‘We each sought to serve the Vow in our own way.’

The Bonecaster shook his lean desiccated head beneath its hood of curving bear fangs. ‘I thought such hope long gone from us, Lanas. Yet it lives again and I repent of my despair. Think on this during your ages-long imprisonment.’ He swept his hand and the Imass dissolved into a scarf of dust that the wind immediately scattered across the snows.

Ut’el turned to Silverfox. He knelt on one knee. ‘We of the Kerluhm offer ourselves to your judgement, Summoner.’

Silverfox laid a hand upon his bear headdress. ‘There can be no punishment worse than that which the T’lan have already endured tenfold, Ut’el. Stand with me. The Kron and the Ifayle welcome the Kerluhm.’

Ut’el stood and he and the two other Bonecasters grasped one another’s forearms: Pran Chole, and the other Shimmer now recognized as Tolb Bell’al, whom she had met on an ice-floe during their journey to Jacuruku. The Summoner, she noted, looked to the other woman, the short powerful one with hair like a long black mane that whipped in the wind. This one stood rigid, her arms wrapped tightly about herself, her cheeks wet. For an instant she appeared familiar to Shimmer; a ghost memory of having seen her before drifted across her awareness, only to waver away. Somewhere – she’d seen her before – she was certain.

As if summoned, this woman now strode towards her. An unreasoning urge to flee grasped Shimmer’s throat. She couldn’t breathe and she felt the hair rising upon her arms and neck in terror. Something awful is coming, she realized. Yet her feet in their frayed boots remained frozen to the ice, her lips numb with cold, and her arms heavy – so very heavy.

The woman faced Shimmer and K’azz and Blues and Cal-Brinn, lined up as they were to challenge the Kerluhm should they attack. Yet there was no hint of challenge in the woman’s wind-darkened features. No, what horrified Shimmer was the sadness there, the open compassion in her dark eyes.

The woman said to Silverfox, over her shoulder: ‘One more task awaits you before we may go, Summoner. One I do not envy you.’

Silverfox drew a heavy shuddering breath. Her hands closed to pale fists at her sides. ‘This is not my burden, Kilava,’ she answered, resolute.

The woman named Kilava closed her eyes for an instant, let her arms fall. ‘But it is.’ She added, ‘I’m sorry.’ Yet to whom she was apologizing was unclear to Shimmer.

Swallowing through her dread, Shimmer addressed K’azz: ‘What is this?’

The man was holding himself rigid. His hollowed cheeks and bruised sunken eyes made him look so very ill. Was this what they were speaking of? That he is near to death? ‘I’m so very sorry, Shimmer,’ he answered, his voice choked and ragged. ‘This wasn’t what I wanted – please believe me.’

‘What is it, please?’ she begged.