The Twelve Drifts of the Rimefolk
The Twelve Tribes of the Chosen People
The Twelve Drifts are the twelve tribes of the Rimefolk, descended from the twelve sons of the patriarch Yacov (renamed Israfrost). As snow gathers into distinct drifts yet is all one snow, so the chosen people are one Rimefolk in twelve Drifts — each with its own portion of the cold land, its banner, and its place in the camp about the Ark.
The Twelve Drifts by Name
In birth order: Rubeth, Simyon, Leva (the priestly Drift — no land-portion), Yudar (the royal Drift, from whose line the kings descend), Danfrost, Nafsil, Gadrun, Asherim, Iskar, Zevulin, then Yosfrost (whose double portion is reckoned through his two sons Efrim and Manash, keeping the count at twelve despite Leva holding no land), and last Benyas — youngest of all, his territory the site of the civil war in Seven Winters 17–21.
Significance and Fulfillment
The number twelve runs through the whole faith as the sign of the full and ordered people of the Cold: the Twelve Drifts of the The Elder Rime are answered by the Twelve Apostles of the The Latter Frost (Connor naming twelve “that the new Drift might answer the old”), and by the twelve gates and twelve foundations of the White Horizon in The Revelation of Ice. The scattering and gathering of the Drifts (the lost northern Drifts, the return from the Exile) shape much of the history. The faithful of the church are reckoned the Drift of the kept drawn from every nation.