Her leathers were rimed with ice, yet mist drifted from her as if the Iceblood woman were afire. But Orman knew it was not heat driving those tendrils of mist; he knew that if he touched her, his hand would probably freeze. He ducked his head. ‘Thank you.’ Then he remembered he was walking with Jass’s mother – a lover of his own father – and what had happened, and he hung his head even more. ‘I’m sorry,’ he murmured.

‘Do not chastise yourself. The Eithjar told me of it. Your only mistake was in not understanding that Lotji is very … old-fashioned.’

‘Old-fashioned?’

She nodded; her mane of black hair was frozen in one solid slab down her back. ‘For Lotji, the old bloodfeud and vendetta remain everything. That is what drives him. These invaders, these lowlanders … he cares nothing for them.’

‘I see. So he is here for you Sayers.’

‘And you.’

The Reddin brothers had selected a copse of trees to camp in and had started gathering dry branches for a fire. The fog remained dense about them; they moved in some otherworld where shapes emerged suddenly from shifting walls of haze, and sounds returned distorted and echoing eerily.

‘Me?’

Vala’s smile appeared touched with melancholy. ‘Haven’t you seen it yet, Orman?’

He had no idea what the Iceblood woman was hinting at. ‘Seen what?’

‘We are the same, you and I. Your people and mine. We share the same ancestors from long ago.’

Orman stared, dumbfounded. Impossible, he thought. How could that possibly be? They are Icebloods!

Vala continued, her voice calm, almost wistful. ‘Your clans separated from ours long ago to make their own way in the southlands. They mixed with humans they found there. Over the generations we drifted apart. Yet not so far apart. Orman, our numbers are few, we remaining clans. Our blood is too similar. When we wish to add to our numbers we take a mate from among you lowlanders – our distant cousins. Or, sometimes, we offer a position in our families to those few who arise every generation or so who seem to fit in among us.’

She regarded him directly now. Her strange oval eyes seemed to glow amber in the shadows. ‘Such an offer was made to your father. And so … whatever should happen …’ Her gaze released him and he found he could breathe once more. ‘Well … please know that I am glad you and Jass met. Glad that you did what you could for him.’

The Iceblood woman seemed to be suggesting that nothing more could be done for her son – his half-brother. Yet Old Bear had told him not to worry. He fought to find his voice, murmured huskily, ‘We’ll get him back. I swear.’