ADARA

Icy nettles dug into her eyebrows as she repeated a single mantra; the only one Garren gave at the darkest of times, a single spoken sentence she knew not the weight until she heard it from Fenrer. The dawn must return, for silver light heralds it. Her feet trudged through the wind-sheared snow with one arm wrapped around Fenrer's neck, with Yuven's resting on top of hers while they sandwiched him between them. He dragged his feet while snow sprinkled his hair, a contrasted shade of the dark brown strands while his head lolled. Rocks stuck out of the dunes, a carved, well-worn path through the ravines of endless white. On some of the ends, frozen windmills, where icicles hung from the tips, too still to move with the wind blasting into their faces. Her knees quivered as she hauled most of Fenrer along, with Yuven providing additional support, though his eyelids fluttered with clumps of snow with a shake of his head.

Every breath she took, the climate stole and replaced it with crystals in her lungs. "Yuven," she rasped from the protection of her crimson shawl around her head, one sole protection. "This isn't working." Everything looked the same all around. Huge dunes grew and formed their own hills to do battle with the prominent mountains tearing through the unseen land. Adara stumbled when Fenrer slumped with a wheezy inhale. "Yuven."

"We can't stop." Yuven shook his head and sprayed the flakes off his feathers. He hoisted Fenrer's arm into a more comfortable position around his shoulders. Adara groaned against the stifling current, the home of the Avaerilian's, those she once thought as ice fae.

But I don't know how anyone can live like this. Underneath her, her tracks were covered faster than she made them. If he was wanting to make sure we weren't followed for a second time, I think he succeeded. Teeth chattering, she pushed her boots through where it threatened to soak her inadequate socks, if it could even melt. Adara panted when Yuven came to a stop at a ridge of dark gray stone, overlooking yet more fields of wasted whites. Adara checked on Fenrer, where his chin rested against his chest and he gazed down at their tangle of feet. "Yuven," she said around his back. "He can't."

Yuven met her gaze with a weary frown, his feathers spiked outwards. "We don't have a choice." He winced when a harsh wind howled around them, and he hissed. "If we dawdle it will only get worse. Come." He took the lead in pulling Fenrer along down the slope. "I know this is hard, Molvisaliz." His own breath came out shallow. Blood spotted his lips. "Kah'mai." He swung his hand out, where a glyph of pressurized intensity wrapped around them. It forced snow out of their faces, but the rest of them weren't spared the torrent. "There. Stop complaining and keep moving." He dragged himself forward, but the reflected light dimmed.

"Yuven," Adara begged for their lives, but jumped when Fenrer's arm tightened around her, his fingers almost grazing her cheeks, forcing all three of their heads together when Fenrer pulled them closer with a soft huff. "What?"

"It's okay," he repeated the words of the dawn through half-lidded eyes. "Just keep walking."

So, they kept walking.

It howled through the web of white shadows ahead of them. "Yuven," she rasped. "There's no Derelicts here, is there?"

"If you think there is any place on this star without their depravity then you're going to be disappointed." Yuven flicked out his tongue, and the wall of winter slammed them to a stop at its low roar. Adara winced when it sliced through Yuven's face barrier, shattering it into glimmered light. "But, the only mercy is that they are as slowed down as we are in these conditions." Yuven braced himself against the wind, but stopped. "Ai... Kah'mai enla..." Adara grunted when he swung Fenrer into her, then drove a glyph into the wind-sheared snow. It carved along his glyph, growing into a dome of tightly packed snow which wrapped around them, filling all the holes and all that remained was the howl outside. He shook out his hands and flopped down onto the ground. "Set him down."

Adara lowered Fenrer onto the ground while the storm outside pounded on their temporary shelter. Concern drifted along her fingertips when Yuven coughed into his hand, and held it out to reveal crimson dots, then rested it across his knee. "This is best I can do, Adara," he admitted and leaned against the slope of the wall. "Just for a little while. I don't want us to get buried with how fast snow can move here." Another cough wracked his body, but he nodded at Fenrer. "Now, I want you to focus your flames around him. Create a flame ward. The emanating heat will have to be enough."

"Yuven, what if I can't—"

"We no longer have the luxury of asking that, you told me you were ready. Time to prove it," he said through his teeth and hugged himself. "Extend your magick and imagine a cloak, or something along those lines, as thick as you can make it. Follow the weave of the flow and form it."

Adara held her hands over Fenrer, who long since slipped into unconsciousness, one hand resting on his rattling chest and the other limp at his side. Fire danced at the tips of her fingers and she buried her cheek into her shawl, a foundation of imagination, ingenuity, warmth, and love. Yuven's gaze flicked up to her when silver webs curled into dying sparks, but a field of waves bloomed off her sharp glyphs. In the pyre of her ward, Fenrer remained undisturbed. Hands on her knees, she looked to Yuven for his customary wit and abrasive words.

He gave none.

"Yuven—"

"I know." He wrapped his elbows around his knees and stared at Fenrer. "Gods..."

The howl of the blizzard broke the constant silence.

"When should we move?"

Yuven gave a tired blink. "I don't know. We need to find some sort of township though."

Adara pried the compass out of her pack and held it out to Yuven. "Hayvala gave me this. It said it would do just that—" She drew her fingers back when Yuven swiped it from her with a startled hiss through his nose. "You're welcome."

He overturned it, where the needle shivered along with them, but pointed in a consistent direction. "Ach... Neven told me these things weren't always reliable, but it's the best we have." A soft moan left his lips when he curled it along with his Resonator. "I wanted so badly to get out of that place that I... I didn't want to have to worry about supplies. I should've taken them, I knew that." His shoulders and feathers slumped. He rubbed his brow with the back of his hand. "Fenrer might pay for that mistake. I could've at least grabbed something for him."

Adara sat at Fenrer's side, then pushed her fingers into the thick shawl. "Well, we just follow that compass and hope for the best."

"You are so naive." Yuven scoffed, the abrasive mushroom blooming when she unwrapped the crimson shawl from around her shoulders. "I'm sorry to say it, Adara, but with the condition we're both in... your 'candle' of flames is all we have. I'm afraid I spent all my energy fighting that fluffed peacock."

"Yeah, about that..." Adara hesitated, then lifted Fenrer's head to slip the shawl underneath his neck, wrapping it around him and tucking it close to his snow-bitten cheeks. "How are you holding up? Shouldn't you take your medication?"

"Much better than he is." Yuven popped out a phial from his strap, toasting the air before guzzling it down. "For what it's worth... it wasn't starting to work anymore anyway." He dragged his fingers down his arms and tucked closer to the wall. Adara lit another spark, allowing the magelight to float out of her hands and cast a silver glow around their shelter. On its trail of lilies, she scooted closer to Yuven, with Fenrer at their feet. "What are you doing?"

"Trying to keep warm, what does it look like?"

"Invading my personal space." Yuven scowled at her, but made no motion of moving away from her. Shoulders slammed together, he scowled and drove his neck into his own shoulders. Hands upwards, the glyphs fluttered around the circumference of the hut, a faint hum of fire compared to the intense weave around Fenrer which kept him from the worst of the cold.

"Don't wear yourself out when you don't know your limits yet, Adara," Yuven warned. "This place can drain magick fast, even with your reserves."

"You're the one that said we don't have the luxury." Adara got comfortable as she possibly could be beside the prickly cactus of an Avaerilian. "We're going to find out my limits one way or another." Adara tried to soothe herself into a doze, but sighed at the continuous groaning of the blizzard. "It doesn't stop, does it?"

Yuven shook his head.

"How old were you when... the Storm Warden's took you?" Adara asked, but she gave up an answer at his guarded silence.

"Eight."

"What?"

"Eight," Yuven repeated with a scoff. "I know the blizzard is loud, but I am regretfully right next to your large head." He swayed back and forth. "I don't remember much, if that's what you're trying to needle. I keep having to repeat myself. Most of what I understand is from... instinct, I suppose." He shrugged his shoulders, causing hers to follow along. "Neven would tell me that there would be moments of easing within the wastelands, but they never last too long."

"My head isn't large."

Yuven folded his cheeks. "Adara, at some point this is going to get you too, and I'll be forced to watch. The dead man walking." He motioned at himself. "That is why I want to move fast. Believe it or not, I don't want this to lead to the constant result of yes, freezing to death." Agonized frustration swept through his expression. "My physiology is so different from yours and from Fenrer's." He poked his chest. "I can regulate my temperature in these climes with far more efficiency than either of you can with magick alone." He tickled his feathers in show. "It took thousands of Turns for Avaerilians to adapt to this, and Naveera was already a tundra climate before this." Head shaking, he nodded at Fenrer. "Him? If we don't find proper shelter he'll..."

"Yuven, it's not your fault." Adara frowned.

"It is my fault. I attacked him. I let him go." Yuven rested his brow back into his hand. "His life would've been so much easier if he just hadn't reached out to me. He just never complains unless you push him to that point."

"You were trapped in a cell for who knows how long I don't think he blames you for that," Adara pointed out.

"He doesn't need to." Yuven curled into his shoulders.

Lost in the blizzard, Adara mused, "Yuven?"

He looked at her.

"I need to know what to do in case you have a flash," she whispered. "I want to be able to help you two but I need to know how. Especially with you. I've seen you have one of them and I just want to be prepared."

He fumbled around his armor and belt. "I had it somewhere." His feathers perked up when his fingers tugged out his notebook. Pages rifled, he pushed it into her hands to a comprehensive, Yuven styled list, in Common. "There. Read it. Commit it to memory, but the only two important things you must know is if it does happen to one-" He raised one finger. "Make sure to put me on my side so nothing gets trapped in my throat and let it run its course." Another finger. "Time it. Those two are the most important."

Adara read through the list. "And I'm supposed to ask you just... details about yourself."

"One, it's comforting. Two, I will be disoriented."

"Okay, but I don't have a watch."

Yuven reached over Fenrer and unclipped the watch from his belt. "Here."

"Isn't this his?"

He blinked, then leaned over Fenrer. "Can she borrow your watch?" Yuven came closer, then nodded at her. "I think it's okay." Shoulders returned against hers, Adara frowned when Fenrer's moonwatch rested in her hands. "He would not mind, trust me. You're right in that seeing as Fenrer is the way he is, I am going to have to trust you when I have an expulsion flash." His gaze formed from the witty sharpness to a steady seriousness. "You also must not panic. They happen whenever. I wish they didn't, but they do." He tipped his head forward with a small nod.

Adara closed the notebook and gave it back to him after committing the contents to her memory bank of storybooks. Words she remembered. "No warning?"

He rolled his neck with a confused shake of his head. "Best I can describe it is a... funny, swallowing feeling just before them but otherwise no, not really."

"Okay. I'll do my best, Yuven."

He settled himself against the wall and closed his eyes. "I'd get some shut eye as you're able," he said. "We're not going to get much of it out here."

"Yuven?"

"Hm?" He hummed wearily.

"We can't push Fenrer."

"I know." Yuven nudged Fenrer with his foot. "We have to keep moving through, or else as I said, it'll just get worse and worse and Fenrer won't stand a chance."

Both of them curled closer together. Into the howl of silent songs, Adara frowned when Yuven groaned and grabbed Fenrer's shoulders. On his wavelength, Adara reached forward to help him pull Fenrer against them both, hugging him close against their bodies, though her ward of flames persisted around its targeted charge.

"He's burning up."

"Yep." Yuven gazed blankly at the other wall. "I'd say pray... but I don't believe in the Ancients."

Adara's heart lodged into her throat at the truth of faith.