Night’s deep hush lingered. Shard-Miners, assigned to the quarry’s lower depths, had not returned. Kaelen found himself alone in the barracks, the vast, echoing space a familiar companion. Cold air, sharp as a splintered shard, swirled through gaps in the rough-hewn walls.
He rose from the stiff cot. Muscles felt unbound, spirit clear. No residual ache from yesterday’s ordeal, no chill reaching his bones. Such was the subtle grace of his inner ice, a constant counterpoint to the Everwinter’s bite.
Morning’s glow was a pale, watery light, filtered through layers of frosted ice on the window. It promised little warmth.
Kaelen moved through the Snow-Strider Outpost. Its avenues, carved from glacial ice and hard-packed snow, remained mostly deserted. Structures leaned, shaggy with frost. Here, life clung precariously to the edges of the vast Everwinter, a desperate scramble for Cryo-Crystals that powered enclaves and kept the relentless cold at bay.
This outpost, despite its grim veneer, was a vital artery. Caravans, laden with trade from distant geothermal pockets, paused here for resupply. Adventuring parties, much like Jarek’s formidable Awakened, came to outfit themselves before plunging into the treacherous Glacier Depths. A makeshift market had naturally coalesced, a testament to humanity’s stubborn will to commerce, even in the teeth of the ice.
His task: understand this place. Rumors and whispered tales were thin ice. Kaelen trusted only what his own eyes measured, what his own senses verified.
Few souls moved among the stalls. Early morning, and the deepest veins of the Frost-Shard Quarry held most of the Shard-Miners captive. Their work was multi-day endeavors, deep beneath the surface, sustained by rations carried down. Emerging for a meal was a luxury, a wasted journey. A miserable existence, Kaelen knew. A slow surrender to the rock and ice.
He would not enter those depths. Not yet. His secret, the cold fire within, demanded a path of its own. He had to learn how to wield his true power, or this outpost would consume him, just as it consumed so many others.
An empty ache gnawed at his gut. He had not eaten since yesterday’s midday meal. Hunger was a simple, undeniable truth.
Kaelen walked the market’s winding paths. Not a true restaurant here, only makeshift stalls and communal hearths. A scent, rich and savory, drew him. It drifted from a small, squat building, barely more than a lean-to of ice and timber, tucked against a frozen cliff face.
An old man tended a sputtering brazier. Meat, dark and stringy, sizzled on long iron skewers. His face was a map of deep lines, etched by years of frost and wind. A grizzled beard, white as fresh snow, obscured his chin. One lens of his spectacles was cracked, a spiderweb of fracture across the thick glass.
Kaelen settled onto a rough-hewn stool, directly before the old man.
“What meat is this?” he asked, voice low.
Old Man Boreas chuckled, a dry, rasping sound like shifting ice. “Better not to ask.”
Kaelen offered a short nod. Once, the vast herds of the Northern Plains had provided. Now, the world was a different beast. Even the Glacial Citadel relied on cultivated proteins. Out here, survival dictated terms.
He took a skewer. The meat, though tough, tasted earthy, spiced with unfamiliar herbs. He chewed slowly.
Through the fractured lens, Boreas’s gaze sharpened. “A new face, you are.”
“Arrived yesterday,” Kaelen replied, not looking up. “This is… passable.”
“Yesterday. Aye. Must be the one who walked out of the Deepfrost Leviathan’s maw.”
Kaelen paused. “News travels fast.”
“Haha! Not much secrecy here, lad. Unless it’s the color of your underclothes. By sundown, every Shard-Miner will have heard.” Boreas gave another dry chuckle. “Many will be looking your way. You, with your luck, your raw presence.”
Kaelen’s jaw tightened. He held the old man’s gaze. Ferocious, some called it, but Boreas simply met it, unmoved.
“Be wary. I don’t know why you sought shelter here, but this is no soft pillow.”
“Not shelter. I came to earn.”
“Earn?” Boreas’s brow, thick with white hair, rose slightly. “You came to the Frost-Shard Quarry to earn, yet you carry no ice-pick. Not the bearing of a man set on such work.”
Kaelen felt a prick of irritation. His intent was far grander than a simple pickaxe could achieve.
“You’ve been here long,” Kaelen stated, changing the subject.
“Since the first Cryo-Crystal vein was struck.” Boreas gestured to the back of his lean-to, a shadowed alcove piled high with unrecognizable junk. “An old-timer. As you can tell by these.”
Within, ancient tools, rusted pots, faded garments, and shattered trinkets lay in chaotic heaps.
“Those who came first. Who tried to hold on. Just like you.” Boreas’s voice dropped, a low murmur. “They resist the quarry’s grip with every breath. When coin runs dry, they sell. Starting with worthless scraps, ending with their most precious. When there’s nothing left, they go down. That’s the routine.”
“Useful things go to the Glacial Citadel. The useless, the discarded, remain here. They’re the echoes of the desperate. Heh.” Boreas’s final sound was a chilling whisper of a laugh. His eyes, behind the cracked lens, seemed to bore into Kaelen, seeing his own fate among the forgotten refuse.
Kaelen’s appetite withered. The remaining meat in his mouth turned to ash. He forced it down.
He stood. “Ten Glimmer-Shards? For one skewer?” His voice was flat, but a tremor of disbelief ran beneath it. “Did you sprinkle these with actual starlight?”
In the Glacial Citadel, such a price was unheard of. A single Glimmer-Shard was a thousandth of a Cryo-Crystal fragment. Ten Glimmer-Shards for mere meat was outright plunder. His annoyance flared, a brief, cold spark.
Boreas remained impassive. He had seen this reaction countless times.
“Everything here holds a price. Food, clothes, even a miner’s pick. Supply and demand, lad.”
“What if I refuse?”
“Heh. There’s a good reason a helpless old man like me has done business in this rough place for so long.”
Nearby stall owners, who had seemed oblivious, slowly turned their heads. Their gazes, sharp and cold, settled on Kaelen. A quiet pressure built in the air.
*An old-timer.* The meaning of Boreas’s words clicked into place. The old man was a lynchpin, a central figure in this sparse market. He possessed the connections, the unspoken authority, that had allowed him to thrive where others perished. To defy him was to defy the outpost’s unspoken laws.
“Damn it.” A soft curse, barely audible.
“Still, your wits work. Some fools thrash and learn nothing.”
“I have no Glimmer-Shards.”
“Then you must have something else. Perhaps… a Cryo-Crystal?”
Kaelen felt a cold knot tighten in his chest. He would rather have fought a pack of Frost-Wolves than reveal the fragment he carried. Not for a single skewer of dubious meat.
Boreas smirked, seeing his resistance.
“Lad. A rumor that you hold a Cryo-Crystal will spread through this outpost in an hour. Think you can protect it, once it’s out?” The origin of that rumor was clear. Boreas himself.
Kaelen glared, his jaw clenching. He had known hardships. He had faced true terror. But this old man, with his dry chuckle and knowing eyes, held a different kind of power. A power born of decades spent navigating the treacherous currents of human desperation.
Compared to Boreas, Kaelen felt like a novice, a mere boy, for all his Cryomancy. Once the whisper of a Cryo-Crystal was out, the choice to refuse became no choice at all.
From a hidden pouch, Kaelen extracted a small, rough shard of Cryo-Crystal. It shimmered with an internal, cool light, no bigger than his thumb.
Boreas’s eyes glinted, a brief flash of hunger. “Ah. That size. Worth perhaps a hundred Glimmer-Shards.”
“A hundred? In the Glacial Citadel, that would fetch three hundred, easily.” Kaelen’s voice was strained.
“This isn’t the Glacial Citadel.” Boreas shrugged, a slow, deliberate movement.
“Is this a joke?”
“Boy. Even a treasure becomes a burden if you lack the strength to shield it.” Boreas’s chuckle was devoid of warmth.
Kaelen felt an intense urge to strike the old man, to freeze the smirk from his face. But he did not. He considered the consequences. Boreas’s survival here, his network of sharp-eyed shopkeepers, suggested deeper ties. Perhaps to the Awakened Ones who patrolled the Frost-Shard Quarry. His indifference, his calm superiority, spoke of untouchability.
He sighed, a wisp of vapor in the cold air. All his efforts, all the risks taken to secure this fragment, now reduced to this. A hundred Glimmer-Shards. A pittance.
He handed the Cryo-Crystal to Boreas.
“Heh. Don’t lose heart. I’m not so cruel. Not to a newcomer. Not to the bone.” Boreas counted out a small pouch of Glimmer-Shards, clinking with their distinct, icy chime. “Ninety Glimmer-Shards. Keep them close. Many a nimble-fingered one lurks here.”
“A cat pretending to care for the mouse it just cornered,” Kaelen muttered, pocketing the pouch. It felt heavy with defeat.
Boreas chuckled, then gestured to the pile of junk inside the lean-to. “As a token for our first transaction, choose one item. Any one, from there.”
“That… junk?”
“If you’d rather not—”
Kaelen pushed past him, into the shadow-filled alcove. Walking away felt like another loss, another concession. He needed to salvage something, however small, from this encounter.
His hand swept over broken tools, a chipped mug, a length of frayed rope. Nothing of apparent use. He didn’t expect to. The valuable had been siphoned off, sent to the Citadel. Only the forgotten remained.
Boreas watched from his brazier, a knowing smile playing on his lips. Kaelen’s frustration, his stubborn refusal to simply give up, was a curious thing. Most who came here were already broken, worn down by the Everwinter’s relentless pressure. But Kaelen, despite the quiet stoicism, held a raw, unyielding core.
Such energy, stark and vibrant, was rare in this weary place. It was almost endearing.
Kaelen’s fingers closed around something. He pulled it free from the tangle of discarded things.
It was a rime-glass. Small, exquisitely crafted from clear, flawless ice, no larger than his palm. Inside, delicate frost crystals, like powdered diamonds, slowly drifted from the upper chamber to the lower. It was an ancient, decorative piece, utterly useless in this practical world, measuring only the slow creep of rime. No one would carry such a thing.
“This. What is it doing here?” Kaelen held it up.
“No one wanted it. So it remains.” Boreas sounded nonchalant. He had acquired it years ago from a caravan, a fleeting curiosity. It served no purpose beyond a quiet beauty.
“Choose something else, perhaps?”
“No.” Kaelen turned the rime-glass in his hand. “Nothing else here is whole.” He walked out, the crystalline timer cool and smooth in his grip.
“Heh! Visit again sometime.” Boreas called after him.
“I expect we will.” Kaelen’s voice held a dry edge.
“An unfortunate thought.”
Kaelen paused at the edge of the market, then looked back at Boreas. “Then I’ll call you Old Man Boreas. Let’s hope our paths do not cross again.” He turned, melting into the pale, frozen morning. Boreas watched him go, a faint smile on his lips, a new, small weight of curiosity added to his years.
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