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In Vertu's taxicab, on the Port Road. Outside, a blizzard.
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PROGRESS WAS SLOW; Jemmie called on the radio to make sure the car was in motion, at least, and Vertu’s confirmation of a fare in progress to a known destination was welcome.
"You call in when you get to the top, hear me? We got folks wanting a ride, but I'm thinking we're all best just staying put. This is a wallop of a storm all of a sudden; couple the old-timers say we’ll be lucky to move anything much on the road tomorrow, much less tonight. So you call me, Vertu, before you head back down. Promise."
"I promise," Vertu said mildly, as if Jemmie wasn't younger than her youngest daughter.
"That's all right, then. You drive careful."
Vertu had already driven through a Surebleak winter, and seen two storms that the locals had grudgingly awarded the accolade bad 'un. This storm though, this was, in Vertu's opinion, shaping up to be something other than a mere bad 'un. This one was a worrier.
She got them through a small intersection where two cars had been pushed to the side, quiescent. Periodically the vibration transmitted from the road to the taxi changed ... oddly.
"Graupel," said Yulie, "in layers with some sleet and then with fling-snow. Slick as – " and here he paused, considering, perhaps, the ears of the girl, before continuing, "slick like skin ice from a rain it can be. We’re good though, our Miss Vertu’s got us on course, all good."
About that, Miss Vertu herself was less confident – and in the next moment realized what exactly was wrong with the light approaching them.
"Wrong side!" Yulie said sharply.
Vertu slowed the cab to a stop while the other vehicle – a small panel truck – continued down what must have been the gravel edge of the wrong side of the road at a breathtakingly slow pace.
"Flo’s Grocery Wagon?" Mary read the side of the truck as it passed. "They're city-based. What is it doing up here?"
"Musta been up to Lady yo’Lanna’s place!" said Yulie. "Geez, ain’t got no sense, city or else, 'noring oncoming traffic!"
By now dusk had edged into dark, with other traffic nonexistent. There were tracks in the road, but the snow and breeze were working together to fill them in, leaving vague ruts. Vertu wondered about the van’s driver, seeing several places where it appeared the ruts wandered off the road entirely, but there – parallel ruts – must have been other traffic going one way or another.
Questioned, Vertu would have told anyone that she knew the Port Road well, but in the dark, with the snow blowing it wasn’t clear to her exactly where she was, and with two major turns – surely she couldn’t have negotiated those without knowing it! – she missed the Tree’s presence as a guide and found herself peering into the snow’s star field as if—
Hah! Likely that was....
But she heard Anna give an intake of breath and then Yulie, who’d been leaning comfortably against Mary in the back, sat up straighter.
"Yanno," he said, "sometimes we get weather a little different on top the hill than at the bottom; I think we might not have that slick ice under us now – haven’t heard that grind! We’re not too far away from that turn at Chan’s Pond, I’m thinking. See, there’s the pointer rock for that slick twisty part – kinda looks different under snow, though, if you don’t know it."
Vertu didn’t know it, and barely made out a lump three times the size of the car lurking just by the right edge of the road. She tried to imagine the thing dry and unshrouded by snow, sunlit on an early fall day and – failed.
The snow and gathered darkness had her driving by instinct now. She recalled that there were more than a few twisty parts to the road, and if she remembered correctly, this part was twistier but not as steep and angled as the next, very sharp, turn.
Rascal mumbled a complaint on the seat next to her and Anna shifted him so that his shoulder leaned more against the side window. He peered at – and possibly through – it, vague trails of smoke rising from his nostrils.
Anna spoke then; another word again that Vertu missed hearing. Yulie didn't catch it either, and he said so.
"Anna, not thinking I got that clear ..."
She looked over her shoulder briefly, then at Vertu.
"It was for Rascal. He’s got fidgets and I asked him to stay still. I think he’s been seeing the wavy tracks off on this side and he’s worried."
"Might be. Can’t see 'em so good, myself. You watch hard, then. Tell Rascal we’re not letting a little snow get in the way of giving him his dinner!"
The girl whispered something to the dog; his fidgets grew quieter.
Vertu shrugged tension out of her shoulders. She’d been unconsciously using those very same tracks as a guide while avoiding them because they affected traction and also because they tended, in her estimation, to hug the edge far too closely.
Briefly, Vertu was sure she knew exactly where they were. The slow motion exaggerated the twists, and she knew this as one of the spots she enjoyed driving a little harder into on dry days, without snow. The acceleration here could be exhilarating, the car willing to grab at the road and allow the driver to fling it this way and that.
She smiled. That was the kind of driving she was required to deplore in her underlings, of course – officially, but there, a useful kind of training it was sometimes to know how the car might act at the edge of control.
Vertu allowed the taxi to slow now, the tracks before her an odd jumble.
"He’s driving scared," Anna said with the kind of forcefulness that brooked no doubt. See? He ran off the side of the road. The – "
She stopped as if she’d caught herself being a Seer. On Liad, Vertu had twice driven those in the throes of their Sight – and the girl sounded as if she might be on that route.
Hugging Rascal, Anna turned to speak to her.
"Liad does not have such weather?"
Vertu answered, wondering why this question now.
"There are parts of Liad that have snow in some seasons, but not so much – and in any wise, no such storms as we have here."
She might have said more, but she was startled into silence, as the scene beyond the windscreen grew momentarily bright as early dawn, the blowing snow drifting across their vision and sharing the light an eerie moment or two before thunder bounced about the cab. Rascal whined, the humans all gasped. The light lessened, came back twice, both times with the shock of nearby thunder, before the storm deepened and there was the sound of hail bouncing off the cab’s roof and windshield before their world was again the small tunnel of light they carried with them.
"There’s a problem," Anna said abruptly. "She’s out of patience. They’re all scared and she’s ready!"
Rascal whined.
Mary asked, "Who, Anna? Where?"
Anna shrugged, the dog pushing his head against her shoulder.
"Where – ahead of us. I don't know who, but she is ahead of us – up!"