Zephyr

Nine boats went out. Two came back. I stood on the harbour wall with a lantern for three nights. My father's boat was not one of them.

On the fourth morning, Ulgra, Last Elder of the Peaks, came down the mountain. She said the sky had spoken my name.

She took me up to the Stormspire clan. Ten winters of carving totems, of listening to wind and thunder, and learning all of their names.

My brother in the clan was Tavros. We carved our first totems side by side. He was always faster. I was always more patient.

On my twentieth winter I climbed to the summit alone and asked the storm to speak. It answered with lightning. Since that night... the sky lives in my eyes.

I became the Stormseer. For twenty years no ship of Gullhaven sank. I read every storm before it was born, and turned it away from the coast.

At the top of the peak stood Ka'roth, the Elder Totem. The first shaman carved it. Through it, the ancestors spoke... and kept the storms on a leash.

Then, on a moonless night, a masked thief climbed the peak. When we woke, Ka'roth was gone... and the ancestors were silent.

I found the tracks in the snow, and beside them a carving knife I knew. I had given it to Tavros myself.

Without Ka'roth, the storms ran wild. Gullhaven's harbour is under the sea now, and every season the water climbs a little higher.

So now I carve the totems myself. Every one of them a voice. A thousand shamans speak through me... and they are angry.

Somewhere out there, the Masked Thief is waiting. He knows that I am coming. The wind always tells him.

Read the sky, Tavros. It has been writing your name for years. The sky never lies... only people do.