Against the boulder ahead of us, covered in a thin layer of snow, was a body. It lay on its side, facing away from us, arms and legs folded. It was as still as the rocks themselves.
“Who is that?” I murmured, my ears ringing. Please, no. Please, please, no.
River bent over the body. After what felt like an eternity, he replied, “I don’t know. Whoever he is, he’s been here awhile.”
My knees wobbled with relief. “He has? Are you sure?”
“Oh yes. Years and years. He must have been trying to take shelter here, poor fellow.” River surveyed the terrain, his expression thoughtful. The discovery of the body did not seem to disturb him at all. “Perhaps a storm caught him unawares, and he grew senseless from the cold.”
“Could it be Mingma?” I didn’t like to consider the possibility, which stirred up both sadness and dread.
“Perhaps, or a member of his expedition.” River stood, dusting his hands. “We should keep going.” He moved on but stopped when I didn’t follow. “Kamzin?”
“Right.” I shook myself. It was difficult to stop staring. The dead man’s arms curled toward his head, as if, in his last moments, he had pressed his face into his hands. It was not that I had forgotten that twenty men and women had died trying to reach the summit of the very mountain I was challenging. But after days of pouring over Mingma’s map, reading his notes, I had begun to see him almost as another companion on the journey. And now, this stark reminder.
The fear seemed to lengthen and grow.
We reached the rock face that afternoon and began exploring the terrain. It was not an easy task. As the winds tossed snow against the mountainside, much of it settled here, creating drifts that extended far above my head. River and I roped ourselves together as we walked, keeping a safe distance so that if one of us fell through the snow, the other would be able to haul them out. While we slogged through the drifts, Azar-at glided over the surface like a puff of cloud.
“What do you think?” River shouted as the sun dipped behind the mountain, plunging the world into shadow. Clouds billowed over us in cold sheets, and the winds grew ever more ferocious.
I kicked at the snow in frustration, nearly falling over in the process. We were over halfway up the mountain, but how we would make the final ascent was a mystery. We had spent hours traversing the uneven bench that bisected the upper third of Raksha from its lower slopes, searching for a way up the rock face. It was possible that a path lay ahead, beyond the curve of the mountainside, but we were not likely to find it in the dark.
I rubbed my hands over my face. I was exhausted—so exhausted that the world seemed enveloped in a heavy fog, separating me from the mountain, from River, from everything. I was moving my feet, and yet moments would pass during which I was aware of nothing, not even the snow crunching beneath my boots. Despite my annoyance, I was relieved that River wanted to stop too.
The rock face was scarred with innumerable pockets and caves. River had discovered a large one earlier that day that he declared would serve as a perfect shelter—flat and deep, and almost high enough to stand in. Returning to it as the shadows deepened over the landscape, I felt a shiver of apprehension. There was something about the mountainside here—its nakedness perhaps, or the caves that riddled the rock like the holes of burrowing insects, that made me uneasy. I would have sooner chosen to sleep outside in the tent than turn to Raksha for shelter.
Still, once we were settled in the cave with a small fire burning—our first since leaving Tem and Dargye three days ago—and River had piled snow in front of the cave entrance to block the howling wind, I began to feel more comfortable. It was warm enough to remove my chuba and heavy boots. After a hot meal, I felt almost like my old self again.
“What are you doing?” I asked River. The fire was dying down. I was wrapped in my blankets in the corner of the cave, watching him.
He looked up from the bundle of string he was weaving with his fingers, forming intricate shapes between his open palms. “It’s a trick for divining the weather. If you can read the patterns, you can see what the winds have in store for you.” He loosened several strings and rubbed his hands together. When he drew the string taut again, it showed an entirely different image. He peered at it closely. “Hmm.”
“I’ve never seen anyone do that,” I said. “Not even Chirri.”
“It’s very old magic.”
“Like astronomy?”
“Not really. Astronomy is a messy way of seeing the future. There are too many variables. I’ve never had much use for variables.”
We fell silent. I was warm, almost too warm, though it was far from hot in the cave. It was as if my body was becoming so accustomed to the snow and the ferocious chill that it had begun to believe that was its element now.
“Tell me about your family,” River said suddenly.
I dragged my eyes open. “What?”
“Your family.” His voice was quiet, musing. “Tell me about them. I never had a normal family—you have no idea how fascinating you are to me.”
“My family isn’t all that fascinating.” I yawned. “You’ve met my sister; you know what she’s like.”
“I know she’s nothing like you.”
“That’s true enough. We’ve spent most our lives arguing about something or other. When we were little, and I did something she didn’t like, she used to threaten that when she was Elder, she would have me exiled to the barbarian lands, or tied to a yak and dragged down the mountain.”
River laughed. “She sounds vicious.”
I shook my head. “She hated that I wasn’t afraid of her, the way everyone else was. I used to follow her everywhere. Sometimes I think she started hanging around the seer’s observatory to get rid of me. I always found astronomy terribly boring.”
“And your father?”
Elder’s face rose before me, and I felt a pang. I missed him badly—I hadn’t realized how much. “My father is a busy man. He didn’t always have time for us growing up. I know he loves me, though. Even if I am a disappointment and a stain on the family honor.”
“How do you know?” River’s head was bent over the strings. I couldn’t see his expression. “How do you know he loves you?”
I thought. “I don’t know. How do you ever know someone loves you? You just know.”
River seemed to ponder this. “Tell me more,” he said.