Chapter 10: THE WHITE PASS

RAIGORO’S POV

The storm reached them before White Pass did.

By the sixth day, Raigoro had redistributed an overloaded wagon, replaced struggling horses, and sent two riders back before lame mounts became dead ones. The winter clothing from the border station had already justified the delay.

His wife still walked during easier sections of the road, though less often now that the climb had steepened. The deep blue coat kept snow from gathering at her shoulders, and the mountain boots gave her enough footing to move safely when the convoy stopped.

Every time Raigoro saw the mountain boots, he remembered the thin shoes Odran had sent her north wearing.

The convoy reached White Pass Station near dusk. It was the third mountain station and the last junction before the western and eastern roads divided around the pass.

The garrison had been built into the side of the mountain, with three stone buildings surrounding a sheltered yard. A fortified gate protected the eastern approach. A second gate on the western side opened directly toward the pass, where the road disappeared between steep white slopes.

Snow had begun falling before they entered the gate.

The station commander met Raigoro in the yard.

"Scouts returned an hour ago."

"What did they find?"

"Western face is unstable. Two slides since noon."

"Road?"

"Still open when they crossed."

Snow came almost sideways across the pass.

"How long until it closes?"

The commander gave the mountain another look.

"I would not put a convoy into it after midnight."

"We leave before dawn."

The man hesitated.

"There is another problem."

Daric had come up beside them.

"What?"

"A civilian caravan left Rellan Mine yesterday morning. Six wagons, seventeen people. They should have reached us before sunset."

"Which route?"

"Western pass."

Raigoro looked toward the map room.

"Show me."

The missing caravan had been carrying lamp oil, iron fittings, and twelve mine workers returning to their families farther north. Two wagoners traveled with them. Three children belonged to the workers.

Their route followed the same road Raigoro intended to use.

"Last marker report?" he asked.

"Third western cairn. Just after midday yesterday."

"Any sign of attack?"

"None."

"Send a six-man search team before the snow worsens."

The station commander frowned.

"We already sent four."

"When?"

"Two hours ago."

Raigoro looked at him.

"And?"

"They have not returned."

Daric moved closer to the map.

"They could be sheltering."

"They could."

Raigoro examined the elevation marks.

There was one narrow section beyond the second turn where the mountain cut sharply down toward a frozen ravine. If a slide had crossed there, both the civilian caravan and the search party might be trapped on the far side.

"What equipment do you have for avalanche recovery?"

"Ropes, shovels, two trained dogs."

"Prepare them."

Daric looked up.

"You are going."

"I know the pass."

"So do I."

Raigoro shook his head. "You stay here."

Daric’s expression changed.

"The bride was targeted less than a week ago. I am leaving this station with half its experienced mountain riders. You remain with the convoy."

"You have twenty men who can lead a rescue line."

"I also have seventeen civilians missing on one of my roads."

Daric said nothing for a moment.

Then he nodded.

"Take Verren. He grew up near Rellan."

Raigoro fastened his winter cloak.

"I intended to."

His wife appeared in the doorway to the guest quarters while the rescue party assembled.

Alma stood behind her.

The bride looked from the ropes to the shovels, then toward the closed pass gate.

She raised her slate.

WHAT HAPPENED?

Raigoro answered because the question required no secrecy.

"Civilian caravan is missing beyond the pass."

She looked toward the mountain.

Then at the riders.

Raigoro knew that look now.

"No."

Her attention returned to him.

"You are staying here."

She had not moved.

"Whatever argument you are about to write, save the chalk."

Alma covered her mouth.

The bride looked at Raigoro for several seconds, then wrote anyway.

I WAS GOING TO ASK HOW MANY.

Raigoro read the sentence.

"Seventeen."

She erased the board and stepped aside.

He would have preferred the argument.

Raigoro handed command of the gate to Daric and rode out with the rescue party.

The wind strengthened before they reached the first cairn.

By the second, snow had covered half the road.

The mountain dogs found the missing caravan beyond the third marker.

One wagon had overturned against the inner rock face. Another rested at an angle near the ravine, held in place by a broken tree. The remaining wagons had been abandoned where the road vanished beneath fresh snow.

The first rescue team had already found nine civilians sheltering between two wagons.

"Eight more went ahead on foot before the slide," the team leader reported. "They thought the station was closer."

"Children?"

"One with them."

Raigoro looked toward the buried road.

"Verren, take four and bring these nine back. The rest come with me."

Nine accounted for.

Eight is still somewhere ahead.

Raigoro kept the number in his head as they continued on foot. Casualty reports had taught him years ago that a missing name could disappear too easily inside a larger count. Seventeen civilians had entered this pass. He intended to bring seventeen out.

The storm reduced the mountain to a few yards of road at a time.

They found five more beyond the buried road, including the missing child wrapped in a worker’s coat.

Fourteen.

Three remained.

Raigoro found them farther down the slope shortly before darkness. One woman had injured her ankle, and the two men with her had tried to carry her until the snow became too deep.

"Can you stand?"

"Badly."

They secured her to a rescue frame.

The return took twice as long.

By the time White Pass Station appeared through the snow, Raigoro’s cloak had frozen stiff along the lower edge.

The gate opened.

People crossed the yard toward them.

He noticed his wife before anyone else because she was carrying an armful of blankets.

One of the rescued men had a child in his arms. The girl’s clothes were soaked through from the knees down, and she had stopped shivering.

The healer cursed when he saw her.

"Inside. Now."

His wife followed.

Raigoro dismounted and handed his horse away.

Daric met him.

"All seventeen?"

"Alive."

"The first group returned an hour ago."

"What about the search party?"

"Inside. Minor frostbite."

Good.

Raigoro removed his gloves.

"Road?"

Daric looked toward the commander.

The station commander had the expression of a man preparing to deliver expensive news.

"Western face came down twenty minutes ago."

"How much?"

"Enough that we will not clear it in a day."

"A week?"

"Maybe."

Raigoro crossed to the route map posted along the covered walkway.

"Eastern road."

"Open as of this afternoon."

"How much time?"

"Four days added, assuming the Hollow Bridge remains passable."

"Then we take the eastern road."

The commander nodded.

No one suggested waiting a week for the shorter route.

A servant came from the infirmary carrying the deep blue coat Raigoro had bought at the border station.

Raigoro recognized it.

"Why do you have that?"

The servant looked down.

"The Duchess gave it to the little girl, Your Grace. Her clothing was wet."

Raigoro looked at the coat in the servant’s hands.

Selena Valence had been raised for a throne.

She would have been taught when to smile, when to offer sympathy, when to surrender comfort in a way people would remember afterward. Court generosity was rarely accidental. A princess could turn one good gesture into a story repeated for years.

Giving an expensive coat to a freezing Northern child was exactly the sort of gesture people remembered.

Perhaps that was all this was.

Another performance from a woman who had spent her life being watched.

"Where is she?"

"Inside, Your Grace."

Raigoro glanced toward the infirmary door.

Selena Valence had been raised to understand the value of public generosity. Raigoro had seen enough courts to know how easily kindness became performance.

No court had been watching this time. The child was cold, and his wife had given her the coat.

That required no interpretation.

Raigoro turned toward the quartermaster.

"Find her another before dawn."

"Yes, Your Grace."

Outside, snow struck the shutters hard enough to rattle them.

The western road was gone.

Their only route home was four days longer, and his wife had just given away the warmest thing she owned.