The Infinity Gate: Darkglass Mountain: Book Three - By Sara Douglass Page 0,141

was the only way out for you. It was the only way for you to survive the hex. But . . . why am I here? I should not be here. I was to have died, no matter what.”

I have changed, she thought. The river runs murderous in me, now.

“Ah.” Axis smiled so broadly his entire face was wreathed in laughter lines. “Eleanon created a hex that was to recreate for me my battle with Borneheld. It was perfect, Inardle, his trap was perfect. Either both you and I died trapped in the hex, or I lived, but at your expense. Eleanon thought of everything. Save for one thing.”

Save for two things. “Which was?”

“Eleanon had heard of the story of my battle with Borneheld in the Chamber of the Moons. He’d assumed that the battle was about one thing — our bitter, hateful rivalry. The Chamber of the Moons was where it was to be settled. But a battle to the death to end a rivalry wasn’t the ultimate purpose of that night. The ultimate purpose was a rebirth — in the original situation, the rebirth of an Icarii prince named FreeFall. That was the magic that encased that night. Eleanon didn’t realise it. That magic was there again . . . I could sacrifice you, but I could also bring you back.”

“You dragged me through the ice and the snow. You risked everything. Ice encased your chest and you could not breathe. You dragged me back through the ice and the snow.”

Axis didn’t say anything for a moment, remembering that terrible journey. “Yes,” he said, finally.

“I know of it,” Inardle said. “I know how bad it was. Thank you.” The rivers ran gentle now, and Inardle understood they would never harm Axis.

“Do you know what I swore to do, during that journey?” Axis said.

Now Inardle regarded him with very bright eyes. “Kill Eleanon.”

“Yes. I will do that for you.”

Inardle rolled her head so she stared at the sky. The Lealfast had long gone — to report her life to Eleanon, no doubt.

Axis wanted to kill Eleanon.

A small smile curved Inardle’s mouth. Only if he got to her brother before she did.

Whatever ties had bound her to the Lealfast had now broken completely.

“Don’t worry about the Lealfast,” she told Axis. “I will know if they return, and I know they will not be able to harm us.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

She could see that Axis didn’t understand, but she saw also that he decided to trust her.

“Very well,” he said. “Sleep for a while longer, Inardle. I will build a fire for the evening and we can talk some more then.”

“I would like to talk about Azhure,” she said, and Axis nodded.

“We can talk about Azhure.”

She slept, and the rivers raged.

“They are alive?” Eleanon stared at the scouts. “They are alive?”

“Yes, brother,” replied one of the Lealfast who had circled high above the reed bank where Inardle and Axis rested. “They have a little camp in the reed banks just east of Elcho Falling. They . . . ”

Eleanon didn’t hear much else the scout said. How could they still be alive? Axis, perhaps, if he’d had the wit and the balls to murder Inardle (and Eleanon had gambled on him having neither). But the pair of them should not have survived.

There was no way Inardle should ever have emerged from that hex save as a brutalised corpse.

“Brother?” the scout said. “What should we do? We could attack and —”

“No,” Eleanon said. “This is my battle.” It had always been going to come down to just him and Axis, hadn’t it?

Eleanon looked at the sky. Night was not far away. Did he want to attack at night?

Something made him hesitant about a night attack.

Best to wait until morning.

“Dawn tomorrow,” Eleanon said, naming five other Lealfast he wanted to accompany him. “We will attack at dawn tomorrow.”

The scouts left and Eleanon walked a little way from the Lealfast encampment in the mountains to the north-west of Elcho Falling, and stared into the distance where his eyes could just pick out the citadel glimmering in its turquoise lake.

Axis and Inardle’s survival was irritating, frustrating, but it could be reversed easily enough. Just another day.

Everything else, though, had fallen neatly and swiftly into place. The Lealfast Nation was set to descend on Elcho Falling the moment Maximilian and his wife were inside. And they were on their way — Eleanon’s scouts reported the pair close to Elcho Falling in their pathetic little boat. Another few