Finn Ashford's Arc

Chapter 7 of 12

Finn moved sideways along the rock for an hour before he heard boots on the slope below. The watcher had come down from the platform. Finn cut uphill into a stand of black pine and ran with his hand pressed to the half-cured meat in his coat. Branches raked his face. The scar above his eyebrow stung where a needle caught it. He did not look back. He ran until the boots fell behind and the only sound was his own breath. He stopped in a hollow to listen and saw the first rose at his knee. Red. Open. Stem green as summer. Snow sat on the leaves and did not melt. He stared at it until his hands shook. Winter roses again. He could not tell if the woman had planted them to mark the way, or if his own head was putting them there to pull him forward. He pulled the gold bracelet from his pocket and squeezed the ruby until the chain bit his palm. The pain was real. He chose to trust the pain. He followed the roses. They came in twos and threes between the trunks, then in a line. The line bent around a low ridge and opened onto a path he had not walked before. Flat stones. Clear ice columns rose along both sides, taller than him, and inside each column a rose hung suspended. Pink. Red. Petals perfect. He counted nine columns before he stopped counting. The air smelled of roses and woodsmoke. He looked past the last column and saw a stone lodge tucked behind a thick bush, low roof under snow, one chimney pushing gray smoke into the sky. She was home. Finn crouched behind a tree and watched the door for a long time. No movement at the windows. No tracks in the fresh snow around the steps. He thought about turning back. He thought about the relic, and the months of cold trail, and the bracelet in his fist. He stepped onto the path. The smell of roses thickened with each step. He kept his eyes on the door and his hand near his knife. He passed the last ice column. He passed the bush. He set his boot on the bottom step of the lodge and reached for the latch. The snow gave under his other foot. A loop of braided rope snapped tight around his ankle and tore him off the step. The sky swung. His shoulder hit packed earth. The bracelet flew from his hand and skidded across the stone. He was hanging upside down from a frosted branch, the snare biting through his boot, the meat spilling from his coat into the snow. The lodge door opened above him. He heard one slow set of footsteps cross the porch and stop.