Embers of fire help us get through the cold winter

Tora was the first to wake up.

The hearth in the longhouse burned throughout the entire polar night, and the fur in the corner remained warm. She opened her eyes, lay flat on the straw mat, and listened to the unusual silence beyond the wooden beams above her head.

The wind stopped.

The wind, which had howled and roared all winter, pounding snow against the wooden walls like handfuls of fine sand, was now silent. Tora pulled off the sheepskin covering her, stepped barefoot across the cold ground, and pushed open the wooden door that had been sealed off by the cold all season, only briefly opened when gathering firewood.

The world beyond the threshold was still dark. The outline of the mountain ridge on the opposite side of the fjord broke free from the darkness, its edges edged with a thin, cold white light.

Tora stood by the threshold, staring at the thin beam of light, motionless.

Ragnar was awakened by the beam of light. He rubbed his eyes, got up from beside his mother, followed his sister's back, stood behind her, and looked out in the direction of her gaze.

The ray of light at the edge of the ridge was widening. The light transitioned from cool white to pale gold, and then from pale gold to a very faint orange-red. The texture of the rocks on the ridge emerged in this thin layer of light, each fold casting a long, thin shadow.

The sun rose from the gap at the highest point of the mountain ridge.

It was just a thin, bright golden rim, like someone had used a sharp knife to slice a narrow gash in the gray-blue sky. The light flowed out, down the mountainside, onto the snow halfway up the mountain, where the snow shone for a moment; onto the still-frozen ice of the fjord, where the ice surface shimmered with a layer of fine, diamond-like sparkles; onto the bottoms of the boats hulled on their supports by the dock, where the old moss on the hulls was illuminated with a wet, bluish-green light.

That golden rim lasted perhaps only a few breaths. Then, the sun slipped below the edge of the gap and sank behind the ridge. The golden rim narrowed into a line, then into a thin filament, and finally disappeared completely. The sky faded back to grayish-blue, the outline of the ridge blurred again, and the sparks on the ice went out simultaneously.

Tora then let out a long breath, the white mist dissipating around her lips.

"The sun," she said.

Ragnar did not respond. He was still looking at the ridge that had just been lit up and was now darkening again.

Footsteps sounded behind me. It was my father.

Haral stood behind the two children, looking down at the southern mountain ridge with them.

The morning light had faded, leaving only a faint, almost indistinguishable gray-white line on the horizon, like the watermark left on the beach after the tide has receded.

"Tomorrow," Harald said, "it will be a little higher."

Tora turned her head and looked up at her father: "Is it high enough to shine into the fjord?"

"Yes," Harald paused, "it will take some time. But it's possible."

Tora was satisfied. She glanced at the ridge again, then lowered her head and began to intently pick at a splinter sticking out of the door frame.

Ragnar remained standing. He watched his father turn and walk back into the depths of the longhouse, his figure disappearing into the warm light of the fire pit. He heard the soft clinking of earthenware pots as his mother began preparing breakfast, the rustling of his uncle Brody sharpening his axe in the corner, and Tora's satisfied "hmm" after finally prying the splinter off.

He turned around and looked out the door again.

The ice over the fjord was still there, thick, pale, and intact. The snow on the dock hadn't melted, nor had it covered the woodpile. The air was still sharp and cold, stinging the nasal passages. Everything that belonged to winter remained in place, unmoved and unyielding.

Only that arc of gold that flashed and then went out proved that something had already changed direction in an unseen place.

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Every day, the sun lingers a little longer in the gap on the mountain ridge. On the first day, it only reveals a golden rim, like a fingertip testing the water temperature; on the second day, the golden rim widens, revealing the jagged edges—the silhouette of the distant mountains; on the third day, half a disc squeezes out from the gap, dyeing the entire eastern fjord wall a pale orange.

Every morning, Tora stands punctually on the doorstep, as if waiting for some promise. She doesn't speak, but simply looks up, watching the light slowly rise from behind the mountain, climbing higher and higher in the sky. When the sunlight shines on her face, she closes her eyes, letting the warmth linger on the back of her hands, her forehead, and the tip of her nose for a long time.

Ragnar stood with her. He noticed that his sister's shadow was getting shorter each day.

On the morning of the fifth day, Ragnar was awakened by a noise.

It was a sound I had never heard before, a fine and dense one, like someone in the distance pouring basket after basket of dried beans, or like the tiny, barely boiling bubbles at the bottom of the porridge pot when my mother was stirring it with a wooden spoon.

He walked to the door, wearing a sheepskin.

Sunlight was pouring in through the gap. No longer the stingy light of the past few days, but a broad waterfall of light cascading down the ridge, immersing half the fjord in a pale golden glaze. The wooden piles of the dock, the keel of the shipwreck, and the rooftops in the distance still covered in snow—every silhouette cast a clear, long shadow.

Icicles that had hung from the eaves all winter were now dripping their first drop of water from their tips. The droplet struggled to grow and stretch at the end of the icicle, becoming a very thin silver thread that shimmered in the sunlight before landing on the stone slab outside the threshold, leaving a dark dot the size of a fingernail.

Then came the second one, and the third one.

She reached out and caught one. The water droplet burst open in her palm. Cool, transparent, and clean. She turned her palm over and watched the puddle of water slowly thin in the sunlight, its edges reflecting tiny golden fragments.

Ragnar looked up.

On the woodpile, the snow, which had been packed tightly together all winter, began to collapse at the edges, turning into fine streaks of water that crawled down the grain of the wood and converged into a thin black line at the bottom of the woodpile.

Further away, a different sound came from the direction of the stream. The cracking sound of thin ice breaking was like biting into a frozen hawthorn. A small stream of black water struggled out of the crack in the ice, twisting and meandering, drawing the first curved ink mark on the pure white frozen earth.

Tora suddenly ran out.

She stepped barefoot across the black mud outside the threshold, soaked by dripping water from the eaves. Her toes sank in, and mud squeezed out from between them. She looked down at the black mud slowly spreading over the back of her feet, as if witnessing some miracle.

Then she turned around and grinned at Ragnar, who was standing by the threshold.

Mud splattered on her calves and the hem of her fur coat. The sun shone on her golden-red hair, bathing the fine strands in a translucent white light. She said nothing, only smiled, and stomped her foot forcefully in that small patch of melted black mud.

Mud splashed up, drawing a thin arc in the air before landing in the sunlight, shimmering like scattered gold.

From deep within the longhouse came a mother's voice, calling the children back for breakfast. Smoke rose from the roof vents, ascending straight into the crisp air, until it reached the ever-widening expanse of pale golden light.

At the end of the polar night, the first thing the men usually do is check the boats, inspecting those that have been sitting on scaffolds all winter, checking for cracks in the hulls, rat gnaws on the sails, and insect damage to the oars. But Harald didn't head to the dock at this moment. He walked along the pier to the end, squatted down, and brushed away the remaining snow on the shore.

His palms were pressed against the ground.

He pressed the heel of his palm against the damp, black soil where the snow had just emerged, leaning forward and pressing his entire weight onto it. He closed his eyes, as if listening to something. Then he stood up, walked along the edge of the field, took a few steps, squatted down, pressed again, and listened again.

Ragnar followed.

He didn't understand what his father was doing, but he saw that the edges of his father's palms were covered in mud, and tiny pebbles were embedded in his fingernails. Those were different hands from his sister's—those hands were measuring, probing, asking the earth a question that only the earth could answer.

"It's too wet," Harald suddenly muttered to himself.

He stood up, his gaze passing over the field still buried under the remaining snow, and looking towards the faint gray-white beyond the fjord.

"Let the land catch its breath a few more times."

"How did you know?" Ragnar suddenly interrupted Harald's thoughts.

Why is the soil so wet?

"Feel it with your hands." Harald squatted down and looked at him.

"You experienced it, and then what?"

"And then I found out."

Ragnar thought for a moment, "But how did you know?"

Haral looked into his son's eyes and paused for a long time.

"Go and experience it for yourself, dry or wet, try it a hundred times, and you'll know."

"One hundred times."

"Your grandfather taught me, he taught me a hundred times," Harald began grinding again. "These things can't be explained, you can only do them."

Ragnar was silent for a moment, then nodded.

He squatted down and placed his palm on the patch of black soil where his father had just pressed.

It's cool, wet, and a little sticky.

He didn't know if this counted as "feeling" it. He couldn't tell.

He stood up, patted the mud off his hands, and followed his father back home.

In the evening, Olaf peeled the last leaf of cabbage from his hand and put it into the soup pot. Tora sat by the fire pit, her feet already washed clean, but she would occasionally look down at the back of her feet, as if to make sure the mud was really washed away. Ragnar sat next to his mother, sipping the meat soup mixed with bits of cabbage leaves.

Harald put down the wooden bowl and wiped his mouth.

"In three more days."

Olaf stacked the empty bowls and gave a soft "hmm".

Ragnar didn't know what they were talking about. But he remembered the way his father's palms pressed against the ground, and the light in his mother's eyes.

Outside the window, the southern sky darkened again.

The cracking sound of ice continued. It was fine and continuous, like someone very, very far away, tapping very lightly on the windows of the longhouse.