First light in the Capital was a gentle affair. The sun-lanterns dimmed slowly, letting the real dawn, pink and soft, wash over the white stone buildings. Birds sang in the manicured gardens.
At the Ironfrost Lodgings—a grim, functional inn used by Northern traders—dawn was a command.
Naevia was already in the courtyard. Winter's Mourning was strapped across her back. Two sturdy Northern-bred horses, their coats thick and shaggy, were saddled and loaded. One carried her meager luggage: a bedroll, rations, tools. The other carried sacks of salt, basic medicinal herbs, and a few ingots of low-grade iron—all she could afford with the last of her personal funds. It was a pathetic offering to a dying duchy.
She checked the straps for the tenth time. The action was pure ritual. Her mind was elsewhere, already leagues north, calculating dwindling grain stores, vulnerable border villages, the rotting timbers of the Frostveil Keep gate.
She had not expected him to come.
The offer, made in the strange, fragrant dark, felt like a dream born of desperation. A handsome fool with a taste for candied fruit and a laugh that didn't belong in her world. He was probably still asleep in some silk-sheeted bed, his absurd offer forgotten.
"Morning, Boss! Hope I didn't keep the apocalypse waiting."
The voice, cheerful and bright as a sun-lantern, shattered the cold silence of the courtyard.
Naevia turned.
Zane stood under the inn's archway. He wore the same simple black and white from the night before, with only the addition of a long, grey traveler's cloak of surprisingly good wool. He carried a single, small leather satchel. That was it. No sword. No armor. No supplies. He looked like he was going for a leisurely walk in a palace garden.
Her eyes swept over him, the assessment brutal and swift. "Your horse?"
"Oh, I'll ride with the supplies," he said, ambling over. He patted the neck of the pack horse, which snorted. "This fine fellow and I will get along famously. We have similar dispositions. Stoic. Load-bearing."
"You will ride your own horse. We cover sixty miles a day. The terrain will break you if you try to walk or share a load."
"Sixty miles. Right." He nodded, unfazed. "And the horse?"
"You don't have one."
"A minor logistical oversight." He smiled, that infuriating, disarming smile. "I'm sure you have a solution. You seem like a woman of many solutions."
Naevia closed her eyes for a second, summoning patience from a well that had run dry months ago. She turned to the stable master, a grizzled Northerner named Kael, who was watching the exchange with open suspicion. "Kael. The dun gelding. Sell him to this man."
Kael spat on the straw-covered ground. "That's a spiteful beast, My Lady. Kicked Bjorn's ribs to splinters last spring."
"Perfect," Naevia said, her voice flat. "The price is ten silver marks. Pay the man, Zane."
Zane rummaged in his satchel and produced a small, heavy purse. He didn't count. He simply handed it to Kael. The stable master hefted it, his eyebrows rising at the weight, and nodded.
The dun gelding was led out. It was a big, muscular animal with a nasty roll in its eye. It took one look at Zane in his fine clothes and tried to bite his shoulder.
Zane didn't flinch. He simply turned his head and looked the horse in the eye.
It wasn't a dramatic stare. He didn't frown or tense. He just… looked. His warm amber eyes held the animal's wild gaze.
The gelding froze. Its ears, laid flat back, twitched forward. The aggressive light in its eyes dimmed, replaced by a sort of confused wariness. It let out a soft, puzzled huff of air.
Zane reached out and scratched the base of its ear. "See? We're already friends. You just needed proper introductions." He took the reins from a bewildered Kael and swung up into the saddle with effortless, graceful strength. The horse sidestepped once, then settled.
Naevia watched, her glacial eyes missing nothing. The money. The calm. The way the vicious horse submitted. Not a fool, then. Something else.
"We ride," she said, mounting her own steed. She didn't look back, guiding her horse out of the courtyard and onto the Capital's northern road.
For the first few hours, she ignored him. The road was wide and well-paved, cutting through farmland and gentle hills. She set a punishing pace, her body moving in sync with her horse, a part of the machine. She expected complaints. Questions about slowing down. Requests for breaks.
None came.
When she finally glanced back, Zane was there, a few lengths behind, sitting easily in the saddle. His white hair streamed behind him like a banner. He was looking at the landscape—the tidy farms, the fat sheep, the prosperous villages—with an expression of mild, anthropological interest. He didn't seem tired. He didn't seem bored. He just seemed… present.
At midday, she finally relented, guiding the horses to a creek beside the road. She dismounted, letting her horse drink, and chewed on a strip of dried venison.
Zane dismounted with the same easy grace. He filled a waterskin from the creek, took a long drink, then produced a perfect, red apple from his satchel. He offered it to his gelding, who took it with delicate surprise.
"So," he said, leaning against a tree. "The North. Tell me about the problem. Not the official petition version. The real one."
Naevia studied him. "Why?"
"Because if I'm going to be your attendant in problem-solving, I need to know the shape of the problem. Start with the weather."
"The 'weather' is called the Ever-Winter," she said, the words tasting of frost. "It is a magical climatic anomaly that has been slowly expanding from the northernmost peak, Frostspire, for three generations. Each year, the growing season shortens. Each year, the cold digs deeper. This year, the snows did not melt in the high valleys. At all."
Zane nodded, taking a bite of a second apple for himself. "Magic. Nasty, persistent stuff. And the people?"
"Hard. Proud. Starving. The crops that do grow are stunted. The herds are thin. We survive on mining—ice-iron, glowstone—and hunting the frost-elk. But the hunting grounds are being overrun."
"By the Frostspine Ogres."
"You know of them?"
"I read a thing or two," he said, waving the apple. "Big. Tribal. Traditionally stayed north of the Glacier Fang River. The cold is pushing them south, into your territory."
"Yes. They raid villages. Take livestock. Sometimes people." Her hand tightened on the venison strip. "My father led a warband to push them back last autumn. He came home sick. The cold… it had gotten into him. The healers called it the Frostlung. He wasted away for three months." She did not look at him as she said it. She watched the creek flow south, away from her home.
Zane was silent for a long moment. The playful glint was gone from his eyes. "I am sorry for your loss. He was a formidable man, by all accounts."
"Accounts mean nothing now. Only results." She stood up, brushing off her trousers. "We ride."
As the days passed, the land changed. The comfortable warmth of the heartland faded. The trees grew denser, taller, and darker. The friendly villages gave way to fortified hamlets with watchtowers. The sky turned a perpetual steel grey.
Naevia's silence became a palpable thing, a wall of focused dread. They were getting closer.
Zane, however, began to talk. He asked questions. Not just about threats and logistics, but about things that seemed pointless.
"What do your people sing about?" he asked on the third day, as a cold drizzle began to fall.
"Survival. Lost summers. The mountain's heart."
"No love songs?"
"Love is a luxury. It is sung about quietly. In private."
"What do the children play at?"
"Building walls. Hunting shadows. Staying warm."
"And you?" he asked, his gaze on her profile as she rode slightly ahead. "What did you play at?"
Her back straightened. "I trained. From the time I could walk. I played at being my father's heir."
"That sounds… incredibly dull."
For the first time, she almost smiled. It was a tiny, brittle thing that died before it reached her eyes. "It was necessary."
The fourth day brought them to the Sentinel Wall—a massive, ancient fortification of black stone that marked the formal border of the Northern Reach. It was manned by a skeleton crew of Empire soldiers, who looked miserable and cold. They glanced at Naevia's ducal seal and waved her through with barely concealed relief.
Passing through the gate was like stepping into another world.
The wind hit them first. It was a physical force, sharp as a blade, carrying the scent of pine, stone, and endless cold. The well-maintained road ended, becoming a rutted, frozen track. The dark pine forests crowded in, oppressive and watchful. The light was different—a weak, silvery luminescence that seemed to come from the snow itself.
Naevia took a deep, shuddering breath. The air hurt her lungs. It was home.
She looked at Zane, waiting for the shock, the complaint, the realization of his terrible mistake.
He had pulled his grey cloak tighter. His white hair whipped around his face. He looked… fascinated. His amber eyes scanned the towering pines, the distant, jagged peaks, the oppressive sky. There was no fear. No disgust. Only intense, focused curiosity.
"Well," he said, his breath forming a cloud in the air. His voice had lost none of its warmth. "It certainly has character."
"This is the mild borderland," Naevia said, a hint of grim pride in her tone. "Frostveil Keep is five days north. The temperature will drop another twenty degrees. You will see your breath freeze and fall like dust. Your skin will crack if exposed. This is where your 'good story' begins, Zane. If you wish to turn back, now is your last chance. The Empire's comfort is behind you."
Zane looked at her, then back at the harsh, beautiful, deadly landscape. A slow, genuine smile spread across his face, brighter than the weak sun.
"Turn back?" He chuckled, the sound rich and alive against the silent, pressing cold. "My dear Duchess, the story is just getting interesting."
He urged his gelding forward, past her, taking the lead on the frozen path north.
Naevia watched his back for a moment, that straight, unconcerned posture moving confidently into her world of grey and white. A strange, unfamiliar feeling stirred in her chest, buried deep beneath the ice and duty.
It wasn't trust.
It was the faint, fragile spark of something she hadn't felt since her father fell ill.
Hope.
She kicked her horse forward, following the white-haired stranger deeper into the cold.