The next day the company moved again and climbed out of the northern side of the canyon, where the narrow path they took led them back into the mountains. The mountains there, which before had been made of stone ranging from pale to an almost obsidian-grey, were now turning the slightest shade of blue.

“It’s a sign we’re getting close,” said Eser-Vir.

The idea of finally leaving the mountains had become something of a novelty for Caden and the others, who for so long had been so focused on their survival that many had lost track of how long they had been there.

Still, they pressed on through the snows, then that night they camped under the cover of a small wood that grew on a steep slope above them. The following morning they rose again as early as light permitted, then ate a little of the precious food they had left before setting off on the day’s hike.

Food had, for a not-insignificant part of their journey, been a rare commodity. Their stocks had run low quickly in those mountains, and though the new spring allowed the company to supplement them with new-sprouting edible plants and small animals coming out of their winter hibernation, hunger had become a constant companion. Many of them had lost significant amounts of weight, and several of Caden’s kingsguard were growing weak enough that they had to be supported. It was so that, when Caden had his breakfast of picked berries and dried meat that morning, he came to find that he was now entirely out of food.

“Just one more day,” the Black Warden said. “Tomorrow we’ll be back on the proper trail, where spring will have begun in earnest, and we’ll eat like kings.”

“I am already a king,” said Caden as they walked. “Pray we eat more than what I have.”

Around mid-day Eser-Vir halted them on the path, then knelt to examine something. Caden pushed gently through his kingsguard to reach the head of the column and find what was wrong, and realized that Eser-Vir was examining a number of tracks in the snow.

“Dwellers?” Asked Caden.

“Yes,” Eser-Vir replied. “I imagine they realized we left the main trail they expected us to take and now search for us in these back ways.”

“How many are there?” Asked Caden, who could see only two pairs of tracks but knew that number was almost certainly false.

“Hard to say,” replied the Warden. “They’re walking in each other’s prints. I’d wager it was only the snow that fell two nights past that covered our own, otherwise we may well have found each other.”

“Where will they be going? Back down into the pass proper?”

“I’d say so. They probably think we’ve already made it down there, or they would have better hid their tracks.”

Caden could not help but think back to the wolves as Eser-Vir spoke, and how they had even earlier seen wolves in the company of the mountain tribesmen. Had they sent those animals out to scour the canyon and find them? Had those wolves, due to whatever part of him had subdued their aggression, made no indication of their presence when they returned to their masters?

They marched on through the afternoon and found that, to their great relief, the snow on the ground began to melt away and dry until only patches remained, and that the light of the sun was warm enough to offset the chill of the mountain air. This coincided with their path taking a downward turn, and though they were still surrounded by snow-capped peaks that were like jagged knives piercing the clouds, each hour they walked took them further into spring.

Eventually the sun began to set and it was then that, as the ground they walked on was illuminated by a filter of orange light that made a painting of the sight ahead, Caden spotted a small camp in the distance. He and Eser-Vir alone crept closer to scout, with the rest of their companions ordered back and out of sight.

The camp was on a small, rocky incline slope that stopped suddenly above the trail they had been walking, which snaked below the slope’s edge and continued down towards a valley of stone. There were three tents of fur and hide, and around a fire sat four men with wild hair and characteristically dark-grey skin. Two others stood away from the fire, one looking up the path towards where Caden and Eser-Vir were hiding and the other down into the valley.

“Do you smell that?” Asked Eser-Vir. “Meat.”

As Caden looked on their campfire he realized that they had a small mountain boar roasting on a makeshift spit, and that they almost certainly had provisions of dried and smoked meat in their possessions. “We need that food,” said Caden. “Can you fight?”

Eser-Vir shook his head as he examined his left arm, which was still bound in clean cloth. “I could use a sword in my hand, maybe, but I couldn’t draw my bow with this arm.”

“Don’t worry,” said Caden. “We have more than enough men. I will gather those of my guard who have bows, then when dusk approaches we will ambush them. Shoot them all before they can escape.”

Eser-Vir agreed with Caden’s plan, then the two returned stealthily to their companions and set to put it in motion. Caden gathered ten archers, then asked Arthur to lead them. In the short time it took them to complete their preparations the sun had fallen behind the western mountains and though there was still light, a shroud fell over the path that made them significantly harder to see.

The ambush, when it did begin, did not last long. Arthur ran down the path along the outside of the camp, sword in hand, hollering old Sarkanian insults as he did so. The ash-skinned Dwellers, who did not expect such a wild and unusual display, turned their attentions to Arthur and fired at him with arrows. Arthur ducked and dodged away from the projectiles and danced like a fool, and by the time the Dwellers realized he was distracting them Caden’s archers had already gotten into position and readied their bows.

The arrows they shot through the air flew with an almost silent whistle, hitting flesh and wood and stone with thuds and metallic ricochets. The first volley killed three of them, then the second volley killed two, and as the final Dweller jumped off the edge of the slope Arthur ran him down along the trail and dived at him. He dragged the Dweller down to the ground, then used his sword to cut the wild man’s throat before he stood victorious and panting.

That night they camped around the Dweller’s camp and divvied out the roasted boar flesh, the dried meats they had in their tents, and the foraged plants and berries equally between all men. Each of them got a small meal that held their hunger at bay and as they rested both Eser-Vir and Ethelyn went through the Dweller’s camp looking for anything of use.

For Eser-Vir it was a purely practical search, looking for anything that could help them learn of the Dweller’s intentions and movements. For Ethelyn, however, it was a scholastic curiosity – a chance to explore a culture and people she had never seen before. She wrote down notes, findings and speculations in her small book, then when she finally grew bored she settled down in her tent to sleep.

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The next morning they followed the path down into the valley of stone, then followed that for several more miles until it too began to fall away. By the early afternoon the valley trail joined a larger, more open pathway and before they realized it, they were walking not on wild and undulating terrain, but on an ancient road of cobbles obscured by the grass and weeds that grew over them.

“What is this?” Caden asked, following what remained of the road north with his eyes until the distant mountains seemed to close around the end of it like a gate.

“The Auld Road,” said Eser-Vir. “Or what’s left of it. This is about the only place that remains where it is largely intact, and it goes for only a few miles. Each winter we seem to lose a little more of it, as ice and rockfall and the shifting of the mountains turn the old paths into unrecognizable, unbreachable terrain.”

“But this means we’re close, doesn’t it?” Asked Caden. “To the edge of the mountains.”

Eser-Vir nodded but it was Ethelyn who spoke, her slender figure walking up alongside the two. “I remember this place,” Ethelyn said. “I don’t think the northern gate can be any more than two or three days away.”

They kept going, the knowledge that they were on the final leg of their journey passing down the length of the column and imbibing each man with newfound vigour. In addition, the sun, whose light was bright and warm and unimpeded by the presence of cloud, raised their moods significantly, and soon their march was filled not with the quiet perseverance that had filled those past weeks, but with cheerful talking and singing.

That afternoon they camped by a small river and fished, and once again shared the results of their efforts equally between the men. That night they slept without hunger and in comfortable temperatures, and when they continued their journey the next day they were refreshed and strengthened.

The remains of the road ended that next morning, the cobblestones becoming more and more sparse until, with no apparent explanation, they suddenly ceased. The Herald, who Caden had barely seen since his doppleganger had stayed behind to hold off the Dwellers, explained that alongside getting broken and buried, certain people would dig the cobbles out of the road for building material.

“What buildings?” Caden asked. “There are none.”

The Herald did not answer, and Caden wondered if it was because those buildings were no longer there.

Later on in the day men from the rear of the column came racing up towards the front, panting and, while not panicking, certainly afraid. “Calm down, man,” said the Warden. “What is it?”

“Those Dweller folk, they’re following us,” one of them revealed.

Caden and Eser-Vir looked to one another, while the Herald looked specifically to Caden. The eyes behind that silver mask were not the eyes of the Philosopher King, who Caden was sure by that point had never gone to the Southern Realms at all, but that did not make their gaze any less intense. It was a gaze composed entirely without worry, and entirely out of watchful curiosity. The Herald, as Ethelyn had seemed to suggest some days before, was looking to Caden not because he himself was incapable of giving orders, but because he wanted to see which orders Caden would give.

“Arthur, Anselm,” Caden called, and their names were repeated back along the line until the two men came jogging up towards him.

“What is it, Sire?” Anselm asked.

“I want you two at the rear of the column. The Dwellers are following us, and I need to know if their number increases.”

“Of course.”

The two ran back down the column again, and Eser-Vir asked Caden, “what is it we’re doing?”

Caden gestured towards the cliffs that flanked both sides of the path they were taking, each at least a hundred feet tall and each curving away from the path towards the top so that both sides sloped down towards a sudden drop. “How far do these cliffs continue like this?” Caden asked.

Eser-Vir thought for a moment. “A few miles. Why? Do you mean to turn and hold the pass against them?”

Caden shook his head. “I don’t plan to sacrifice any more Ekyrians just so we can escape,” he said as he walked. “If we turn to fight them, then we are stuck fighting them. Our objective is not to hold them here, but to leave ourselves. Similarly, they can hold this path just as we can and though we out-skill them, they still outnumber us.”

Ethelyn, who was walking close by and listening to their conversation, gave a sly smile. “He means to ambush them when they come out of the other end,” she revealed. Caden merely nodded.

“It could work,” admitted Eser-Vir. “But we would need to get through before they had chance to catch us in number.”

“We can’t alert them that something is wrong,” said Caden. “We’ll pick up our march, but we won’t go so far as to run.”

Soon the order was relayed silently down the column and each man began to walk both a little faster and a little harder. They pressed on through the ravine, the path curving one way, then another, over the course of a mile, until finally it straightened out again and led towards what Caden could see was a more open area of woodland. Meanwhile updates on the number and daring of their stalkers were passed up the line by Arthur, who reported that though they were not getting closer, they were indeed growing.

Suddenly Ethelyn, who had been silent for some time, spoke out to Caden and Eser-Vir. “There’s blizzard coming,” she said.

“A blizzard?” Replied Eser-Vir. “Nonsense. It’s too warm for a blizzard.”

Yet Caden looked up and found she was right, and that though he could barely see into the distance beyond the woodland canopy of new-sprouting leaves, a thick layer of dark and freezing cloud was rolling towards them from the north. “We could use this,” said Caden.

Eventually they reached the end of the ravine and Caden ordered the column to separate into halves and hide amongst the trees on either side of the path, so that when the Dwellers followed them, they could be ambushed. They had lost sight of the Dwellers by that point, a curve in the path hiding them behind a cliff wall, and as the last few men went into the trees Caden peered back into the ravine with keen eyes.

When the Dwellers showed themselves again there were hundreds of them. They marched around the curve in the pathway, led by a single figure larger than the rest of them, and all of them wielding frightening and primitive axes, spears and spiked clubs. A few had bows with arrows already against the strings, and several of the ash-skinned women ran ahead along the path with bare-breasts to look for tracks in the dirt.

Caden stayed hidden as they marched closer and watched as the brightness on the ground was swallowed by ever-growing shadow, until all were beneath a sky that was now blackened with cloud. And yet the Dwellers kept coming, more and more appearing in the ravine until Caden counted over a thousand of them. It was a mighty war-host for such an isolated people, and for a brief second fear gripped Caden’s heart as the snow began to fall.

“Don’t worry,” Ethelyn told him, though her voice was not spoken out loud. It passed through the air between them, a sound not heard but felt, and entirely unique to their bond. “Victory is already ours.”

In the few minutes it took the front of the warhost to reach the end of the ravine, the gentle snowfall became unimaginably fierce, blown towards the eyes of the Dwellers on a wind that whipped at Caden’s back. Suddenly the snow was so heavy and swept through so swiftly that when the Dwellers finally stepped into the waiting ambush they could barely be seen, and Caden had to rely on the sound of their snarls, war-cries and marching to realize they were coming towards him.

Besides him Ethelyn raised her hands towards the sky, the fire-red in her mahogany hair melting the snow that touched it, and suddenly the blizzard seemed to swoop down – as though the entirety of that terrible storm was focused on where they stood. A moment later Caden drew his sword silently, and the grey-in-white silhouette of a man far larger than him drew closer by the second. He held his breath, waiting until the silhouette drew unbearably close, then lunged forward with his sword and swiped for the neck.

A second later the war-leader’s head hit the ground, and the body that held two large axes fell crippled besides it. The Dwellers by his side were like grey shadows in the wall of white, but Caden let out a furious cry as loudly as he could, then killed them with wild and frantic swings. Then the rest of the men began to scream, and the Dwellers began to scream, and Caden watched as the wall of snow was suddenly raised just enough that he could see them – hundreds of them – being cut down by the swords of men shrouded in transparency.

In their defeat the Dwellers helplessly swung around themselves, unable to see the killers that some strange thaumaturgy hid from their sight. Soon the ash-skins fled back into the ravine and men who seemed to be made of nothing more than wind and falling snow pursued and cut them down.

As their victory played out, Caden pushed his sword into the ground and watched silently through the storm.