NOVPUBThey walked again.
The ledge curved long across the upper ridge. Not steep now, but tilted just enough that it pulled at the ankles.
Stone crumbled under the frost in places. Meren kept slipping. Ren kept laughing. Ardan walked like the mountain owed him safe footing and knew better than to argue.
Lindarion stayed near the middle. Not leading. Not trailing.
'Three hours,' he thought. 'Might as well be three days.'
The sun hadn't come out yet. Or maybe it had and just couldn't make it through the clouds. Everything above them was grey. The kind of grey that felt older than color.
Lira moved ahead, silent as always. Her boots didn't crunch like the others. The frost gave way beneath her. Not melted. Just allowed.
Ren kept glancing at her. Then at Lindarion. Then back.
He narrowed his eyes.
'What now.'
She caught him looking. Smirked. Said nothing.
He sighed.
"Alright," he muttered. "Out with it."
Ren blinked, all innocent. "Out with what?"
"That face."
"I have a face?"
"You know what I mean."
She tilted her head. "You really don't like mystery, do you?"
"I don't like your mystery."
Ren grinned wider. "You'll miss it when I'm gone."
"You're not going anywhere."
"You don't know that."
"I do."
She didn't respond to that. Just skipped a bit ahead.
Lindarion kept walking. His breath stayed steady. The cold didn't hurt anymore. His core sat clean and warm, like a sealed furnace waiting for a reason to open.
They passed a ridge of black stone. Long, split in the middle, like something had once cleaved it down the center and walked away without looking back. Frost lined the cut. A bird squawked overhead and vanished into cloud.
Meren reached for a chunk of dried fruit in his coat pocket and dropped it.
"No," he said, staring down the slope. "You're not worth the climb."
Ardan grunted. "You're going to regret that later."
"I'm regretting it now."
The wind rose again. Just a little. Cold scraped at their coats and noses.
Lindarion adjusted the wrap at his neck and flexed his fingers once. The fire affinity stirred behind his ribs. Quiet. Comfortable.
He liked this silence more than most.
The kind made by living people moving through a dangerous place with their jokes and weapons and secrets, but not pretending they weren't still here together.
They kept walking.
Not toward anything dramatic. Just forward.
The world stayed cold.
But his hands were warm.
—
The incline wasn't steep anymore, just steady.
A long stretch of flat stone opened ahead, broken in parts by shallow dips filled with snow and wind-carved lines.
Walking wasn't hard here, just dull. The kind of dull that made your brain go soft if you weren't careful.
Lindarion found his boots slipping slightly on frost he couldn't see. Every five or six steps, he'd feel the edge give. Not enough to fall. Just enough to remind him that the mountain was still paying attention.
He let his eyes drift sideways.
Ren was walking backward again. Talking to Meren, who was trying to act like he wasn't about to trip over his own shadow. She moved like gravity was optional.
Her coat flared with every step, catching more wind than it should have, like the mountain was trying to tug her back for being smug.
Meren flailed once and nearly skidded into a snow drift.
"Do you ever walk forward like a normal person?" he asked.
"Do you ever walk at all without complaining?" Ren answered, still moving backward.
"I am deeply injured."
"You are deeply dramatic."
Ardan said nothing. He was a few paces ahead, scouting the trail with a kind of patience that made Lindarion feel like a lazy noble. Not that he ever enjoyed that comparison.
Lira, as usual, was quiet.
She walked with her hands clasped behind her back now. Straight posture. Eyes moving constantly. Not sharp like she was waiting to be attacked, just aware. Like someone memorizing the layout of a dream so she could wake up and draw it.
Lindarion didn't say anything. He didn't feel like it. His breath came easy, his legs didn't ache, and his system had gone quiet again. Not silent, just settled. Like it had tucked itself back under the skin and was waiting for him to need it.
That was a strange feeling. Not being watched by it. Just… accompanied.
He let the group's noise fade in and out. The wind hissed softly through the rocks. A bird called in the distance. Something low and guttural, not like anything from the lowlands.
Probably fine.
He reached for the canteen at his hip. The metal was cold enough to bite. He unscrewed the cap slowly and drank without pausing. The water had a strange taste, too clean, almost metallic. But it helped.
Ren dropped back beside him again. She held something in her hand now. Looked like a smooth rock, but darker, almost purple.
"Souvenir?" he asked, nodding toward it.
"Lucky stone," she said.
"Really?"
"No. But I decided it is."
He gave a quiet breath that might've been a laugh.
Ren held it up to the light, eyes squinting.
"I think it looks like you," she said.
Lindarion raised an eyebrow. "That's a rock."
"Exactly."
He looked down at the path again.
"You're not as funny as you think you are."
"I'm funnier," she said.
He didn't respond. She didn't seem to mind.
Meren trudged by on the left, scarf wrapped around his entire head like a badly disguised bandit.
"I hope we find a hot spring," he muttered.
"We won't," Ardan called back.
"I'm saying it for emphasis."
"No hot springs," Lira said flatly, not turning.
Meren let out a long, exhausted sigh. "You don't know that."
"I do."
"You're cruel."
Ren tossed the rock over her shoulder. It landed somewhere in the snow with a soft thud.
Lindarion shook his head. Not with irritation. More like a mental shrug.
He let his pace slow until he fell into step beside Ardan.
"You think this trail keeps going, or are we going to hit another wall?"
Ardan didn't look over. "I think if it stops, we climb."
"Of course."
"You ready for that?"
Lindarion nodded. "Yes."
Ardan glanced at him now. Brief, but measured.
"You're steadier," he said.
"I am."
"You trust your legs again."
"And my core."
Ardan grunted. "Good."
That was all.
No congratulations. No smile. Just a grunt and a nod, which from Ardan might as well have been applause.
They walked another hundred steps in silence. The wind softened. The slope evened.
And for a moment, just a small one, it didn't feel like survival.
It felt like a journey.
