As Keke rose to dive again, Wycan reached out and touched her thought. Not mad, not mad at all. Only deeply anxious to the point of panic. About what? Danger! Beware! Danger! Wycan closed his eyes, caught a flash of boiling waters broken by jagged points.

[Keke]: “That . . . boy you took up with. Don’t say I didn’t warn you!”

Before (Wycan), the track curved towards the right. There, to his left, the smaller one trailed off into mist. One last look he took up the slope behind him, then headed down towards the Dunderfosse.

Heat rushed up, breaking into sweat across his brow. Up under the peak, the song he’d heard coming from her bed: mothers sang it to soothe their newborn into sleep. . . . The strange and lovely shawl with which she’d bound him to her: a baby shawl! They’d taken it from her, just as they had taken him.

Maybe passing under [the entrance grille] had somehow dislodged the iron housing. If so, he was well and truly stuck, why he could die down there, except— His eye went to the torch. Those things did not last forever. Someone had set that flame up there, and not so very long ago. A shadow rounded the corner, slid into the light.

Ystrid’s scowl deepened. . . . “Explain yourself.”

(Ystrid) broke off in mid-cry, a look of blank astonishment upon her face.

Gom) pulled a light, sent it bobbing up above his head, and gazed around on utter devastation. Only the bed remained intact. On it lay a small gray-green bird, eyes closed, unmoving

“You know—” Ystrid paused. “My father never let us up here. I would see her now.”

“Oh, I see you now,” (Leana) said. “He’s called Wycan, you say? And a young man? I cannot believe it.”