Winter has begun. There is snow on the tops of the higher hills now. The frozen mist of my breath in the morning makes me remember my climb over the High Pass. Last week my thoughts were on preparation for the journey, and what might happen after it. Today, though, I feel like the journey is all but begun, and that I am now marking the days until Kestrel and I stand at the very peak of the Pass.
With the cold every night, I now spend my nights in the house that Miss Brynleigh told me I could sleep in. While moving my possessions there, I've started to go through them, figuring out what needs to be left behind, what should be taken with me, what needs repair, what needs to be replaced. I came upon an old pendant I found in the ruined stones of Framsburg while looking for hiding places for a lantern. It is a tarnished and bent disc of brass or bronze or some other metal, with an embossed outline of a rearing horse on it that seems like an older, simpler version of what I saw on the tapestries in the Marton Mead Hall. It once had a chain, perhaps of silver rings, but that was broken off. I've been trying in my idle moments to mend the loops enough to affix the pendant to a cord so it could be worn again. Perhaps if I present it to the Thane as an artifact of the Éothéod, it will help soften the blow of my failure to find the lantern.
Last night, the water in the troughs froze not just in a thin sheet on top, but quite solidly, enough to shatter two of the stones that make up one of the troughs. This led me to my first return to Bree in almost a week, to let some more of my dwindling supply of silver slip through my fingers, paying a stone-mason to make stones of just the right size and shape to replace those broken, and mortar to use for the repairs. The trough once again holds water, though I fear my craftsmanship is not a match for what it replaces; but to pay the mason to do the repairs himself would have cost more than I have, not merely more than I can spare. And from now on, I nearly empty the troughs before nightfall, and refill them come morning.
That's more work, with several extra trips to the well, but that's not a concern. My time remains free enough that I've poured many hours into practice with the sword and bow. I still wouldn't take my sword to a fight I could avoid, but it feels more comfortable in my hand now, even with the lighter grip and less forceful motions that Mister Aren urges me to. But the bow feels more natural to me than it ever has. It was a hard thing to change my habit, but now that I have, I can strike the target at much greater distances, and my arrows cluster together much better.
No word yet from Miss Brynleigh about when she will return. Would that I'd been able to hear clearly what she said as she was leaving. I hope she will not be disappointed in my forgetting to empty the troughs, or my efforts to repair the one that broke. But also, I hope she will be pleased that, other than that, I've kept up with everything; and with my tale of being able to save that spooked mare.
While I was visiting town to get the stones, I saw Haritha, and learned from her that things have gotten better, though she offered no further information and I didn't think it right to demand more. It seems she is not so much in fear for her life, though. I am to return this evening to collect my sewn undertunic; if she wishes to elaborate, perhaps she will at that time. It's possible she had been about to, when she was interrupted by her boss, Gerlof, who had apparently gotten deep into his cups. Unlike my previous encounter with him at Miss Owena's house during Miss Adri's birthday party, this time he was friendly to a fault, lurching drunkenly against me as if we'd been fast friends since childhood. Poor Haritha had to practically pry him off me, keep a surprisingly angry Mister Eddrick from drowning him in the fountain, and lead him home. I found the whole thing baffling, but then, I'm sure much has happened with these people that I know nothing of.
And perhaps that I ought not to know anything of. It's nothing to do with me, after all. All the more reason for my thoughts to focus on the count of winter's days. Far beyond where my eyes reach, snow piles atop the High Pass. It is already impassable for most, perhaps all, who walk on two feet. The rising depth of snow there speaks of the day, soon, when it will retreat, and the way will be clear once more. My thoughts are almost already there, frozen at that moment at the highest point of the Pass, the unknown both before and behind.
