With a silent mourn he moved his arching shoulders. A short glance at the cracks of the closed windows confirmed approaching dawn, though no light showed through the shutters. Laying awake he listened most of the night to Sanna's breathing and the soft pops of pine. The rest he'd spent feeding splits that burned hot but wasn't able to warm the air sufficiently.
"Too many times." Sanna answered to his small movements from below the sheet. She pressed her thumb from under her built cave of sheets against his bare back. "And it's still cold."
"Three splits since midnight." he answered. Eirik pulled on his shirt followed by thick wool socks before he slipped into his boots. "Same as before." He looked at the pile of blankets under which Sanna lay.
The leather of the boots were stiff. He worked his toes. Through the walls he noticed sounds—other households stirring, other fires being fed - again.
"Four for Taren's."
Their son appeared in the doorway. Wrapped in his wool blanket, breath showing white. "The walls are so cold."
"Come here. Why didn't you come earlier?" Sanna opened her arms.
Taren crawled into the bed between them. His fingers were stiff. She rubbed warmth back into his hands while humming.
Her grandmother had hummed the same tune when she was a child to make her feel warm and secure. Fifteen years back, that bad winter when snow came much too early.
"Listen." Eirik placed his palm against the cold wall. "Do you hear it?"
Sanna and Taren both hold their breath to listen. "No - nothing. Why?"
"Me too. No wind, no settling of the house."
Eirik knew which noises meant what after fifteen years in this house. Now he heard nothing.
"Like the cold comes from inside?"
"Smart boy." Sanna kissed his forehead. She removed some of her blankets. "Help me with the fire."
All three of them worked together. Added splits to the hearth. Watching the flames nagging on the new wood, burning bright and steady. Welcomed heat pushed outward.
Following that short period of relief, Eirik stepped to a outer wall and felt how the cold crept back to the room's edges.
He'd noticed it since three nights back. The fire burned normal, consumed wood at an expected rate - but the heat increasingly began to refuse to settle.
"Same as yesterday." he mused. Sanna stood close to the flames—closer than a week ago. "The Fire burns fine. We just need somehow more."
Taren blew into his cupped hands. "Will we have enough wood?"
Eirik and Sanna exchanged a glance over their son's head. The pause stretched. Long enough that Taren noticed.
"We always have enough," Sanna said. "Your father makes sure."
Outside he was welcomed by a kind of smog that lingered between houses that burned too much wood. Dark smoke rose from nearly every visible roof he could see. The scent of burned wood lay heavy over the yard.
Eirik counted chimneys by habit. Fifteen alone in the inner ring, all burning and contributing to the smog—no wind to push it anywhere.
"Three loads coal since dawn." Ardis stood at his forge, watching his iron cooling faster than it should. "The damned metal clangs to the cold as if willingly resisting my efforts..."
Normally three pumps brought the coals in his smithy to working temperature. Now it took him five or six. The orange glow started to creep through charcoal instead of spreading.
"Same at home." Eirik watched the smith work his bellows with unusual patience. "We needed three extra split minimum. I overheard some burning even more."
"Four loads at my mother's home." Osric approached from the inner ring. "She's been up feeding it four times alone this night."
Osric's mother had outlived two husbands but still worked her garden. Four nights feedings meant no sleep.
"Four times?" Eirik turned to study him.
Osric stopped and watched Ardis taking care of an other load of coal for the furnance. "I come straight from her. She's fighting the cold in her bones since three nights back. When the wind stopped."
Sanna came from their home, moving quickly through the cold. Eirik watched her walking to them. Not rushing, just avoiding stillness. "Lyrn says the wind's been wrong all week. Now it's stopped for the last three days."
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She gripped the water bucket in her hand, heading for the well. Her breath coming white in big clouds.
"Still air." Ardis pumped the bellows. The coals flared, then settled back. "Cold's got nowhere to go. So it stays where it is."
The village was built taking in natural windfalls for a good climate. Wind mixed temperatures, kept air from layering in winter and Summer. Without the wind, cold pooled now in yards and streets.
"That's just winter." But even as Eirik said it, he watched smoke rising straight from every chimney. Still air was one thing but this felt definitely different.
"Winter doesn't usually eat the heat before it hits the walls," Ardis said. "Cold's just... stubborn this time." he tried to convince him self.
Eirik shook his head. "It's just cold. We burn more wood. Simple math."
More wood burned meant less stored. Less stored meant harder choices when deep cold came—if it wasn't here already.
"Your maths better be good." Ardis set down his hammer. The metal was finally ready, but it'd cooled visibly fast. He had to work quicker between heats. "Because at this rate..."
He didn't finish.
Eirik stood at the wood stacks, running the calculations that bothered him already since two days again. Even burning two extra split per night and house hold meant a worrying change in calculation for their stock. Some houses seemed to burn three or four - an extra that meant a burden they did not count in.
If the pattern continued—they'd burn through a month of wood in two and a half weeks. That would overthrow their summer's preparation in just another 5-6 weeks.
He found himself walking to the smoke-shed. Inside the meat hung in rows, each row marked with household tags. At reduced portions, they had five and a half weeks. A concerning coincidence with their wood stock.
No word from the hunting teams on the south slope. The boundary situation had pushed them to less productive grounds. Even if they succeeded, they brought back results that were not as much as they needed them to be.
Leaning in a doorframe that separates the grain from the smoke section the hard truth was not longer to be ignored:
- Wood: usage higher than planned
- Meat: consumption already streamlined
- Hunting: compromised by boundary restrictions
- Weather: colder than expected
He pressed his hand against the smoke-shed door. Even through his glove, the wood felt colder than usual. Not quite frozen—the fires inside prevented that—but maybe they could start saving wood here first.
Back at the yard, he found Halek taking measurements at the well.
"The damn rope's slipping through the hands - stiff like ice," Halek grunted without greeting. "Harder to pull. We will have to help people getting it up."
Eirik looked down the well. "How's the fourth marker this morning?"
"Same lean as yesterday. No change in angle. But the distance..." Halek paused looking into the direction of the northern markers, choosing his words carefully. "Same state than yesterday. But the way feels longer."
Eirik nodded.
The hall slowly filled up as the evening fell. Week's end meant their traditional came together, no matter the seasons. The gatherings represent a tradition older than anyone could remember, carried forward over the generations even when times were harder than this.
Not a celebration—a gathering that gave everyone in the village a sense of stability in good times and especially in tense times like these. A few strips of cured meat together with hot broth, shared as a sign of community. The food itself was less important than the sense of community that went with it.
“Before we eat,” Brynja raised her voice, standing in the middle of the hall to officially begin the gathering, “let us celebrate that we have survived another week together. The cold has been testing us for a few days now. But we have overcome the challenge through teamwork and perseverance—just as we have overcome our challenges in the past.”
She slowly turned around, looking at the assembled families and residents. Many of those present showed concern, but also confidence and trust in the community.
“Let us begin our meal with one of our old songs about winter and the cold. Let us find warmth together in the familiar words of our ancestors.” She looked at Vardek expectantly. Leaning his back against a support beam, the old man began to sing an old song in his deep voice.
Osric's mother was the first to start humming along, and others joined in when they recognized the melody. Old words about the grip of winter and the promise of spring. About work that warmed the blood when fires couldn't warm the air.
Eirik noticed that he was singing along, even though he rarely sang. Next to him, Sanna moved closer with Taren, and her clear voice rose above the others. On his other side, Halek fell in slightly behind the beat, even when singing rather cautiously.
"Ice may creep and winds may still,
But hands together break its will.
Stone and timber, blood and bone,
None survive the cold alone."
While sitting on Sanna's lap Taren tried to follow the texts that he was still learning. Sensing the moment his eyes were bright - trying to fetch all the impressions and warmth of the gathered people at once.
Tapping away with his foot Taren followed the rythem of the song. Vardek's walking stick brought a steady guideline by beating the rhythm against the floor. Brynja's voice lead the community as it was second nature to her. Even Lyrn was caught and sang, his gate-keeper's rasp voice adding rough warmth to the chorus.
"Share the cup and share the load,
Warm the heart when hearth grows cold..."
Noticing a slight smile on the face of Vardek, Eirik tried to catch the reason. Closing his eyes himself he felt a small shift in temperature. Not dramatically— but something eased in between their shared song. Surprised he subdued a shiver, as the cold did not hold that distinct pressure it still had just a few moments ago.
"Well sung." Brynja raised her cup of thin ale. "Now we eat."
While the village ate together, the conversation remained quiet, but there was a palpable sense of relief after they had sung the old song to reaffirm their bond. The conversations were now filled with more positive topics—work completed, anniversaries, and plans for the coming week. No one mentioned the extra wood they had burned or the cold that had been banished from the hall since the song.
However, when they stepped back out into the night, Eirik immediately felt the difference. The comfortable warmth of the hall—the cozy feeling they had built up with their song and their shared meal—disappeared. The cold outside now seemed even hungrier and even less willing to bow to attempts at human warmth.
“Then we'll do it again next weekend,” said Vardek contentedly, stepping up beside him. He pulled his coat tighter around himself, gave Eirik and his family a friendly smile, and then set off toward his little house.
Eirik was still standing in the courtyard long after the others had disappeared into their houses. He watched as smoke rose from almost every chimney again. The small embers had been rekindled by the families returning home.
His gaze wandered to the individual woodpiles. Despite the good time they had had together that evening, he was overcome by a gloomy feeling that they would not be enough.
Behind him, Sanna called softly from the door, “Are you coming?”
He forced his gaze toward his wife and banished the feelings. He stepped over to her own pile of wood and picked up a few logs. Their own fire also had to be rekindled before bedtime.
“I'm coming,” he said.