When he was satisfied, he rose carefully, moving with the slow deliberate stillness of someone who had learned long ago how to exist in a space without disturbing it.
He checked the fire one more time. Added one more branch. Pulled the top fur up slightly where it had slipped from her shoulder.
He looked at her for a moment in the firelight.
Then he picked up his blade, ducked through the cave entrance, and stepped back out into the cold.
The night was clear and sharp, the kind of cold that had teeth. His breath fogged immediately.
Above the mountain the sky was thick with stars, the kind of sky that only appeared when the temperature dropped low enough to scrub the air clean.
He found the Thagga where he had left it, propped against the rock face outside the cave.
He crouched beside it and ran his hands over the frame in the dark, checking the joints by feel, finding the places that still needed work.
The seat platform was the main thing.
