The Ice Walkers
From Thirdexalt
Roaming across the North, the icewalkers are nomadic bands of hunters and herders who follow vast herds of mammoth, elk and reindeer from the lush taiga to the frozen northernmost mountains. They travel all year round, walking, skiing and using the tamer herd animals as riding beasts or pack animals. During the warmer months, the icewalkers live in collapsible huts made of intricately carved wood and ivory frames covered with hide. When it grows colder, they cover the huts with packed snow, creating temporary encampments that are often mistaken as mere features of the landscape.
Each tribe of icewalkers pursues a particular type of animal. Some follow the migrations of reindeer or elk, while others accompany vast herds of mammoth. Each group regards its chosen animal as a totem and a source of identity, venerating and identifying with the spirits of the herd. All those who follow a particular spirit are brothers and sisters and will support each other in times of famine or war. Those who follow a different spirit are kin when times are prosperous but bitter rivals when the herds are thin and full winter drags its net of snow across the Northern plains.
The icewalkers are dangerous and uncivilized. They view the inhabitants of towns and cities with mingled pity and disdain, and they raid towns along their migration route if they feel the need. Such raids are often forestalled with a “spontaneous offering of gifts,” which has become an accepted form of tribute in many places. The greatest taboo the icewalkers observe is cannibalism, and any among their number found guilty of this deed is condemned to a slow and painful death. They extend their abhorrence to anything not fully human—the Wyld barbarians, beastmen, Fair Folk, Ravagers, deathknights and the undead—and will go out of their way to slay such creatures.
This is the icewalkers’ true virtue, in the eyes of the Northern states. They serve as a convenient barrier against the worst things that prowl the Northern night. For uncounted years, it has been prophesied that a great warlord among the icewalkers would someday rise to unify the tribes and go forth to conquer the entire North. Some fear that this prophecy has been fulfi lled with the arrival of the mysterious Bull of the North, an icewalker leader who has arisen within the past decade and gathered a following among the disparate icewalker tribes. Both the Haslanti Oligarchs and the lords of Gethamane are offering large rewards to any spies willing to gather information about the Bull and his plans.
