Ike Frostthread's Arc

Chapter 1 of 2

Ike Frostthread wanted to make the robes for the next Glowflight Festival. To earn that honor, he needed frostglider pelts that held their glow. He had six fresh pelts drying by his hut wall. He watched the youngest one all night. By morning its blue light had faded to a dull gray. He pressed his thumb to the fur. Nothing woke under it. A robe stitched from these would go dark long before the spiritual leader ever wore it. He knew the fault now. He skinned the gliders too slow. The glow lived in the skin oils, and the oils dried the moment the pelt left the body. His father had never trapped gliders for this. Ike was on his own. A sled scraped to a stop outside. Sivara Frostwhisper stood beside it, blowgun slung across her back. On the sled lay a black stag, roped tight, three small gliders lashed along the side rail. She hunted for her village and rarely came this far. She did not knock. She only looked at his gray pelts and then at him. "Dead already," she said. "They dim after I skin them," Ike said. "I can't stop it." She crossed to her sled and cut one glider free. It still glowed, faint blue along its flank. "Mine keep light three days. I take them alive. Cage. Skin them last, warm." Ike looked at his trap boxes stacked by the door, the runed capture boxes he had built to hold gliders alive. He had caught them living, then killed and skinned them at his leisure. That was the error. "The oils set while the animal is still warm," he said. "Skin warm. Rub the flesh side with stag fat. Seals the glow." She said it flat, as a fact, not a favor. They unloaded the stag together. Ike caged his two newest live gliders instead of killing them cold. He skinned them fast while their bodies still steamed, then worked stag fat into the raw side with his palm. The blue held. He set the pelt by the wall beside the dead gray ones. It stayed lit. Sivara watched it glow. "Good," she said, and that settled it. Her dwelling lay far off, and fresh frost was setting. She stayed two days in his hut. Ike used the black stag's obsidian hide to sew her a winter coat, frost-lined at the hood, toggles cut from crystal. He worked while the new glider pelt shone steady behind him. He gave her the coat. She pulled it on and looked up at him. She said nothing. Her face said everything. She kissed him. The glow problem was solved. Ike now had a method that held. He needed more skins and Sivara agreed to stay and help him set the new traps.