"You mean we'll be back in the rain before we even have a chance to get down to lower altitudes and get warm," she grumbled. "That's what you're telling me."

Richard understood all too well her discomfort, but could offer no prospect of relief anytime soon.

"I guess so," he said.

Suddenly, something small and dark skittered down out of the white curtains of snow. Just as he saw it, and before he had a chance to react, it knocked Richard's feet right out from under him.

CHAPTER 38

Richard saw the ground flash past his face as his legs flipped up in the air, then all he could see was white. For an instant he couldn't tell up from down or where he was in relation to anything else.

And then his full weight came crashing to the ground, the momentum pitching him down the slope. The snow offered little cushion. His breath was driven from his lungs. Rolling over and over he saw only brief glimpses of the ground. The world spun crazily. He couldn't control or stop what he quickly realized was his tumbling descent down an increasingly steep slope.

It had all happened so unexpectedly and so fast that Richard hadn't had much time to brace for the fall. At that moment, inattention seemed a poor excuse and no comfort. He bounced over a knob of hard ground and landed on his chest. With the wind knocked out of him, he tried to gasp a breath as he slid face-first down the mountain, but instead of air he got only a mouthful of icy snow.

With the force of the fall and the precipitous angle of the incline, there was nothing at hand to help stop him as he skidded with increasing speed down the steep incline. Heading downward face-first made it all the more difficult to take effective action. In a frantic attempt to stop or at least slow his fall, Richard spread his arms. He fought to dig his hands and feet into the snow and scree to slow his out of control plunge down the side of the mountain, but the snow and the scree only began to slide along with him.

He saw a shadow flash by. Over the sound of the wind he could hear wild screams of rage. Something solid slammed into the back of his ribs. He dug his fingers and boots deeper into the scree beneath the snow, trying to slow his frightening slide. With the snow billowing up around him as he slid, he couldn't seen anything but white.

The dark shape again came flying out of the swirling snow. Again something hammered into him, only this time it was much harder and it was a direct blow to his kidneys meant to help accelerate his plunging Call.

Richard cried out with the shock of pain. As he twisted in distress onto his right side, he heard the unique ring of steel as the Sword of Truth was yanked from its scabbard.

As he slid down the slope, Richard twisted and reached for the sword as it was torn away from him. He knew that if he were to grab the razor-sharp blade itself it could easily slice his hand in two, so he tried instead to seize the hilt or at least snag the crossguard, but he was too late. The assailant dug in his heels to stop himself as Richard sailed out of sight.

Twisting awkwardly as he reached for his sword left Richard even more off balance. As he bounced over the uneven ground he was thrown into a headfirst roll.

In the middle of pitching over, just as he started spreading his arms and legs to stop the tumbling, if nothing else, his back slammed into a jut of rock under the snow. Again the wind was violently driven from him, only this time more painfully.

The force of the impact flipped him over the obstruction.

Tingling dread surged through him as he found himself in midair. With frantic effort, Richard reached out and snatched the rock outcropping he had hit. He held fast as his legs whipped out and over a drop-off.

Richard clutched the rock with frantic strength. For a moment, he clung to the rock, collecting his wits and gulping air. He had at least stopped falling. Snow and small flakes of scree still sliding down the steep slope bounced off the rock he was holding as well as his arms and head.

Carefully, he swung his legs all around, trying to catch them up onto something, trying to find some support for his weight. There was nothing. He swung helplessly, a living pendulum clutching a knob of icy rock.

He glanced over his shoulder and saw blowing snow and dark clouds scudding by underneath him. Through a brief gap, he spotted bits of scree in the midst of a long fall through the air toward trees and rock far below.

Above him, feet spread, stood a short, dark form with long arms, a pallid head, and gray skin. Bulging yellow eyes, like twin lanterns glowing out from the murky bluish light of the snowstorm, glared down at him. Bloodless lips curled back in a grin to expose sharp teeth.

It was Shota's companion, Samuel.

He was gripping Richard's sword in one hand and looked more than content with himself. Samuel wore a dark brown cloak that flapped like a flag of victory in the wind. He backed away a few paces, waiting to sec Richard fall from the mountain.

Richard's fingers were slipping. He tried to get his arms around the rocks to climb up, or at least get a better hold. He wasn't successful. Ho knew, though, that if he did manage to get a better hold, Samuel stood ready to use the sword to insure that Richard fell.

With his feet dangling over a drop of at least a thousand feet, Richard was in a very precarious and vulnerable position. He could hardly believe that Samuel had gotten the better of him in such a way-and that he had managed to snatch Richard's sword. He surveyed the gloomy gray trailers of fog carried along with the blowing snow but he didn't see Cara.

"Samuel!" Richard screamed into the wind. "Give me back my sword!"

Even to himself, it seemed a pretty ridiculous demand.

"My sword," Samuel hissed.

"And what do you think Shota would say?"

The bloodless lips widened with his smile. "Mistress not here."

Like a wraith materializing out of the substance of the shadows themselves, a dark shape appeared behind Samuel. It was Cara, her dark cloak billowing in the wind, giving her the aspect of a vengeful spirit. Richard realized that she had probably followed his rolling trail down through the snow. What with the blustery wind in his ears and, more importantly, his gaze riveted on Richard's predicament, Samuel didn't notice Cara looming behind him.

In a single glance she took in the ominous sight of Samuel gripping Richard's sword, standing above Richard as he clung to the edge of the cliff. Richard had learned in the past that Samuel's attention and actions were pretty firmly ruled by his rampant emotions; his feet just followed. With the gleeful distraction of having the object of his rabid hatred at the point of a sword he'd once carried and to this day coveted, Samuel was too busy gloating to watch for the Mord-Sith showing up behind him.

Without a word, Cara unceremoniously rammed her Agiel into the base of Samuel's neck at the back of his skull. With the slippery conditions, she couldn't maintain the contact.

Samuel shrieked in pain and sudden, confused terror as he dropped the sword and toppled back into the snow. Writhing in agony, not understanding what had happened, he pawed frantically at the back of his neck where Cara had pressed her Agiel. He squealed as he Hopped in the snow like a fish in sand. Richard knew that the horrifying shock of pain from an Agiel when applied in that spot fell like a lightning strike.

Richard recognized the look on Cara's face as she started to lean over the squirming figure. She intended to used her Agiel to finish Samuel.

Richard wouldn't really care if she killed the treacherous companion to the witch woman, but he had far more urgent problems right then.

"Cara! I'm hanging on the edge of a cliff. I can't hold on. I'm slipping."