My left foreleg still ached as I walked after her, and the extra weight didn’t help at all. But I bore it. This was important, wasn’t it?

So we set off, heading to Gwymr/Frina, to the faer. Along the way Hinte took out a kind of orb. A yellow-white light shone from the center, past the clear liquid and the two glass shells of the object. Beneath, four legs sprouted from the orb at wide angles.

The compass had a bunch of colored pebbles on the shell and they rolled as Hinte handled it. She turned the outer shell of the compass until the glyph for ‘south’ was over the white pebble, the south stone. Metal guards limited the inner shell’s rotation⁠ ⁠—⁠ without them you could flip east and west, and leave yourself starless and confused. Well, at least, without the suns to mark east and west you would be.

I peeked at the compass from behind Hinte. Sky’s compasses could have up to twenty guides, but surface dwellers wouldn’t need as many. I counted seven. White south and black north, green Ceiwad and violet Laswaith, blue Oleuni and yellow Enyswm, and a red stone I couldn’t place.

That stone danced across the sphere, at the very bottom, never rising above the horizon. Was it something below us? Or maybe something was interfering? You’d hear of cursed locations that wrecked compasses, like iron-smited caves or yellow mangrove copses. My brother had told me there even was a maelstrom in the deepest south that sucked skylands right out of the air! It would totally fit for the Berwem to be cursed. It would explain so much, really.

Oh! Maybe it was a real cryst detector! That would be great to have, and exactly the sort of thing Hinte would have without telling me. But it was fine. I’d let her have her secretes.

While I thought, we were walking on. Again Hinte did not press on at her frantic pace. Some more ghost canteen-swallows later, and Hinte might have faltered. She moved on as if nothing had happened, but we walked slower after that.

The pace felt almost relaxing after the brisk marches through the lake. The burden I carried didn’t hurt, but I guessed it might balance whatever soothing the slower stride did for my legs. We walked back into the dust and smoke and heat of the Berwem, and I groaned.

The sound turned Hinte’s head, and she peered at me, lips pursed. “Why do you still have my bag?”

I looked down. “Oh! Um. I forgot?”

“Give it here.”

I slipped my head through the strap and footed the bag to her.

Taking the bag, the dark-green wiver reached in with one wing, without looking, and pulled out another small glass bottle. “Here. You’ll want this. More respira. Use it when you need it.”

“Oh, now you think to give it to me before we walk into the lake’s death clouds.” I was joking, but it feel like that didn’t come out in my tone.

Hinte frowned at me, frills flaring. “Only because I had not realized how much weaker your throat was. I can take it back.”

“No, no, it’s fine. Thank you, Hinte.” I smiled, and Hinte’s frills relaxed, and her frown eased.

We continued on with me walking even further behind Hinte. Somehow, that amazing electric feeling was less amazing, and that awful burden pressed harder into my back.

“Did anything happen while I was gone?” Hinte asked after some time, as if it had slipped her mind. She slowed even further, and I had to reply face-to-face.

Pray don’t tell.

“Uh…no. Well, sort of. There were these footsteps once that ran up the human and took its sword. I think it was a olm looking for metal or something.”

“You didn't see it?”

“I… hid? It happened really quick, I didn't know what the cracking sound could've been.”

Hinte stayed silent for beat. Then, “Anything else?”

“There was this shadow at the edge of my vision once. Um, I guess it might have been the size of dragon or less. It was gone when I looked at it. I think it was a shadow or something,” I said, hugging my wings to my body.

“And you ignored it?” She stared at me, eyes unreadable behind her goggles and face stark in the lantern light.

“No? I mean⁠ ⁠—⁠ there is nothing out on the lake here this late at night.”

Hinte continued to stare at me, incredulous, like I said something silly. I glanced down to my claws. It wasn't convincing — I knew it wasn't convincing. But I didn't want it to be. I was done lying, and the new Kinri was painfully, stutteringly transparent. I could lie, I just didn't want to.

Hinte's fangs were salty. “Tongueless!” she said. “That could have been something important. Imagine what a dragon out here at the same time as these humans could be up to.”

I said, “I’m sorry.” She said nothing. We walked on, the darkness outside our bubble of glairy light seeming so much more intense, seeming to hide known and unknown terrors. Staring at it, as I had grown to do in my day in the lake, I saw the darkness was more intense. Night had fallen long outside of the lake.

What could a dragon out here be up to? Hinte and I weren’t up to anything. And the two sifters seemed nice enough. I tried to imagine what a dragon out here at the same as these humans could be up to, and couldn’t really think of anything. I slacked that line of thought, and went back to staring⁠ ⁠—⁠ no, how about ‘meditating?’⁠ ⁠—⁠ I went back to meditating on the blackened vog.

Our footfalls made even bigger cracks in the dustone, and though it held, the ground now flexed with our steps. My thoughts were drifting; I was pretty bad at meditating.

I shook my empty canteen. My ghost canteen would have half-emptied by now, wouldn’t it? It sounded frilly, but trust me, it tracked the time better than ‘a while.’

Did dragons working late into the night invent their own ghost rings to track time? Maybe if you needed to track time for something you shouldn’t need to do it at night anyway. Nights were for sleeping and star-gazing.

The corpse on my back shifted as I stumbled over some pointed, furrowed ground. “Why are we carrying all these bodies back home?” I asked.

“Proof,” Hinte said. “The faer will believe us, but not everyone. The bodies will assure them.”

“All of them?”

“They will have information and evidence we would not know to check. One of the apes is still alive, unconscious. Rhyfel and his⁠ ⁠—⁠ inquirers will investigate them and taste whatever is at the root, here.”

I didn’t say anything else, and followed behind in silence. As I walked, I thought to the ape on my back. I recalled the blood dripping onto my suit. Something about that piqued me.

“Hinte,” I said. Her wings hitched in acknowledgment. “Why was the creature injured when we found it? Was it attacked?”

“Yes, that was a rockwraith bite.”

“How can you tell?”

“The behavior is a tell. Almost nothing is active in the cliffs near the gray season. Glasscrabs would not attack unless provoked. Crawlers would not leave remains. Only rockwraiths will fly away after you stop moving.”

“What! You said they would eat me!”

She only snickered. I smacked her in the side with my wing. Waving her tongue at me, she shifted onto her hindlegs to retaliate, but faltered, and yelped, and fell toward me, wings flailing. I caught her. She got back over her feet and I let her stand on her own.

“Okay, let’s stop.”

She only rolled her head at me, looking away.

“You can’t carry all of that weight with your hindleg injured! You’ll only make it worse!”

“I am fine,” she said, high-walking away again. I followed, reluctant. Back where we’d just played, an even bigger crack had broken the lake skin. Glass oozed out in places, but the open veins were small.

I caught up to Hinte, then we walked on a few sips. It reminded me of how boring this was. I should have brought a kazoo or something. Hinte would hate it. Or maybe a flute! Did I still have that flute I would sneak away to play when I was a fledgling? I hoped I packed it in one of the bags I hadn’t opened yet. I’d only brought a few things with me when I left.

Two thumps came from the right of me. I turned to them. A pause. My heart quickened. The last time something stirred in the vog, I had cowered, disappointed Hinte.

So I bravely slinked after the thumps.

“Kinri!”

I spun back around, almost stumbling. On Hinte’s back, one of the apes moved! It struggled to its feet while Hinte tried to knock it off. She spread her wings to block it. But without me following, the ape leapt behind her. She lashed her tail. It wrapped around the ape’s hindleg. The thing tripped over.

It carried another ape corpse on its shoulder, one with its throat torn. It flopped to the ground with it. The ape stabbed down with its forefoot. Hinte groaned, but held fast. The ape twisted the knife stuck in Hinte’s tail, and dragged it. Hinte screamed and released her hold.

The thing picked up the corpse, starting away. I was landing behind it. Slash at it. I caught the armor of the corpse. Pull. The ape was overpowering me, and I only snapped some links of the armor.

I crouched to leap at it, and then Hinte groaned. Stopping, I turned to her.

She growled, fangs dripping. “What are you doing?”

“You are injured and⁠ ⁠—”

“And the ape is getting away.”

I stepped closer to her. “It can’t outfly us and it can’t hide from us. If we found them once, we can find them again.”

She flared her frills. “I do not need your help. Go. I will join you.”

“But⁠ ⁠—”

“Stone-frills, listen to me for once. Go.”

I ripped at my rope, the human falling to the lake skin. My bag was unstrapped and left there.

Bravely, I went, waving my tongue in the air, and smelling the sweat and blood of the fleeing ape.

* * *