The ice sings the songs of our people. We are born as warriors when we learn the ice’s song, and when we die, we join the singing. Below me, white spots of frozen air rushed past and disappeared into the darkness behind. Above, purple lightning slashed across the almost black clouds. The bird god Seiipiret was watching my journey. That alone was an omen. Hopefully it was a good one. I released another slow breath. It came as a cloud of thick mist that quickly streaked down the sides of my face and dissipated into the rest of the cold air. Lightning flashed again, and showed me the next track, a hoofprint in the snow. It was much too large for deer or elk. That alone wasn't unusual, but it was no normal prey I was hunting.

  It had come onto us a couple of sleeps ago. We were dancing the song in celebration, our bellies filled and our feathers warm. We had reveled in the hunt, chasing our prey many days across the ice. It must have been following us across the ice for many sleeps, keeping far distance and staying hidden in the storm. The rancid smell of burning tallow had hidden it from our noses. Feasting and basking in the heat we had been unaware. It came over us then, all shearing horns and kicking hoofs. It gored Tamar on its antlers. He did not scream as he joined the song. He will sing with much honour. Moru tried to pierce it with his Shakran, but the bone blade broke on its gray hide. Moru joined the song with a hoof through his skull. He too went with honour. Khsak almost brought it down. His Shakran stood from the side of its bellowing throat draining dark red blood as he too joined the song. His voice will be heard loud when he sings with the ancestors.

  The beast spared me. I do not understand why, for I saw no mercy in its frenzied eye. It stood over me, Tamar still hung from its great antlers, the vibrant blue-and-green feathers across his shoulders bloodied and the gray feathers down the back of his legs were streaked with crimson instead of white. His arms hung lifeless, the bright tattoos scattered along his bare arms mingled with running blood, like a thousand white shards frozen into red ice. The ice sung beneath us, a deep bellowing song. Without a sound, the beast turned its head and left, trotting across the ice and into the darkness beyond our candles.

  I grabbed Khsaks Shakran, still steaming from the heat of the devil's blood. Its handle was smaller than I was used to, fit for his five fingers. Its blade had been made from our first kill together, just when we had learned the song. It had been a warm hunt across the ice. I held the jagged edge of the Shakran to my hand. I could hear my heart trying to hack its way out its cage of plumage. Was I not a warrior? Could I not swear the oath? The ice sang once more, a deep wallowing sound. It masked my scream. The oath of vengeance had been sworn.

  The storm was silent. That too was an omen. From the darkness rose an even deeper darkness. There was a small island of jagged rocks poking through it, and here my prey had left the ice. This island in and of itself was a great discovery. It was not in any of the songs of our ancestors. There shouldn't be any land out this way. The songs spoke of only ice and ice, for ever and ever, until eventually the ice ends in a sheer cliff with only dark waters below. From the loop on my hip I grabbed my Shakran. Its handle felt large in my hands now. Like when I had first made it. Then, it had made me feel like the biggest creature on the ice, be it of feathers, naked or pelt. It had made me feel warm with pride. Now only cold comforted me. I felt small as I bent down and pulled the skates from my feet. They had been a gift from the Lightbringers to my father once, made not from bone but from shiny metal and carved with shapes intricate beyond imagination. The lightbringer-skates went to my beltloop.

  Rocks and mulch felt wrong under my feet. Ice was safe. Our ancestors willed it so, and their songs told us where it was treacherous. I had not stepped off the ice many times in my life as one of the song, less times than I had fingers. The island was so much darker than the ice, wherein the glow of the storm hung ethereal and eternal. I lit a candle, one I had not put in the ice with my fallen flock. Its rancid smell brought the illusion of frailty.

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  The island had a grove. There were large trunks, almost too large for a man to circle with his arms, and as tall as three. Crouching between the trees I saw the beast. It stood, bent forward over something. Its neck was still streaked with blood from the wound Khsak had given it, but the wound itself had been covered by bandages. Who would care for such a beast, I didn't know, but they would not be of the song.

  I crouched down, shifting my weight onto my toes, and pushed forward. I would skate around the beast, slice its hind leg and be out of range before it could maul me on its horns. It ended poorly. Instead of flying across the ice, my face kissed half-decomposed tree-corpses with a thud, my Shakran gone from my grasp. The beast turned in silence. Its eyes shone with mockery in the darkness. Steam burst from its snout as it charged me.

  The ice sings the songs of our people. The ice gives our warriors strength. I dashed for the shoreline. Behind, I could hear its hooves beating the already dead ground. It was almost over me when I stumbled onto the ice once more, sliding just out of the way of its goring horns. I knew it would be over soon. Quicker, if I could not get on the skates. Either I would deliver a fatal wound with my Shakran and watch it bleed out, or it would rend and stomp me to death.

  It did not slide across the ice, its hooves dug into it just as surely as the sharpest of saws. But it did not glide as I could. With but the span of a feather to spare, I managed to secure one of the skates before having to roll out of the way of its savage stomps. One was enough to get some distance. Hopping on the one foot to gather speed, I flew across the ice. Balancing and bracing against the speed, I managed to fasten the other one on my foot.

  I reached for my Shakran in the loop on my hip. My hands gripped the leather-wrapped bone handle. It felt just right in my hands. It should've felt large, but it fit perfectly. The stump of my sixth finger rested comfortably outside the handle. It was Khsaks Shakran. That was fitting somehow. I would go into the hunt hand in hand with Khsak. Into the song.

  I crouched down. The beast stared at me from across the ice, its frenzied eyes surely regretted sparing me. I crouched down further, felt the muscles in my legs, felt the feathers on my calves stand on edge. It huffed, billowing steam into the storm. Almost at the same time, our legs pushed off the ice. Arching lightning accompanied the thunder of its hooves as the song accompanied my every cut across the ice. The world around us lost its meaning, moments stretched into eternity, as we raced against each other. The ice rang out in song.

  It was over just as it began. I felt its horns grip and toss me into the air as I felt Khsaks Shakran find its way to its throat. With a thud that pushed all air out of my body and broke most feathers along my back, I hit the ice. The beast stumbled for a step. Then it steadied itself.

  I had lost.

  From the corner of my eye I watched as the beast limped back for its island home. My body felt cold, as if all of my warmth had suddenly left me. I felt the ice grip my feathers, freezing me to it in blood. Khsak sat over me, I felt him in the song. He held my head in his lap, his five fingers rubbing soft circles around my temples. He was so cold, his hands so small. Through him, I heard the song. I heard how it called for me.

  - Will it hurt? I asked the cold air.

  - Yes, the song answered.

  I laid in silence for a while, listening to the song and feeling Khsaks fingers on my tattooed face and in my frozen feathers.

  - Is it worth it? I asked the air once more.

  Khsak leaned forward, his forehead touching mine. It was cold too.

  - Yes, he whispered; the whisper echoed in the song.