I didn’t have a lot of opportunities for excitement in my life—there was only so much fun to be had in doing laundry, cooking our small meals, and chopping wood for the fire. So even the slight thrill of being on the river path, going somewhere I shouldn’t be going, made my skin tingle and my breath come fast. I hurried down the path, grinning to myself as I thought of what I would tell Tamsen when he asked me where I had gotten the really good ice berries. He would surely ask, and I began to think of wild tales I would tell him by way of explanation.

But I was jolted out of my thoughts by the sound of ice cracking. I looked quickly around and was alarmed to see that the cracking ice was directly beneath my feet.

The river trail was precariously narrow, and it was easy to wander off if someone wasn’t paying attention—which was precisely why I had been forbidden to use it. I had a tendency to let my mind wander, and that was exactly what I had done, which meant that now I was standing directly on top of the frozen river.

I held my breath for a moment, but when the ice didn’t give way beneath my feet, I took another cautious step. And to my delight, the ice held. I could feel it through the thin leather soles of my boots, slick and cold, and I took another step.

My smile grew as I looked down at the pathway the frozen river created. Taking the river wasn’t necessarily a more direct way to the Shadow Veil, but it did seem exciting. I was enjoying the feeling of sliding with each step. The river was unpredictable even when it was frozen and walking along it felt risky. Being out here, heading toward the Shadow Veil on a pathway made of ice, was a far cry from the dull safety of our chilly cabin, and I laughed as I nearly slipped on the frozen surface.

The wind gusted around me, making me shiver in my thin cloak, but I didn’t turn back. The sun was out, and I still had a mission to accomplish.

The sun was the reason I’d set out to begin with. The appearance of the sun was rare in wintertime. The Northern Peak seemed to cast our valley into perpetual shadow all year round, but it was worse in winter.

I glanced over my shoulder as I heard rumbling and a clap of what might have been thunder. But when I looked at the Northern Peak, I saw it was another cloud of ash billowing from the top.

The ash looked almost white against the sky, and for a wild moment, I let myself imagine it was snow falling instead of the hot, filthy ash.

I’d only ever heard stories about snow and how it used to fall in the valley, but I had always been taken by the idea of it. I used to beg my father to tell me the stories about how the snow would drift up the sides of the cabin. He didn’t even remember that—those were stories his father had told him.

He couldn’t often be coaxed into telling stories, but when he did, I would always go to sleep dreaming about what it must be to feel it falling, to touch it, taste it.

The ice cracked again, and I jumped back as a chunk fell loose and caved into the rushing river.

There was another rumble, and I looked behind me again at the peak. It was strange, I was moving away from it, but it still seemed to loom just as large and imposing. How could that be? Was it just a trick of the light?

I shook my head and stepped back onto the river path. I pressed ahead, pulling my cloak more tightly around me, huddling into it. It did me little good here—the wind always felt more biting as I approached the Shadow Veil. Though, sometimes I wondered if that was all in my head. My father had always told me I had an active imagination.

The way he’d said it made it sound like a curse, but growing up the way I had, I’d always been grateful for it. Not that it hadn’t gotten me into trouble before—of course it had, plenty of times—but up on the mountain, living nearly all alone, it was all I had.

A stick cracked, and I looked up quickly. The wind died down for a moment, and my heart began to race as I realized I was hearing footsteps.

There was someone on the path ahead of me.