The Ranger of Marzanna (The Goddess War #1) - Jon Skovron Page 0,83

better than me. Not that I could tell…” He frowned and his eyes grew distant, as if that had given him an idea, perhaps for some new potion. Then he shook his head. “My concern is that if we have to wait out a storm for several days, we might not have enough food to get us to the other side of the tundra.”

“True. That’s why we veered northwest instead of due west yesterday when we started out.”

“We did?” Apparently he hadn’t noticed. “But how does that help?”

“Because now we’re nearly to the White Sea. There isn’t much inland hunting on the tundra during the winter. Most mammals have either migrated to another area or started hibernating. But there’s still plenty of fish in the sea. We lost about a day coming this far north, but as Mikhail Popov used to say, better to lose one day than all of them.”

“The White Sea?” Jorge squinted as he scanned the muddled gray horizon. “It’s really that close?”

“Trust me. I can smell the salt. It’s less than an hour’s walk north of here. You start on the shelter and by the time you’re done, I’ll have some fresh fish for us. Or maybe even a nice fat seal!”

“I’ve never actually seen a seal,” said Jorge.

“And you won’t today even if I catch one,” she said. “Something like that is too big to drag for an hour through the snow. I’ll just cut off as much meat as I can carry and leave the rest for scavengers.”

She dropped her pack and took out the few items she would need for ice fishing.

“Make the shelter bigger than usual so we can actually move around if we’re stuck down there for a little while.”

Jorge nodded. “Good luck.”

“Who needs luck when you have skill.”

Then she pocketed the hooks, line, and bait, slung her ice cleats over her shoulder, and started north.

The transition from tundra to ocean shore was almost unnoticeable, given how much of it was frozen over at this time of year. It wasn’t until she was some ways out on the ice that she was able to see the black, rippling waters of the sea. The ice was thinner that far out, so it would be easier to break through.

She cleared a small area of snow, then changed from snowshoes to ice cleats. The bottoms of the cleats were lined with a jagged layer of tiger teeth, which prevented her from slipping. Then she drew her knife and began the slow, tiring work of chiseling a hole in the ice that would be big enough to pull a fish through.

Once she could see the cloudy black water, she pulled out her fishing line, tied one end to a small hook carved from whalebone, and baited the hook with a bit of meat. She slid the baited hook into the water, twirled the fishing line around her gloved hands, and sat down to wait. To Sonya’s mind, fishing was merely another form of hunting. Like hunting, it required patience and absolute focus. One might have to wait in stillness for hours and then suddenly spring into action before the fish stole her bait.

By carefully reading the vibrations of the line, Sonya was able to catch a small pile of fish in a relatively short amount of time. She strung them all together with a rope through their gills, which would make them easier to carry back to the shelter.

The wind was stronger on the coast, bringing with it a sharp salt tang that never failed to soften her heart. As she sat and waited for the next bite, she wondered what it would be like to live life on the sea in one of those huge ships Mikhail had sometimes spoken of. Perhaps when she had liberated Izmoroz, she would find out.

She noticed that she hadn’t had a nibble in a little while. She wondered if the fish had wised up. She had caught enough already, but there were still probably a few hours before the storm hit, so she decided to enjoy the solitude a little longer.

Occasionally, she felt a faint vibration beneath her feet, as if someone was dragging something across the surface of the ice. But when she looked around, all she could see was black rippling water on one side and rolling, uneven snowdrifts on the other. She was alone, and she was content.

It wasn’t until the water in her fishing hole begin to bubble that she understood the danger. She