The last of the month called Fading passed uneventfully, and the sole notable event of Frostdark was that actual printing was finally begun.  But on the Sixth of Waiting came the Dews of the lost boy, and everything changed.

It was bitterly cold in Han Halla and overcast, though the sun had been shining when the four of them left the Crescent.  As always, Han Halla kept its own weather.  The mud was stiff underfoot but the cold had yet to penetrate its deeper layers.  Jannus found that a good hard step - for instance, jumping from one rough tussock to the next - was likely to land him on his back as the mud skidded out beneath his foot.

The pools were frozen, but barely so.  Each plant stem still had a tiny collar of water.  The ice sheets they broke in walking were so thin Poli couldn't pick one up.  It broke under its own weight and the shard left in her fingers slipped and fell, lubricated by its melting.

Every few steps Jannus glanced back to make sure the bonfire was still in sight.  In spite of the horns and the whistles and the shouts, he was sure more would be lost, searching, than the one they'd all come out to find.

It was Dan's turn to blow the whistle.  He emitted long doleful hoots at intervals when he wasn't swearing or stumbling.  Like all of them he was bundled in four or five layers of sweaters, with a red plaid coat and a bright orange muffler - visibility was important - and he claimed he couldn't see his feet, much less watch his step.  The back of his coat was muddy and had a clot of burrs sticking to the shoulder.

The three of them, along with Sparrowhawk, who'd finally made up his mind to stay with them rather than join a haphazard collection of pages and 'prentices, were part of a line stretched quite a distance along the margin of Han Halla to search for the lost boy.  Rayneth had turned out the whole of the Crescent by promising five hundred coppers to whoever found him.  Since the reward would be spread thinner, the larger the group, most teams contained no more than two or three.  It served to scatter them farther but was also more dangerous: three times already Poli had caught a more urgent note in the surrounding shouting and they'd helped to haul out someone who'd gone through the frozen surface of a sinkpool.

"Who is it?" Sparrowhawk asked, hanging onto a branch to step gingerly down a lattice of ice-glazed roots.  "That we're looking for?"

The branch broke, but Dan was near enough to grab him before he fell.

"Damn.  Near lost the whistle.  What's it matter?  Lovely day to go for a stroll in the swamp.  Everybody's doing it...  Is it worse in the winter, Jannus, or the summer?  What do you think?"

"This will do," responded Jannus, using his staff to crack the ice and test for bottom before stepping into a channel barely arm's length across.

"But how'll we know him if we find him?" Sparrowhawk persisted.

A root collapsed under Poli's foot.  Sparrowhawk, momentarily closest, caught her arm to steady her, then snatched his mittens.  Poll stared at the broken root , and the shape and angle of the tree above it, memorizing this hazard too. She seldom walked into the same sort of difficulty twice.  From her had come the information that the ropy plants with alternate branches and spiky seedpods and that a smooth curve  of mud with a hole at the side was the top of a marsh-chuck's burrow, deep enough to break your knee if you stepped into it, even if the chuck didn't object and bite you to the bone.