The Girl and the Stars (Book of the Ice #1) - Mark Lawrence Page 0,42

to eat as many as they like . . . as long as no one sees them do it.”

Kao’s truculence weakened as opposing desires waged war. Arka allowed herself a small smile then led them on. “First we visit the foundry!”

* * *

“THE FOUNDRY IS the closest area to the main pit shaft that we still hold.” Arka had led them for what felt like an hour and couldn’t have been anything like that. “Can any of you guess why we keep such valuable industry out here where the Tainted contest us?”

“To show them who’s boss,” Kao grunted.

“It’s too difficult to move?” Maya asked.

Yaz frowned, puzzled.

“The heat,” said Quina. “It needs to escape without drowning you or bringing the roof down.”

“Fast brain as well as fast feet,” Arka said.

At the exit to the low cavern they had been traversing Arka led the drop-group past three gerants and a short dark man heading in the opposite direction. One of the gerants must have been close to nine feet in height and was built like a bear. All three of them wore metal plates linked together by iron rings, each plate no bigger than Yaz’s hand so that together they formed a flexible metal skin over the warriors’ chests, arms, and upper legs. Rust patterned them like frost rings on a closing sea.

The smaller man wore no armour. All four carried iron spears, not bone shafts tipped with an iron blade but iron throughout. And at their hips they bore huge knives with small arms spreading from the hilt.

“Swords,” Thurin said, seeing her surprise.

Arka led them on through a perfectly round tunnel that went up and later down, gently undulating through the ice. Broken rock had been scattered on the floor to give purchase in the steeper sections. There seemed no way to account for the conflicting gradients. Meltwater would only flow down.

Arka paused where one tunnel pierced another, listening.

“How are these tunnels made?” Yaz had seen similar ones before, shortly after crawling from her drop pool.

“Coal-worms.”

“What-worms?” Yaz knew of worms that swam beneath the ice surrounding the Hot Sea but none of them were much longer than her arm and she didn’t think they burrowed.

“Coal.” Thurin waved his hands. “Black rock, but not like the mountain. Eular says it used to be forests . . . trees . . . and you can burn it just like whale oil.”

Thurin said whaleoil, as if it were one word and he had little idea of what a whale or oil was. Which Yaz supposed was true. “Good for burning but hard to light, Eular says . . .” He looked at Arka for support.

“Coal-worms eat coal. They generate heat and melt their way through the ice. Though mostly it’s the young ones who travel, looking for new deposits. The big ones only move on when they’ve exhausted the seams.”

“Lucky for us a big one chose to head where we’re going then!” Yaz said.

Arka frowned. “This was made by a baby. Pray you never meet a full-grown worm.”

* * *

“WHAT WERE YOU?” Yaz kept close behind Thurin in the tunnels and asked her question quietly.

“What was I?”

“You know, hunter, harvester, warrior—”

“I was a miner. Mostly.” Thurin glanced back at her, his face curiously lit by bands of stardust in the ceiling just above them. “Ice-workers have to be. Well, they are ‘encouraged.’ Miners produce most of the stars that we give to the priests. But the biggest stars are scavenger finds. Like the one we . . . the one that lights the settlement cavern. And those are dangerous.” His voice carried the warning. “Not all the Tainted were stolen from us. Some went willingly. A star can do that to you. A big one. They break your mind up and fill you with demons.”

“What sort of demons?” little Maya asked from behind Yaz, proving to have sharper ears than expected. She was shy but curious, always watching. “What do they look like?”

“Imagine all your hate broken away from you and given its own voice,” Thurin