The clock struck mid­night. It rang flat in the dark­ened cot­tage. Aton­al, shock­ing­ly loud in the still night.

On the fourth strike, some­thing stirred. In a nest of woolens, curled close to the dark and fire­less hearth, Leif lurched aright. Eyes shut, he lis­tened until the twelfth strike. 

It came, soft and weak. Bare­ly a dying knock of ham­mer against bell. There was a slith­er as the chain wound out, clunked its weight to the clock-case’s bot­tom. The pen­du­lum slowed, quit, ceased its tick­ing. All was still, silent.

Leif rolled upright, stag­gered, clutched for his woolen cloak. He fum­bled the clasp, pulled it snug round shoul­ders mound­ed with coat and scarves. With shak­ing, gloved hands, he pulled one scarf over red cheeks. White breath slipped through the knit, shon dul­ly in moon­light cast through the cot­tage door’s small, snow-caked win­dow­panes bleed­ing frigid moon­light.

He tot­tered to the door. Neath the panes, a horse­shoe had been nailed. Leif touched the iron, breath­ing long, then, with his oth­er hand, gripped the draw­bolt. He with­drew it slow from the jamb. Hinges scraped. Leif drew them open and gasped at the cold.

Beyond lay a stark domain. A plain of drift­ed pow­der, thick with rimed spruce and the bones of naked birch­es. A white for­est awash with lumi­nous, metal­lic fog and domed by stars and yawn­ing black. All still. All silent.

Leif stepped out onto the snow. It creaked and keened neath his boots, inch­es deep. He did not shut the cot­tage door, nor look back at all. His grey eyes, blink­ing fast to ward off the cold, fixed clear ahead. He walked.

The way was path­less, obfus­cat­ed by fog and blank snow. Leif car­ried on. His gaze wavered not at all, not even to his shuf­fling feet. He hes­i­tat­ed, shirked only for sharp licks of wind, like white, lash­ing tongues in the mist. Despite, he trudged onward, drug troughs through the snow with tired legs.

He con­tin­ued like this for a mile or more, deep into the wood. The birch­es here were long mass­es of many sil­ver trunks. The spruces, great walls of snow and black nee­dles. In alcoves midst their bows, unlit by moon­light, there glit­tered droplets of eyes. Sway­ing dots in black, reflect­ing stars, blink­ing and star­ing. Leif did not meet them. Whis­pers, bare­ly sep­a­rate from the wind, met his ears. Leif did not reply to them. He only walked.

Ahead, a fork­ing, black rift showed in the white wood: The knuck­led, titan bole of an old oak, so dark against the snow as to seem an exten­sion of the night sky. Leif approached it, step­ping over its high skirt of roots. A branch creaked over his head. Snow drib­bled on and around him. Leif flinched. He breathed fast, shal­low, but paid no heed to the shak­ing boughs, to the rustling of feet over rimey bark.

He stepped upon the broad oak-feet, touched the inch-deep knurls of bark. Round he went, over the knob­by roots, search­ing the sur­face. Half around, he found it: A knot­hole, high as his head. He avert­ed his gaze from it, hasty, instead put an ear to the dark inte­ri­or. There he lis­tened, shiv­er­ing, eyes tight shut. Where it touched the icy bark, his flesh turned raw pink. A shiv­er wracked him; tra­versed first from clench­ing jaw, then down the back.

“Walk.”

Leif tore his ear from the knot­hole, from the susurrant voice. He stum­bled fast from the snowy roots, eyes wide and avert­ed in fear.

He walked. Back into the for­est with deliri­ous fer­vor. Trudg­ing, eyes fixed ahead and unfo­cused into bit­ing fog. A ragged trough of snow trailed behind him, more crooked with every step. Beside, as if on a road, many trails accom­pa­nied his own. Dozens of sets of foot­prints, care­ful­ly picked. Prints left by quick steps, by feet lift­ed clear and nim­ble over deep pow­der. Their mak­ers were heard by Leif as snow rustling in the fog, unseen.

Twice more, Leif vis­it­ed great oaks. Giants in the wood. Twice more, with def­er­en­tial gaze, he found their knot­holes and lis­tened. At each, he shud­dered. Only at the last did that shud­der come with a nod and a chap-lipped sigh of relief.

He crept from the last oak back to the path carved through white woods. Foot­prints appeared about him in scores, as if plant­ed by the fog as it eddied and swirled.

From some far angle ahead, a fig­ure showed in the fog. See­ing it, Leif star­tled, avert­ed his gaze abrupt­ly, buck­led at the knees. He com­posed him­self, and, cau­tious, eyes tear­ing, caught it in the bare periph­ery of his down­turned gaze. It was a mere walk­er like he, thin ankles churn­ing snow neath a tar­tan coat and a bob­bing wrap of fur. A human woman.

A vaporous heave of relief blew through Leif’s scarf. He con­tin­ued, sped slight­ly to pull ahead and walk aside her.

They walked in silence. Sol­i­dar­i­ty, with­out acknowl­edge­ment or even gaze. Beside, Leif could hear her heave and pant, breath dry and raw in lungs pierced by cold. She shiv­ered, teeth click­ing, hard­er than even he. Still, she walked.

As they went even deep­er into the wood, a deep­er pall of fog descend­ed. With it, dead­ly cold. Leif’s jaw had now seized, for all its shiv­er­ing. He now shook, shoul­ders and arms and spine, employed gri­mac­ing effort to fix his eyes ahead.

Whis­pers grew in the fog. Sibi­lant and calm; con­ver­sant. Quick to switch from one ear to the next. Star­tling­ly close, often­times. Leif jerked, as if sup­press­ing a reel­ing jerk of the head. Beside him, his fel­low walk­er groaned, clutched her ears. Clum­sy, with­out eyes to aim, Leif placed a hand upon one fur wrapped shoul­der. Under that cau­tion­ary touch, she quit.

Out of the dis­tance, some­thing loomed. The trees had bro­ken way, cleared to yield the banked slope and stand­ing stones of a great henge. Stones, broad as a large man’s height and twice again as tall, stood like ver­ti­cal spokes in some great drum. Between them all stood a dol­men, like a giant, crooked table. Dark, but queer­ly shad­ow­less in the radi­ant snow and fog. The walk­ers passed between them, and, with stag­ger­ing step, began to cir­cle.

Thrice, they cir­cled with­in, wore deep paths in the drifts piled round each stone. With each pass, more foot­prints appeared aside, their mak­ers invis­i­ble some­where in misty tow. Nei­ther walk­er dare looked for their source.

At the final cir­cle’s end, they stopped. Leif stag­gered to the near­est stand­ing stone. He sat, crashed into the soft snow at its base. His eyes shut imme­di­ate­ly, head lolling into lay­ers of snow-caked scarves. Beside, his tar­taned com­pan­ion dropped, too. Worn down, they slept.

Leif woke to warmth and light. He star­tled, cracked rime-frost­ed eyes to a squint. A wood­en bowl of fire lay before him, its heat liq­uid and tempt­ing. Eager­ly, he grabbed for it, let the heat wash frost from his face. He then paused, as if struck by thought. Shiv­er­ing, he looked up, cau­tious.

In the snow, there were gath­ered folk in white. They sat against the inte­ri­or of the stones, like Leif, warm­ing wiry hands over bowls of fire. Del­i­cate faces black eyes, shin­ing, ensconced in deep hoods sewn from cloth white and vaporous as the fog. Where they end­ed and the snow and mist began, there was no divi­sion. They spoke gen­tly, indis­tinct­ly, oft gig­gling short and wicked­ly. Some danced round the tow­er­ing dol­men, half-hid­den, cloaks and soft, cloth shoes whip­ping whirls from the mist. None shiv­ered, though their breath showed frozen in the air. All sound­ed queer­ly dis­tant, despite their prox­im­i­ty.

Leif hur­ried­ly avert­ed his eyes, looked instead to the bowl before him. Smoul­der­ing spruce cones and hard­wood chips. He held it wel­come­ly, basked in the smoke, though it bit his red­dened eyes.

Beside Leif, with­in earshot, his fel­low walk­er could be heard awak­en­ing, shiv­er­ing abrupt­ly into con­scious­ness.

Furtive, Leif snuck a glance to her, found that she had scram­bled to sit aright, looked open­ly upon the white folk. Fear and fas­ci­na­tion showed in her wide eyes and frost-nipped fea­tures.

“What are they say­ing?” said the walk­er, hoarse. She turned to Leif. He flinched, shook his head hur­ried­ly in response, kept his gaze care­ful­ly avert­ed.

“Please, Mas­ters. I have come so far. What are you say­ing?” she called, loud.

Round the stones, the pale folk flinched, turned large, white­less eyes on the woman. An offend­ed silence passed. Leif held his breath, sup­pressed shiv­ers.

One, a wil­lowy man, leaned about, whis­pered to his fel­lows. His eyes crin­kled in a smile. Quick, sud­den­ly, he stood, unfurled from the snow. He plucked up a bowl of fire, approached the woman, step­ping light through the deep pow­der, almost skip­ping.

Leif, despite his trem­bling, stole a covert view. He watched the crea­ture draw near, lead­ing with his fire. Gen­tly, with smil­ing eyes, he prof­fered it to the woman. “Come,” he said soft­ly, long­ly accent­ed, extend­ed his oth­er hand in wel­come. “You are so curi­ous, so cold.”

Unsure, the woman in tar­tan accept­ed, held the flame close to her chest. “Thank you,” she mum­bled, eyes flick­ing down, as if embar­rassed.

The crea­ture still offered his hand. “Come, come.” 

Hes­i­tant, trem­bling with cold, the walk­er tilt­ed her head, met the cor­dial, black eyes. She took the hand.

Leif watched them cross to the dol­men, hand in hand. Then, stop. Smil­ing-eyes motioned into the inte­ri­or, looked to the woman. “Pass through. Your walk will be end­ed.”

Once more, they met eyes. “Go,” said he. “You have come so far.”

The woman in tar­tan welled tears of relief. “Thank you,” she said, dashed through the dol­men.

She did not emerge from the oth­er side. The crea­ture with the smil­ing eyes let cry a peal of delight. The oth­ers did, to, odd­ly soft in the mist. Leif shook, curled round his flame with eyes screwed shut.

Abrupt­ly, the älves stopped. Silence came. Utter, save for whirling licks of winds and the pat­ter of new snow begun to fall. Leif sat, curled for the heat, and the stars turned above him.

When final­ly he dared open his eyes, the henge was emp­ty. The älves had gone, leav­ing noth­ing but prints already half filled-in, and the wood­en, burnt-out fire­bowl fall­en from numb hands. Leif sighed shud­der­ing­ly, frozen, rose to stand, limbs creak­ing. As he did, he paused.

Before him, sat upright in the star­lit snow, was an acorn. Glossy and plump. Placed with pur­pose. Leif loosed a weird, halt­ing chuck­le of dis­be­lief.

He plucked up the lit­tle gift, held it safe all the long walk home.

Year Walk

On mid­win­ter’s eve, the folk of Fir­lund’s cold ances­tral province of Awn prac­tice a har­row­ing tra­di­tion. A rit­u­al known as the year walk, by which par­tic­i­pants seek to gain favor with or knowl­edge from the Oth­er.

Walk­ers, as they are known, rarely embark more than once in their lives. Many nev­er do so in the first place, such is the per­il of the rit­u­al. Those who do walk do so soon after they come of age, or soon after a crit­i­cal life event. In any case, it is not under­tak­en light­ly, for many year walk­ers nev­er return.

The year walk is a rit­u­al with many imper­a­tive pre­scrip­tions. Each must be fol­lowed close­ly, lets dis­as­ter fall upon the walk­er.

Those who would walk must pre­pare. They must plan to walk only at mid­win­ter, a sig­nif­i­cant time to super­sti­tious North­ern­ers, who usu­al­ly devote the hol­i­day to feast­ing and cel­e­bra­tion. They must spend the entire­ty of the eve in soli­tude. Alone, in a cot­tage in a deep for­est con­tain­ing a faerie henge. There, they must stay up through­out the night, sans food, light, or fire of any kind. The best they are afford­ed is a clock, by which to warn of the turn of mid­night.

At the clock­’s twelfth strike, they must depart. Into the night, regard­less of cold and snow, the walk begins. On their way, it is imper­a­tive the walk­er nei­ther speak, look back, nor stray over-far from a deci­sive line. To do so is said to be risky in the extreme, as, on mid­win­ter’s ear­ly morn, the Oth­er­world looms close, and any way­ward act or word may draw atten­tion of a fear­ful sort. That, or risk the walk­er’s slip­page from the world. 

Any crea­tures seen, even fel­low walk­ers, should nei­ther be looked at or addressed. This is imper­a­tive, for many crea­tures of the Oth­er are revealed at mid­win­ter, and many are apt to lure and pre­date walk­ers in their domain. They must be ignored and avoid­ed. Like­wise, walk­ers must avoid con­tact with each oth­er upon set­ting out, though they may walk com­pan­ion­ably if encoun­tered by chance in the for­est, so long as they do noth­ing else.

With these cau­tions in mind, a year walk­er must locate three oak trees and lis­ten at their knot­holes. Such trees belong to the Oth­er, though they exist in both worlds. They are home to älves.

The words with­in oaks, should they be encour­ag­ing, indi­cate that the walk­er must con­tin­ue. Should they be oth­er­wise, this is an ill omen, indica­tive of a mis­take made ear­li­er in the walk. In this case, a walk­er must turn back at once, and pray their dis­cre­tion be not their undo­ing.

By this time, like­ly after hours of walk­ing, many fail. Whether by hypother­mia or fell design, none can say, as for­est skele­tons are usu­al­ly encoun­tered far too late to ever tell.

By the guid­ance of three oaks, the walk­er must con­tin­ue to a henge. A ring of stand­ing stones, build atop a hill or a built up embank­ment. Rare is a for­est or stretch of North­ern coun­try­side with­out one. Large or small, most often con­struct­ed round dol­mens, round gates of stone, they are numer­ous, and they are rit­u­al grounds not to mankind, but to älves.

Though the walk­er may not know, they will sure­ly be in com­pa­ny in their walk to the henge. The pale älves will be walk­ing along­side, in their own jour­ney to inscrutable mid­win­ter fes­tiv­i­ties. In snow­fall or the frozen mist of tru­ly cold lands, they go unseen. It is imper­a­tive a walk­er not dis­turb any of them.

At the henge, no rit­u­al pre­scrip­tion for a year walk­er is giv­en, save one word of advice: The walk­er must mere­ly attend, with eyes avert­ed. They may take only if gift­ed, and speak only if spo­ken to, which älves are unlike­ly to do. To walk among them on mid­win­ter is a priv­i­lege earned, and few earn friend­ship worth more than dif­fer­en­tial pres­ence. Only those who have shown par­tic­u­lar respect are bid to watch.

What is heard or seen at the älves’ cel­e­bra­tion may be rev­e­la­to­ry; wis­dom for the com­ing year. It may be ter­ri­ble, so fear-induc­ing as to cause a walk­er to flee. Many walk­ers, come this time, sim­ply van­ish, for flight or fool­ish atten­tion is apt to earn glee­ful, unescapable wrath. 

Those who attend with the älves in respect are paid a gift. Often, the respect­ful, watch­ful eye of local älves dur­ing years to come, a favor which may spare no end of suf­fer­ing, for the action of friend­ly älves is pow­er­ful indeed.

In sto­ries, this gift comes in the form of an acorn, a mark of respect. When nur­tured and plant­ed, these acorns grow to become the finest of guardians, for those who live beneath them always know the pro­tec­tion of neigh­bor­ing älves. A man or woman who year walks and pro­cures an älfin acorn for their fam­i­ly’s prop­er­ty is a per­son of respect, an elder for gen­er­a­tions to come.

With gift acquired, a year walk­er’s tri­al is near­ly at an end. If their har­row­ing under­tak­ing has thus far suc­ceed­ed, lit­tle chance of fail­ure may remain, for the worst is behind. Often, when a year walk­er returns home, frozen to the bone, but wis­er for it, a new year’s sun has just begun to dawn.

Why or when the folk of Awn began to year walk, none can say. Nor can any say why the älves demand it in exchange for their great­est favor. Some say it is mere­ly a symp­tom of their cru­el, capri­cious nature; a seem­ing­ly-dig­ni­fied game pro­posed to humans that älves may watch in amuse­ment. Oth­ers say it is an rit­u­al wil­ful­ly begun by wise humans. An aus­ter­i­ty, under­tak­en in respect and apol­o­gy for the ways of their broad­er, cru­el­er kind. A peace offer­ing, deliv­ered over gen­er­a­tions in an attempt to undo the crimes of whose who raze oaks and put cru­el, burn­ing iron to the chil­dren of the Oth­er.

Whether one or both are true, none can say, for the first year walk­ers are mil­lenia dead, and the älves give no indi­ca­tion of telling. This way, unknow­ably, it will con­tin­ue, and the young and the will­ful of Awn will walk every year for futures for­ev­er hence.

Author’s Note

Request­ed by Semi Urge, who desired lore about those in sol­i­dar­i­ty with the Oth­er, rather than in oppo­si­tion to it. It’s been a long time in com­ing, and turned out way longer than intend­ed.