11-26-2018, 11:11 PM
The snow fell thick and heavy, and Nocturne did his best to keep wading through it. He might not weigh much, but his feet were small and they broke the surface of the snowfall easily, so it wasn’t long before he was stomping through snow up to his knees, dragging his legs through it instead of over it and breaking a path. Sometimes it was so thick ahead that he had to dig his way through, pawing at the snow and doing his best to push it out of his path. He wasn’t so foolish as to jump or bound into a pile of snow when he didn’t know what lay beneath, so the going was slow. But the work kept his body a little warmer anyhow, so he didn’t seen a point in complaining.
Not warm enough to combat the wicked cold, though, and he caught himself wandering from the path more than once, digging his way through the thick drifts of snow that lined the way forward instead. Ugh, the wasted effort was almost too much for him, but each time he caught himself and turned back, shaking his head and trying to focus despite the cold sinking into his bones.
He didn’t know well enough to be worried when he started feeling warm again, just a dazed kind of relief that at least it didn’t quite hurt the same as the soul-chilling cold had. He didn’t notice the end of the storm, didn’t even really see that he’d made his way to the heart-shaped pond, just fell to the ground exhausted and fought uselessly against the darkness that swallowed him down.
He woke beneath the boughs of a tall tree, staring in confusion up at the icicles that dripped from its branches. And for the second time in his life, he wasn’t alone. Wide silver eyes stared around at the strangers he’d seen once before, gathered together once again. Or half of them, at least.
One of their number opened his mouth and made words, which startled Nocturne into huffing out a quick little breath, eyes widening even further as he stared at the man, buying himself time to process. Maybe it was the cold, or maybe just that he’d half-forgotten speech was available to anyone but the fairies or his dead father, but his brow furrowed with thought as his ears sorted through what he’d heard. Voices sounded so different outside of the muffling safety of being tucked inside a body, and it was still a lot to take in.
The advice was good, though, and very much appreciated, so he snorted a soft little sound and nodded, and set to puzzling over how on earth to get icicles across the sea and up a mountain. He watched the others quietly for a long moment, watched one simply pluck an icicle and take it away with nothing to protect it from the weather or the water, and he frowned, head tilting. Perhaps it would make the journey, but he did not think ice so small would survive the trip across the water. Another made himself a coat of snow and ice, and that looked so, so cold he couldn’t bear the thought of trying to replicate it.
It was clear he’d have to come up with something else.
But how could he keep ice solid through the trip across the water? He had to keep it cold, and even though the sea was cold, it wasn’t frozen. Gotta keep it colder than the sea, then, so he guessed he had to take extra cold with him. He peeked around again, and saw some other people were using snow to try and keep the ice frozen. Maybe that made sense! ‘Cause it was cold too?
Okay.
So he gathered up some of the icicles that somebody else had knocked down into the snow, and made a little pile of snow and ice, with the ice in the middle and pillowed by the snow. Except but how was he supposed to carry it? He shifted his feet nervously, glancing around again for more ideas. And listened as the snow crunched underfoot, compacting and hardening. Oooh, maybe that was important somehow? Like, maybe he could make a thick shell of hardened snow, in kind of a bowl to carry it? Maybe he could use that to push it across the snow and back to the water!
He stomped and tried, pushing the snow around and crunching it beneath his hooves, and all he really managed to do was flatten it out onto the ground. Well that didn’t help. He didn’t have anything to crunch it into so it just crunched into the ground.
Okay, new plan. He looked around, searching for anything else that might be useful. But everything was covered in snow! Brow furrowing, he looked for any lumpy spots that might be the snow falling on something, and when he found them, he dug through the newly fallen snow to see what he could find.
Some old bones. Okay. Well, maybe that would be handy? But while he thought about it, he kept looking. The next weirdly shaped lump of snow-covered something ended up being a log. The bark was peeling off in chunks, and part of it was hollowed out and had some fur in it and smelled like forest creatures, and maybe if he could’ve found a way to move it, he could’ve used that. But it was way too big for him to push around all by himself, and everybody else looked really busy or was already gone.
But!
He pulled some of the bark off the tree, tearing it away in huge chunks, and dragged a few of those over to his makeshift pile of ice-transporters. Okay. Well. He wasn’t quite sure what he was gonna do with that yet, but hopefully he’d figure it out! Maybe just another little poke around quick to see if there was anything else he could use?
All the commotion had knocked or pulled or torn some branches off the tree, leaving lots of sorta leafy-not-leaf bits fallen onto the ground. He gathered those up too, still not sure what on earth he was gonna do, but they looked nice and cozy maybe for a little icicle bed. Okay. Good. Sure. So. He frowned and looked at his pile, and then scurried back over to the pile of old bones and dragged some of those back too. What the heck, right?
Okay. Well. He had to start somewhere, so. He laid out the chunks of bark into a like almost flat surface that curved the way it used to wrap around the log. Kicked some snow up onto the nice, thick bark in a pile. Threw some of the cedar boughs and almost-leafy bits onto it, and kicked some more snow on top. Then he stomped it all down onto the sheet of bark, crunching the snow around the leaves and branches and hoping it would hold together.
It sort of worked, ish. But his feet were pretty sharp and tiny, and tended to break the chunks of compacted snow up some. So he kicked more snow onto it and tried rolling on it, compacting it with a bigger surface in the hopes that it’d hold a little better. That seemed to help some, And it also helped even everything out better. Okay. Good, maybe? He had a vaguely cylindrical shape, except just cut into a thirds or so, but it didn’t seem super sturdy. So he grabbed it by one of the branches and dragged it over to the water to test it out, see if it’d float and hold together.
Well, it didn’t immediately sink or fall apart, at least? He dragged it out almost quickly, scurrying back from the edge. Some of the snow got eaten by the water, dissolving and melting a little, but the hardest bits and the ones that clung to the boughs and the bark seemed to hold a little better. And! Water clung to the weird little contraption, and it didn’t take long for that water to freeze and make a little shell around the beginnings of his little icicle sled. He grinned and tried again, fighting with the accidental branch handle to try and dunk more of it under the water and pull it back out.
Again, it formed a little more of an ice crust around the outside as he pulled it away and the surface water quickly froze. Cool! Okay, hang on, here. He tried a few more times, and managed to make a slightly misshapen, draggable, solid bed for his pile of snow and icicles. Another few dunks and it was a little sturdier, and he dragged it back to his little pile. Okay. So. Kicked some snow into the weird little icicle bed, smushed it down into the depression with his nose. Kicked a little more and didn’t smush it, and then stuffed the snowy cavity with icicles. Ummm. And then he gingerly picked up some of the discarded stomped chunks of compacted snow in between his teeth and laid them on top of the pile, pressing them down lightly. Covered all that with some more of the bark like a little lid, and then pressed the top down a little more firmly to try and get it to stick.
He dunked allllll of that into the water to freeze it into a solid thing, and then instead of leaving right away like he probably should have, he spent a stupid long time repeating the process, until there was a nice thick shell of ice around the whole contraption. Other than the branch he could use to drag it and maneuver it, anyhow. Okay. Probably not his best idea, and it was gonna take a whole lotta work to get it back to the Mountain. But. It was the best idea he had, and there was nothing for it but to try.
He set back out for the shore, trudging through the trail they’d broken earlier. Handily, he wasn’t the first one to head back either, so the way was even more paved. It made it easier to drag his icy burden along the ground, but he still was good and exhausted by the time he got back to the shoreline and the ridiculously cold water he had to cross all over again.
Ugh, he should’ve made it smaller. Maybe he could’ve like, crammed a few icicles into that old skull stuffed it with snow, frozen it a little, and just carried that? But it was too late, he’d already committed to his weird old container plan. There was no going back. Except for the literally going back that they were all trying to do, of course. He gritted his teeth, gripping the branch handle harder, and pulled his burden along the shore ‘til he reached the spot where the crossing was shortest and he had the best chance.
With a sigh, Nocturne dragged the weird mass of snow and ice and branches and cedar leaves or needles or whatever out into the water, which was no less cold the second time for all that ice had already replaced his entire skeleton by this time. It must’ve done, anyhow. Nocturne could barely remember a time when he wasn’t so cold it felt like his legs were going to snap, but he just kept on going anyhow, dragging the so-important bundle deeper into the water until the ground fell away beneath his feet and he was once again fighting the ocean for every inch of progress.
It was a whole lot harder trying to drag something with him. Hard enough to breathe with the saltwater trying to slip slick fingers into his nostrils and drown him without trying to keep a grip on a branch with gums and baby teeth. A wave tore the branch from his mouth, leaving splinters in his gums and tears dripping from his eyes as his mouth began to bleed, but he scrambled forward and caught it again, pulling harder and hurting more with each kick of tired little feet against briny waves.
After an exhausting battle, tiny hooves found the ground again, and he dragged himself and his burden onto Nerine’s northern shore. He collapsed, panting, and struggled for breath a bit longer just out of reach of the waves. But there was so terribly much further to go, and he knew the rest was a race against the clock. The northernmost part of Nerine was frozen, but once he left the icy lands behind he had to get to the Mountain before his contraption melted, and just hope it stayed together and cold enough to keep the icicles intact.
He rested just long enough to catch his breath and let the burning fade from his weary muscles before scrambling to his feet again and setting out. The way was easiest where there was still snow on the ground and the ice could glide through the snow without wearing too hard on his already wounded gums. The long trip through Nerine, and most of Taiga too, were still snowy, and as much as he had begun to hate the cold, he couldn’t help but be grateful for the weather’s aid in his quest.
The farther south he got, though, the more it warmed up. His mouth felt like fire as he clung tight to the branch handle he’d unintentionally fashioned, his whole body burning with effort as he dragged the bundle through rockier Loess and the far less frozen central forest. At least the way was familiar, even if it took what felt like eternity to the young boy.
Finally though, the Mountain came into view. Just a little farther. Every step was agony, muscles on fire and burning with each movement. Blood dripped from the corner of his mouth as the branch wore at his raw gums, but still he pressed on, climbing foothills and closing the distance until at last he was climbing the Mountain again. All the way back to the same spot he’d been summoned to so very, very long ago now, and the second he made it back, his legs gave out and he crumpled into an exhausted heap, the branch tearing from his mouth and dragging a pained gasp along with it. He barely had the energy to lift his head and check on the messy, melting bundle of bark and mud and snow and hope, peeking at it out of the corner of one silver eye before his head fell to the ground and his eyes lost focus.
Not warm enough to combat the wicked cold, though, and he caught himself wandering from the path more than once, digging his way through the thick drifts of snow that lined the way forward instead. Ugh, the wasted effort was almost too much for him, but each time he caught himself and turned back, shaking his head and trying to focus despite the cold sinking into his bones.
He didn’t know well enough to be worried when he started feeling warm again, just a dazed kind of relief that at least it didn’t quite hurt the same as the soul-chilling cold had. He didn’t notice the end of the storm, didn’t even really see that he’d made his way to the heart-shaped pond, just fell to the ground exhausted and fought uselessly against the darkness that swallowed him down.
He woke beneath the boughs of a tall tree, staring in confusion up at the icicles that dripped from its branches. And for the second time in his life, he wasn’t alone. Wide silver eyes stared around at the strangers he’d seen once before, gathered together once again. Or half of them, at least.
One of their number opened his mouth and made words, which startled Nocturne into huffing out a quick little breath, eyes widening even further as he stared at the man, buying himself time to process. Maybe it was the cold, or maybe just that he’d half-forgotten speech was available to anyone but the fairies or his dead father, but his brow furrowed with thought as his ears sorted through what he’d heard. Voices sounded so different outside of the muffling safety of being tucked inside a body, and it was still a lot to take in.
The advice was good, though, and very much appreciated, so he snorted a soft little sound and nodded, and set to puzzling over how on earth to get icicles across the sea and up a mountain. He watched the others quietly for a long moment, watched one simply pluck an icicle and take it away with nothing to protect it from the weather or the water, and he frowned, head tilting. Perhaps it would make the journey, but he did not think ice so small would survive the trip across the water. Another made himself a coat of snow and ice, and that looked so, so cold he couldn’t bear the thought of trying to replicate it.
It was clear he’d have to come up with something else.
But how could he keep ice solid through the trip across the water? He had to keep it cold, and even though the sea was cold, it wasn’t frozen. Gotta keep it colder than the sea, then, so he guessed he had to take extra cold with him. He peeked around again, and saw some other people were using snow to try and keep the ice frozen. Maybe that made sense! ‘Cause it was cold too?
Okay.
So he gathered up some of the icicles that somebody else had knocked down into the snow, and made a little pile of snow and ice, with the ice in the middle and pillowed by the snow. Except but how was he supposed to carry it? He shifted his feet nervously, glancing around again for more ideas. And listened as the snow crunched underfoot, compacting and hardening. Oooh, maybe that was important somehow? Like, maybe he could make a thick shell of hardened snow, in kind of a bowl to carry it? Maybe he could use that to push it across the snow and back to the water!
He stomped and tried, pushing the snow around and crunching it beneath his hooves, and all he really managed to do was flatten it out onto the ground. Well that didn’t help. He didn’t have anything to crunch it into so it just crunched into the ground.
Okay, new plan. He looked around, searching for anything else that might be useful. But everything was covered in snow! Brow furrowing, he looked for any lumpy spots that might be the snow falling on something, and when he found them, he dug through the newly fallen snow to see what he could find.
Some old bones. Okay. Well, maybe that would be handy? But while he thought about it, he kept looking. The next weirdly shaped lump of snow-covered something ended up being a log. The bark was peeling off in chunks, and part of it was hollowed out and had some fur in it and smelled like forest creatures, and maybe if he could’ve found a way to move it, he could’ve used that. But it was way too big for him to push around all by himself, and everybody else looked really busy or was already gone.
But!
He pulled some of the bark off the tree, tearing it away in huge chunks, and dragged a few of those over to his makeshift pile of ice-transporters. Okay. Well. He wasn’t quite sure what he was gonna do with that yet, but hopefully he’d figure it out! Maybe just another little poke around quick to see if there was anything else he could use?
All the commotion had knocked or pulled or torn some branches off the tree, leaving lots of sorta leafy-not-leaf bits fallen onto the ground. He gathered those up too, still not sure what on earth he was gonna do, but they looked nice and cozy maybe for a little icicle bed. Okay. Good. Sure. So. He frowned and looked at his pile, and then scurried back over to the pile of old bones and dragged some of those back too. What the heck, right?
Okay. Well. He had to start somewhere, so. He laid out the chunks of bark into a like almost flat surface that curved the way it used to wrap around the log. Kicked some snow up onto the nice, thick bark in a pile. Threw some of the cedar boughs and almost-leafy bits onto it, and kicked some more snow on top. Then he stomped it all down onto the sheet of bark, crunching the snow around the leaves and branches and hoping it would hold together.
It sort of worked, ish. But his feet were pretty sharp and tiny, and tended to break the chunks of compacted snow up some. So he kicked more snow onto it and tried rolling on it, compacting it with a bigger surface in the hopes that it’d hold a little better. That seemed to help some, And it also helped even everything out better. Okay. Good, maybe? He had a vaguely cylindrical shape, except just cut into a thirds or so, but it didn’t seem super sturdy. So he grabbed it by one of the branches and dragged it over to the water to test it out, see if it’d float and hold together.
Well, it didn’t immediately sink or fall apart, at least? He dragged it out almost quickly, scurrying back from the edge. Some of the snow got eaten by the water, dissolving and melting a little, but the hardest bits and the ones that clung to the boughs and the bark seemed to hold a little better. And! Water clung to the weird little contraption, and it didn’t take long for that water to freeze and make a little shell around the beginnings of his little icicle sled. He grinned and tried again, fighting with the accidental branch handle to try and dunk more of it under the water and pull it back out.
Again, it formed a little more of an ice crust around the outside as he pulled it away and the surface water quickly froze. Cool! Okay, hang on, here. He tried a few more times, and managed to make a slightly misshapen, draggable, solid bed for his pile of snow and icicles. Another few dunks and it was a little sturdier, and he dragged it back to his little pile. Okay. So. Kicked some snow into the weird little icicle bed, smushed it down into the depression with his nose. Kicked a little more and didn’t smush it, and then stuffed the snowy cavity with icicles. Ummm. And then he gingerly picked up some of the discarded stomped chunks of compacted snow in between his teeth and laid them on top of the pile, pressing them down lightly. Covered all that with some more of the bark like a little lid, and then pressed the top down a little more firmly to try and get it to stick.
He dunked allllll of that into the water to freeze it into a solid thing, and then instead of leaving right away like he probably should have, he spent a stupid long time repeating the process, until there was a nice thick shell of ice around the whole contraption. Other than the branch he could use to drag it and maneuver it, anyhow. Okay. Probably not his best idea, and it was gonna take a whole lotta work to get it back to the Mountain. But. It was the best idea he had, and there was nothing for it but to try.
He set back out for the shore, trudging through the trail they’d broken earlier. Handily, he wasn’t the first one to head back either, so the way was even more paved. It made it easier to drag his icy burden along the ground, but he still was good and exhausted by the time he got back to the shoreline and the ridiculously cold water he had to cross all over again.
Ugh, he should’ve made it smaller. Maybe he could’ve like, crammed a few icicles into that old skull stuffed it with snow, frozen it a little, and just carried that? But it was too late, he’d already committed to his weird old container plan. There was no going back. Except for the literally going back that they were all trying to do, of course. He gritted his teeth, gripping the branch handle harder, and pulled his burden along the shore ‘til he reached the spot where the crossing was shortest and he had the best chance.
With a sigh, Nocturne dragged the weird mass of snow and ice and branches and cedar leaves or needles or whatever out into the water, which was no less cold the second time for all that ice had already replaced his entire skeleton by this time. It must’ve done, anyhow. Nocturne could barely remember a time when he wasn’t so cold it felt like his legs were going to snap, but he just kept on going anyhow, dragging the so-important bundle deeper into the water until the ground fell away beneath his feet and he was once again fighting the ocean for every inch of progress.
It was a whole lot harder trying to drag something with him. Hard enough to breathe with the saltwater trying to slip slick fingers into his nostrils and drown him without trying to keep a grip on a branch with gums and baby teeth. A wave tore the branch from his mouth, leaving splinters in his gums and tears dripping from his eyes as his mouth began to bleed, but he scrambled forward and caught it again, pulling harder and hurting more with each kick of tired little feet against briny waves.
After an exhausting battle, tiny hooves found the ground again, and he dragged himself and his burden onto Nerine’s northern shore. He collapsed, panting, and struggled for breath a bit longer just out of reach of the waves. But there was so terribly much further to go, and he knew the rest was a race against the clock. The northernmost part of Nerine was frozen, but once he left the icy lands behind he had to get to the Mountain before his contraption melted, and just hope it stayed together and cold enough to keep the icicles intact.
He rested just long enough to catch his breath and let the burning fade from his weary muscles before scrambling to his feet again and setting out. The way was easiest where there was still snow on the ground and the ice could glide through the snow without wearing too hard on his already wounded gums. The long trip through Nerine, and most of Taiga too, were still snowy, and as much as he had begun to hate the cold, he couldn’t help but be grateful for the weather’s aid in his quest.
The farther south he got, though, the more it warmed up. His mouth felt like fire as he clung tight to the branch handle he’d unintentionally fashioned, his whole body burning with effort as he dragged the bundle through rockier Loess and the far less frozen central forest. At least the way was familiar, even if it took what felt like eternity to the young boy.
Finally though, the Mountain came into view. Just a little farther. Every step was agony, muscles on fire and burning with each movement. Blood dripped from the corner of his mouth as the branch wore at his raw gums, but still he pressed on, climbing foothills and closing the distance until at last he was climbing the Mountain again. All the way back to the same spot he’d been summoned to so very, very long ago now, and the second he made it back, his legs gave out and he crumpled into an exhausted heap, the branch tearing from his mouth and dragging a pained gasp along with it. He barely had the energy to lift his head and check on the messy, melting bundle of bark and mud and snow and hope, peeking at it out of the corner of one silver eye before his head fell to the ground and his eyes lost focus.