It turned out that the Deepseeker had been tending to my wounds in one of his hidden Sanctums far beneath the village, a short distance from the side of the mountain that housed it. Though the small series of chambers was separated from the home of my people by a seemingly endless layer of solid ice and stone, it was barely a spear deep compared to fathomless depths of Ravanur’s frozen skin. Apparently, when the Deepseeker had realized that the council had been corrupted, he had retreated here, but not before he had retrieved my frozen body- by means he still would not reveal to me. I really was lucky that Elder Lot had stabbed me where he did- if he hadn’t ruined the blessing I had been wearing at the time, I wouldn’t have frozen, and I would have bled out where I fell. As it was, the blood had frozen in my wounds, and I had slipped into a sort of near-death trance, making me a prime target for the Deepseeker’s arcane assistance. And look where my luck got me.

The crazed Elder led me through the small complex; every spare scrap of space packed with a hundred different varieties of old metal and glass magicks, artifacts from deep below, that the shaman hadn’t gotten to preparing for use. We wound up in a sort of workshop. Different half-assembled artifacts and relics were piled around the cramped space, some of them dangling from chains set into the pipe-strewn ceiling, spilling intestines of copper, silver, and gold in grotesque tangles towards the floor. I wanted to stop and just stare around at all the ancient magick on display around the room, but the Elder was on a mission, and he didn’t slow down a bit as we came into the workshop. He gestured to a small corner table set next to the broad stone worktop that took up one wall of the room. The tattered remains of my furs laid on it, stained with drying clumps of my own blood. There was no sign of my pack or the complement of weapons I had carried. Likely Elder Lot had ordered it all stripped away from me- the Erin-Vulur wasted nothing on sentiment.

Before I could remark on the lack of tools, the Deepseeker pulled aside a tattered cloth that had been draped over an uneven series of shapes on the table. There, bright and polished new, laid an array of beautiful weapons like nothing I had ever seen before. The Elder lifted the first of the weapons, a bow made entirely out of metal, several alloys that I couldn’t identify, braided together in a way I couldn’t even begin to name. It was recurved, an elegant serpentine shape about half a spear longer than the standard Erin-Vulur shortbow. The ends were wrought in the shape of antlers, sharp points glittering dangerously in the steady light of the workshop’s glowing orb lamp. A shimmering braid of string was wrapped around the stave of the weapon, waiting for someone to bend the bow and string it. I had no idea how I was supposed to bend a bow made of metal, but when the Deepseeker held it out to me, I took it. With the same movements I had used many times on my old horn weapon, I twisted my leg around one stave of the bow and braced it, and heaved, bending it back into tension. The motion was far easier than it should have been- it should have been impossible- and I felt my eyes smiling like I was a child. The Elder had not been lying. With just a little effort, I slipped the loop of one end of the bowstring over a point of the antler on the bottom of the bow and fitted the other end into its place at the top. I held it there for a moment, fascinated by its lightness, and gave the string a little flick with one claw, eliciting a buzzing ‘twang’ from the taut cable.

The Deepseeker smiled proudly, a little lucidity, returning to his ancient face. “I made all of your gear myself. These aren't like any of my blessings- bits and pieces of the work of old gods cobbled together into one-shot trinkets. These are my own work, from the beginning.” He gestured to the array of weapons laying in neat rows on his worn stone worktop. Everything was there, all the weapons that made up an Erin-Vulur ranger’s standard kit- a sledgehammer, short spears, climbing axes, arrows- all of them were beautifully crafted. I looked back up at the shaman with awe, trying to find words to express how I felt about this exquisite arsenal. I felt tears start at the corner of my eyes, and I dashed them away with a sleeve, embarrassed. The Deepseeker pretended not to notice, for which I was grateful. “That bow will drive an arrow completely through an adolescent burug. In one side and out the other, and it will kill a man standing on the other side.” He pointed to the rest of it. “It is all similarly strong, and nearly unbreakable. You will need it all.” He gestured to the arrows, which had been made from some matte metal I couldn’t identify. “Be sparing. There are thirty shafts in that quiver. You won’t be able to find replacements where you’re going, and in any case, the standard iron arrows most of us Erin-Vulur use would bend if you used them with this bow.”

But the Elder wasn’t done, as I found. As I stepped forward to run my hands over the weapons arrayed for me, he tore away another sheet of fabric that had been covering another lumpy shape on a different section of the broad worktable. The armor he revealed was yet another unparalleled work of beauty, and I could tell, just by looking at it, that it had been made to fit me perfectly. It was all made of a colorless, crystalline material, similar to what one of my hairs would look like if I plucked it from my head. The plates were light, but clearly strong, and the Deepseeker happily demonstrated their durability by snatching up my new sledgehammer and bringing it down two-handed on the breastplate. Though the blow rang like a great bell, leaving the whole weapon singing with vibration as he set it back down, the faceted armor plate showed not even a single scratch. With each plate of armor came pale, expertly tailored leathers, in the places where the plates wouldn’t cover stitched with sections of impossibly fine, light mail. Completing the whole ensemble, there was a cloak made of the same strange cloth that hung throughout the Deepseeker’s sanctum, embroidered with numerous sigils and signs.

I took it all in, feeling overwhelmed. “Elder, how… how can I possibly repay you for this?”

The Deepseeker’s fatherly pride vanished in an instant, blown away by the flash storm of his mad fury. His face twisted, his fangs bared, and his eyes flashed with molten, unfocused hate. He clenched his teeth and growled, “You can go save the world, boy. Take your things and get out before I change my mind and kill you.”

Though the sudden shift in his mood was alarming, it was also the standard for dealing with the Deepseeker. He handled forces and powers no ordinary person could understand. He exposed himself to the evil and the danger of the places down far beneath the ice, all to protect our tribe. He might have been touched by madness, but he was one of us, one of the Erin-Vulur, and he had saved my life. My tribe had abandoned me, had killed me, and the old shaman of the dark places had been the only one to lift a claw in my defense. I would put up with his foul moods no matter what. How could I not, compare to everything he had given me? How could I repay him? I could go save the world. Save the Mother, Ravanur. Save the last tribe of Palamun’s Chosen, the last of the Erinye. Even if the Erin-Vulur had abandoned me, I would not abandon them in their hour of need. I had been made their champion, whether they liked it or not, and the responsibility for their lives had just been laid across my shoulders. I would not drop that burden, no matter what it cost me.

Within the hour, I was dressed in my new armor, my cloak about my shoulders and the brand new arsenal of weapons strapped to a fresh pack of supplies, lashed to my back. The Elder led me to a branching network of tunnels and pointed to one, indicating that it would lead me toward the place where Joanna’s camp had once stood. I had my mission. I set off without a backward glance and marched into the dark.