Chapter Nineteen

Grey dawn's frosty fingers pushed past the edges of the hide covering the cave entrance and dispelled the coal-black darkness. Cold waves seeped into the living space, prowling like a four-legged intruder, belly close to the ground. The rough-hewn log pallets Torrocka and Tarn slept on were elevated off the cavern's rock floor to help prevent the chill from disturbing their occupants. It did not work well during the coldest winter months. And this Asgard winter was quickly becoming the coldest in memory. Though it was fall, already the temperatures were those of early winter. Only a warm hearth fire banished an Asgard winter, but the roaring fire had long ago burned down to a bed of warm ash; the Sword Chamber priest was too warm and comfortable to start the day's fire from the coals that survived. Especially when there was a much younger inhabitant moving about the cave, already tossing kindling into the hearth. Sharp snapping sounds followed as they added larger wood. Long exhalations of breath told the priest his young charge blew upon the fire, coaxing the first flames into being.

Smiling contentedly, Torrocka huddled beneath two furs with his knees drawn to his chest, hardly more than a lump, when Tarn went to the table to break his fast. Between his first and second plates of cheese, meat, oatcakes, and bread, Torrocka left his furs to stand in front of the fire while the cave warmed. He put a kettle next to the fire to heat. Crackling flames made the space somehow friendlier and more inviting. Tarn grunted a greeting, disdaining to engage in idle conversation while the more serious matter of placating his rumbling stomach stole his concentration.

Hunger appeased, Tarn went to buckle his sword around his waist, saying, "Let us scout the pass. My village awaits."

"Were ye planning to travel like that?"

"Aye, since I canna fly, walk I must" quipped Tarn, fastening his cloak.

Torrocka snorted derisively and removed a pair of teardrop-shaped, wooden-framed, sinew-woven objects off the wall beside the exit, and tossed them to Tarn, who caught them deftly.

"Attach them to thy boots. They will allow you to walk on top of the snow. I call them snow walkers."

"What will ye use?"

"The pass is closed, even to one such as you. Ye might consider hunting ere ye return. There are spears over there to replace the one you lost," said Torrocka, pointing to the corner. "There's an axe on the other side. Take it with you it in case the leopard is frozen solid."

Grunting his reply, Tarn picked out a well-balanced spear to add to his own, stuck the axe handle beneath his sword belt, and stepped outside into a winter day, warmed by a fugitive autumn sun. He followed Torrocka's instructions and lashed the snow walkers to his boots with long leather straps. Despite stumbling about some and stepping on one snow walker with the other, he managed not to fall. Much to his delight, the equipment allowed him to walk on top of the snow. After a few hundred paces, he adapted to the unfamiliar stride, discovering he moved far quicker with the snow walkers than without. Truly he seemed to fly over the knee-deep blanket and the much deeper drifts bothered him not at all.

In much less than an hour, Tarn reached the site where he had killed the snow leopard and began digging with the head of one of the snow walkers. Two feet down he struck the intact, frozen carcass. Leaving the frozen leopard to partially thaw in the sun, he jogged toward the pass.

As he rounded the corner of jagged rocks he passed days earlier, the mouth of the pass came into view. Tons of snow had slid down the V-shaped mountainsides carrying, wood, boulders, and other debris. Whole trees were upended, their roots in the air, their trunks broken like so many matchsticks. Nature's carnage plugged the narrow cleft. And it would remain shut until the thaw. He returned to the frozen carcass.

Cleaning the cat was more of a matter of chopping through the crystallised organs with the axe than cutting them loose. And though snow leopard meat was not prized for its taste or tenderness, it was nevertheless nourishing, and the shorthaired tawny fur would make excellent winter attire. Tarn hoisted part of the stiff carcass across his shoulders and turned for the cave, replaying Torrocka's tale of his heritage.

The Ramka: the awakening. What an odd sensation. His blood had stirred, burning hot as pins and needles stabbed him before it cooled. Close at the heels of the electric vitality that had swept through him, as if every cell in his body awoke at once, followed a sense of belonging to the land—as though he were connected by an invisible thread. Beneath his boots, and under the snow, he felt the ground sleeping. The wind, skirling through the trees, keening like a shrill flute, spoke to him. Impossible. If he tried, Tarn almost heard its message that warned of cold weather. The entrance of the cave snatched his fanciful thoughts back to the present. He strode through the hide flap believing that a small residue of the snow leopard's venom yet plagued him.

After tossing the leopard haunch on the cave floor, he turned expectantly to Torrocka and received an 'I told you so' look.

Ere Torrocka spoke, Tarn said, "I hunt. Ye cook."

As he spun on his heels, Tarn heard Torrocka grumble something unintelligible about ungrateful barbarian youths. Several more trips were necessary to fetch the remainder of the big cat.