Borin Frostwalker's Arc

Chapter 6 of 10

The last pods hung empty on the tree. Borin's people had stripped it clean. He stood in the cold and did the math. Forty mouths. Six days. No food between here and the stronghold. The flowers and fruit had bought them one good meal, nothing more. Gregor leaned on his stick nearby, watching the tribe lick nectar from their fingers. The old hermit knew this glacier better than any living man. Borin needed what was in his head. "You know where the food went when the fires passed," Borin said. "You know what's left. Come with us. Guide us the rest of the way." Gregor laughed, a dry sound. "I buried myself out here on purpose, boy. I don't walk for anyone." He thumped his stick toward the cabin. "That's my roof. These are my bones. I'm too old to die on open ice chasing your grandfather's dream." "My people starve without you." "Then they starve." Gregor turned away. "I warned your father off this crossing too. He didn't listen either." Thyra stepped between them, spear planted in the snow. She had herded children across crevasses for six days and her patience was gone. "You fed us once," she said. "You could have let us pass. You didn't. So don't pretend you've got no stake in whether we live." Gregor stopped. His jaw worked under the gray beard. He looked at the thin tribe, then at Borin's face, so like the man he'd once shared this cabin with. Before he could answer, a sound rolled across the ice. Low grunts. The crunch of heavy hooves. Over the ridge came a herd of pale beasts, thick-coated, each crowned with three curved horns. They moved slow and wary, pawing the snow for buried moss. Whitehorn caribou. Meat enough to feed forty people for a week. The tribe froze. A few men reached for spears. Borin grabbed the nearest arm. "No. Rush them and they scatter. We'll lose every one." Gregor's eyes had changed. He straightened off his stick. "They winter in a hollow two days north," he said quietly. "I've watched them thirty years. You can't take them running. You take them in the hollow, where the walls pen them." He pointed with the stick, down the safe line Borin's map showed. "Your route passes close to it." Borin met the old man's eyes. "Then show us the hollow." Gregor was silent a long moment. The herd grazed below, breath steaming. "Your father saved my life on this ice once," he said. "I never paid it back." He spat in the snow and shouldered his stick. "Two days. I take you to the hollow. After that you're on your own." Borin gripped the old man's shoulder. He had his guide, and he had a way to feed his people across the ice. But the caribou were still wild, still fast, and no one in his tribe had ever hunted a herd like this.