Womba bared her teeth. It occurred to Yob and Cheyne at the same time what was about to happen next. Cheyne stepped between them and gently, firmly, took Claria's hand-and the comb in it-into his own just as Yob threw his massive arms around his daughter.
"I am so glad to see you safe and well and beautiful, as always, my little flower," rumbled Yob, tightening his arms around her like iron bands.
"Muje Rifkin is indeed gone, orcess. We are not hiding him," Cheyne repeated.
Caught in Yob's powerful embrace, Womba curled a nostril back and sniffed the air, unsatisfied with that possibility.
"Then where has he gone?" said Wiggulf.
Frijan stared miserably out of the portal into the dark, cold night. The river swirled under her, and the three sisters winked in and out of the cloudspun sky.
"I cannot answer you, Father. But I have done a terrible, unforgivable thing. I have lost the waterstone to the songmage."
She continued to face the riverbank, her tears dropping into the dark currents below. Wiggulf came up beside her and put his short arm around her.
"Yes, yes, you did, but this time I think the best has come of it, daughter. And do you not know that if I can learn to respect and understand people who have been my enemies, there is nothing I would not forgive in you? Look."
He nodded to the water below. The glassy shelf, ever present around the shoreline, had completely melted, and the ice-locked brush had already been swept away. The river seemed wider, faster. Frijan heard the grind and shudder of an ice floe breaking up far to the east.
"You see? He has heated our waters. The stone was always his, Frijan. It has been our privilege to keep it safe these years until he came for it. It has been so from the beginning. The stone found its way back to him, daughter, just as I found my way back here,