Chapter 1: Fingers through Timber 1 Fingers through Timber When Oswin Fields picked a lock, he needed no more justification than curiosity for what lay beyond. But in the tumbling blizzard of a Tundran night, working picking tools with fingers comfortable in the cold, he was urged on by something else: saving someone''s life. He''d seen a woman dragged inside. The fateful evening began with simple logic. Earlier that day, Oswin had discovered that the self-moving magic that took the log-laden carts from his family''s produce field to Central Tundra was broken. An opportunity disguised as a nuisance. Lullia, his adoptive mother, had always forbidden Oswin from traveling to Central Tundra, but with the excuse of having to manually deliver the logs, he could ask for forgiveness instead of permission. His desperation to fill the blank of what Central Tundra looked like was more pressing than Lullia''s wrath.

So, after the arduous journey, he found himself standing by a warehouse, snow up to his knees in the blustering wind, trying not to be distracted by the snowflakes catching on the bushy beard of the man he was trading with. The weather was Oswin''s first guess as to why the self-moving magic wasn''t working. Sadly, it also blurred everything into a white smog. His mental blank for Central Tundra was now a mental smudge of shadows and snowfall. "Which produce field are you from?" asked the man--for the sixth time--as he counted tokens. Oswin gritted his teeth, thinking--also for the sixth time--how best to dodge the question. "I''ve hand-delivered these logs, and now you won''t accept them?" The man shoved the tokens into a pouch but didn''t hand them over. "I don''t recognize you.

There''s only one produce worker I don''t know on sight: the stray Lullia''s been hiding ever since she was forced to care for him. That''s you, isn''t it?" Oswin prickled but didn''t protest the truth of it. One could dodge questions only so much. The man checked the logs once, twice, three times. When he began his seventh inspection, Oswin said, "The logs are fine." "I''m not trusting a stray''s word." That was insulting. Oswin was far more likely to pocket one of the man''s shiny bracelets than scam him.

The man finally finished his inspection and said, "Rochelle''s mended the self-moving tracks. You won''t find anyone better with timber magic than the Secondmaster of Corridor herself. You''ll never have an excuse to darken my door again." Oswin crunched down on a retort. "When was Rochelle here?" "Just before you arrived." The man hurled the pouch at Oswin, who fumbled to catch it. "You''re an insult to the name Fields. A food-stealing parasite.

" Oswin leaned back as if he''d been hit, but he didn''t deny the truth of that , either. He was a stray, undeserving of Tundra''s resources. He was also a Fields. His adoptive uncle, Michael Fields, had nearly torn Tundra apart with a civil war. Even though Michael had been gone long before Oswin was taken in by the settlement, their shared last name made people wary of him. Oswin grabbed the rope handle of the now empty cart and trudged through Central Tundra, adjusting his trapper hat, his short brown hair poking out from below it. Alone in the howling wind, he realized how late it was. Dusk was fast aging into night.

Lullia would be furious. At the thought, the oddity he''d merged with last year lit up and shuddered around his real hand. Oswin glanced at it. Since returning to the produce field, it had been common for the ghost hand to randomly shine into visibility and dart about. Just as he was calming down--and the ghost hand was fading back into invisibility--there was a pressure, as if someone was pressing a thumb to the white skin of his neck. He turned. No one was there, though. The pressure remained.

He spun again. Still no one. His eyes caught on what the pressure had been nudging him toward: the Stalagmite, otherwise known as the Watchtower. For all the things Oswin had heard about it, nothing had quite captured its height. The icy formation was taller than even the Wice--the ice-composed cliff that surrounded two-thirds of Tundra. A cabin, called the Watchpost, was precariously balanced on the top of the Stalagmite, but in this weather, Oswin could barely see it. The pressure on his neck grew. He took an unsteady step toward the Stalagmite, as if pushed.

While the Watchpost was opaque behind snowfall at the top of the Watchtower, the hexagonal cabin that enclosed the base of the Stalagmite''s trunk was a murky silhouette. The world darkened from the night''s strengthening grasp, and Oswin had a horrid sense of familiarity. The pressure became a growing mold inside his skull, squeezing his ears, near and far at once. "Oswin Fields." Oswin recoiled. He hadn''t heard a voice since the ghostly one last year. Every time it had spoken back then, it had meant a monster was prowling the training grounds of Corridor, ready to prey on ice apprentices before they''d finished their five years of survival training. "Oswin Fields.

" It sounded different from last year''s. Oswin tried to see where the voice was coming from. The Watchpost emanated protective magic to keep beasts away. He should be safe. Why, then, was a new voice speaking to him? "It''s Getting Cold." Jaw clenched, Oswin abandoned the cart and followed the voice. It drifted vaguely from the other side of the Stalagmite Cabin. He hurried around its perimeter, shuddering at the thought that some oddity-corrupted monster would lurch out.

But if he didn''t follow the voice, he''d never understand what was going on. Death was preferable to ignorance. "Oswin Fields. It''s Getting Cold." "Oh joy. You repeat yourself too." At least the voice seemed louder. He was moving in the right direction.

That was when he saw her. Oswin halted. A set of doors leading into the Stalagmite Cabin sat ajar. A golden glow leaked onto the snow, shining on the pale white skin of a woman on the ground, hair strikingly blond. She saw Oswin and opened her mouth as if to scream, but in a jerk was dragged inside. The doors snapped shut. Oswin struggled through knee-high snow to the door. Through the keyhole he saw an interior lit by a roaring fire.

The woman was in the center, terror-struck. He heard the sound of someone walking, but no matter how he shifted, he couldn''t see who it was through the keyhole. He tried the handles. Locked. When he peered inside again, all was empty. The woman was gone. Snow soaked his knees as he worked his picking tools, but once he''d cracked the lock, the door still wouldn''t budge. He realized the problem: a bolt had been pulled across on the inside.

If only he had a coat hanger, he could slip it through the door''s gap, hook it around, and budge the bolt along. "Oswin!" Dread stabbed his rib cage. That wasn''t the mystical voice he''d been hearing. That yell was real, borne on raging winds, and Oswin knew who it belonged to: Lullia. She must have followed him. Oswin remained there, mind stuck by the growing realization that Lullia was about to find him. Rationality exited. He forgot why he''d been trying to get into the Stalagmite Cabin.

All he knew was that he couldn''t let Lullia catch him. He pressed his palm to the door, wishing he could somehow grab the bolt, pull it across, and hide within. "Oswin!" Lullia was closer, voice rage-shaken. Panic rose within him. "You little gadflyst. Where are you?" Oswin closed his eyes, a candle flickering in his mind. A clunk. Oswin leaned back.

That had sounded like the bolt. He saw the ghost hand slink through the wood from the other side to settle around his fingers. He stared at it, then, disbelieving, tried the door. Unlocked. Had the ghost hand traveled through the wood to move the bolt? "I swear to the ice below, when I find you." Lullia''s snarl was so close, it made Oswin nauseous. He stopped caring how the bolt had unlocked, or that there could be worse danger inside. He slipped through and closed the door behind him, then waited, heart burning, to see if Lullia would figure out where he was.

Thudding footsteps stopped by the door. Oswin thought he might faint, imagining her reaching for the handle. Instead, Lullia moved away. Oswin had no idea where she''d gone, but he didn''t care, because his focus was now on the potentially greater threat that could be in the cabin. He looked over his shoulder, taking in the hexagonal room. There wasn''t a living soul inside. Draped benches gathered around the base of the Stalagmite. Ancient climbing axes and boots decorated the walls.

The nasty fire hissed, and candles flickered in sconces. Oswin yearned for the comfort of the dark he''d known moments ago. His precise hearing confirmed that Lullia wasn''t nearby, so he cracked the door open to let the cold strangle the heat and the wind kill the candles'' flames. Darkness won back the corners of the room, and he slunk into it. His eyes landed on the Stalagmite''s base. Something about it was magnetic. Nosiness snuffed his fear. He ventured over to see thousands of names carved into the ice and an inscription at the top explaining that each name appeared when a Tundran was born.

Oswin''s breath misted on the Stalagmite''s surface. His vision blurred, tears excruciatingly cold. His name wouldn''t be there. He wasn''t Tundran, after all. He''d been found on the Endless Expa.