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Carina Goldstone, Logician of the 3rd Renown, and Vitt Secondson-Salvado, Hunter of the 9th Renown, Kingdom of Infinzel, in the company of the champions of Fornon, always on their best behavior
Cortland Finiron, Hammer Master of the 12th Renown, and Traveon Twiceblack, Skulker of the 2nd Renown, Kingdom of Infinzel and Soldier’s Rest, on the wrong side of the mountain
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13 Meltzend, 61 AW
Ascending the Nortmost Mountain
Day Fourteen of the Trial
Carina had been being good. Well, mostly. On their way up the Nortmost, she had largely avoided using [Future Sight] to probe the possibilities awaiting her. The unforeseen confluence back in Tiptop had shown her the error in becoming too reliant on clairvoyance. Plus, the lurking presence of the stone walkers made Carina hold back on wasting the ability. She wanted to keep it in reserve for when they came under attack, figuring that her Ink would be better utilized staying a few steps ahead of a stone walker than trying to parse the variety of grim fates awaiting her.
And they had come under attack. Twice in the last three days the stone walkers tried to enclose them in their grasp. Carina had certainly found it useful to know exactly where to put her feet and what distance to maintain, how best to keep the lumberjocks of Fornon between her and these strange, plodding creatures. The stone walkers would attack if given the opportunity, but more often seemed content to simply herd the champions higher up the mountain. Carina thought it would’ve been a simple thing to stay ahead of the creatures.
Breck Bucksap made every encounter a battle, though. He demanded his champions break the stone walkers down to rubble. Carina knew the lumberjocks well enough to keep her suggestions of a better, easier approach to herself.
That morning, high above, Carina had glimpsed the cliff. One cliff amongst many, yet Carina knew this one. Even though she had never been up there before, Carina remembered dragging herself across those rocks, desperate to throw herself off and onto the protruding ledge below. She had spent hours in that possible future, poking it like a bit of meat stuck in her teeth.
Carina knew it was time to make a move.
It was night and she was supposed to be sleeping. Instead, Carina packed herbs into a kettle with some snow and picked her way across the camp to the fire. She was careful not to disturb any of the alarms. The lumberjocks had stretched chains and ropes tied with bits of metal across the ground in a network like a spider’s web—this was supposed to alert them if a stone walker rose up from the mountain in their midst. Carina felt this was unlikely. For whatever reason, they had never seen a stone walker after the sun set.
Carina stepped carefully around the mound of blankets where Geana Woodsmith moaned in her feverish sleep. The woman’s arm had been crushed that morning when she let a stone walker get too close. Geana happened to be Fornon’s healer, but she’d already faded her Ink after an earlier altercation. She wouldn’t be able to mend herself until the gods restored her in the morning.
“All that squalling keeping you awake?” Vitt asked as Carina nestled her kettle at the edge of the fire. The Secondson sat opposite the hulking Kendrick Branchbull, the two of them on first watch.
Carina glanced in Geana’s direction. “She’s not that loud, Vitt.”
“A thing doesn’t have to be loud to be irritating,” he replied.
“Empathetic, as always,” Carina said.
Vitt showed his teeth.
“It’s my fault,” Kendrick said quietly. “She used up her [Healing Touch] on me.”
“It’s your leader’s fault, actually,” Carina said. “Breck is too cavalier about killing the stone walkers. It’s unnecessary. They can be rebuffed and outpaced. Dismantlement is a waste of resources.”
Kendrick’s eyebrows drew together in consternation, like he’d never considered that the senior champion of Fornon could be wrong about anything. “He says it’s good training.”
“Perhaps,” Carina said with a shrug.
Not so long ago, she’d rebelled against her own training for not moving quickly enough. She felt a brief pang behind her ribs, remembering how Cortland had walked them all through the Underneath, putting himself between them and the danger lurking down there.
Her kettle whistled and Carina pulled it out of the fire with a glove. She produced two tin mugs from her cloak and poured, handing one to Kendrick and keeping the other for herself.
“Something to settle the nerves,” Carina said.
“Thank you,” Kendrick replied and, though the light was low, Carina suspected he blushed. The young man had probably never tried tea in his life. He held the cup under his nose and inhaled deeply before drinking, smacking his lips as he burnt his tongue. “It’s good.”
“What about me?” Vitt asked.
Carina paused with her mug in front of her lips. “Your nerves never need settling.”
“True enough,” he said. “But I do like tea.”
“Not enough cups,” Carina replied, before turning back to the lumberjock. “Kendrick?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you for carrying me those first days.”
“Of course,” he replied, running a hand over his face. “Smish mosh bork.”
Kendrick’s brow furrowed as his tongue turned to cotton in his mouth. A string of drool dangled from his bottom lip, his eyes rolled back, and his chin dropped to his chest. Carina bounced to her feet, tossing her tea into the fire, and bracing her hands against Kendrick’s chest to keep him from falling over. She balanced him there and stepped back.
“Fuck me,” Vitt said. “What did you do?”
“Time for us to make our own way,” Carina replied. She glanced up—they were amongst the stars and clouds now, the jagged last quarter of the Nortmost silhouetted in the night like knives secreted in cloak sleeves. “A blizzard rolls in the day after tomorrow. Breck will cut us loose then, let us get lost in the white. We won’t catch up and the Ink will be theirs.”
Vitt snorted. “Figured he would try screwing us. Just wasn’t sure when.”
“We don’t need them the rest of the way,” Carina said.
“You’ve seen all this?”
“A combination of foresight and deduction.”
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“Logician talk. A combination of guessing and bullshit.” Even as he groused, Vitt stood up. His movements were completely soundless. “What now?”
“The rest won’t wake up so long as we’re careful about the chains,” Carina said. “I’ll gather our things. You cut out the bottoms of their backpacks.”
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14 Meltzend, 61 AW
Ascending the Nortmost Mountain
Day Fifteen of the Trial
By Cortland's count, there were five of the creatures. Stone walkers. He had never seen one in person before, but he had read stories about them in the Battle Library. They were rare things, denizens of the cold and cruel north, and thought to be mostly extinct. Perhaps they had merely been hibernating somewhere deep below, the Nortmost their peaceful cradle, and their emergence now was part of their natural cycle. Or, equally likely, the gods had nudged them awake, maybe even forced them back into existence, as a test for the champions. Their provenance mattered little to Cortland. He had seen the bodies on the way up here—sucked down into the stone, crushed impossibly, smeared across the rock. The stone walkers were not here for discussion.
“You run if you have to,” Cortland told Traveon. “They're slow. Watch where you step and don’t get cornered. You'll be fine.”
Traveon took a gulping breath in response. The air had grown thinner these last days. The skulker had his hand-bow out, aimed at the methodically advancing stone walkers, although he had already fired one bolt that bounced harmlessly off the lead creature's front. He stumbled and slipped over loose rocks as he tried to walk backwards.
“You hear me, boy?” Cortland asked. “Easier for me to kill these fuckers if I don't got to look over my shoulder for you.”
“I hear you,” Traveon said. “I’m not enamored with leaving you behind.”
“I’ll catch up,” Cortland said. “These things don’t talk, but they communicate. Left those bodies down there for us to see.”
“So?”
“So, I’m going to send a response. Chunks of these ones, in our wake. Let their friends know to stop following us.”
They had chosen a steep trail up, one that at points required them to scramble on hands and knees. The path was exposed on all sides to tilting winds, but Cortland hadn't wanted to navigate them up through one of the crevices or ravines—he didn't trust having walls beside them when the stone walkers were about. It had started with one creature in the morning, watching them from a distance. Then three. And now five. If any more gathered, Cortland might stop liking his odds.
The hammer master dug his heels in, getting his balance on the slope. Traveon hesitated only a moment before continuing on without him.
“Right,” Cortland said. “Let’s see what you cunts are made of.”
The stone walkers approached methodically, unbothered by the steep incline of the path. They looked almost like they had human features yet, as they neared, Cortland realized that was a trick of the eye—or some predatory camouflage. Ripples and veins in their marble-like flesh gave the impression of faces, but it was like seeing shapes in the clouds. Up close, the stone walkers were like flattened worms.
Back in Infinzel, they committed their dead to the mineral garden. In other places, Cortland knew, they buried the dead and raised plaques for them. That’s what the stone walkers reminded him of—ambulatory gravestones. Their feet never actually lifted off the mountain. Instead, they rolled upward across the rock, like they were a wave passing through the mountain itself.
For the briefest moment, Cortland lost his focus. He remembered Ben Tuarez’s body sinking down into the welcoming sludge of the mineral garden. Ben’s wife, Emelia, had wanted her husband committed to the stone as quickly as possible. She hadn’t cried for him—at least, not in front of Cortland.
The stone walkers came on. Walking versions of the mineral slurry that had consumed his old friend’s body. Cortland’s knuckles popped as he squeezed the handle of his hammer.
He cocked his arm back and used [Hammer Toss]. Cortland aimed for what he interpreted as the lead stone walker’s head. His hammer struck with a satisfying thunderclap, shattering alabaster and sending cracks through what bits of stone walker were left behind. The creature stilled and crumbled.
“You die like men,” Cortland said. “Good. Easy.”
Cortland had thrown the hammer with enough force that it might have flown all the way down the mountain and put a crater in Tiptop's immaculately paved thoroughfare. He stretched out a hand and activated [Weapon Return]. The wind snapped and howled as the hammer changed direction, returning to Cortland with the same velocity. He hoped he'd gotten the angle right and could pulverize a second stone walker on the rebound.
As if sensing the attack, two stone walkers leaned to opposite sides and let the hammer pass between them. One lanced out with an appendage and grasped onto the hammer's head. Cortland felt a tremor pass through his boots as the stone walker was dragged toward him, careening up the path on the end of the hammer with a noise like nails on slate.
The hammer’s handle slapped into Cortland's hand. But the rest of the hammer was already inside the stone walker's torso. The creature had pressed the weapon into its chest as if it were mush, its alabaster flesh slurping at the metal forged by the heat of Infinzel.
“Stupid,” Cortland grunted.
He activated [Destroy].
In truth, he wasn't sure the ability would work on the stone walker. It was meant for walls and shields—and the occasional gargoyle—but was not supposed to affect the living. Were these creatures truly alive? Or were they pieces of the mountain? Did such a distinction matter?
Cortland got his answer quickly. A shudder pulsed through the stone walker and tiny cracks spread across its surface, ruining the network of veins that gave the impression of human features. The creature's body slid apart and, from within, came a gritty, black mist. The discharge swirled through the air, stinging Cortland's cheeks like hail, and then retreated with unmistakable purpose. The particles spread across the next nearest stone walker, melting into its flesh.
In those moments exposed to the open air—or, rather, disconnected from the mountain—he sensed the cloud diminished somewhat. Some kind of spirit, then, animating the stone. Not so different from the shades that haunted the Underneath, creating bodies for themselves from old bones. Cortland only hoped he had done some permanent damage to the thing.
Wrestling his weapon from the cavity in the inert stone walker's chest, Cortland grimaced as he discovered the hammer’s head had partially dissolved. His weapon looked like a collapsed honeycomb.
“Gods damn you,” Cortland said. “I liked that hammer.”
No sooner had he said these words than the third stone walker was upon him. The creature grabbed Cortland's weapon arm—not that he could do much damage with his ruined hammer, anyway. The stone walker's grip was like a vice and Cortland’s upper arm deadened. He felt the sinking sensation then, like gravity had doubled and the mountain beneath had responded by turning to jelly. The stone walker meant to pull him downward.
Cortland leveraged himself backward and relied on [Unmovable]. Nothing could budge him, so long as his Ink held. The ground shifted unnaturally beneath his feet—breaking and twisting from the conflicting forces. He poured his [Strength+] into his captured arm, wrenching against an impossible weight. Growling, Cortland felt the joint in his shoulder loosen and pop. On the training grounds, he had flipped great stone slabs that were intended as blocks for Infinzel’s walls, but it had been some time since he’d truly tested the limits of his power.
Sweat trickled down between Cortland’s eyes. He had wrestled the sinking stone walker to a painful stalemate. The Ink on his chest blazed from the exertion. Meanwhile, the fourth stone walker rolled closer.
Though he worried about losing his balance, Cortland decided he had no other choice. He stomped his foot and used [Crevasse].
A seam opened in the side of the mountain, directed by Cortland’s mind. The rock parted around the stone walker, leaving it suspended in the air from Cortland’s arm. As he broke its connection to the mountain, a round hole opened in the creature’s face—a dark recess filled on all sides by flat, grinding teeth. The stone walker released an echoing shriek and then the spirit within poured forth, desperately seeking the safety of stone.
Cortland swung the stone walker’s empty body through the particulate mist, spreading it about. Hardened pebbles—like blackened little turds, Cortland thought—tinkled to the ground as they broke off the whole.
Ignoring the jangling pain in his shoulder, Cortland hoisted the stone walker’s empty body over his head and pitched it at the next stone walker. The impact broke apart both creatures, though the fourth kept coming forward—damaged but not compromised enough, apparently.
Cortland reached down, grasped a broken chunk of alabaster, and used [Forge]. The ability had been one of his first, though it hadn’t seen much use since he acquired [Weapon Return] and stopped going through hammers so quickly. An inappropriately timed sense of nostalgia warmed Cortland as the stone crackled and reshaped itself—a new hammer, gleaming marble white in the sun.
“Come on, fucker,” Cortland snarled. “Come on.”
He didn’t actually wait for the stone walker. Instead, Cortland marched out to meet the thing. The stone walker grasped for him, but Cortland shunted these attempts away. He pounded and pounded—spitting and howling as he did—aiming for the cracks he’d already made in the stone. Soon, the creature was a pile of rubble at his feet.
One left.
Cortland grinned as the last stone walker stopped its advance. Here had been the fight he’d been searching for—it had felt good to crush these nightmares of legend, to see them crumble. He even relished the stretched pain in his own shoulder. And now, it pleased Cortland to see that even the Nortmost, even nature itself and its ancient secrets—even these quaked before his rage.
“How do you want it?” Cortland asked. “Beaten into rubble or thrown off the mountain entire?”
Cortland did not hear the sixth stone walker rise from the path, not until it was right behind him and had already wrapped its arms around him like a lover. His arms were pinned to his sides, the air crushed from his lungs. A heavy weight struck the back of his head—once, twice—so that Cortland smelled blood and saw spots.
And then, he began to sink.
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