Over the next several days of their journey the company walked through the perilous paths of the deep mountains. They were narrow and jagged walkways, often barely wide enough for a man, that snaked impossibly around a forest of razor-sharp rocks and treacherous snows. Every day their company seemed to lose another man. It was one of Caden’s on that first day, then two of the Ekyrians on the second. On the third day they lost none but by then they were like the living dead, as cold as corpses and taking aimlessly their only remaining path.

“We’re going to die in these mountains, aren’t we?” Asked Arthur, who followed closely behind Caden and Anselm with whatever rag of fur or cloth he could find wrapped around him until he had lost his human shape. They were all like that now – even the Ekyrians had started wrapping their metal shells in their blankets, stubbornly refusing to leave any part of their armour behind.

“Don’t be stupid, lad,” answered Anselm. The old man was stubborn, but it was clear his age was working against him, and despite his still-impressive physicality he had been slowing down considerably. “You’re wasting your energy thinking about defeat, when you should be using it on walking.”

Caden spoke up then, pressing on ahead of them as he always had and behind only Eser-Vir in the column. “We’ll get out of this, I promise you,” he swore, carefully navigating each placement of his feet. “It can’t be much further…”

“We were a fool to trust this Black Warden. He does not know these paths, he’s leading us to nowhere but our ends,” said Arthur. “We have no food left, we drink from the ice, and last time we took rest I saw men whose feet were going black.”

Eser-Vir had been in earshot of Arthur’s words, but did not respond directly to the young knight’s accusations. He instead called out with news, saying, “there’s a canyon down below. It should be warmer, and large enough for us to camp.”

They spent the next several hours trekking down to the canyon Eser-Vir spoke of, where they found for the first time in several days some semblance of comfort and safety. They found a small stream that was once a mighty river and surrounding it were new-grown shoots of spring plants, and deadwood for fires that a storm had been torn from trees.

It still lightly snowed and that snow dusted a ground that remained cold and hard, but it was significantly drier than the path they had been on and Caden found himself able to sit and joke with his men in a way that had been limited since the Dweller’s attack. Several of them went to fish by the stream or set traps for freshwater shrimp and other small animals, and whenever something was caught a small cheer was heard.

“Your Majesty,” said one of those soldiers, who bowed to Caden before the fire and offered a small fish he had caught, “you should eat this.”

“We’re all hungry, Sir,” Caden replied as he held up his hand to decline. “Give it to someone weaker than I.”

The soldier nodded and bowed to him again. “Thank you, Sire,” he said, then he turned and walked away.

“Should’ve taken it,” grumbled Anselm. “I’d have eaten it.”

“You would eat the mountains if I let you,” Caden replied.

“Now there’s an idea,” said Arthur.

The three men laughed for a moment, but that laughter died as they were reminded of their exhaustion. Across from them by another fire sat Ethelyn, the remaining Herald and several of the Ekyrian officers, and they were speaking aloud in a foreign language that the Sarkanians could not understand.

“They seem to be having an easier time of it than us,” said Anselm, who added more sticks to their fire and blew to make the flames rise.

Caden lay himself down on a fur roll and stared into the fire’s embers purely so he would not have to look at Ethelyn, though the flames infuriatingly reminded him of her. “The sorceress does not feel cold the way that we do,” he said. “Or rather, she has ways to hold it at bay that we do not.”

Anselm smirked slightly. “Like you, for instance? I saw her enter your tent one night, and she did not leave until the morning,” he said.

Arthur seemed surprised by this but said nothing. Caden rolled his eyes slightly, resting his head on the inside of his elbow. “Are you spying on your king, Anselm?” He asked.

“No, but I would warn him about women who cannot be trusted,” the old knight replied.

“You need not worry for me, Anselm,” said Caden. “She has done more for me and our kingdom than you could imagine. We are… Connected in that way.”

“She saved you when you fell, didn’t she?” Anselm asked. “She used her sorcery to prevent you from dying.”

Caden did not answer, but Anselm took it for a response and nodded. “I see,” the old knight said. “No matter. What’s done is done and we can only change the future.”

Their conversation changed then, though Caden had no more part of it. Anselm and Arthur spoke of other things and Caden’s eyes grew heavy until, under the soothing comfort of his comrade’s voices and by the warmth of the fire, he passed into a deep and dreamless sleep.

When he woke again it was because of someone gently nudging him, and he opened his pale eyes to find Ethelyn kneeling by the campfire and pressing her hand into his shoulder. It was dark now but the fire was built well, and members of their company were still active and talking.

“What is it?” Caden asked her as he shifted to lean on his elbow.

“Eser-Vir has gone missing,” said the Sorceress, quietly.

Caden was suddenly alert and pushed himself up further with his hand. “What do you mean? Where did he go?” He asked her.

“Down the canyon. He went to look ahead for something, but it’s dark now and he still hasn’t returned.”

“Damn it all,” he grumbled and finally got to his feet. “Has anyone gone to look for him?”

“Not yet,” said Ethelyn, who then leaned in closer to Caden and lowered her voice to barely more than a whisper. “Only a few of us know. The Herald believes if your men found their guide was missing, it would cause a panic.”

Caden nodded slowly, then looked around at the tents and the campfires. “The weather is clear, so we have more time to search,” he whispered back. “I’ll go myself. If we were to send a search party, it would be noticed.”

“Are you sure?” Ethelyn asked him, her voice marred with a hint of concern. “We could send some of the Ekyrians.”

“It’s not just that. My eyes have grown increasingly accustomed to the dark as of late, and I would see better than any of them. Even so, I won’t go alone – I’ll take two men with me.”

Ethelyn nodded, then secretly placed something in Caden’s hand that he could feel was a small orb, and warm beyond how much her body would have heated it. “Take this. It’s a source of portable flame, but this one is smaller and far more reliable,” Ethelyn said.

Caden put the orb beneath his furs then left Ethelyn with a nod of farewell that he did not wait to see returned. He pulled his hood over his head to shroud himself then walked through the camp until he reached the end of it, where the canyon suddenly became shrouded in night.

If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

Nearby, two of his kingsguard were resting by a fire and he gestured for them to get up. “You two, come with me,” he said, and it was only that they could see his eyes under his hood that they obeyed him.

“Is everything alright, Sire?” Asked one of them, as he gathered his sword from the ground.

“I’m heading out to look in the canyon,” Caden answered. “I need an escort, but we must be quick and quiet.”

The two nodded and bowed and a minute later the three men passed over the threshold of light and warmth and stepped into the cold of the untamed evening. They walked quietly down through the canyon towards the north, following the direction in which Eser-Vir had last been seen, and it was only when they were out of sight of their camp that Caden brought out the small orb, which began to glow with a warm heat that lit the space around them.

“Keep an eye out. If you see something, alert me immediately,” said Caden, even though his eyes pierced far more deeply into the distant night than theirs.

For perhaps the next hour they searched. They followed the banks of the stream, often climbing up over rocks or onto ledges, or veering off to peer into a small cave or what looked to be a pathway out of the canyon. Eventually one of the men called to Caden that he had found tracks and as the snow began to fall again Caden approached and knelt to examine them.

There was blood on the ground in two different places, perhaps ten meters apart, and the broken shaft of a dark arrow with no sign of the head. He examined the arrow and noticed that the fletching work was skilful but improvised, and utilized foraged material that was far below the quality of what a professional fletcher would use.

“This is Eser-Vir’s arrow,” Caden said under his breath, and when he stood again he drew his steel sword. His guards did the same and they took position behind Caden so that they could each keep watch over their surroundings.

“Sire, perhaps we should run back to camp and get help? It looks to me he’s been attacked, and it could be those Dweller creatures are responsible,” one of the guards said.

Caden nodded. “You go back,” he told the man. “Do you see over there? There is more blood, a trail of it. We’ll keep following that in case he doesn’t have much time.”

The guard nodded and as Caden and the second man proceeded to follow the trail of blood up a rising path of rocky ground, he ran back down through the canyon until no longer in the glow of Caden’s orb.

“What’s your name, man?” Asked Caden to the guard who followed behind him.

“Alfred Tianard,” he replied.

“It’s imperative we get Eser-Vir back, Alfred. We’ll die in these mountains without him.”

Alfred nodded and picked up his pace to match Caden’s increased own, and soon the two men were jogging ever-higher up the walls of the canyon until the stream below them disappeared from sight.

Eventually Caden put the orb back in his cloak and the light disappeared so that they were only two more shadows in the night. Caden could still see the splatters of blood on the floor but they were slowly being covered by snowfall, and he had to increasingly rely on the terrain itself to estimate where Eser-Vir had gone.

After around ten minutes of following the upward trail they came to a small plateau where, below them, the canyon split into multiple different routes, and various hills and low mountains surrounded them. They followed this plateau into a small woodland of cedar trees where the fresh snow was stained with streaks of blood and both Caden and Alfred turned to stand back to back and look for the source of it.

“I don’t like this, Sire,” Alfred said. “Perhaps we should go back and wait for help.”

“We’re close. We have to be,” replied Caden. “This blood is new.”

“But the blood behind us isn’t and anyone who comes won’t see it under the snow to follow.”

Caden did not reply and instead looked around at what he now realized were tracks. They were not as crisp and defined as they would have been mere minutes ago, but they were there – large, boot-shaped indents surrounded by a frantic mismatch of smaller prints. The two men followed them around behind one of the cedar trees and a moment later they found a large, dead wolf with silver fur and half a dozen sword wounds.

“Keep an eye out, Alfred. There are wolves around,” said Caden.

“Sire, look out!”

Caden heard Alfred’s cry, but did not fully comprehend it until a moment too late. A large beast, swift from the woods, was bounding across the ground towards them as fast as it could sprint, and as Caden turned to see it, it leapt through the air and knocked him to the ground with such force that he slid across the snow and found the ground giving way beneath him. He tried to reach out to grab hold of something, but whatever he caught came away in his hand. Suddenly he was sliding and rolling down a steep decline until he came to an abrupt stop at the bottom of a large gulley.

When Caden opened his eyes again a few moments later, the entire world seemed still, and so silent that he could almost hear the falling snow. He groaned slightly and began to push himself up, and as he did so he noticed another trail of blood leading towards Eser-Vir, who was sitting back against one of the gully’s walls and holding a finger to his mouth in a bid for Caden to be silent. Caden nodded at him, then without a word he began to crawl along the ground until he was by Eser-Vir’s side.

“Are you injured?” Caden whispered.

“Wolves,” replied Eser-Vir, who held his left forearm with his remaining hand. “They’re watching us.”

When Caden looked up again he saw them – nearly ten white and grey creatures stalking at the top of the gulley in front of them, and with more still yet behind. They were all baring teeth and waiting for a signal to attack, and it was then that Caden realized he had dropped his sword and only had a dagger to hand. He pulled the dagger from his belt, drew it, and threw the sheath down by his side. “Stay behind me, Warden,” he commanded.

Slowly Caden took to his feet, his dagger raised like a stinger, and he held it threateningly towards each pair of cold eyes that looked on him with a ravenous hunger. He tried to listen out for any sign of Alfred at the top of the gully but heard nothing, and a moment later the large wolf that had jumped on Caden bound down the side of the gully like a silver flare. At the bottom it came to a sudden halt and Caden turned to face it with his blade held forward.

“Come for me, beast,” Caden challenged. “Let’s see if your teeth are quicker than my knife.”

He glared at the beast, his eyes as white as the falling snow, and though the wolf had started moving towards Caden it paused the moment it saw them.

The next few moments were some of the most terrifying of Caden’s life. All around him the pack waited, standing high over him like the mountains and ready to pounce in an instant – yet they did not. They stood and resolved to observe him, eyes as pale and white and as blue as the ice swallowing his stature and his unshaken resolve. Suddenly Caden realized that they were no longer growling and no longer aggressively tense, and that the silver wolf was watching him not only with curiosity, but with fear.

When Caden saw this hesitation he stepped forward, causing the wolf to move back then slowly lower its head away from him and submissively lick its own lips. “Are you no longer hungry, wolf?” Asked Caden, who made a feinting thrust with his knife that caused the wolf to leap back, then slowly turn and climb out of the gully in a succession of quick leaps.

“What’s going on?” Eser-Vir asked, tightly gripping his wound as the wolves, whose eyes were fixed upon Caden, began to step back from the gully’s edge and disappear into the trees like shadows retreating from the sun. Suddenly, as though they were nothing more than fading phantoms, they were gone, and Caden lowered his dagger.

“Are you hurt?” Asked Caden, turning back to the Black Warden and ignoring the question he had no answer to.

“Only my arm, nothing some clean water and stitches won’t solve,” Eser-Vir replied, then struggled to stand up himself until Caden took his free arm and pulled him to his feet. “Thank you, Sire.”

A few seconds later the Kingsguard, Alfred, took a step towards the edge of the gully, his eyes still wide with fear. “I thought you were dead, Sire,” he said.

Caden had no idea where the man had been, or how he had survived, but he answered him in only a shrug. “Help us climb out, Alfred. Eser-Vir’s injured and we’re still a way from the camp.”

They found the shortest part of the gully wall where Alfred held on to each in turn as they climbed up the side and out. When they were back amongst the trees and the dead wolf, Caden found his sword lying in the snow and picked it up, and Eser-Vir looked down at the creature he had killed.

“These are truly wild wolves, or truly hungry wolves, for them to attack us so brazenly,” the Warden said. “They followed me up here out of the canyon.”

Caden nodded to him and took a long strip of cloth from his pockets that he had kept for such an occasion, then began to bind it around the gash on Eser-Vir’s forearm to stop the bleeding. “There were so many of men,” Caden said. “I have never seen so large a pack.”

“Indeed, it was large. And the moment they realized who you were it was though a fear overtook them, or some instinct to leave,” said Eser-Vir, who was looking once more into Caden’s eyes just as he had done at that decrepit gate – with suspicion.

It was then that ten men ran out into their vision led by the guard Caden had made return and Ethelyn, who came to a sudden halt the moment Caden was noticed. “Caden! Are you hurt?” She called. “I could feel that you were in danger, but that the danger has now passed.”

“I’m fine, Ethelyn,” Caden replied. “But we should get back. We’ll freeze here soon enough, and Eser-Vir needs his wound tending properly.”

The party made their way back to their canyon camp, wrapping themselves tightly again as the snow continued to fall, and when they finally returned the camp seemed abuzz with worry. Men were not sleeping like they should have been, but waiting, and when the sentries called out that they had returned it was as though the canyon itself sighed.

“You’re a damn fool lad,” called out Anselm, who stepped out to greet them. “I would have gone after him if you’d told me, or we could have sent Arthur, or the foreigners.”

“If that had been the case,” said Eser-Vir as he stepped past the old man and towards the nearest fire, “then we would both be dead.”