They left minutes later, Fie dragging three Sparrow teeth into harmony as sunrise ripped the dark seam of the horizon. Spindly fingers of Vulture tracking spells pried all about the cave behind them, fumbling over rock and tree like a drunkard who’d dropped his purse in the dark.
All through the morning they hurried on, through beech and spruce and bristling pine, as the trees thinned and yielded to snow-patched black stone. A hushed murmur through the leaves swelled to a full-throated roar once they reached the gnashing river.
“It’s the Fan,” Tavin said as they paused at the top of the banks. He hadn’t spoken since they’d left the cave. None of them had. Instead they’d glanced over their shoulders again and again and rushed ahead. “This is where it starts, from the glaciers.”
It looked nothing like the sedate ribbon Fie recalled from Cheparok. But the river was far, far from the southern deltas now, and so were they.
Tavin sat and unrolled one of the stolen pelts from his pack, then cut two wide strips and handed them to Fie. “Wrap your sandals. We’ll be crossing snow and ice soon.”
“Where are the Vultures?” Jasimir asked over the water’s rush.
Fie reached through her triad of teeth and grimaced. “League and a half? We’ve gone northeast. They’re going due north.”
“They must think we’re trying the Sangrapa Pass.” Tavin waved at a dip between two gray peaks leagues north, then handed two more hide strips to the prince. “It’s the fastest route to Draga. But Trikovoi is beyond the Misgova Pass.” He pointed to a toothsome, winding slope to the east. “We can clear it tonight. And if we make it through Misgova without them catching on…”
It could give them the lead they needed. Fie still heard the question behind the question. She dug a fistful of Sparrow teeth from her bag. “But if they catch on, they’ll know we aim for Trikovoi, and then we’re rutted.” Tavin nodded, grim. She fed the teeth into gloves she’d stripped off a dead Vulture days ago, trapping them against her palms. “So I’ll make sure they don’t.”
“You fainted yesterday,” the prince said. “Are you certain—”
“Aye,” Fie snapped, and pushed on the hide binding her sandals until the nails poked through. “We done dawdling?”
They were done dawdling. Tavin led them along the river, following a game track drawn with a toddler’s shine for nonsense curves. Trees shrank to thorny scrub, and scrub to grass and wiry lichens. Shaggy goats paid them no heed, nibbling daintily at any sprouts of green.
On they climbed, on and on and up and up, and with every breath Fie marked the path of the skinwitches, the searching talons of their tracking spells, the distance between them. It did not grow fast enough, but it grew, enough to keep her weaving tooth after tooth into her triad.
That old headache grew as well, starting as they picked their way over a rope bridge strung across a great ice-mottled ravine. Fie fought it off as best she could. The pain was only another note in the harmony that, by all the dead gods, she would hold until they’d cleared Misgova Pass.
Then as the noon sun crested above, dizziness struck, sending Fie to her knees. She retched up bile and just barely caught herself before the Sparrow teeth slipped into discord.
“Is it the teeth?” Jasimir asked.
“It’s the height,” Tavin answered as she scoured her mouth with clean snow. “Mountain sickness. Some people aren’t used to climbing this far up.”
“Aye,” Fie croaked, and let the Hawk pull her back up, his hand lingering in hers. “Just … keep going. We have to clear the pass.”
“I can carry you.” Tavin’s grip on her tightened.
“Not with that pack you can’t.” She forced her feet into an aching stagger again. “Come on. We clear the pass tonight, or we don’t clear it at all.”
They pushed on, picking a switchback trail over ground that tilted ever steeper. Only plain rope bridges marked the passage of any life here, lashed between boulders, over ravines, along cliff faces. They had just set foot on one when the wind whipped at them, clawing at her cloak and tearing through the rags and fur beneath. Fie turned her face to the rock only to stop the sand pushing into her clenched eyes.
“Keep going!” Jasimir shouted as the bridge bucked.
Fie fumbled along the quivering rope, sliding on her knees.