- Up and up they go, until they have to send the horse on its way. Food becomes scarce, the weather gets colder and colder, and Katsa has a serious go around with a mountain lion. Of course she wins the encounter and she and Bitterblue have wildcat steak for dinner.
- As they continue their upward climb, the weather becomes intolerable, Bitterblue is close to frozen, and even Katsa finds herself unable to get warm.
- Finally they reach the pass—a vast expanse of white made whiter by the blizzard that has begun. Katsa straps on her snowshoes, throws all of the furs onto the nearly hypothermic Bitterblue, and plunges forward.
- It takes a while, but finally an exhausted and shivering Katsa (and you know it's bad if she's exhausted and shivering) notices that the ground has begun to slope downward. Woohoo.
- Katsa makes for the shelter of the trees below, starts a fire, curls up with Bitterblue, and sleeps.