Years passed in the rhythm of the seasons, each one carving deeper lines into Tor’s face and hands. The boy who had once scraped marrow from wolf-killed bones with trembling fingers was gone. In his place stood the “Spear-Singer,” a man whose name was spoken in low voices around every fire from the steaming valley to the distant birch groves where other bands wintered. His hair, once dark and matted with soot, was now streaked with silver at the temples and bound with thin strips of dyed sinew.
