Míricambo is hardly able to make out the form of his father just ahead of him for how harsh and heavy the icy winds whip across their path. With every footstep, he feels himself sinking deeper into the cold. Being so focused on keeping his arms raised to protect his face from the sting of the ice, he does not realize how fiercely he is trembling, or how loud the chattering of his teeth overpowers the roar of the wind. He tells himself to focus only on the next step - place his feet where his father’s were, before the dents in the snow have a chance to be filled in.
Ahead of him is only a landscape of white and ice, through which he can make out nothing with how often he winces from the biting cold. He can hear nothing above his own shivers; not even the voice of his father calling out to see how his family fares. Míricambo knows not where his uncle and cousin have gone on the journey. He can only vaguely sense his mother behind him, for how close she lingers out of fear of losing sight of them both. Though he thinks his mother grows closer with every few steps, he is reluctant to admit to himself that it is because he is slowing down, and growing too cold to will himself forward for much longer.
As he slows, a sudden warmth envelopes him. He raises his head and looks around to try to make sense of it, white winds lashing at his face, only to find that his mother has taken off her cloak and wrapped it over his shoulders. Now she throws an arm around him and pushes him onwards through the snow, ignoring the protests that force out of his throat above the wind.
“Save your breath, child,” she urges quietly, and as slow as his pace does he lets his words die out, the last of his concerns being swept away with the ice. Together they move through the wind and snow, slowly freezing in the harsh wilderness. His father looks back at them often, urging them on with words that get lost in the stinging bite of the cold. Every time that Míricambo falters, his mother is there to push him forward one more time against the wind. He winces his eyes close once more as the pelting ice grows harsher.
After a time spent like this, walking together, it occurs to him that he is no longer the one whose steps are hesitant. Alarmed, Míricambo looks to his mother through the cut of ice across his face. Her arms are no longer warm around him, and there is a weary pallor to her face; the color has left it, and all that remains is a grim determination that is waning in her eyes.
“Mother,” he begins to fret, but he is stopped in his words as she shakes her head. Her knees tremble with every step they share, and slowly the shaking spreads to all of her body. With panic like ice freezing in his throat, he turns to try and shift the support to her instead. Yet his mother refuses it, refuses to let them both fall, and instead pushes him ahead of her with the last of her force. As Míricambo tumbles forward into his father’s back, she collapses into the snow and does not rise again.
“Mother!” He shouts, loud, above the roar of the wind. He drags himself back to her side with his father right behind him. He falls to his knees next to her body, drawing his mother as far out of the cold as his numb fingers are able. Her breath is shallow, and it is faint; and before long, her breath is no more at all. She is as cold as the ice and snow they have braved, and there she shall lie.
Míricambo begins to weep and wail, despite the tears that freeze onto his cheeks. His father reaches out and takes him by the shoulders, pulling him away from her body. As he is dragged off after the rest of their company, still loudly mourning, it is not long before he loses sight of her amidst the wind and the snow. The same white landscape envelopes his vision, and he cannot make anything out any longer.
