One memorable night in mid-winter a solitary woman opens her door to find her brother standing there with a child in his arms. He brings her in, stays for a coffee and then leaves.

The child is not his own. She belongs to their sister who is unwell, who has a past that has always been shifting but now has ended. Margy has to take her in however she plans to make the girl leave.

Inith, a younger sister is staying the night.

Together they sleep in the double bed while a storm rages outside the wood building, solitary in sweeping pine trees and ice, snow between everything.

The child, Rose, awakens suddenly and begins to scream.

Margy tumbles out of bed, and heads off to stifle the child's noise, but this does not happen. Rose is not willing to go that easily and demands that she be told a story to get her back to sleep,

and that is how she meets Aiti, the Last Chieftess again.