Firelight dances as a soft glow on the walls of the lodge, painting Frey’s cheeks in warmth as she sips her ale. Deep shadows twist and grow in interesting shapes that the village children stare wide-eyed into as the Volya, their Shaman, aging but still strong, lifts her arms and weaves the air with her fingers, signaling the beginning of her tale. Her long, slender antlers seem to twist and grow in the flickering light and a hush falls over the small gathering. Her voice, powerful despite her age, lifts into the rafters.

“Listen well O People, for in my words are the threads of fate, of wyrd. Truth, I speak, for those who have ears to listen.”

As one the villagers bring the fingers of their left hands to brush an ear, the formal greeting of the Hearthlands. Frey can’t help but smile a little and leans back on the bench as the Volya drifts into a familiar old story of bears and spirits, and warriors with long swords and a magic ring. It’s one of her favorites and she remembers fondly all the childhood days she had grabbed her wooden sword and took off into the woods pretending to be the warrior of legend.

That’s what she had been doing, ten years ago on the evening that her brother… She avoids his name, even in thought, for fear of summoning the Pale somehow, even here, but the memory washes over her mind now, the sensations relentless and fast as thought as shes stares blankly into the flickering light. So long ago her own antlers were bare nubs without a single fork then.

The thick trees and the fading light of evening, the gentle bite of the first frost still around the corner. Her older brother, barely a man whose horns were still short, but already a good hunter and a skilled fighter... but there is no fighting the Pale. Frey remembers how he yelled for her to run, even as he turned to face the wraith. His hands gripped his  sword without shaking, but he must have known steel passed right through them. He had thrown Frey behind him, she’d scraped her knee hard on a rock, and then she heard him scream…

Frey is jolted back into the present as a child tugs her sleeve. It’s little Eivar, the blacksmith’s son, so young his horns haven't even grown in and he’s pushing a berry-filled tart into her hands with a smile. She shakes the memory away, smiles back and ruffles his thick, dark hair with a grin and a whispered thanks as he crawls into her lap. The Volya is nearing the end of her tale and people are yawning and stretching as the light fades outside. Another day’s work done, another night to turn in, touch the carved runes on the door hoping they keep the Pale away, to wake tomorrow and do it all again.

She doesn’t say it out loud, no one ever does but… Frey often wonders how long they can go on. 

Far from the comfort of the village, deep in the Northern Wastes, a dark, lifeless sky hangs over the silent landscape. Too vast. Too empty. Nothing moves but the wind-driven snow, swirling in restless flurries that obscure the jagged, uneven ground. Crystalline formations of ice jut up at odd angles, dark and cold, catching only the faintest sliver of moonlight.