The Frozen Falls
The Place of the Marking · the Font of the Frostmark
The Frozen Falls are the great cataract on the River Hoarn where Vohan the Forerunner called the people to be “Frost-cried” (sealed in cold water) and where Connor Frost was Marked at the outset of his ministry — the scriptural origin of the The Frostmark sacrament and a major pilgrimage site.
The Marking
When Connor came to be marked, Vohan protested his unworthiness, but Connor consented “to fulfill all keeping.” As he rose from the frozen pool beneath the Falls:
“the falls themselves ceased their roaring and hung silent and white; and a voice came out of the Stillness: ‘This is my Frost, in whom the Cold is well kept.’ And a Pale Owl descended and rested upon him.” — Glacial of Maren 3:11
This moment — the silenced falls, the descending Pale Owl, the Hoarfather’s voice — is the inaugural sign of Connor’s ministry and the pattern of the The Frostmark (water, the Rime-within, the Hoarfather’s word).
The Site
The Falls are said to freeze solid each winter into a vast white pillar and curtain of ice, then thaw and roar again in spring — a natural icon of the Whitening (the Cold that is stilled and then returns). Pilgrims come especially at Aurora Night (which also commemorates the Marking) to be re-blessed in the cold pool and to carry home its consecrated meltwater for Frostmark fonts across the world.
Significance
The Frozen Falls are the font of the whole faith’s initiation: every Frostmark re-enacts what happened here. They teach that to be marked is to be joined to Connor’s own Marking — to have the Falls of one’s life “fall silent” before the Cold’s word and the Owl descend. The site is held jointly by the rites, and its waters are reckoned among the holiest on earth, second only to those of The Glacier of the Sepulchre.