He didn’t like that thought and pushed it away.

His da appeared by his side.

‘You like this girl, don’t you?’

‘I do,’ Drem muttered, only admitting the thought to himself at the same time as he did to his da. At that internal and external confession he felt a rush of fear and dread at what might have happened to her. The thought of life without her sky-blue eyes and freckles.

‘We’d best be getting after her, then,’ Olin said.

Drem nodded.

‘Why’s the bear taken her?’ Olin muttered.

‘Bears do that, take their kill to a den where they can eat in peace,’ Drem said. ‘The white bear did it with our elk, remember?’ He thought his da was being kindly, telling him that, even though they both knew that Fritha, despite not being here, was most likely dead.

‘Why did it leave Hask and the hound?’ Olin muttered, quieter, more to himself than to Drem.

For the first time in his life Drem didn’t want to ask questions. He felt frantic with worry for Fritha, desperate to find or avenge her.

‘Now’s the time to hunt, Da,’ Drem said.

Olin looked up at him and nodded.

Drem sat silently upon his mount, snowflakes falling steadily about him, gusts of wind catching and swirling them into twisting, spiralling patterns, like a kaleidoscope of white butterflies. His da was beside him, Hildith and Ulf just ahead.

We are wasting time. Let’s get on with it, Drem thought, knuckles white as he gripped his reins.

Ulf raised a horn to his lips and gave a great, ringing blast. Hounds were released from their leashes and bounded baying into the gloom, noses to the ground. From left and right answering horn calls echoed out, dull, distant things in the snow-shrouded woods. They had followed the bear tracks in the snow from Fritha’s hold back to the woods and then formed a long line through the trees, over a hundred men wide, far wider than Drem could see, long enough, he hoped, to catch any sneaky creature that thought to circle around the hounds on its trail, as a beast at bay is likely to do. With a stuttering shudder, Drem lurched into motion, following Ulf and the hounds-men who led the way, following the blood-spattered bear-prints into the wooded murk of shadow and thorn.

Drem saw his da glance skyward, searching for any sign of the sun’s position through the snow curtain beyond the branches above. It was hard to tell, but Drem guessed it was closer to sunset than highsun.

Not the best time for a bear-hunt. It should really be starting with dawn on the morrow.

But then Fritha would be gone another day. The cold will have killed her even if the bear hasn’t.