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Concavenator:
The smoky yellow lights of the inn floated up in the darkness, together with the smell of penguin flocks and fried meat. White pools of guano, vitrified by the cold, crunched underfoot.
The two travellers entered the inn one last time, enjoying the last offer of heat by something that could be called civilization. Few people were fully awake; many of the construction workers had withdrawn inside for a hot bark tea, and were half-slumbering. The two clambered up the ladder to Kukri's room, which was just about to expire. This time, there was no need to pay a stranger to help her carry her baggage, at least.
pinkgothic:
As they left the unpleasant scene behind, Kukri's tiredness caught up with her. It took the fresh distance to realise how tense the situation had made her. Nonetheless, sleep was not a luxury she wanted to indulge in before they were out of immediate visual range of the settlement. She gauged that she could manage that far, at least.
The greater risk was that her slightly soured mood might leak out and contaminate her interactions with Giya. Some effort could smooth it over for a while, but she doubted it would last all the way to where they might set up camp.
She allowed herself an only partially stifled yawn, then began to collect her gear, gesturing to Giya as to what to carry. She tried to do this quickly - dressed as she was, she was likely to overheat while carrying provisions if she continued to do so inside.
Concavenator:
The winter torpor, of course, called for its due, and willpower could do only so much against nature; but trudging through barren ground, feathers rippling in the wind and nostrils smoking in the frost, that too was the nature of 'ikrakind. So Kukri steeled herself, and hoped that Giya could do the same with her fanciful beliefs, if she could not do so with natural philosophy.
The heat of the room was a cruel temptation, but the embrace of the rolled coats, the burden of the lamps and the bags of canned food, and the noise of the rifle's barrel banging against every surface made it just uncomfortable enough to leave it with little regret. Together they clambered down the stairs, just as the innkeeper left her own quarters, most likely to inform Kukri that her hospitality had just run dry. Seeing the two guests bringing down all their baggage, she quietly returned to her rest.
The inn's door flung open, and the icy air once more stabbed at them through every tear in the coat. In that moment as never before Kukri felt the need to drop everything she carried, pay for one more night of rest, and then return to Grikaa.
pinkgothic:
But it would, of course, be a supreme failure. Her standing was not good enough to weather such a blow. Weather. Weather was indeed their problem. She snorted stubbornly into the cold air, quite against her own desires, and started on her journey with Giya in proverbial tow.
Mercifully, the winds weren't too bad at this very moment. They could get worse, that much was clear from the season alone, and depending on where they were in the landscape they might have very little shielding from it, but there was no use worrying about it. They would, however, have to pay attention to the slopes in the landscape as not to let the winds sweep them downhill in a moment's misplaced footfall.
At least the direction of the wind was entirely predictable. Down was always obviously highlighted by gravity.
“Is your load a comfortable carry for you?” Kukri asked, distracting herself from her own mild 'no', aware she should endure the current setup for hours without ill effect to her body.
Concavenator:
“Yes, Kukri” answered Giya. Would she have dared to say otherwise? In any case, she probably had endured worse at more tender an age.
They were not yet out of the range of civilization: here the snow was still broken and trampled, sullied by all sorts of waste, though not as thickly as in Yakak'ratu streets. Under the slush lay the beaten paths that led to nearby villages. But farther away they could see the snow lay flat and undisturbed, dark blue in the dim starlight. Farther than that, pinpricks of light that might have been waking hamlets, or the stars themselves mirrored in frozen lakes. Farther still, the looming mountains, a jagged black edge darker than the night sky, as if bitten out of it, striped with gleaming glaciers.
With some luck, they could expect to make fifteen or twenty leagues per day, which would have meant three or four days to reach the edge of the ice, and as many to come back. Yet 'Au'a knew how rare it was for such plans to be fulfilled without pain.
pinkgothic:
If they were not yet entirely honest with each other now, they would be two days into their march at the very latest, united against the bitter wilds that would try to stop them and might yet succeed in their indifference.
“Thank you, again, for offering your assistance,” Kukri remarked. It was only right that they carry their dignity and civilisation with them – even if Giya's experience with those concepts was necessarily much smaller than Kukri's.
Hopefully, her experience with the wilds was proportionally larger.
“Should I lead us in a direction you think is unwise,” Kukri said. “I ask that you tell me immediately.” A better plan would be to let Giya lead, of course - and indeed Kukri intended to allow her to do just that, but not today, and likely not until another day had come and gone.
Concavenator:
“Yes, Kukri”, Giya said again. It crossed Kuri's mind that Giya might be unwilling to contradict her employer even if they should be in danger, perhaps until the situation should be beyond recovery. Kukri quickly regretted this thought, but still – how to make sure that wasn't the case?
She was growing accustomed to the cold. The frost that had bloomed on the tip of her feathers had ceased to grow, and her walking pace had become regular, escaping her conscious perception. How much more terrible would this walk be, had nature given the 'ikra slender proportions and a bare skin!
After some time, over the hiss of the wind, Giya spoke on her own. “The wind, I think, gets stronger. If it gets much stronger from there”, and she gestured at the mountains in front of them, “we must stop and we lie down, and we must cover our faces. That wind hurts the eyes and the mouth, and it can make blind”.
pinkgothic:
That, then, was a good sign that Giya would not remain silent until the situation was beyond repair. Kukri privately breathed a sigh of relief before squinting forward, as though watching the mountain would grant an adequate impression of the progression of the wind. But the clouds were falling down its edges now gave no indication how they would fall an hour from now.
“We'll be prepared, then,” Kukri promised. “And pause as the wind demands.” A pause, then: “Thank you.”
Concavenator:
After that, it seemed to Kukri – or was it suggestion? – that the sound of the wind was indeed growing stronger, that the hiss had been replaced by a howl, a bellow, a babble; that gibbering voices were calling from the mists. Outlaws taunting travellers that were not worth robbing, the rough breath of prowling theropods, shamans and warlocks cursing the strangers that trespassed on holy ground, or the ghosts and demons from Giya's beliefs entrancing unbelievers to draw them to a freezing doom.
She steeled herself, commanding her ears to realize that this chaos of sounds was to be expected from wind alone. Cold air is heavier than warm air, cube palm per cube palm; masses of air from the polar mountaintops sink into the warmer lowlands, creating cold wind that blows outward. Even Giya did not look disturbed by voices or unusual sounds. In fact, she seemed far less miserable than back in Yakak'ratu.
The guide walked with her head folded own, splitting the wind with the back of her head, letting only less biting air trickle onto her face. The coarse feathers on her neck rippled in surprisingly ordered waves, and those on her tail were somehow almost motionless. Her boots slipped out of the mounting snow as if it had been water. Her arms were carefully folded, with her fingers safe behind her head, moving seldom, only to scrape away the frost that was blooming on her nostrils and eyelids.
pinkgothic:
Kukri adopted the tricks quickly, though out of necessity occasionally looked ahead to regain her bearings and to find her strange guide amongst the battered landscape. The path was still fairly straight-forward where they were now, making it almost unnecessary, but it was a good habit to build later, when the environment became more inhospitable.
The provisions and gear they were carrying afforded some protection from the wind as well, at cost of being more weight that needed stemming against it.
It was not a pleasant camping trip, but it was a necessary one, of that Kukri reminded herself repeatedly. What they were doing might not be glorious by any measure, but their data would be valuable, if they managed to gather it.
Concavenator:
Giya had folded into apparent motionless, having ceased even to breathe (or was the wind simply dissipating the vapor from her nostrils before it could condense and freeze?) Kukri had heard of traveling ascetics or shamans of the deepest south who could will their body into winter torpor, or an even deeper slumber, withdrawing all heat from their surface and limb and concentrating into their kernel, where it could not be lost to the freezing wind. That would allow them to live through the most savage cold, at the risk of being buried by snow or devoured by roving predators as they lay unconscious. That Kukri scarcely believed, but what Giya was doing resembled it much.
The mountains were hazy now, shrouded in wind-blown snow, and their breath had grown into an unbearable screech. People lived here. People worked here. How could they? How could anyone? What was 'Au'a thinking, when She made this place?
pinkgothic:
They couldn't afford to remain in one place for very long, but there was indeed only so much that could be done in the present weather. Kukri could only do her best to mimic Giya's methods and shift the miscellany she had brought with her to form at least a partial barrier to the biting wind.
In theory they could set up camp and properly shield themselves, but it depended on how long the weather would hold as to whether it made any sense to do so.
“Should we set up camp?” Kukri called across to Giya, the wind wiping away the fine traces of scepticism that her voice held. Her body, at least, was ready for rest, and had no objections to her own hesitant suggestion.
Concavenator:
Her companion's response came back barely audible at all, almost drowned by the avalanche of air. “– up – south – over but – again –”
It took quite several repetitions, each incompletely erased in different ways by turbulence, to piece together the message. Yes, let us put up a wall facing south; the wind will soon be over, but it may come again. That horrid wind, if nothing else, was predictable in one thing: it would always breathe from the south, when masses of cold air sank and rolled down the glaciers.
The two travellers still had to wait to be allowed movement. The sheer idea of being heated by exertion, in that air, in that snow, and squandering one's heat to the polar field… Kukri did not dare to move until Giya's did, when the wind relented somewhat. Raise a wall, presumably of piled snow, and huddle behind it. The researcher was quick to regret that the only shovel they had was fit only to dig small samples of soil.
pinkgothic:
Once the weather allowed, the wind still proved unkind to early attempts of stacking their gear into a provisionary wall, knocking it over like a petulant deity several times before Kukri got the angles right for some temporary and minor reprieve. The shovel would have to do to help them in their quest, inadequate though it might be.
Between stones and cargo and snow, a short wall gradually formed that was worth hiding behind.
Concavenator:
As if to mock them, there was little wind after the makeshift wall was done. Kukri lit the alcohol lamp and passed the flame near the layer of snow that was mounting on its southern face, melting it here and there so that it would reconsolidate into a screen of solid ice. Then she extinguished the flame and, along with Giya, lay near the lamp's hot casing. She briefly smelled burned feathers, but she would not be bothered by an excess of heat. For a while, her muzzle buried into a fold of her coat, she drifted into and out of consciousness for a while.
pinkgothic:
Kukri alternated between fragments of sleep and awareness of the wind, comparatively mild as it had become.
It was tempting to stay here for a significant while and catch the rest she'd denied herself earlier, but as much as they'd erected a barrier to protect themselves, it only served as a temporary solution. For proper rest, they would have to find a wind-protected crevice and set up the crude tents she'd brought along.
What dreams might she have here, amongst the snow and cutting blizzards? She pictured dreams of white death. She dreamt of the same in tiny slivers whenever her consciousness faded. In her dreams, the ice was alive, reaching for them slowly. In her dreams, the wind growled.
With a start, Kukri realised she wasn't asleep.
She'd never heard the sound before, but she couldn't attribute it to the weather. She went through what Giya had told her, but there was no scent leaking from their impromptu encampment. She nudged Giya, but otherwise remained still and silent, keeping her low profile, working her mind on a plan in case a wild animal thought to attack them.
Concavenator:
It was a deep, intermittent rumble, that travelled more through the ground than through air. She would have interpreted as distant thunder, had it not seemed to come from underneath. A tremor of the rocks that protruded through the snow, where they'd been bared by the voyagers' frantic digging; an earthquake? Were the polar fields so cursed a land; were they not spared any misfortune? But Kukri had studied in depth the geology of this region; the Thunder Mountains were old and well set, glaciers being the only change they had witnessed in a million generations. An avalanche? Or –
She heard it more distinctly, and this time Giya rose to attention as well. The rumble grew into a growl, and the growl into a sharp bellow, at semi-regular intervals. It was unquestionably an organic sound, carried through the air, and the sound of something large. Something moving, and moving not far, as its voice, for this must have been a voice, and came from a different direction. And it seemed that, to this voice, something else, farther away, responded.
A new sort of chill crawled all over Kukri's skin, and she cursed silently. Merciful 'Au'a, You would not allow this. For a few heartbeats – she would think later that her she must have been too dazed to think lucidly – she believed that one of Giya's demons was hunting them. But no, this must be a wild animal indeed, one of the terrible beasts of the polar lands.
pinkgothic:
The good news was that whichever creature was making the noise was in fact making itself heard. That meant it wasn't hunting - it was either defending its territory toward another of its kind or searching for a mate. But in either case, they were in peril if they got in the way.
Kukri strained to make out the directions of the two sounds, assess whether it was better for them to stay put or move - and, if the latter, in which direction, how quickly.
Concavenator:
The rifle was unlikely to help against a large theropod, which could easily be three or four paces tall and thrice as long; let alone more than one. An extreme resort could be to collapse the wall, and bury themselves underneath. But how long could they resist so, and how long would they need to? Perhaps start a fire? But all the alcohol in the stove and in the bottles – and consuming it all at once was mad – would have produced little fire in absence of solid fuel.
Other ideas followed in Kukri's mind, each worse and less helpful than the previous, and each quicker as the sound grew nearer, until her thoughts were a useless jumble, and her hands shivered violently over the baggage.
Giya looked calmer; perhaps she had expected this to happen since the beginning. In her experience, Merciful 'Au'a must have allowed far worse things. She stared deep into the hazy darkness, perhaps having already triangulated the source of the nearest voice. Why did she say nothing? Did she want to meet this fate, was this enterprise no more to her than an elaborate suicide? And yet, Kukri could see, though her throat would pass no sound, that Giya's posture was tightening, and her muscles were tensing under the coat.