——

A huge statue loomed overhead. Lleu was not sure what it depicted as everything around him was blurred and distorted as if he was looking through some poorly made glass. Briefly, he wondered how had he gotten there and where this was but then his attention was quickly drawn back to the statue.

A few blinks cleared the distortion in his vision somewhat, colors sharpened and the room became more illuminated. With this new illumination, the statue was revealed to be a titanic figure wrapped in a majestic cloak standing in a ruined temple. Surprisingly, its head seemed to be missing leaving only a pitch black hole where the neck ended.

The air around him twitched, ripples passed through the air and causing cascading rainbow patterns in the mist covered floor. He watched completely fascinated as the ripples continued. The air twitching again and again and constantly increasing in frequency until they suddenly halted as something moved in the opening where the statues head should have been.

——

Light fell on the camp and opening his eyes Lleu looked about. Aelan still seemed to be dozing even though an occasional eye opened and after briefly scanning the surroundings closed again. Lleu stretched tiredly, feeling as if he hadn't slept at all during the night and began the new day. As he stretched he was surprised to see the golden disk in the palm of his hand which promptly crumbled into dust and floated away on a light breeze.

Unsure how to feel about the loss of the mysterious disk Lleu decided to put it out of his mind and focus on the day's tasks of which a meal was the first.

Dried meats, fruits, and a hard sort of cracker was the food of the morning. It was not exactly good but wasn't bad either and Lleu had eaten far worse in his life. He guessed the choice of food was so because the expedition had no wish for any spoilage to cause the illness of its pathfinders.

Aelan, eating the same, got up from his vigil and began prepping. The camp was quickly cleaned and moments later the pair was ready to go.

The next several days passed without great event, no more of the monsters attacked and Lleu spent his evenings working through the sets of exercises provided by his mentor. Each day, the mountains had grown with their increased proximity until they towered above, impossible to climb or traverse.

It was about midday when they finally reached a point on the slopes where they could no longer gain any altitude and so they began riding alongside them. Up ahead, Lleu could recognize the mountain shapes Aelan had pointed out days before which marked the position of the pass they would be investigating.

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Abruptly, the rocks beside them fell away as a break in the mountain chain came into view. Long and dark, a winding corridor located at the center of this break twisted its way into the depths of the rocks only to disappear out of sight. They had reached the pass.

“There is just enough light left in the day to scout the pass fully. We will camp out here after we come back.” Said Aelan as he tied his enquian to a lone tree.

“Leave Fiella here, enquian refuse to go into the mountains, they’ll be safe here though.”

Lleu did as instructed and together the pair entered the corridor and began to walk.

Footsteps echoed and the few outside sounds became more muted the farther they proceeded.

“No wind, it seems this will not take too long,” Aelan said, raised finger in the air as he tested for a breeze.

“What does no wind mean?” Lleu asked

“No wind means that the pass is most likely blocked. Usually, no pass is closed for more than two years in a row except those that are shut permanently. If we do find a blockage this will be the fifth year in a row and we will consider this pass dead.”

As if called, a gigantic heap of rubble made of ice and rocks came into view as they turned the next corner.

“Looks like I was right,” Aelan said unhappily, “let's go back.”

Not much later, as they exited Aelan began to lead the way to an overhang he knew where they would camp for the night. When they reached it he said,

“This spot will do for tonight. Tomorrow though, we will be heading straight to the gathering point.”

“Is it far from here?” asked Lleu.

“The gathering point? No, it's barely half a day away and actually still on the road coming out of our city. The ride there should be fairly quick. Actually, we should be one of the first to get there.”

“Shouldn't the main force get there first if it's on the road? They've been traveling it this entire time haven't they?”

“Nope, they are slow, drives us nuts with how long they can take to cross a little ground.”

Joking about the slowness of others the two trained for a time after setting up their camp. As the sun was setting and the two were preparing to sleep Lleu looked out to the sea of fog that spread out below and noticed the same twitching in the mist that he had seen on the first day of travel. Finally, certain of its existence, he asked the question.

“Is it twitching?”

“Is what twitching?”

“The Mist. I keep on seeing it do that out of the corner of my eye.”

“Yeah it does that, doesn't mean anything though. We’ve tried finding a pattern when it starts and connect it aberration appearances and so on. Would have been pretty useful but we never could find any connection. I wouldn't worry about it.”

Something about the twitching seemed familiar in a way it had not been before, feeling almost as if it was part of a far-off dream. Unsure of where he had seen something like it before or what caused it to move that way Lleu drifted to sleep feeling wary of the land.