Mercedes Lackey - Snow Queen

The pot simmering over the fire this late-Autumn afternoon breathed forth a savory aroma, and the bread just pulled from the oven built into the side of the fireplace added its scent to that of the soup. But there was only one wooden bowl and one carved spoon laid out on the table, for her son Veikko had gone in the Spring to seek his Teacher.

Their people, the Sammi, did not have a King; they were one of the few lands that did not. Towns rarely housed more than a thousand people, and villages were much smaller. Half the population tended the migrating reindeer herds, which made it difficult to have a settled life. In Winter, the deer were always on the move, foraging for food as they traced paths through the trackless wilderness. Only in Summer could these folk settle, as their herds settled to graze on lush meadows and drop their calves.

Life moved at the pace of the land here, not the pace of man. As their fathers and their father's fathers had done, so did the people here. In Spring, the reindeer herds returned, to join the sheep and goats at their grazing, and with them, the herders. It was a slow life, but hardly a dull one. Those Bears, wolves and uncanny things found deer and man equally tasty; the storms of Winter could be unpredictable and equally deadly. In other lands, not one person in a hundred had to contend with the kinds of dangers that faced the Sammi every day. And in other lands, a child would probably have been forced into the paths of his or her parents. But not here.

And Annukka would not have had things any other way. Even if our ways have sent my son far from home.

Tradition was not so important here as being good at what you did. Sometimes Annukka wondered if that had to do with need, or with the fact that there was no single ruler here and no ruling hierarchy. With no king, and no order of landowning nobility beneath him, there was no one to answer to except to one's own neighbors, who were not likely to take “because I said so” as an appropriate answer.

She smiled at that thought. We are a stubborn people, we Sammi. A King would have a hard time with us.

Whatever the cause was, when a child came of age, his or her runes were cast, and it was those runes that predicted the future for that child. Not what was to happen, but what he was to become.

There was, for instance, the rune of the Herder, which meant you would tend domestic animals of one sort or another. There was Hunter, of course, which was self-explanatory, and Home, which meant you would do well with all possible domestic skills. Those marked with Healing were very much sought after, as were those of the Forge. There was the Salmon for Fishing, the rare rune of Fellowship — which meant the skill to lead people. More common than Forge was Craft for the smaller handicrafts, and Wood for the hewers and shapers. Rarer than Fellowship was Singer, which covered not only the making of music, but the composing of it, and the ability to play one or many instruments. Last of all were two that were seldom seen in these parts, Warrior and Mage.

The boys and girls whose runes had been cast to follow the deer — the Herding rune with the Wanderer — took over the work of watching, tending, doctoring and milking them, under the direction of the adults. When the last of the frost left the fields, they were sown by those whose runes had marked them forever with the Plough.

For in the land of the Sammi, the man did not choose the occupation, the occupation chose the man. And at twelve, based on one's runes, the child took its first steps into the adult world.

Annukka smiled again to think of her son. Never had she seen a boy more confident than he was at that age. The runes had not surprised him; it was as if he had known from the time he was born what they would say, and he greeted the reading with a laugh and a nod.

She passed her hand over the cloth already woven, to make sure the weft was consistent, and felt the tiny tingle of the magic there.

It was possible to get mixed runes, of course; that was considered very, very lucky. All runestones had a blank side and an inscribed side, and it was theoretically possible for all of them to turn up inscribed, though Annukka had never, ever heard of that happening. Usually, not more than one or two showed their faces in a given reading. Three was highly unusual. Four, almost unheard of.

Annukka was a mixed-rune child, of Hearth, Craft and Mage, although the Wise Woman who had cast them only whispered that third into her parents' ears, and Annukka had not known, until the woman returned to teach her the Mage skills two years later, that she had been so marked. The Mage rune meant that she had the power, the ability, to do much more than the little domestic magics that all women could do. She had been schooled in some of the greater ones, magics that would permit her to do extraordinary things.

She had used them no more than once or twice a year in her youth — only when the need was very great indeed. Even now, she did not much use the magic except in small things like her weaving, as the Wise Woman had taught her; the use of it could attract some evil to the user, and by extension, to her people. And so she had never become even so much as a Wise Woman, much less one of the Wizardly kind.

Veikko had also gotten mixed runes, Warrior and Mage. Most boys at twelve would have practically turned themselves inside out to get such runes. He had been calm — so calm! Happy, yes, even content. But also calm and sure. But there were no teachers for either the path of the Warrior or that of the Magician in so small a village — oh, everyone could use weapons, but not with the skill that could be attained by one so rune-marked. And as for Magic — how was she to teach the hard path of the Magic? She only knew the earth-ways, not the Iron-ways. Accordingly, he had waited until he was a fairly skilled warrior by village standards, then went in search of a Warrior Magician to teach him. For that, too, was the way of the Sammi; if a teacher did not come to you, it was up to you to find the teacher. Perhaps so many generations of following the reindeer herds had made them more willing to go great distances in order to obtain a desired goal.

He had left behind not only his mother, but his sweetheart, Kaari — Kaari, the darling of the village, Kaari of the sweet voice and gentle hand, with hair like spun sunlight and the face of a flower. Their parting had been a reluctant one; Veikko would much rather that a teacher had come to him. Annukka loved the girl almost as much as her son did, and would gladly have had her living in the house as a daughter. But Kaari would not hear of it, refused to displace Annukka from the place she had held for so long. “When Veikko returns, we will have a house of our own,” she said with quiet certainty. “I will never displace you, Mother Annukka. This will always be your place.”

Truth to tell, that had pleased Annukka. She had not been looking forward to giving up her room and the big bed to Veikko and Kaari, of having to climb that ladder to the loft every night, nor to eventually having to lose the peace of her working to the wails of babies and the mischief of toddlers. She had made the offer twice more after Veikko left, and had been twice refused with the same gentle courtesy. That made it final by Sammi custom. And so Kaari remained in her father's house — though Annukka did not stint on gifts of her own making for the bride-chest. This cloak, for instance, was intended for Kaari, and besides protection, Annukka was weaving in a wealth of love.

She brushed her hand over the warp-threads and listened to the whisper, like the ghost of a harp-thrum. She gathered to herself the warmth of the sun on her back, the memory of this golden afternoon, and wove that, too, into her cloth.