The Battle for Skandia- Character Reaction

1

The group filtered back in the room an hour later, and Ingvar took the book next.

IT WAS A CONSTANT TAPPING SOUND THAT ROUSED WILL FROM his deep, untroubled sleep. He had no clear idea at what point he first became aware of it. It seemed to slide unobtrusively into his sleeping mind, magnified and amplified inside his subconscious, until it crossed over into the conscious world and he realized he was awake, and wondering what it might be.

Tap-tap-tap-tap . . . It was still there, but not as loud now that he was awake and aware of other sounds in the small cabin.

Will sighed. "Oh, joy, the thaw." Cassandra grimaced.

From the corner, behind a small curtain of sacking that gave her a modicum of privacy, he could hear Evanlyn's even breathing. Obviously, the tapping hadn't woken her. Cassandra chuckled. There was a muted crackle from the heaped coals in the fireplace at the end of the room and, as he became more fully awake, he heard them settle with a slight rustling sound.

Tap-tap-tap . . .

"That makes it sound almost ominous," Gilan remarked. Will shrugged.

"I suppose it was, in a way."

It seemed to come from nearby. He stretched and yawned, sitting up on the rough couch he'd fashioned from wood and canvas. He shook his head to clear it and, for a moment, the sound was obscured. Then it was back once more and he realized it was coming from outside the window. The oiled cloth panes were translucent—they would admit the gray light of the pre-dawn, but he couldn't see anything more than a blur through them. Will knelt on the couch and unlatched the frame, pushing it up and craning his head through the opening to study the small porch of the cabin.

A gust of chill entered the room and he heard Evanlyn stir as it eddied around, causing the sacking curtain to billow inward and the embers in the fireplace to glow more fiercely, until a small tongue of yellow flame was released from them.

Horace raised an eyebrow. "And you saw all this, did you?"

Will rolled his eyes. "I didn't write this. It's for the story, Horace."

Somewhere in the trees, a bird was greeting the first light of a new day, and the tapping sound was obscured once more.

Then he had it. It was water, dripping from the end of a long icicle that depended from the porch roof and falling onto an upturned bucket that had been left on the edge of the porch.

Tap-tap-tap . . . tap-tap-tap.

"That's got to be annoying," Halt said.

Will frowned to himself. There was something significant in this, he knew, but his mind, still fuddled with sleep, couldn't quite grasp what it was. He stood, still stretching, and shivered slightly as he left the last warmth of his blanket and made his way to the door.

Hoping not to wake Evanlyn, he eased the latch upward and slowly opened the door, holding it up so that the sagging leather hinges wouldn't allow the bottom edge to scrape the floor of the cabin.

Closing the door behind him, he stepped out onto the rough boards of the porch, feeling them strike icy cold against his bare feet. He moved to the spot where the water dripped endlessly onto the bucket, realizing as he went that other icicles hanging from the roof were also dripping water. He hadn't seen this before. He was sure they usually didn't do this.

Will snorted. "Alright, clearly my brain doesn't work the first thing in the morning." Halt coughed, and Will glared at him.

He glanced out at the trees, where the first rays of the sun were beginning to filter through.