“Raven Hunter protects you?” Nashat laughed. “It seems he doesn’t do a very good job.”
Ti-Bish made a gurgling sound, eyes blinking.
“That punctured your liver, and most likely the bottom of your lung. It won’t take long.”
“Why?” Ti-Bish croaked.
“Because, with you dead, we have no choice but to head south. No Guide … no way to find the way to the Long Dark.” He made a face. “Long Dark? Who’d want to live there?”
“Those who believe,” a sober voice said from behind.
Nashat whirled to find Skimmer, breathing hard, standing behind him. He backed up, raising the stiletto. “This time I’m armed. And, well, your timing is perfect. A Sunpath assassin has taken our Guide from us. All the more reason for the people to joyously head south. It makes reaping the benefit of your old lands even more precious to them.”
Skimmer smiled coldly, stepping forward.
Nashat caught the cold glow of her large dark eyes, as if they no longer had pupils, but watched him like some great raven’s. “Better that you ran, Skimmer. You’d at least have a chance before we hunt you down.”
“There’s no running, Nashat.”
Even as she spoke, Kishkat and Tapa stumbled in behind her, staring first at him, then at the bloody stiletto he held, and finally at the Guide, flat on his back, blood pooling blackly on the hides.
“Take her,” Nashat said. “Drag her out to the people. Let them tear her apart. She’s killed the Guide.”
Skimmer’s smile grew. “It’s too late, Nashat. You’ve uttered your last lie.” She cocked her head as a low wailing rose from the ice tunnels. The sound was eerie, keening, one he’d never heard before.
Skimmer fixed him with her liquid-dark eyes. “Hear them? Those are the voices of the Sunpath dead. The Nine Pipes women are screaming for your soul.” The smile widened. “And I’m going to give you to them.”
He watched her pull an old ax from her belt, raising it. Then, she jerked her head toward the door. “Go on, run. But leave the lamp behind. They’re waiting for you. Just out there in the darkness.”
Nashat swallowed hard, hearing the eerie wail rise like a thousand screaming voices.
“Kishkat, Tapa, seize her. I’ll give you anything you want. Women? I have them. Would you like to be war chiefs? Elders? I can make it happen.”
“Go,” Skimmer ordered, her voice little more than a whisper. “Run! They’re reaching out, their fingers as cold as the very ice.”
“Skimmer?” Kishkat asked, staring in horror at the Guide.
“Let him go.” She continued to glare at Nashat. “Death at the hands of the ghosts will be more horrible than anything we could imagine.”
Nashat turned, threw down the stiletto, and bolted for the doorway. He shoved past the two warriors, scrambling down the tunnel, slipping, falling, grunting as he ran headlong into the walls.
Then something cold plucked at him from the solid blackness … .
“Will he make it back to the main caves?” Kishkat asked. He glanced at Tapa, finding his friend wide-eyed, speechless.
“No,” she said softly, crouching down beside Ti-Bish. “He only thinks he knows the way.” She turned, looking up at Kishkat, her large eyes as black as the caverns themselves. He stepped back. It was as if he’d looked into some night creature’s face, something not quite human.
He felt Tapa’s reassuring grip on his arm. Then, mustering his courage, he bent down, lifting the Guide, seeing the blood draining from the back of his shirt.
Ti-Bish coughed, frothy red bubbling on his lips. “Too late,” the Guide whispered.
“I know,” Skimmer told him. “The world is dying.You understand, don’t you?”
Ti-Bish jerked a slight nod, crimson leaking past his lips. “Skimmer? Do … do you love me?”
“Yes, Ti-Bish.”
He smiled slightly; then his voice changed. “Raven Hunter, is that you?” His eyes had widened, sightless. “Thank you, the light was getting to be too much.” He coughed, spewing red. Then he whispered, “ … Let’s fly now …”
Skimmer reached out, running her fingers along his blood-smeared cheek. Then she closed her eyes.
Kishkat watched for a long moment, and then saw her nod. She said, “He’s reached the Long Dark. Raven Hunter kept his promise.”
Somewhere from down the tunnel, they heard Nashat’s terrified scream.
Skimmer turned her strange black eyes on Kishkat, and his blood ran cold. “Nashat has found the dead,” she said simply.
Scream after hideous scream echoed from the darkness.