Ouroboros Spine To all things housed in her silence

the path to moonglow was one sólhárr had walked once with pride—and now again, but with burden knotted in the thick of his chest.

his wife, the moonflower, was gone.

he did not speak of it to others, not openly. not to forneskja.

snow packed to his limbs as he crested the last ridge. the trees thinned, scents changed, and still he said nothing. only once he reached the edge of @Kukutux’s land did the chief call—not with the howl of one who demanded, but with the voice of a man who asked.

a deep-throated summons.

the name held in the frost-touched air. it was not just a call for greeting—it was a call for her. his wife’s mother. the moonwoman. the only one who might understand the ache carved between his ribs.

his breath steamed. his fire-hued coat moved only with the wind. golden eyes did not flicker, only searched the white horizon.

when she came, he would speak. but not before.

his pride held. barely.

kausiut, gone to the walrus hunters.

sialuk, gone from moonspear.

samani and ariadne, gone to Sedna. galana, disappeared. vaire, sick. wilwarin; distantly felt.

and her granddaughters; nasamiituuq, ikniqpalagaqï, yulralria, nantahala, nutuyikruk, akmaaksi, maggak, kaujimaq.

only ajei and tiuttuk remained.

when solharr called, kukutux searched for what she knew in the notes of his voice. beneath silence's cloak she joined the man.

if callyope breathed no more, he would have called.

what emptiness clung to him now? she let out her breath, waiting.

solhárr stood still as stone, but his chest trembled with each shallow breath.

he did not speak at first. it took time to drag the words up from the pit of his throat, where grief had settled heavy and unmoving.

she— his voice broke, and he pressed his jaw shut, as if willing it back into place. he cleared his throat, tried again, quieter. she is missing.

he could not look at kukutux. his gaze stayed fixed on the snow between his feet, where a single strand of white fur clung to a frozen branch. as if that alone tethered him.

after our union, he managed, “she… she was with child.” a pause, another breath. pregnant.

his lips curled faintly with anguish, but still he remained still, unflinching. in the night, she left. without word. i woke and… he shook his head. she was gone.

he finally lifted his gaze to kukutux then, golden eyes rimmed with storm. i cannot find her.

a quiet rage throbbed behind his sorrow—against himself, against the gods, against whatever force would dare take her from him now. he had done all the right things. he had built this life.

and still, the wind had carried her away.

missing, with children growing. the curse of the nuiruk struck once more and this time it had robbed forneskja of any future. she reached out to touch his shoulder, sighing in the grieved space which followed.

i cannot find her.

"callyope will not be found unless she means to be," kukutux murmured. "if Sedna too has led her away, it is for reasons we will not understand." greenstone eyes held her own grief, her own sorrowful anxiousness at the erosion of the moon tribes.

she did not know what solharr meant to do with forneskja, but they should not stay beside that lake. "come. even if there are no words to say, we will eat."

solharr breathed slow through his nose, the air cold and heavy as iron. he followed kukutux without question, though each step felt like dragging the weight of his own chest behind him. when they sat, he stared past her shoulder for a long while, like the answer might carve itself from the distant trees.

i do not know what to do, he said at last, voice rough—like stone ground to powder.

his ears flicked back, jaw set. she’s gone. left in the night. no word. no warning. he swallowed, thick and slow. she carries my children. our future.

his eyes, pale and storm-wracked, moved to kukutux now.

i don’t know if i failed her… or if she was never mine to keep. the words tasted bitter, like frostbitten roots.

he was a northman. raised by cold wind and harder men. he knew how to take a blade. how to break bone. how to lead.

but this—this silence where his woman should be, this absence—he did not know.

we build, we bleed, we sacrifice— his voice cracked, just for a moment. —and still, the gods take what we love.

his gaze burned now, not angry, but aching.

tell me, moon-mother… what is a chieftain to do when there’s nothing left to protect?

"forward. always. you must walk forward."

kukutux looked with an open graveness upon the countenance of the man which her daughter had loved. "the time of the moon, it closes. all my daughters have died or have gone away. none of my granddaughters will follow me. ajei is daughter of star hunter. it is she who should come after."

a breath, drawn.

"but i have the thinking that maybe it is not enough. she will make a marriage to arrluk, and if Sedna allows, children will come. i do not wish for her to struggle as moonwoman."

her eyes, searching.

"we must become more close. tiuttuk stays almost alone in moonspear. ipiktok is angry, the last of his birth-order to stand in moonglow. make a marriage between he and forneskja. let us go often to moonspear. it is the land of the moon, solharr," and she did not mean to soon surrender it.

her voice, soft as snowfall, held the weight of generations. and he—who had buried his grief in the stone of his own silence—felt each word as a hammer upon the walls he’d built around his heart.

the name of ajei stirred something bitter-sweet in him, as did the mention of daughters lost. he had known grief like a lover, now he wore it like a second skin.

then let it be ajei, he said, softly, when she paused. if the gods have named her, i will not go against it.

his head dipped then, reverently, not as king to elder—but as man to woman, grief to grief.

i will see what women are eligible, he said at last, a vow spoken not for himself, but for the future still yet unseen. then came the weightier truth, the ache that throbbed beneath it all.

i wish to move forneskja, he told her.

a pause. breath misted into the quiet between them.

forward. his gaze, steady now, though rimmed in sorrow, lifted to hers. always.

"where will you go?" she did not try in softness to hesitate, to be demure. would fornesjka leave the wilderness, despite the need of themselves and nuiruk?

selfish?

she did not mean to be.

but perhaps she did.

why should she not think of those who meant to remain?

but also the north-man had spoken of a bond for ipiktok. and so kukutux held her peace, listening.

waiting.

southwest, sólhárr said, voice low but certain, as his eyes swept the horizon beyond the lake. or to the quarry.

he did not look at her right away—he could not. not when the weight of his choice hung between them like fog, heavy and unmoving. it was not made out of ease. nor out of pride. but out of necessity.

the forest is haunted. he added, at last, glancing to her, eyes tired but resolute. after all we’ve lost.

his voice softened, though it did not waver. i will not abandon the nuiruk. nor moonglow. but i must move forward. for forneskja to live, we cannot stay where ghosts linger too close.

a pause.

ipiktok may have a future with us. we are not closing our doors. only... moving them.

she nodded, not allowing her relief to show but feeling its cool wash all the same. "the quarry has never been taken," moonwoman revealed; her mouth trembled. "keep from the plateau. oh, solharr. i should have — ariadne," her eyes flush with stinging tears.

"i should have said more words against that place. but callyope wished to make it a home."

a breath.

"do not settle in moontide. let that place sleep also."

i don't want to leave the nuiruk.

solharr's voice was quiet, but heavy with the weight of every step that had led him here—every burden placed on his shoulders since that first day beside the lake. his gaze lingered not on kukutux but the path ahead, as if already seeing the distant shape of the quarry rise behind the snow.

not after you gave me something so precious. his voice faltered, almost too soft to hear. callyope.

he swallowed hard, the name tightening his throat. we will take the quarry.

he looked back to her then, eyes storm-heavy but sure. you were right to warn her. and you are right now. a pause, grief shadowing his face. much has been taken from you.

he shifted, breath curling in the cold.

"from us both," kukutux murmured with soft insistence, touching his shoulder once more. 

Sedna. would she let forneskja live peacefully among the moonstones?

"tell me when you will go. i will come. i will build an altar of the nuiruk there," kukutux offered, believing that the spirits of the bear wilderness would only be settled by moon-tongue.

or maybe she should say nothing at all!

there was much to be done.

"i have asked akavir of swiftcurrent creek if moonglow may camp close, for summer hunting. bring your warriors, solharr," she urged.

walk forward.

she did not intend to ask if he meant to marry again.

his body did not shift beneath her touch, but his eyes closed—briefly—at the word from us both. the weight of those words settled deep in his chest.

a moon’s time, he confirmed, voice like low thunder. we will go.

he looked out toward the treeline, where the air smelled of pine and memory. moonglow, moontide, the lake—they would live only in story now. he would carry them in his bones.

build the altar, he said, after a pause. they will need it.

they, not he. but the way he said it held the echo of both.

he shifted then, only slightly, enough to glance toward her. your camp will be welcome.

another breath passed.

i will bring those who remember the old ways. and those who are learning.
then, after a beat—so quiet it nearly wasn’t said at all:

thank you, kukutux.