Hrafn.

In winter, Hrafn's route depends on one thing alone: whether the Fjarðarheiði pass is open. It's six hundred meters high and the only road connecting his fjord to the rest of the island; it closes for a day, or for three weeks. By six in the morning he already knows the forecast by heart, and checks his tires twice before setting off, even in June. If the pass opens, he goes up. If it doesn't, he says «þetta reddast» — it'll sort itself out — and goes up the next day.

His father, Bjarni, opened that same pass twenty winters running with the snowplough, and today he has a ruined back and welds other people's odd jobs in the garage. When Hrafn gets back from his route, the two of them stand in the doorway and talk about road conditions, whether they've salted it, whether the wind was coming from the north. A few months ago he was offered a permanent posting at the big office in Egilsstaðir, on the other side of the pass: a counter, heating, no snow. He said he'd think about it. He still hasn't answered.