would take him over the pass, as she had promised last night. But no more than that. She was sick to death of having others involved in her day-to-day living. Never again would she let anyone depend on her for anything. If his knowledge of the pass could help her through it, she would consider it an even bargain.

      Slowly Ki moved over on the wide plank seat. She motioned him to get up. He was scarcely settled before she released the brake and shook the reins. The wooden wheels jerked out of their frosty emplacements. The creak and sway of the wagon began.

      Ki slid the door of the cuddy open behind them. ‘There’s food in the cupboard under the window. Apples, cheese, and I think a slab of salt fish.’

      He moved to fetch it, touching nothing in the cuddy other than the cupboard she had indicated. He emerged from the cuddy and set the food on the seat between them. Ki waited, guiding the team, and then glanced over at him impatiently.

      ‘I haven’t a knife,’ he reminded her.

      The wheels creaked, the wagon swayed. Ki kept her eyes on the trail ahead as she drew the short knife from her belt and passed it to him. A moment later she felt a nudge and took from him a slab of cheese on a slice of dried fish. They ate slowly. The withered apples could not completely clear the salt of the fish from their mouths. Ki reached back, snagged the wine skin, drank, and passed it to Vandien. He accepted it, drank briefly as she had, and passed it back. Ki rehooked it and shut the cuddy door. Vandien leaned back on it, stretching his booted legs before him.

      ‘I had almost forgotten how pleasant it could be to ride instead of walk. I shall hate to see the deep snow. You will know then, as I do, that it makes the way impassable for a wagon. You will decide to turn back then.’

      ‘I am going through,’ Ki asserted quietly. ‘And the wagon goes under me.’ Vandien gave a snort of what might have been amusement. Ki did not deign to reply.

      The wagon-trail ground upward, twisting and dodging among stands of spruce and snaggles of alder that grew in the shelter of rocky outcroppings. Where the bare outcroppings of rock thrust tall, the trail detoured around them. Often it seemed to pass on the far side of hummocks of land instead of winding closer to the pass. Ki wondered who had made such a roundabout trail to go through the mountains. The grade was easier on the pulling team, true, but sometimes the detours of the path made little sense to her. Ki had used passes that followed the bed of a river, or sought the lowest place in a range of mountains to cross. This trail seemed to do nothing but sneak and slink across the face of the mountains. Sometimes the path seemed to run out entirely, and the team pulled the wagon over flat, lichened rocks and mossy places. Ki saw little sign of game, other than an occasional school of lichen mantas. They were only