Read Online The Towers Of the Sunset by L.E. Modesitt Jr. - Free Book Online Page A

dried fruit and cheese he repacks.
    Silent is the high forest, except for the faintest whisper of branches and breeze stirring the dry powder snow that lies on the heavier whiteness.
    Creslin must also meet other needs, and before too long, despite the chill such necessities will entail.
    The night winds have swept clear his tracks, or enough that it would take far more guards than accompanied him to find him. With that thought he proceeds, beginning with physical necessities, then with packing, and covering his shelter. Standing on the skis, he brushes away as much as he can of his traces, trusting to the snows and winds to do the rest.
    His pace is measured; he takes even, long-sliding stride upon long-sliding stride. Before the cloud-shrouded sun has lifted dawn into gray day, he has covered another three kays or more through the high forest that falls and rises, falls and rises, as he heads toward the northeast and the eastern barrier peaks of the Westhorns.
    The dry whisper of wind through fir branches, loose snow sifting down from the trees, and the faint scraping of his skis: the sole sounds he hears as his legs drive him onward.
    No roads, no trails, mark the northeast route he takes, and it is for this reason he takes it, knowing that where lies a surface uncovered by snow, or by a road, there the guards would find him.
    Food? He has enough for an eight-day, in battle rations. Water? He has melted snow with body heat and drunk it before, in the winter training of the years before his mother declared such training unseemly.
    Slide, lift, slide… cubit after cubit, until it is time to rest. Then slide, lift, slide… slide, lift, slide.
    The gusts from the north rise with the day and rattle loose another frozen cone. Underneath the forest giants-spruces so enormous that his arm span would not circle even a third of the smaller trunks-the snow is uneven, the light muted.
    Creslin concentrates on following ridge lines, on holding toward the north, using the pyramidal peak in the distance as a guide when there are breaks in the trees sufficient to see the barrier peaks.
    Slide, lift…
    Frummmp…
    The cold powder sifts inside his parka, chilling his neck while relieving the heat of his exertion. He struggles to right himself in the waist-deep depression into which he has plowed. At first he slides in even more deeply, until he is engulfed nearly chest-deep by the heavy powder. A fir limb offers hope, and he pulls on it gently, trying to lever himself upward. The limb breaks, and more snow sifts against his chest, no longer even half-welcome in its chill.
    With a sigh, Creslin begins the slow process of easing himself out of the deeps, realizing that no quick pullouts are possible. Inching the skis-now bearing stones’ worth of snow above their tips-sideways, he pauses, takes a deep breath. Again he inches the unseen skis toward his right, until finally he can feel the frozen ground against his leg and hip.
    Once more, he rests. Then he grasps the narrow trunk of the spruce sapling. It bends but does not break as he draws his boots and skis out of the deeper snow.
    In time, his wool-lined leather trousers damp from snow and pressure, he lies draped on more solid snow, his breath rasping as the wind rises and icy flakes drift through the high branches and down upon his woolen cap and dampened soul.
    He sips from the narrow bottle that he soon refills with snow and places in the special trouser pocket, gnaws upon hard, half-frozen cheese, and takes a deep breath.
    “Onward, Creslin, you noble idiot…”
    Noon, or its approximation, and dusk fall too close together. In the growing dimness, despite ever more frequent rests, Creslin’s legs ache continually. He falls frequently, even on the gentle downhills.
    The barrier mountains look to be no closer, and the wind continues to rise, driving harder and thicker whiteness into Creslin’s face.
    Slide, lift, slide…
    Is that a shadow behind the tall fir? Or behind the