Rigi perches on my shoulder, sleeping his owlish sleep while I walk. Timberwall is three days behind me, now, and the Hinterlands are still more than a week ahead. I follow an old merchant track, little used and hard to follow at times, but it is leading me in roughly the right direction.

The weather has been miserable—a constant drizzling rain that obscures my vision and drenches my clothes, turns the track to mud and makes fires impossible. The last three nights have had me huddling beside a scrawny tree for shelter each night, sleeping fitfully when I sleep at all. I am tired, and irritable, and I resent Rigi’s ability to sleep through all of this.

I can feel his amusement even in his sleep, feel the little tickle at the back of my mind that is his mental laugh. Rigi doesn’t enjoy the rain, but he accepts it, and finds it a bit ridiculous that I can’t bring myself to do the same. It’s a fair point, but I can’t help feeling like it’s not fair. Which I realize really is a bit ridiculous.

The light begins to fail, though the rain does not, and I anticipate another night spent huddled beneath the meager shelter of a small tree’s branches. I feel tears prick my eyes and mingle with the rain on my cheeks. For the first time, I seriously consider turning around.

Maybe Oden was right: maybe this was all foolishness. I’m still just a child, really! How could I have imagined I could cross the Havens by myself, let alone find Hilda Deepsight and convince her to take me as an apprentice? What a silly, stupid, childish dream.

I could forswear the oath. I could turn around and return to Timberwall, with its warm fires and sturdy cabins, and I could stand before Oden and admit my foolishness, and I could say the words. I could forswear the oath.

And then I imagine Oden’s response. On the one hand, he would be glad I returned, glad I could finish my training with him, glad I could replace him as the village shaman. But as I imagine his eyes, his gaze as he looks at me…

The disappointment.

I realize that I’ve stopped walking, and Rigi stirs on my shoulder, curious about what’s causing my internal distress. I look behind me at the rain-swept wilderness I’ve traversed, imagining three more dismal days back to Timerwall. The thought of sheltered pallet next to a hearth fire is almost enough to draw me back right there.

But then I turn and look ahead, gaze down the road I’ve yet to walk.

The light is failing, but I swear there’s a structure up ahead. Shelter?

Thoughts of Timberwall and forsworn oaths and Oden’s disappointment are immediately forgotten. I hurry through the rain and the mud, stumbling when my footing slips, and as I draw closer I can see it truly is a shelter. It’s a small thing built against a hill, made of stacked stones, with a roof of sod supported by a few old wooden beams. I’ve heard of these—travelers’ waypoints, Oden called them.

When I finally stand before it I peer inside; it is unoccupied, so I crouch low and make my way in. The walls are imperfectly joined, and unmortared, so there are many holes through which the wind comes in, but I am blissfully grateful for the shelter. In the very back there is even some firewood, mostly dry, and for the first time in days I make a small, smoky fire.

The warmth from the fire feels incredible. I strip off my sodden clothes and set them around the fire, hoping they might dry off, and I curl myself up as close to the flames as I can bear. The light outside has faded now to night, and Rigi finally wakes up fully. I can feel his curiosity about the land around us, feel his hunger. He takes a few hops toward the door, spreads his wings, and flies into the night.

He will hunt, while I sleep. I wish him success as I drift off.

When I wake, I feel a moment of panic, wondering that I didn’t take any precautions against being found in the night by bandits, or worse. But the fact that I wake up at all suggests I was unmolested, and after quickly examining my pack I confirm that all is accounted for.

Rigi is nestled in the back of the shelter, a fur ball on the ground beside him with some mouse bones. I can sense his satisfaction with himself.

I peek out the door, hoping for better weather, but the rain continues. Still, a good night’s sleep has worked a minor miracle for me. I feel a renewed confidence in myself, and in my mission. I feel slightly embarrassed at the despair I’d felt the previous evening, and even wonder how I could ever have considered forswearing the oath. I would find Hilda, and I would---someday---master the secrets and the mysteries of these Ironlands.

The fire I’d made had burned out, of course, but it had lasted long enough to dry my clothes, and to keep me warm through the night. I dress, grateful for even just a few moments in dry clothes, before gathering my things and waking Rigi.

“Up,” I tell him. “Come on, it’s time to go.”

Rigi hoots once, indignantly, before hopping onto my arm and then walking up to my shoulder. I wince as his walk causes his talons to dig into the flesh of my upper arm, but once he settles in the pressure lessens.

I sling my pack over my other shoulder, and crouching, I make my way out of the shelter. The rain immediately greets me, chilly and constant, but my resolve has been hardened. I’m determined again. I will persevere.

I pat the stones of the shelter gently, gratefully, before turning my eyes toward the road.

I take a deep breath, and set out again.