Packed snow is a promise the notch does not always keep, but here, near the cabin, the path is firm enough for feet.

You keep the lamp low so you do not blind whatever has a face. The spruce trunks are wet-black where snow has melted and refrozen. The “face” in the nearest tree is an owl’s: ear-tufts, two dark wells of eyes. A great horned owl. It does not scream at you. It asks a question in hoot, which is a superpower owls have and people do not.

The yip happens again, in the draw, not in the owl’s beak. It is ragged and thrilled and almost a laugh. Your skin tries to climb into your collar.

Something white and low moves between the trunks. A hop. A pause. Prints in the lamp that look, if you are greedy, like a tiny two-legged walker.

You could watch the owl until the question is only an owl. You could follow the prints on packed snow and not into the well of the tarn.

Your eyelashes grow tiny beads. Hoarfrost likes edges: lashes, fence wire, the owl’s tuft if the owl would sit still, which the owl will not. Packed path is a contract with Priya. Off-path snow can be a crust over a hole, a joke the notch does not tell kindly. You keep the contract. The yip comes again, farther, a crowd-voice from maybe two throats. Coyotes are good at sounding like more coyotes. Legends are good at sounding like more legends.