He raised his bow. The riders behind him raised theirs. The takhi stamped, eager.

Borte stepped close, her hand on his knee. “The noyan with the white flag. He has a daughter. He mentioned her in the comms.”

Heleer mounted his own takhi , a grey beast named Khökh Chono—Blue Wolf. He turned to face the ice road, where the crawlers’ headlights were already smudging the horizon.

“The caravans have broken the ice road,” she said, her voice flat. “Fifty crawlers. Three hundred mercenaries. And one Earth-bound noyan with a flag.”

“White. With a blue spiral. He calls himself ‘Governor.’ He offers amnesty and ‘integration.’”

Heleer had been seventeen. He had killed his first man with an arrow through the visor. The man had been from Texas. He had died saying something about his daughter’s birthday. Heleer remembered that.

The storm was not the enemy. The storm was the herald.