Chapter 219: Seen

"Nyriel," said Logan.

Nyriel answered at once. The units were a line of steady dots at the head of the rope. The pairs were dots in twos along it.

Off to the left, alone, there was one small point. It was moving the wrong way, away from the rope.

And beside it, coming round in a long slow curve, there was a point so large it filled a corner of his sight.

"Edda!" Bram was roaring. "Stand still! Stand still and keep talking!"

Logan felt the rope jerk. Bram was pulling at his knot.

"Alice," said Logan.

"I know."

She was already working at the knot on her wrist with her free hand. Her eyes did not leave his face. She got it loose, and then she reached for his.

"Keep hold of my coat," he said. "Walk backward. I will steer."

"You will walk us into a stone."

"There are no stones in here."

"Then you will walk us into the thing."

He did not answer that. The knot on his wrist came free. He took her by the elbows, and they stepped off the rope together into the white.

He walked forward. She walked backward. Her face hung in front of his, wet and pale and set.

Nyriel’s points moved across his sight as they went. Edda’s dot was still drifting left. The great dot was closing on it.

"Edda!" Logan shouted. "We are coming. Keep talking!"

"I am here!" The girl’s voice was closer. It shook. "I am here. Papa?"

"I am coming!" That was Bram, somewhere to Logan’s right, and moving fast. He had come off the rope alone.

’His count is running,’ Logan thought. ’And hers. Both of them.’

The air on his left went cold.

They found her by walking into her.

Logan felt Alice stop dead against a body. He heard a small gasp. Then Alice’s hands left his coat.

"Edda," she said. "It is Alice. Look at me. Look at my face."

Logan could see nothing but white. Alice’s face had gone. She had turned to the girl.

His count moved.

[ Time remaining: 324 days ]

’She has turned away,’ he thought. ’She is looking at Edda. No one is watching me.’

The cold on his left side shifted.

He felt the great slow push in the fog stop. It hung there, close. Then it turned.

It was not turning toward Edda any more.

It rose from the white in front of him.

He saw a pale shape, as wide as a house, rising out of the fog. It had no eyes. It had no face at all, only a smooth blind front of grey-white flesh, wet and soft like the inside of a shell.

The front split open.

It was a mouth. It went back and back, ridged and pale and dripping fog, and the cold poured out of it in a long sigh.

[ Whiteout Drift Leviathan ] [ Rank: Mythic ] [ Scaled to: Tier-9 ]

[ Attack: 46,000 ] [ Speed: 9,500 ] [ Constitution: 150,000 ] [ Arcane: 30,000 ]

Logan drew Grimlord’s Blade.

He did not try to run. There was nowhere to run in the white. He planted his feet and cut at the edge of the mouth as it came.

The blade went in. Pale flesh split and spilled fog like steam out of a kettle. The mouth jerked aside and closed on the air where he had been, and he felt the cold of it go across his whole body.

He cut again. It reared back into the white and was gone.

[ Time remaining: 323 days ]

He stood with his blade up and listened. He could hear the sigh, out there in the white. It was circling. It was coming back.

’It found me as soon as my count started,’ he thought. ’Not before. The whole time Alice was looking at me, it went past.’

’It cannot see people who are seen.’

"Logan!"

Alice’s hand found his coat. She dragged him round. Her face was back before his, a hand’s breadth away, white and furious.

"Look at me," she said. "Do not look anywhere else."

He looked at her.

The sigh in the white stopped. The cold shifted away from him.

Logan stood with Alice’s fists twisted in his coat and his blade still raised. Out in the white, he heard the great thing turn in a slow, puzzled circle and then go on.

"Edda," he said. "Where is Edda?"

"Here." Alice did not look away from him. "I have her hand. She is looking at me. Bram is coming."

Bram came at a run with his hammer in his fist, and he ran straight into his daughter.

Logan heard it more than saw it. He heard Edda say "Papa" in a voice like a child’s, and Bram make a sound with no words in it at all.

Then the dwarf’s voice came, rough and close.

"Look at me, girl. Look at me. Do not look away."

"I am looking."

"Good."

The four of them stood in the white, in two pairs, each pair close enough to touch. None of them moved.

They found the rope again by following Daniel’s voice.

He was counting aloud on purpose now, slowly and steadily, so that they could hear where the line was. They walked toward his voice in pairs, face to face, until Logan felt the rough grey rope under his hand.

Isolde tied them back on. Her fingers were shaking, and she tied every knot three times.

"Big brother?" Vina’s voice came from farther up the rope. "Big brother, are you there?"

"I am here."

"Are you hurt?"

"No."

"Grandpa says I am not allowed to turn round to see." She sounded cross about it. "So you have to tell me. Are you sure?"

"I am sure, Vina."

She was quiet. Then, much smaller: "Good."

"Numbers," said Garen. His voice was sharp. "All of you."

Logan looked at his.

"Three hundred and twenty-three. Two more."

Edda’s voice. "Three hundred and twenty-two."

Bram’s. "The same."

Nobody on the rope said anything.

Then Rishin spoke from somewhere ahead, in the white.

"Now you know what it hunts," he said. "It cannot see anyone who is seen. Only the ones whose count is running."

"Then it can be killed," said Garen.

Isolde made a small sound beside him.

"It can be killed," Garen went on. "It came up for Logan. It opened its mouth for him. Logan cut it, and it went away again. If somebody were out there alone and ready for it, and the rest of us were close enough to strike when it came up..."

"Garen," said Isolde.

"Somebody has to be alone, dear. Or it will never come up at all."

"Then let it never come up." Her voice was low. "Let us walk out of here and leave it."

"And the next family that comes through the stones?" Garen asked. "Hanne and Ivo’s girl, when she is grown, and they decide to walk?"

Isolde did not answer.

Logan could not see Garen’s face. He could not see anyone’s face but Alice’s.

But he heard Garen undo his knot.

"I have more days than Logan," Garen said. "More than Alice, and more than Bram and Edda. I am the best shot on this rope. And I am the oldest of us who still has to fight."

"Garen."

"Do not look at me, dear," said Garen gently. "That is the whole trick. Turn round. Look at Helen. Do not look at me until it is over."

Logan heard only the wind.

Then he heard Isolde turn round.