The Frost Child Read Online Free PDF Page A

told her that it was allowed. The Harsh queen had told her what to do.
    She turned and gave a signal. Other Albions appeared out of the darkness, all with the same white hair and violet eyes, though none as beautiful as she. Thin ropes snaked down into the darkness below. Agnetha caught a rope and slid gracefully downward, followed by the others. Above them another Albion rolled up the ropes, leaving no trace of their passage. They crossed the river, jumping lightly from stone to stone. Suddenly Agnetha turned her head to one side and listened. She gestured to the Albions. They ran to the other bank and melted into the shadows under the bridge.
    Cati's nightly round took her along the front of the Workhouse and down along the riverbank. Strictly speaking, she should have stopped at the boundaries of the
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    Workhouse, but she often went as far as the opening in the wall that led to Hadima. She told herself that it was important to inspect it, but really it intrigued her, seeming to reek of mystery and of the strange lands beyond.
    As she approached she thought she glimpsed movement in the mouth of the opening. She took a quick look around to make sure there was no one watching--she was supposed to be invisible to ordinary people, hidden in the shadows of time, but there was no point in taking chances. Then she clambered up the wall beside the bridge, unaware of the Albions on the other side. She put her hands on the parapet and stared hard into the opening, but nothing moved. Probably a bird roosting--or even a rat, she thought with a shudder. If she had looked down just then she would have seen a circle of violet eyes looking up at her from the darkness, and the gleam of cold chrome talons within striking distance. Cati was invisible to ordinary people, but the Albions' violet eyes saw much that ordinary people did not.
    A gust of cold air struck her. She shivered. It was a long way back to her warm bed. She crossed the bridge again and climbed down to the riverbank, setting off for home at a fast pace. One of the boy Albions gave Agnetha a questioning look, showing his scimitar-shaped talons. For answer she jumped onto the riverbank and started to follow Cati.
    They were skilled trackers. Within minutes Cati was walking, unknown to herself, within a deadly circle of the pale-skinned creatures. Four moved silently through the fields at either side of the path. Two more had circled on
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    ahead and glided along the path in front of Cati, with the rest following behind. At times they drew close enough to touch her, and yet she did not know they were there, although she was uneasy, and more than once stopped and looked around her. They stopped too, starting off again at the exact same moment as she did.
    They had the gift of moving silently. Cati's ears were extraordinarily sensitive due to her time with the Dogs of Hadima, but she did not hear them. And though her sense of smell was acute, she did not smell them, for the Albions were entirely odorless.
    Encased in their deadly cage, Cati walked all the way back to the Workhouse, the Albions almost toying with her--one of them would get close enough to touch her, then duck back into the shadows so that she thought that she had brushed a moth or a cobweb.
    At last she stood in the shadow of the Workhouse, silent presences all around her. She looked up at the crumbling walls, while violet eyes gazed expectantly at Agnetha. Agnetha stood without moving. Moonlight gleamed on steel. Agnetha pondered, then shook her head. They would leave the girl alone. They had got what they came for, and there might be others who would miss the girl and raise the alarm. The Workhouse was silent and unmanned. They would tell the Harsh queen, and await further orders. The girl could wait, for a greater prize was at stake: the queen had promised them what they longed for most. She had promised them that once the Workhouse had fallen, that they would relish the
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    thing that they now found