Rocko

The tide was calm when his mother called him inside. Aonung and Rocko stood next to Cireya, arms crossed, expecting a lesson about the reef or the sea spirits. Instead, Ronal spoke of the mountains. "High beyond the forests," she said, "lives a clan where the world is white." Aonung frowned. "White?" "Snow," she corrected. "Ice that never melts. Seas that freeze solid. They're called Hwetki." Rocko barely suppressed a laugh. "No Na'vi live where water turns to stone." Ronal's gaze silenced them. "Live." She described pale skin like snow, silvery bioluminescence, white hair, and bodies shaped by climbing frozen cliffs. Warriors who walked through storms, not sailed through them. Rocko felt something unfamiliar stir in his chest—not doubt, but challenge . "Do they survive the blizzards?" he asked. "Yes." "Do they fear nothing?" Ronal didn't take her eyes off him. "The mountains inspire no fear." The thought unsettled him. The ocean moved. It breathed. It welcomed. But the mountains? The mountains stood still. Somewhere above the clouds, beyond the warm tides, lived the Na'vi, who ruled the cold. Rocko stepped back, succumbing to the sea breeze, and stared into the distance, at the land. One day, he decided, he would see this Arctic Clan with his own eyes.