Tarashana Rachel Neumeier (top 10 motivational books TXT) 📖

I said, “We will walk a little faster. Only so fast as is safe.” I gestured for her to lead the way. Then I continued. “Perhaps Iro will cross safely and follow the pull of the tie and come to Aras quickly. That would be one good thing that might happen. Iro might not defend Aras with as much determination as I would, but Etta is there. He will defend her with a dedicated heart.”

“Yes, I’ll grant you that,” Lalani conceded.

“Or it might happen differently. Perhaps Iro will fall because he runs too fast. Then Tano might come to Aras, and perhaps his help might be enough. But perhaps both Iro and Tano will fall. Should that happen, we must not.”

“Well, yes, all right, I can’t argue with that.”

“Or perhaps they will both come to the mountain, but meet enemies too strong or too numerous to overcome. We will come behind them, but not so far behind. Perhaps they may clear our path. Or perhaps their battle may distract those enemies and give us a chance to slip past unnoticed.”

Lalani paused to glance at me over her shoulder. “That’s cold.”

“Iro will expect me to try to use him that way, should anything of the sort happen. If he sees too many enemies there, if he knows he is badly outmatched, he will try to lead them away from the direct path if he can, so that you and I can go on without meeting those enemies.”

“Right, yes, I bet he will,” she agreed. “Fine, Ryo, I understand, you have a lot of reasons to hold back, but I bet if I can walk faster, you won’t object to that either.” She did not lengthen her stride, but she began to walk more quickly, taking small steps. She had already learned better how to walk on the ice. She barely lifted her feet, keeping her weight on the balls of her feet rather than the heels, each foot skimming lightly along the surface of the ice.

If she slipped again, that would slow us. But I only said, “Go no more quickly than feels safe.” Then I was silent, and we both put our attention on making the best speed we could.

The urgency of the tie burned in my chest. It did not precisely hurt even now, but certainly the pull distracted me from every other pain and discomfort. I knew Aras was in danger, I wanted to be there, I knew he needed me. But the tie also told me that he still lived, and the very urgency told me that whatever was happening, our efforts had not yet been spent for nothing. Whatever peril beset him, beset them all, our enemies had not yet won, or there would be far less reason for Aras to call for help.

Also, above the sounds of the wind and my own breaths, I was certain now that I could hear my sister singing.

Lalani slipped and fell twice. Each time I caught the back of her coat as she fell, followed her down, stabbed my knife into the ice, and used that to steady us both. She made no comment either time, only got to her feet and went on.

When we began to climb—something we had to judge with our eyes, as there was no sense at all that we were walking upward—the span narrowed, and then narrowed further, until it was hardly wider than two hands. We had no choice but to go more slowly there. Before us, Talal Sabero filled all the rest of the world, rising up to the sky before us and falling away to the distant earth beneath us. But because we walked at a slant to the world, the sky seemed to lie ahead of us, and the earth seemed to stretch out behind us, not below our feet. The highest peak of the mountain reared up directly before us. Moonlight ran like water, like milk, across the stone. Even now, as high as we had come, I could hardly imagine we could climb as far as that peak. Certainly not in time to be of any use to anyone. I set my trust in the gods to shorten our path, having no choice.

Ahead of us and to our left, in a direction that now seemed below our feet, the Saa’arii shadow tide had eaten the sky and the stone until it seemed to fill all that part of the world. It was very close, so close I could have thrown a stone into it from where I stood.

I could hear my sister plainly. She was still far away, far above us, but her voice was so clear and so high that the sound fell through the air and came to us.

She was singing in long phrases, each separated by a pause from the next. I could not make out what words she sang, if she sang in words. It was not a song I knew, though from time to time I thought I heard a phrase of melody that was like something in the song we sing to the Dawn Sisters. That seemed appropriate. Two of those three stars had now emerged from the bright area near the Moon and come closer to the earth, so bright that they blazed with a cold, vivid fire even through the wash of moonlight. The other, I was very much afraid, had gone into the Saa’arii tide.

Less good to hear than my sister’s voice, but unmistakable: I could now hear the sounds of battle. The ringing of metal against metal is a sound that carries a long way. I assumed Iro and probably Tano had met enemies. I heard the piercing scream of an eagle. We were too high above the world for ravens, but probably the eagles were impatient for an end to the battle. I wondered again what fate might come to a