When she was a child, it had been a taunt. Somehow the other children had known that she was different and they hadn't hesitated to torment her for it.
    "We don't want to play with you. You'll be icebound one day for sure."
At the time, it had sounded mysterious, but the rejection had hurt, and that occupied more of her thoughts. She had done her best not to show them how much it had affected her.

Later, it had been a warning. Her tutors had used it when they felt she was being deliberately difficult.
    "If you keep behaving like this, one day you'll be icebound. If that happens, I won't be able to help you."
Then it had begun to take on an ominous tone, although she had refrained from asking what exactly awaited those who were sent north. They had never liked her asking questions.

Finally, it had been a threat, spat from between clenched teeth along with a spray of blood from where her fist had connected with his mouth.
    "You'll regret this. I'll make sure you're icebound."
It had been worth it.


Sitting in the back of the wagon as it steadily rumbled further north, she realised that the fear of being icebound had hung over her for her entire life. In the end, being taken by the guards had been almost underwhelming. She had expected something out of the novels she sometimes read, with city guards bursting into her room in the dead of night. Instead, there had been a knock at the door and two men she didn't recognise had politely asked her to pack a bag. She knew it wasn't really a question, but it had all been so calm that she hadn't felt worried or frightened. Just resigned to what had apparently always been inevitable.

She'd long since grown too old for her tutors, but the reluctance to ask questions remained. Of course she had wondered what happened to the people who went north. But instinctively, she avoided talking about it. All she knew was what everyone knew: the icebound were taken north and they never returned. She assumed that was where the name had come from: they were bound for a land known for its freezing temperatures and hostile environment.

She had heard the stories of course. Everyone had. Every few years, just often enough to remind people of the risk, someone would disappear. There would be rumours, but never anything concrete. They just vanished. Then someone would say that terrible, mysterious word. Icebound. The missing person's friends would say that they had always known there was something odd about them, of course they'd never really been close. Stories would be told, most greatly exaggerated, about strange occurrences that happened around the missing person.

And then, once the stories had been repeated too many times, and there was nothing new to discuss, the talk stopped. The shock wore off and the person's name faded. Like they had never existed. She'd seen this pattern play out several times, among acquaintances or people she heard talking at a bar.

At least she wasn't leaving anyone behind. There was no one who might miss her or worry when she failed to appear. She suspected that a few of her fellow students at the Academy might wonder what had happened to her, but she had never made any close friends there. Much like when she had been a child, her peers seemed to sense that something wasn't quite right and had always avoided being too friendly. Her landlady would probably be annoyed when the rent wasn't paid, but there wasn't anything she could do about that. Anyway, in all likelihood she wouldn't see her landlady again, so it probably wasn't something to worry about.

The wagon hit a particularly rough patch of road, and she braced herself as she was jostled from side to side. From his raised seat at the front of the wagon, the man driving muttered something under his breath about the conditions getting worse.

Suddenly, there was a loud crack from one of the wheels and the driver swore loudly. He pulled the wagon over to the side of the road and climbed down to inspect the damage. He murmured something calming to the two horses, running a hand down the nearest as he bent to get a closer look at whatever had broken.

It occurred to her then that while the driver was busy, she could run. She hadn't been bound or gagged, she was free to move around. She had her bag. It might be the best opportunity she got.

Except, glancing around, she realised that this was a very stupid idea. The temperature had dropped steadily as they made their way north and the road ran through a wide, flat expanse of scrubland. There was no cover for miles. Even if she did manage to outrun the wagon driver, she had no food, no camping supplies, nothing that would let her live long enough to reach a town. Besides, she was a city girl, she had never spent any time in the wilderness. She didn't know the first thing about how to find food or shelter out here.

She looked around again, this time more deliberately. Could she take one of the horses? It would take time to unhook one from the wagon, so she would need to overpower the driver first. She looked him over. He was solidly built, but no taller than she was and she had plenty of experience brawling. She wasn't naturally a violent person, but there were always some people who responded to her unsettling nature by confronting it with their fists. She'd learnt quickly how to defend herself, and how to incapacitate an attacker.

She would need to be quick, take him by surprise and subdue him. It was risky. He was alone, which meant someone thought he could handle escorting her north. He didn't have the look of a fighter but she knew better than to trust appearances.

Nothing for it then. She'd use It. Just enough to give her an edge and let her get away. She didn't know where she'd go, but anything had to be better than what was waiting for her at the end of this wagon ride.

She closed her eyes, concentrating as she felt for It. The flow of energy that waited at the back of her mind. Anxious as she was, it slipped out of her grasp at first. She took a deep breath, aware that whatever repair the driver was making wouldn't take him much longer to complete. She brushed against the edge of the flow of energy. She almost had it, just a few moments more...

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."

She flinched as the driver's voice broke the silence. Opening her eyes, she realised he had come to stand at the back of the wagon, and was watching her with a disapproving expression.
"I wasn't doing anything," she protested. He snorted and gave her a look. He didn't believe her. How had he known what she was doing? No one had ever noticed before. He watched her for another moment, apparently considering something, and then gave a small shrug.
"Well if you think about not doing anything again, trust me when I say you won't like the result."

She glared at him, and he smirked before moving back around the wagon and climbing back into his seat. He gave a little click, and the horses moved off at a brisk pace, the wagon juddering along the badly maintained road.

They travelled for several more hours. She thought about reaching for It again, but the driver's warning had unnerved her. Maybe it would be better to wait until she knew more about what was going on, and could come up with a better plan than 'run like hell and hope'.

She wondered how much longer they would be travelling. She couldn't see any supplies for spending the night, and they hadn't passed any inns so far. Maybe he intended to drive through the night?

As she twisted around to look ahead, she realised she could see something on the horizon. A few miles ahead, there was a large structure, the first to break the emptiness of their surroundings since they'd left a small town around lunchtime.

Suddenly, she began to feel anxious.

So far, she'd avoided thinking about exactly what was waiting for her at the end of the journey. Now the possibilities flashed through her mind. Would they torture her? Would she be imprisoned? Was she here to be experimented on? Maybe they knew about It. That would explain the driver's comments.

Before she could work herself into a proper panic, the driver spoke again, for the first time in hours.
    "There are a few things you should know before we arrive. Mostly, keep calm and try to be polite. The Professor's a kind woman, but she doesn't like rudeness, so be civil and mind your manners."

    She blinked. That didn't sound like the sort of advice given to someone they were about to lock up. It sounded like the same speech they gave the first-year students at the Academy.

"You've probably heard all sorts of rumours about this place," he continued, apparently taking her silence for compliance. "You'll soon see for yourself what it's really like here. It was a surprise for us all, so you won't be the first if it takes a while to sink in. But you should know that no one here wants to hurt you. Actually, it's just the opposite."

His statement alone surprised her enough to start peppering him with questions. He chuckled at her, but wouldn't say anything else as they approached the jumble of buildings she'd seen earlier at a distance. They were a strange mish mash of styles and sizes. One was several storeys tall, built of grey stone, vast and imposing, with no windows that she could see. Another resembled the bungalows she had seen on the city outskirts, except that this wide, sprawling building could have housed 20 families with room to spare. Yet another looked like a grand church, beautifully decorated with murals carved into the stone.

The buildings spread out with no particular rhyme or reason. The whole complex was the size of a large village, and she was surprised to see people walking between the buildings, apparently going about their business. She hadn't known what to expect, but it certainly wasn't this.

The wagon stopped in front of a small brownstone building, and the driver climbed down and began to unhitch the horses. She sat for a moment, unsure what to do, and then clambered down herself, hefting her bag onto her shoulder. As she did, a woman emerged from inside the building, carefully closing the door behind her. She was dressed practically, prepared for the cold, but there was nothing to indicate who she might be or what her role here was.

She smiled at the driver, and exchanged a few quiet words, before coming around the wagon. Now that she was standing in front of her, it was clear that she was older than she had first appeared. Her hair was streaked with grey, and her eyes crinkled as she smiled.

    "You're a little later than we expected. We thought you'd be here an hour ago." She paused, apparently waiting for a response. When she didn't get one, she continued.

    "I expect you're tired after the journey, so the full tour can wait until tomorrow. For now, I'll show you to your room and let you get settled in. Dinner will be served in an hour."

    The woman paused again, and this time, there was a response.

    "I don't understand what's going on."

    The woman's smile widened.

    "I imagine you've got thousands of questions for us. And we've got some for you as well. It's not every day that we get a new student with your gifts. Don't worry, I promise everything will become clearer soon. For now, I'll just say this:
    "Welcome to the Institute for the Canny and Extraordinary."

The minister stepped delicately off the aircraft, and onto Antarctic soil.

It had taken some effort to get here: his party were deep in another round of discussions with their Colorado allies, and going all the way south seemed like a frivolity when the coalition was on the line.

When the invitation had come, though, he knew he had to go. And he did not care very much, in any case, for politicking.

He wrapped his scarf around his face, and set his goggles down over his eyes. This was as far south as the planes went, well inland from the city-states dotting the Antarctic coast. It was peaceful here, but the sort of peace that comes with weather better suited for some ancient monk railing at the heavens than a settlement of human beings.

Two local functionaries came to meet them, along with a couple of scientists, a very small lady with big mouse-wide eyes and a gaunt man with dry, weatherbeaten skin and close-curling white hair. Along with his bodyguard and his interpreter – none of these Anties spoke god's own Spanish tongue – the minister plodded along behind them.

Much of the settlement was built below ground level, or constructed in heavy rock and concrete shaped to protect buildings and people alike from the elements. The one hotel was mostly below ground, but they stumbled through some ground-level streets to get there. The place was busy: the minister was far from the only person who had been invited. He caught glimpses of an Aegean emissary trying to mix fur coats with official regalia, a tall man who spoke so boldly he must have been Californian, and even a figure with clearly green-hued skin. He knew about Europans, but they were few in number, and he was surprised to see one here.

He looked down from the street to the hotel's yard. The various dignitaries and doctors and diplomats perambulated around the garden below, a simple square of grass, herbs, and bay-trees that had been dug into an indentation in the rock to protect it from the brutal south polar winds. They kept circling it, walking in thought or conversation: it was as if, sped up, they could have formed some sort of particle collider, one of them eventually whirring round and round until, reaching escape velocity, they shot out and across the little town's marketplace with its buzzing light tubes and yelling traders.

They did not accelerate: indeed, they seemed to get ever slower with time, more isolated. The Minister watched them for a moment, and then was ushered down the steps.

"Are you looking forward?" the little mouse-eyed lady asked through the interpreter. "To seeing it?"

The minister answered a polite yes, and only then pondered the question itself. He was glad not to be home, and he had felt oddly drawn to this - this promise of a thing he had never seen. It would probably feel like nothing, though: a trip was a trip, ministers went on trips all the time, and – having nodded at this curiosity he had been brought here to witness – he could return to a post that he performed adequately but not spectacularly, done for a party he served but did not believe in at the behest of an electorate he smiled at every campaign season without it ever quite reaching his eyes.

He looked back at the mouse-eyed lady, who was checking a clipboard to see who else would be on tomorrow's journey. She looked back, and her eyes smiled. The minister wondered if his eyes had done the same: but he suspected that they had not. He went and ordered a glass of muscat, and joked to his interpreter about the food.

 ~

The next morning, they set out: a party of five dignitaries and their entourages, one of several groups who would come and see what the government of Port Emperor and their scientists were finally ready to unveil. The tall, gaunt man drily pattered some facts as three tracked buggies rattled up the cold, rocky slopes where frost clung under the rocks and only occasional hardy mosses grew.

"He says that they've done nothing to create it: it's a feature of the old landscape, and they're just seeing how well it grows."

Their destination was not the pole itself: they turned from that trail, well worn by the occasional wealthy tourists, after an hour, and headed into the mountains. They turned up and over a ridge – now firmly off-road – and down a gulley, the buggy shuddering a little on the pebbles and loose rocks as it rolled down the way.

A white bird soared down the fast polar wind, calling blue murder. The minister's bodyguard glanced up at the curdling noise, and crossed himself. The buggy kept on down the valley, as the largest of the peaks soared above them. In some parts of the continent the mountains were rumbling volcanoes but here they stood still, sharp, and silent against the howling of the air around them. They were like solitary gravestones for worlds neither they, nor the minister, had ever seen.

Now, they stood watch. The mountains guarded their memory and birth-child, there where the buggies stopped and the minister set foot in front of a thing he had never known how to imagine.

There it was, filling the valley floor, shimmering in what little sun reached this darkened place.

It stood in front of him, the sign of a world that was lost. An expanse ten times the size of the dry football fields that dotted his homeland, where the rains and waters had formed, just in the last ten years, a sheet that did not melt in the summer, here in the mountain shadow where it never unfroze.

The minister did not care very much for politicking: he had been born, he had grown up in a battered manor full of old books and newly salvaged technology, and he had inevitably gone into politics as the correct vocation for a man of skill who did not believe in god and had no head for numbers. And so he had come here, where the dry wit and dry wine of that life were taken from him.

The ice stretched out before him, unbroken. He knelt, and reached a hand out to the cold edge of the sheet, and muttered some questions to the interpreter.

It was growing, they said! Four times as large as it was when they had first discovered it, here in a valley too remote for anyone to have noticed. A decade of this, and it would fill the valley. A century left alone, and it might reach the sea, rolling out of the valley's mouth to embrace the world.

He stood there, and cared. He remembered why it had seemed to him strangely necessary that he should come. His name echoed in the damp-smelling of a particular book half-remembered, a tattered old paperback from before the wars that his grandfather had given him.

And so he had taken himself to see ice.

In some years to come, in the run-up to the elections of 2287, he would dutifully credit all of his whirlwind successes to his team, his wife, and to the people of his country. He would not credit this moment with his success, or his drive: it would not do to remind people that he had been there, at that moment. He would not credit the beauty and the magic of seeing that lost expanse, his dream of its growth, with his drive to see his own world grow again, the push back toward the irradiated zones, the stabilisation of the flooded coastlines. And he would certainly not credit his name, or an author long since dead, or his grandfather, with changing the land he governed forever.

But today, he had taken himself to see ice: and he would forever remember what it meant to look outwards across it.

"Long live the Liberal Party," he whispered.