Singing Wolf laughed too sharply. A brittle sound, it shattered in the dark.
The line tugged in his hand. Mouth dry, heart hammering, One Who Cries started forward, walking toward the fingers. I'm racing toward a black soul trap. Crackles of dread coursed along every nerve.
' 'Keep talking,'' Wolf Dreamer called back. ' 'Where there are holes and places a person could stumble, tell the one behind you."
A sputter of voices broke the silence.
"Just show them honor and courage," One Who Cries mumbled to himself. He blinked in the darkness, shivering again at the faint noises in the ice around him. Overhead, something groaned loudly, horribly. I have no courage . . . or pride . . . or honor! I just want light!
Step-by-step, they moved, Wolf Dreamer's calm voice
keeping them together, his very Power hanging about them like a protective shroud in the blackness.
The grasping fingers of the dead dangled, waiting. His skin seemed alive with the feet of tiny things of the black.
One Who Cries kept his left hand knotted around the darts at his side while his right gripped the mammoth-hide line. As he felt with his feet, his eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness, faint images coming from the lamp in Wolf Dreamer's hands. Shadows flickered across the grimy walls, tall and long.
Behind, in the blackness, Broken Branch cackled, "Wolf Dream . . . Wolf Dream" over and over. The sound of human voices wove a frail shield against the horror of the squeaks and creaks of the ghosts hanging like bats in the black overhead.
Forever stretched. One Who Cries walked—fear like an animal in his breast, scurrying, eating at his heart. The gouged ice hung lower. His soul screamed, Trapped, you 're trapped! Mouth dry, he forced himself onward. He fell over rounded polished cobbles, hide-wrapped feet sliding off the smooth surfaces. Behind him, Green Water hummed a spirit song to keep her courage, recradling the baby to nurse it as she walked.
They stopped every so often, shuffling forward to huddle around the sputtering grease-fed lamp Wolf Dreamer carried. Each time, the rest and food rejuvenated, a camaraderie of the dark binding them together, giving flagging spirits relief from the cold and the black, and the horrifying mewing of the dead.
By the time they'd made the fifth stop, a resignation had set in. They talked, laughed nervously, and One Who Cries actually looked up to where the tiny flickers of Wolf Dreamer's light played on the shining surface overhead. To his relief, no hollow eyes stared back.
The memory of sunlight became a dream. In rough places, One Who Cries pitched in to build a trail over the piles of rock, making it easy for the elderly and children who still stared wide-eyed at the darkness.
A hideous shriek began far overhead, rumbling down
through the ice like a bolt of lightning. The ground shook, forcing people to stumble.
"Grandmother?" Red Star called in a frail terrified voice.
"I'm here, child," Broken Branch responded.
"Can you hold my hand? I'm scared."
"Don't worry about the ghosts, child. Wolf Dreamer's Power keeps them at bay. We're safe . . . safe."
The shaking stopped, the shriek dying away to nothingness.
One Who Cries nodded uncertainly, wanting to believe. As an added protection, he refused to breathe through his mouth, lest something fly inside—some ghost reach in and hook his soul to rip it away into the forever black.
An hour or two later, they rested again, huddling close to one another. One Who Cries caught himself staring at the young man who had once been Runs In Light. Could this be true? That they walked under the Big Ice? Walked from one world into another? The shimmering hide of Grandfather White Bear gleamed in the faint flicker of the tiny lamp as Wolf Dreamer refueled it at each rest with a frozen lump of fat.
In the feeble glow, One Who Cries caught a glimpse of Dancing Fox's face. Her chiseled features were as cool as the ice around them—and as unforgiving. At that moment, her dark brown eyes lay on Wolf Dreamer, her soul bared in longing and pain. One Who Cries swallowed and pulled Green Water close, hugging her, thankful for her love.
Only then did he realize that Dancing Fox walked last in line. The most vulnerable, the farthest from the light, who would know if she were sucked away by some monster? Seeing the smoldering of her eyes in the dim glow of the lamp, he looked, away. Who was this Dancing Fox? What had she become? Once Crow Caller had hurt her, kept her from the man she loved. But now Wolf Dreamer stood only a short distance in front of her and he'd built a wall around himself she'd never be able to climb. Her haunted eyes said she knew it. One Who Cries shivered.
One step at a time, they continued, forever moving, forever clambering over battered boulders, traversing holes, progressing. Rock grated hollowly under hide-wrapped feet, the