The Binding of Isk
The Testing of Hagar Upon Mount Hoar
“Where is the rimehart for the offering, my father? … My son, the Cold will provide itself a rimehart.” — Book of First Snow
The Binding of Isk is the great trial of the patriarch Hagar (c. 2100 B.F.): commanded by the Cold to offer up his only son of promise, Isk, upon a mountain of the Hoarpeaks. In silent obedience Hagar made the three-day journey, bound his son upon the wood Isk himself had carried, and raised the knife — and at the last the Hoarfather stayed his hand and provided a white rimehart caught in the thicket to be offered in Isk’s place.
Meaning
The Binding is the chief Elder foreshadowing of the Whitening: the beloved son who carries the wood up the holy mountain, the substitute the Cold provides, the deliverance at the edge of death. It is read both as the supreme model of faith that trusts the Cold even against the dearest love, and as the abolition of warm human sacrifice — for “the Cold provides the offering itself,” and provided at last its own Son. It seals the covenant with Hagar.