There’s nothing there.” Matthias began edging along the wall, running his hand over the stone at hip level. “On Hringkälla the drüskelle finish our initiation,” he said. “We go from aspirant to novice drüskelle in the ceremony at the sacred ash.” “Where the tree talks to you.” Matthias resisted the urge to shove him into the water. “Where we hope to hear the voice of Djel. But that’s the final step. First, we have to cross the ice moat undetected. If we are judged worthy, Djel shows us the path.” In truth, elder drüskelle simply passed the secret of the crossing along to aspirants they wished to see enter the order; it was a way of culling the weak or those who had simply not meshed successfully with the group. If you’d made friends, if you’d proven yourself, then one of the brothers would take you aside and tell you that on the night of the initiation, you should go to the shore of the ice moat and run your hand along the wall of the drüskelle sector. At its centre, you would find an etching of a wolf that marked the location of another glass bridge – not grand and arching like the one that spanned the moat from the embassy wing, but flat, level, and only a few feet wide.
