Free The Towers Of the Sunset by L.E. Modesitt Jr.

him.”
    “Would the guards…”
    The woman in the high chair shrugs. “Ask them, or find him, if you can. If not-”
    “That is a dangerous game.”
    “Do we have any choice? Each year the wizards drive their road that much nearer us.” The woman with the cold green fire in her eyes that complements the white-blond flame of her hair watches as her advisor departs.
    In another room, a red-haired woman stares into the mirror that brings forth no reflection, only swirling gray.
    Just one image, one clear moment-that is all she has glimpsed, the image of a man buried in snow-before the pain had become too great to hold the link.
    Each time she reaches out, the bracelets burn, but she only bites her lips when they glow red-hot and when she can no longer bear the heat. Now her eyes flicker toward the iron-bound door, and they burn with a heat deeper than the iron on her wrists.

XVI
    AS HE SEES the clearing on the hillside, Creslin pushes slightly harder, despite the drudgery of forcing the skis through snow that has become steadily heavier and wetter as he has moved eastward and gradually lower. He has followed the ridge lines as much as possible.
    The warm weather of the past two days has made sleeping damp and uncomfortable and the traveling slow. Outside of the several deer, a handful of snow hares, a few scattered birds, he has seen no living creatures. No other travelers, not even a trail. Through the trees, the eastern barrier peaks appear less than another range of hills away.
    Now, nearly an eight-day after escaping the Roof of the World, he is almost through his meager supplies, and his jacket and trousers hang noticeably looser on his frame.
    “Even Heldra would feel that I’m not carrying extra weight…” Talking to himself helps, at least some of the time.
    The massive spruces and firs of the high forest have given way to thinner-trunked pines and firs, interspersed with oaks and other bare-limbed trees he does not recognize.
    His skis almost catch on a branch scantly covered by the heavy snow, and he lurches, but regains his balance. He listens. He hears nothing except the whispers of the wind, and those whispers bear no news. He studies the opening in the trees ahead but discerns no tracks, no structures.
    Then he wipes his forehead. Even with his parka strapped to his pack, even in the shadows of the hill forests, travel during the day is hot.
    Finally he slides the skis between the gaps in the trees and through a scattering of sparse branches poking up through the snow until he stands in unshadowed winter sunlight. The line of blackened trunks marching downhill bears witness to the reason for the clearing.
    Creslin smiles. While the fire may have burned unchecked, the path of the devastation is to the northeast, and the snow, while heavy, is mainly open. He squints through the brightness of the mid-morning sun, a glare to which his eyes are unaccustomed. A narrow line of brown winds around the base of a hill and toward the barrier peaks and the east.
    He shakes his head in wonder. Somehow, in some way, he has managed to find the trade road to Gallos. At least that is what he thinks it is. After withdrawing his hand from his heavy glove, he finds the melt bottle and takes a drink, careful to kneel on his skis and to replace what he has drunk with some of the cleaner snow.
    After straightening up, Creslin brushes his finger across his uneven growth of beard; silver like his hair, he suspects, but he has brought no mirror. With a sigh, he puts the glove back on.
    One way or another, he will reach the trade road by evening. Then his problems will really begin. While the road is beyond the control of the Marshall, he will have to avoid any guards she may send looking for a silver-haired youth. For he knows only too well that he is not a man… not yet.
    With a glance behind him at the distant clouds overhanging the Roof of the World, he glides forward and begins the descent toward the valley and the road