But I’m not listening. Well, I’m listening, but not to Buff. I’m listening to the wall, because I hear the scrape again, only this time it’s louder, and it almost sounds…intentional, like someone’s trying to get my attention. Well, if so, it works, because I scoot across the stone floor, unconcerned about the dirt and whatever else has stained it so dark over the years. I shove my ear right up against the wall, willing Buff to shut his trap.
“You know, I might just ask for your firstborn at some point,” he goes on. “If you can ever find a woman who’ll tolerate you, that is.”
“Shut up, shut up, shut up,” I hiss.
“Or maybe you can just take my brothers and sisters off my hands for a while—or forever.”
“Shut it, Buff,” I finally say loud enough so he can hear.
“Heart of the Mountain, Dazz. No need to get testy. I was just kidding. Well, mostly.”
The wall pinches me, right on the cheek.
I pull back, expecting to feel the wetness of blood, but it’s dry. My skin stings slightly and I feel a tiny bump forming, but that’s it. I reach out to touch the wall, to see if it’ll sting me again. That’s when it jumps out at me.
A stone clatters to the floor, leaving a gap in the wall.
When I peer through, dark brown eyes stare back.
“Who in the burnin’ scorch are you?” the eyes say, as raspy as a punch to the face. “And why the scorch are you followin’ me?”
“What the chill is scorch?” I say, feeling a warm blush on my cheeks. What the chill? I’m not a blusher. I don’t blush.
“What the scorch is chill?” the icy voice says. Did I say icy? I meant raspy. Yah, just raspy.
“I’m Dazz,” I say, memories of a strong, brown-skinned girl floating through my mind. A punch to the face.
“I don’t give a burn whether yer King Goff,” the Heater girl says, which confuses me for a second, because didn’t she ask who I was? But she’s speaking so different than what I’m used to, using words that make no sense and rounding them off, almost like the curve of her hips.
“Uhh,” I say.
“Why’re you followin’ me?”
“I’m not,” I say.
“Who’re you talking to?” Buff calls.
“That Heater girl,” I reply.
“I ain’t no Heater girl,” the Heater girl says sharply. “I’m a Wild One.”
I grin. “I’m sure you are,” I say, instantly pleased with my wit.
“You are?” Buff says.
“No, you ’zard-brained baggard. Not Wild—Wilde, like with an e on the end.”
Roan’s words come back to me. The Wildes steal more and more of our women every year.
“Yah, Buff, I am. Now can you please shut your icin’ trap?” I shoot over my shoulder. I turn back to the hole in the wall and the set of mysterious brown eyes. “You’re a Wilde?” I ask stupidly, considering that’s what she just told me.
“Well, that settles it. I’m speakin’ to a searin’ fool. Sun goddess help us all.”
Well, I don’t know about the searin’ part, but the fool bit’s probably right, considering I’m in a dungeon on an impossible mission to rescue a sister who might not even be here. “Can we start over?” I say hopefully.
“Watcha mean?”
I take a deep breath. “I’m Dazz. I’m an Icer. I’m not following you.”
“Oh-ho,” the Wilde says.
“Okay, okay. I am, but not like you think. You see, my friend and me, his name’s Buff. Say hi, Buff.”
“Hi, Buff,” Buff says. The Yag.
The set of deep brown eyes just look at me and I can see what they’re thinking: his friend’s a searin’ fool too. Which is probably a fair thought to have at this point.
“Anywayyy,” I say, “we were trying to get information on what happened to the Heaters, because there were rumors flying around about bad shiver, all kind of bad shiver, and then I saw you and I thought you were a Heater and so I chased you, not because I wanted to hurt you or anything like that, but because I wanted to talk to you, to ask a couple of questions about the Heaters and whether everything was okay and whether…” I stop. I’m rambling like a river of melting snow in the summer.
“What kinda questions?” the girl says, the rasp of her voice tickling my eardrums.
“I guess just, do you know what happened to the Heaters?” I ask.
“I was there,” she says.
“But how? I thought the Wildes stole the Heaters’ children.”
“That’s a burnin’ lie,” she says. “Give me back my brick.” Because of my bumbling, arguably the most important conversation of my life is spiraling out of control.