Finally, the next day, Xomhyrk calls a halt and we make camp in the snow. Setting up the tents here proves a hard task. Tents are made of fabric strung through with aluminum poles, and those poles have to be fixed to the stony ground by means of steel pegs. The steel is low quality and unruned, and tends to bend when too much force is applied.

Once they're finally in, I'm well ready for sleep, but hit first watch again. I stand outside next to Guthah.

Since our numbers have diminished so much, Xomhryk has had us pack the tents closer together. Our camp looks like a small town with runeknights as its encircling wall. On my other side is Mulkath, and past him is Erak. On Guthah's other side are some dwarves of another guild. I don't know them. They look about fifth degree.

“Feeling all right?” I whisper to Guthah.

“A bit better than before. My arm is healing up.”

“Good.”

“I still worry it won't recover fully.”

“Your runes will make up for it.”

“Will they, though?”

“Yes. You have hundreds of years to perfect them, don't you?”

“Hah. Hopefully.”

“We'll get past the dragon. Don't you worry about that. We'll slay it.”

He doesn't look convinced.

“We will,” I say.

I go back to staring out into the darkness. Just as always, there's nothing to see but a mist of snowflakes lit gray by the moon, and nothing to hear but the gentle hiss of the wind, and a few low voices from within the camp. No conspiracy for now—none will risk that kind of talk with Xomhyrk and his Dragonslayers in earshot.

The night is passing slowly. I keep having to turn my head back to the front, for my helmet pulls my gaze left in the direction of the dragon. There the air looks clear, and I can sense a shadow in the sound, very faint, very far off, where the Mountain of Halajatbast must rise high.

And then I hear something else: a crunch, foot on snow. I focus on where it came from: near directly in front of me, though still a long way off. Another one comes, and another. Something is walking toward us, I'm sure of it. A human? A dwarf?

The sound is too heavy for that. Is it a bear?

“Erak!” I hiss, past Mulkath. “Erak! I can hear something.”

The older dwarf turns to me. The runes of fire on his plate glint copper in the moonlight.

“What can you hear?” he whispers.

“An animal, I think.”

“Just one?”

I listen closer.

“Just one I think.”

“One bear is no problem.”

“If it is a bear,” says Mulkath.

“What else could it be?” I ask.

“There's worse far north, that might have been driven south,” says Erak. “Keep a close eye on it. Or ear. Where's the sound coming from?”

I point.

“Association dwarves, and you two fifths too, keep your eyes focused there.”

There's some worried mumbling. I don't feel worried though. I lick my lips. Despite everything, despite all the danger and terror and death we've faced so far, the prospect of a fight excites me to no end. I suddenly feel as if the scars across my chest are no longer there.

Gutspiercer begins to tremble in my grasp.

The footsteps continue. I resist the urge to stride out to find our foe. If it's a solitary bear, driven desperate by hunger, I think I can take it. I've killed trolls dozens of times. This will be no harder. Bears are just animals. They cannot regrow their flesh, and neither do they possess intelligence.

The footsteps are getting louder now. They're heavy, very heavy. Each step has two sounds to it: first the crunch of snow, then a thud, a compressing impact on the stony earth. I frown. Bears are meant to tread softly, I've read. They're ambush predators. Yet this creature doesn't seem to care who hears it.

So maybe it's not a predator then. I relax slightly, feeling somewhat disappointed. As soon as it sees us and our glinting steel weapons, it'll turn and flee.

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"Damn shame," I whisper.

"What?" asks Guthah.

"Nothing, nothing."

But its advance does not slow. Its heavy, earth-crushing tread continues. Hasn't noticed us yet then. I suppose this is no surprise, since I still can't see it either, and I doubt its ears are as good as mine.

Several minutes later, the sound is still gradually increasing. The thrill I felt when I first detected it returns. The beast is far off, yet its tread is starting to become deafening. My skull shivers with each step. It must be huge.

Definitely not a bear then. Something else, but what? I try to remember what I've read about northern beasts. Some are massive. I try to recall the plant-eaters that exist in this region, but Gutspiercer is starting to tremble again, and my amulet is warm against my chest, and I can't think properly.

“Look!” Guthah hisses. He points with his spear. “I can see something!”

I squint into the dark gray of the snow. There's a tall, pale shadow in it, moving toward us heavily, inexorably. It looks to be many times the height of a dwarf. It's no bear, that's for sure. Two lightish things are ahead of it, swinging side to side in time with its walk. Between them is something darker, swinging also, in a more flexible way.

"What the hell is that?" one of the fifth degrees says.

"A beast from the far north," says Erak. "Hold still. I think it's one of the plant-eaters. It should turn back."

I lick my lips and take a step forward, then another.

"Zathar?" says Guthah.

However big it is, it's no dragon. If I am to kill the dragon, then this beast can be no challenge. That's logical, I tell myself. I have to kill the dragon, I must kill the dragon, therefore I am capable of destroying any beast less powerful.

“Zathar!” Mulkath hisses. “Get back in line!”

I ignore him.

“Zathar!” Erak snaps. “Get back and that's an order!”

I hesitate for a moment.

"Get back!"

I stride out into the darkness, pick up speed, and now I'm sliding.

“I'll deal with this,” I shout back. “No need to bother yourselves.”

“He's lost it!” I hear Mulkath say, but find I don't really care.

"Raise the alarm!" yells Erak. "Everyone up! Up! Someone find Xomhyrk! Form a line of defence—a double one. I think that's a mammoth heading for us!”

A mammoth. What was that again? I've read about them, somewhere, I think. Just plant-eaters, nothing dangerous. Just big. What did they look like again?

Do they look like this thing stomping toward me? Like this beast with tusks twice the length of a pike, a nose like a snake, blunt teeth as capable of crushing bone as wood, thick mats of white fur, and bloodshot yellow eyes? They are meant to travel in herds. Why is this one alone? Fury is in its gaze, and despite all its fur, it's somehow lanky. Unhealthy. Hungry.

It raises its trunk and lets out a sound like a hundred brass trumpets. The noise deafens me—I slip and fall to my knees. I tear off my runic ears, throw them into the snow. When the sound ends, the pace of its advance has increased. The earth is trembling as if from the impact of falling, bouncing boulders, like those I wrote about in the poem across my armor.

It trumpets again. I raise Gutspiercer and yell back at it. Its full size becomes apparent. It's more than ten times the height of a dwarf at the shoulders, and far greater in bulk than even the biggest blindboar.

I laugh in its face:

“Come on, plant-eater! Be my prey!”

It's in range now—I pivot and slide to the right and swing into its leg.

Gutspiercer rebounds off. The force of the rebound sends me spinning into the snow. My arms have gone numb and my shoulders feel slightly torn. But the mammoth doesn't seem to feel anything. It keeps on charging toward our camp, where the thin line of armored figures isn't going to be enough to stop it.

The sensation I felt when Gutspiercer hit it was a familiar one, I realize with a chill. It is something I have written about many times—the feel of a heavy blow being turned by thick ice.

This is no mammoth. No beast of flesh. The great heat that has swept across this land has awoken ancient forces, powerful forces, but in their impotence against the dragon, they have gone mad with frustration, and now seek to do harm to whatever they judge to be weaker than them.

Or so I guess. Whatever this monster is, it's a terrible threat, and one no one has anticipated.

I charge after the elemental, screaming to my friends:

“It's ice! It's ice!”

But I don't think they can hear anything over the monster's tread and trumpeting. I see it swing its mighty head up to one side, then swing back down. Its tusks of white ice flash. Dwarves are sent flying—Guthah is one of them. His spear's silver runes trace a wild spiral through the dark air.

He's lucky, I realize. Its those caught under its tread that are sure to be killed.

“No!” I yell out, and continue my charge. In my haste to attack the creature, I wandered out far further than I intended. The camp is nearly a hundred yards distant still.

“No!” I scream again. “Come back here! Face me! Me!”

The elemental tosses its mighty head back and forth, tearing up the tents with its tusks. Runeknights scream in confusion, try to run. It tramples them. One shows courage; he turns and slashes up, but the monster's trunk is fast as a whip. It wraps around his chest. The dwarf screams. The trunk squeezes and the scream stops, then the monster lifts him and tosses him with terrible force—he's flying right at me—I yell and only just manage to avoid. The impact of his body sends a shudder through the earth and scatters snow up high. I glance back to see who it was.

I can't tell. His body has been crushed and mutilated. The exposed flesh looks cold, jagged, like it was frozen before it was smashed.

The elemental has the same power as my armor. Shit! I keep on sliding, pushing off hard to accelerate myself. This is terrible news. How can my runes, written by me who has only a poor sense of what ice truly is, stand up to a creature wrought of the very substance?

A group of Dragonslayers has formed up behind the beast. They charge it, hack into its leg. The elemental kicks back with full strength and batters two of them into the snow. Those still standing hack at it again, and it stomps, crushing one. The rest retreat.

They wield weapons of ice. What good will those do? None. Perhaps even Icemite will be powerless.

I'm nearly at the camp now. The elemental sweeps another group of dwarves with its tusks, scattering them across the snow. Everyone able to is backing away now, forming a circle around it, yet what good can that do? This isn't strategy, just fear.

I break into the circle, panting and wheezing.

“Stay back!” someone warns me. “Stay back! Xomhyrk will deal with it.”

“Where is he?” someone else shouts. “Where's Xomhryk?”

As if called, he appears, walking out from the other side of the circle, blue armor and weapon magnificent in the gray moonlight. The elemental, still tramping and tearing apart tents, seems to feel his presence. It turns, but already he's leapt—somehow leapt, with that secret I still don't understand—he's clinging to its side. Icemite glitters.

He plunges it in.

The elemental screeches, then whips around its trunk and tears him down, smashes him onto the ground, and rears up over him, heavy front feet poised to crush.