Song of Ashes

17: The Razors

The endless wasteland of ash and dust had been hell to Sarka, a sort of cage without walls that confined her by its very vastness and the dearth of hope or opportunity.

Lady's Wrath had been hell-a long, sweaty walk punctuated with the eruptions of geysers, sometimes near enough to burn an errant limb.

And the river of lava bridged only by a narrow formation of rock had been hell, a cruel joke with which to end their trek across the plains.

The Razors, though, were a new kind of hell. The dark rock cut jaggedly toward the sky in vicious defiance of gravity. The travelers had to watch where they stepped to avoid smaller blades of rock that could stab through their shoes and wound their feet. The path was narrow, sometimes forcing the three of them to walk single-file, and once, when Sarka brushed too closely against one of the ribbed walls, her sleeve and the skin of her arm were sliced cleanly open.

Ro guided them through, keeping to the one route he knew. "I don't feel particularly adventurous in here," he said. "Aneir showed me a single way through, and that's good enough for me."

"Was this always here?"

"No, girl. It rose up on the last day."

"You saw it?"

"No. But it wasn't here before, and it's not on any maps, either, so I know it's not a delusion of mine." Ro unbuttoned the top of his coat and reached into an inner pocket. He pulled out a square of folded paper, which he gave to Sarka.

She skirted around another spike jutting up out of the ground before coming to a stop. She unfolded the paper and looked down at the first map of Kogoren she had ever seen. Its outline was an irregular shape, a few fingers seeming to stretch off to the left of the paper, more to the right, and one brave peninsula stretching up toward the top. "I've never seen this before."

"Well, I'll need it back. There are a few of them in Eagle's Rock, but we don't have a glut of paper to do much copying. They'll be a real treasure in another ten or fifteen years."

"Where are the geysers?" Sarka turned the paper, squinting.

"They're not there-another of Our Lady's parting gifts to us. I estimate this to be about where they are." He pointed at a spot on the map near the neck of the peninsula. "It used to be green fields. That's what those little lines mean. And here-this was a river; it's all dried up now. The Razors are about here."

Sarka looked up sharply. "And those swaying lines, are they water? The ocean?"

Ro nodded, giving her an appraising look.

"We're almost at the coast." She jabbed the map with her finger, indicating the bold line that marked the edge of the godless world.

"Indeed. Eagle's Rock and your town are in the northern part of the continent-didn't you know that? I don't want to think of what became of the center of the world." Ro took the map back, carefully folded it, and tucked it away into his jacket again. "Come on. We have to make it through before dark."

...

The dusk gathered round them. It was difficult to see in the Razors, where the high walls of stone shielded most of the light from the feeble moon.

"Gods damn it!"

Ro had just passed beyond a projecting part of the rock wall, paper-thin at the point and wickedly sharp. His voice betrayed that he was not just angry-he was hurt.

"Ro?" Sarka didn't rush. She couldn't afford to be careless. She continued cautiously, leading Donkey-Meat behind her. On the other side of the rock wall, Sarka heard a wordless exclamation of pain, a heavy exhalation.

"I'm fine. Stepped on one," Ro said. "Didn't break off...that's good. Be careful. We didn't make good time. Goddamned donkey slowed us down. By the Lady's withered heart, it hurts."

Following the sound of Ro's muttered cursing, Sarka came upon him. He was bent over with one of his feet lifted. In the frail light, she could see dark blood dripping from his foot and gleaming on the rock.

"How bad is it? Are you alright?"

"I just stabbed myself through the foot-of course I'm not alright!" Ro drew a shaking breath. "It's my own damned fault. Be careful there."

"What should I do?" Sarka let go of Donkey-Meat's rein and approached Ro.

"Do you have anything clean? There's a flask in the saddlebag. Alcohol. Binding it with anything of ours is just going to inflame it. I'll get it seen to in Horn Harbor. We just have to get there."

Sarka hesitated. In the satchel she had stowed in one of the saddlebags, alongside her precious needles and treasured flosses in their rainbow of colors, there were a few remnants of costly cloth. Snowy white muslin, fine linen, lawn. Her heart clenched in her chest. She closed her eyes and sucked in a breath, reluctant to reveal what she had.

But she owed it to Ro. She owed him this much and more-and, acknowledging this, she allowed herself a few seconds to hate him, his sharp wits, his kindness. Damn him. "Yes. I have some cloth. I'll get it."

She tried to ignore the pain and the panic of agreeing to use her precious cloth for a bandage. These were the last she had of her mother, the last echo of a childhood that had not been quite as painful as her adult life had been. And aside from the sentimental attachment she had to the materials, she knew that each scrap of thread and cloth would her a slightly better chance at success wherever she might end up.

Sarka tried not to think of all this as she took the linen out of her bag. Unrolled, the piece of cloth was narrow and twice the length of her arm. Once upon a time it might have been a nearly useless remnant. Now, it was priceless. "Here. Where's the alcohol?"

Ro had leaned back to rest against the smooth edge of the rock face. "Other bag. Left compartment."

Sarka located the flask, then went to Ro. "Take off your boot."

"Can you?"

Sarka crouched, gingerly feeling the ground beneath her with her hand. Finding it safe, she knelt. "You don't get to say I'm unpleasant to travel with now," she muttered. "My sympathy has its limits."

"Well, if you don't help me, you're on your own in here. Consider this act of boundless compassion to be in your self-interest." The pain gave a tight edge to Ro's habitual sarcasm, turning what could have been a jest into a bitter rejoinder.

Sarka unlaced Ro's boot and tried to tug it off, finding it a more difficult exercise than she would have anticipated. She pulled in short jerks. He hissed with pain, trying to keep his balance.

"What, are your boots too small, you idiot?!" she cried.

"My feet swell when I'm on this blasted journey!" Ro snapped.

Suddenly, kneeling in front of her wounded companion in a labyrinth of death, trying to pull the boot off of his swollen and freshly perforated foot, Sarka laughed.

For a moment, the sound of her helpless hilarity was all that could be heard. She sensed Ro staring at her through the gloom, but she did not look up. She bowed her head so her dark curls would hide her face, laughing so hard that tears rose in her eyes.

"I can't tell what's funny," Ro said at length. His mellow voice was dry, but tinged with amusement-no longer angry.

"Neither can I," Sarka said. She gasped for breath, reining in her laughter with an effort. With one last, brave pull, she tugged the boot off of his foot, and she prepared to give Ro a very inexperienced, very expensive dressing.