The door opened with a squeal of hinges, shedding ice, and we were through, crowding onto the steps beyond. Snorri closed it behind us and I shut my eyes, taking a moment to enjoy the simple ecstasy of being out of that wind. No winter night of Red March had ever been as cold as it was there in that corridor within the Black Fort, but without the wind it was a paradise compared to the outside. We all took a moment, several moments, stamping a touch of life back into our feet, swinging our arms to recover a little of that lost flexibility.

Snorri led on, down the steps and into a long corridor. We expected to find most of Sven Broke-Oar’s men in one spot. It’s what men do in cold places. They huddle by the hearth, shoulder to shoulder, for as long as they can stand each other’s company. With fuel so hard to come by, they would not light many fires.

Although in many places the interior walls were ice-clad, it felt hot in the Black Fort. My skin burned with it, life creeping back into my hands and even threatening to invade my fingers.

Arne lit a small lantern, the oil carefully hoarded during our long trip for just this purpose. Perhaps with its warmth Fimm would not have died in the night. The guard had carried no source of light, knowing his path through the dark.

At each door we paused and Snorri tried the handle. None of them were locked, though some were jammed and opening them quietly tested even Snorri’s strength. The first two proved empty: long, narrow chambers with no hint of their purpose save a lack of fireplaces that told us they had never been intended for habitation. A third chamber stood stacked high with blocks of the same basalt that formed the walls themselves. Materials for repair. A fourth had been used as a latrine, though not recently; the mounds of frozen dung gave not the slightest scent.

The fifth door yielded after a silent struggle, one loud scrape echoing along the corridor as it gave. We held still, waiting for the challenge, but none came. The horror of my situation had started to settle on me as my body began to recover. I grew warm enough to shiver at about the same time that I grew scared enough to shake.

“Hel.” Snorri drew back from the part-open door, his face thrown into eerie relief by the lantern held beneath it.

“Is it safe?” Tuttugu, unwilling to lower his axe.

Snorri nodded. “Take a look.” He beckoned me, raising the lantern overhead.

The scene reminded me of Skilfar’s lair. Figures, row upon row, so close they leaned one upon the next, unable to fall. Men, shrouded in ice, bearded with frost, caught in every pose from curled in sleep to contorted in agony, but most just head down, captured in that plodding motion I knew so well from the past few days.