Nysta woke with a start from a dream of burnt flesh buried in a frozen hole in the ground. Ringing in her ears was the malicious laughter of a Caspiellan mage and she blinked rapidly to clear the remnants of her nightmare.

Her mouth felt dry enough for her teeth to crack.

Outside the wagon, the world was comatose beneath a blanket of new snow. A sharp breeze fingered through small holes in the canvas and the elf shivered, drawing the blanket up under her chin. Though she was anxious to leave, she wanted to cling to the warmth for just a few more minutes.

She stifled a yawn, watching the spellslinger snore gently near her feet.

Wondered again why she'd brought him along. He seemed useless. A child in a world of cutthroats and mercenaries. Should have left him where she'd found him. Preferably with his guts dangling from a hole in his belly.

Could still leave him, she reminded herself.

Slipping past him wouldn't be difficult. She could even cut his throat on the way out and he'd never notice.

She thought of the reason she'd given him. That he distracted her from her guilt. There was a grain of truth to the excuse, she thought with a grimace.

But blaming herself wasn't doing any good. She knew that. It was making her feel weak. Making her doubt herself.

And, with the Bloody Nine to kill, the elf figured she didn't need doubts right now.

Chukshene was a spellslinger, though. A mage. The thought coiled around her brain. A mage had crippled Talek. Destroyed their chance at happiness.

The elf licked her lips, thinking again how easy it would be to kill him.

Further thoughts down that road were cut off as her fingers found the small wooden box in her jacket. Suddenly remembering it, she frowned, and drew it out for a closer look.

She studied it carefully, amazed by the near seamlessness of it.

Only a few times over the years had Talek shown it to her. It had seemed insignificant at the time. A family trinket. An amusing tale she presumed was mostly fiction. As an object, it meant little to her other than something he cared for.

“It's powerful,” he'd told her.

“How? Don't reckon there's much you can do with it, except maybe bash some feller's brains out with it.”

“There's more power in the world than just your arm, Nysta.”

His words echoed in her mind as she rolled it between her fingers. It felt cold to touch. But, the elf thought, so did everything at this time of year.

The indecipherable runes looked like spiders dancing. Something about them disturbed her, though she couldn't say what. Her fingers ran the length of them, tracing the arcane design and sliding along the metal braces which bound the box shut.

There was no lock.

No seal to show how to open it.

And, as far as she could tell, it wasn't meant to be opened anyway.

Puzzled, she began to look for an opening. A mechanism. Something which gave a clue as to how to open it.

She turned it in her hand, feeling the wood between her fingers.

And then her eyes widened.

Talek's box wasn't just cold. It was frozen. As though she was holding a block of ice. The cold spread eagerly into her hands, creeping up her wrists like ice crystals on glass.

The runes on the side of the box looked darker. Like they weren't just seared into the wood but were formed from the void of space. They also looked as though they were poised to crawl over her hands, or yawn open to swallow the world.

She leaned closer. Exhaled a cold fog of air.

Eyes widening.

There was something...

“What's that?”

The elf's head snapped up to see the spellslinger looking at Talek's box with an odd expression. There was something in his eyes she didn't like. Scowling, she shoved it deep into her pocket again, feeling the box's frozen temperature abruptly return to normal. “None of your fucking business.”

Her hand stayed wrapped around it in her jacket, and she decided the change of temperature was her imagination. She was tired enough, she thought, to imagine anything.

The mage yawned. “Whatever. Keep your secrets. I don't care. I've got plenty of my own and I'm sure they're better than yours. Found anything to eat?”

The elf's stomach bubbled at thoughts of food and she tossed the blanket aside. Shivered as the cold air rudely stole her warmth. It would be a bitterly cold day if the temperature inside the wagon was any indication. Cursed softly under her breath and rummaged through the small chests beside the crates.

A few neatly folded packets nestled in the second chest and she tossed one to the spellslinger. Took another for herself.

“Thanks,” he caught it with clumsy hands, almost dropping it.

“We'll leave as soon as you've eaten,” she said with a curt jerk of her head.

“What's the rush?”

“Some fellers out there are breathing when they shouldn't be,” she said. Snapped her teeth into a strip of dried fruit and sniffed at a chunk of dried meat before tossing it over her shoulder.

She chewed quickly and swallowed, barely tasting anything and unsure what kind of fruit it was she was even eating.

As she ate, her mind drifted in a distracted manner, tumbling over fragments of memories and thoughts of Talek's killers dying violently in her hands. Felt her lip curl slightly up toward the scar on her cheek.

At the same time, she found herself wondering what she was really doing out here.

Talek was dead. He would never return from the Shadowed Halls no matter what she did, so what was there to gain from the deaths of those who murdered him?

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

What if they weren't heading toward Spikewrist?

What if they doubled back? What if she was to wander aimlessly for the rest of her life searching for elusive ghosts?

Too many questions riddled her mind like holes in a tattered banner.

Submerged in her doubts, Nysta's expression remained impassive but her eyes slid curiously around the interior of the wagon. The texture of the wood. The soft ripple of canvas. Her nostrils flared as she caught the scent of fresh snow. The hollow sound of silence frayed at the edges of her hearing.

Little fragments of detail that made her wonder about that mystical thing called life. Life she was thinking of taking. And life she might be close to losing.

Was vengeance really what she wanted?

Was it really their blood on her blades that she sought?

Or something else?

Her heart quivered as she swallowed. Quickly stuffed the rest of the dried fruit into her mouth and chewed hard. The wagon suddenly felt stifling, and she wanted to get outside as fast as she could.

To move on before the doubts gnawing at her brain made her pause too long.

“Can I ask a question?” the spellslinger asked, chewing fast as he tried hard to keep pace with her. “How far is it to the next town?”

“Spikewrist? Be there by mid-afternoon on horseback. Quicker if we push them.”

“Mid-afternoon. Do you think it will snow again today?”

The elf shrugged. “Probably. Was pretty heavy last night. Figure it'll come and go for the next few days.”

“Shit. I was hoping you'd say no,” Chukshene arched his back and stretched like a cat. The runes glittered on his robe. “I hate the snow. It's fucking cold. And when it melts down the back of your neck? Well, it drives me fucking crazy.”

“Pull your hood up.”

“I can't. I don't have one.”

“Should've planned better, then,” she smirked.

“Thanks for the sympathy.”

“You want sympathy, you came to the wrong place. This is the Deadlands. We're all out of sympathy around here.”

“So I'm finding out,” he sighed, wriggling under his blanket, trying to cling to the fading warmth. “You got any good news this morning?”

“Good news? Well. I ain't killed you, yet. That good enough for you?”

“Anyone ever tell you you're an absolute joy to be with? That you light up the fucking room just by being in it?” he shook his head. “No, I bet they didn't. Just gloom, doom and mass-fucking-depression. That's you. For me, I can blame the snow. I mean, who doesn't get down when it's so cold you can't piss for the frost on your cock? But you? An emotional cripple. Guess that's a good attitude for a punk in an alley. Maybe you needed it to survive. But for a real person out here in the real fucking world, I gotta say it's a shit one. Tell me, Nysta, what do you do during Spring? I bet you don't even notice it happen if it weren't for the deathpriests and their crazed dances in the streets.”

“Ain't much for the Rites of Spring,” she allowed cryptically. Patted A Flaw in the Glass jutting from her hip. “Only straight edges I got are here.”

“I don't get it,” he muttered. “That some kind of joke? If it was, it wasn't funny.”

For answer, the elf rolled to a crouch and crossed him to get to the rear of the wagon. Threw open the canvas to look out at the pale snow-crusted trees.

Other than the two lumps in the snow, all sign of the previous night's violence had been obliterated.

Not far away, the two horses gave a snort at the sudden movement and she glanced at them.

They didn't seem bothered by the cold and, for a moment, she felt a pang of jealousy. The air was brittle on her skin and every breath was a misty exhale that turned her lips to glass.

She looked down at the spellslinger, who was staring out with distaste.

“Come on, spellslinger,” she said. “Time to go.”

“Can't we stay inside a bit more? There's some cracks in the clouds. Maybe the sun will shine on through. It might warm up soon. It's freezing, Nysta.”

“Stay if you like,” she said. “But I'm leaving.”

“But won't the snow have covered the trail? It's a fucking maze out there. You could take a left when there's no left to take.”

Her eyes glittered as they swept over the white and grey landscape. The twisted trees writhed in the icy wind and she admitted he was right. The trail through this part of the Deadlands was narrow and as knotted as the trees themselves.

With the dark clouds still fuming overhead, it was hard to pinpoint where the sun was, and the mountains to the north which might have given her a bearing were lost from view behind veils of mist and distant snow.

Unless she wanted to climb one of the cursed trees for a better look. She spat sourly out of the wagon at the thought of touching the blistered bark.

It was a tough road to take, but the only other choice was to turn around. Head back north. Maybe swing around to the east. But that would take days. Days she didn't have. Talek's killers were moving further away with every minute, and in her mind she felt the gap yawning wider every minute.

She had to catch them.

Had to make them pay.

Her fingers tightened around the canvas. “I know what I'm doing,” she growled, more for herself than for him. Just saying it gave her a sense of assuredness.

For about a second. Then the doubts whispered softly at the edge of her mind once more.

“Alright alright,” he grumbled, reluctantly easing out from under the blanket. He clung to his grimoire as though afraid it would leap from his hands. Let out a misty sigh.

The elf dropped lightly to the snow and felt the cold immediately penetrate her boots to numb her toes. The wyrmskin leather wasn't made for tramping across the blasted landscape of the Deadlands. They were city boots. Soft-soled and used to creep across rooftops and through the violent shadows of Lostlight's many alleys.

Her skin rippled as the cold snaked through the loosely tied bracer on her arm and she thought of tightening it, but she'd never felt comfortable with her right arm bound as snug as her left. Couldn't say why.

Talek's cloak provided some warmth, and the elf tried not to be swept away on the echo of his scent which clung to the fur. But it was a difficult struggle. Her knees felt weaker and her eyes threatened to let loose a torrent of tears as she approached the horses.

She needed to control herself, she thought. Not let her emotions twist her thoughts.

Hold onto the thought of vengeance, she told herself firmly. Onto the anticipation of hearing their screams.

Every scream, she told herself, would help fill the void left by Talek's absence.

But, for that to happen, she'd have to be tough. Harder than steel and colder than ice.

Clamping her jaw firmly, the elf went through the process of freeing the animals from where they'd been tethered against an old log with old lengths of rope around their necks. They were compliant and didn't seem bothered by the sudden change of ownership.

While there were no saddles, she found a pair of quilted blankets tucked inside a small compartment under the wagon and she tossed one over each back. She had nothing to use for reins, so figured she'd leave the tethers around their neck and haul on that if need be.

Taking the bay mare, she swung up onto the horse and immediately felt out of her element.

Horses weren't her preferred mode of travel. In her life, she'd only used them maybe a dozen times, and each time she resented it more. She would have preferred to walk, but in the freezing weather she figured anything which helped to catch up with Talek's killers was tolerable, if not a good thing.

The horse quivered beneath her. It wasn't used to a rider but seemed docile enough to accept her presence. She allowed it a few moments to adjust to her weight and used the time to button up her jacket and tie the cloak tightly around her chest.

Chukshene emerged like a mole, squinting and shivering. He'd wrapped the blanket around his shoulders and over his head. Her first instinct was to flash him a wry grin. He looked like an old lady in his robes and old blanket worn like a shawl.

He tiptoed over the snow as if each step burnt his feet. “Grim's moldy balls,” he pulled the blanket tighter. “I thought Doom's Reach was cold. But this is fucking evil! Cold goes right through your clothes and bites your skin. It’s sharp like glass on my bones.”

“It's the Deadlands,” shrugged the elf. “Live with it. Or die in it.”

“Still full of cheer, aren't you?” He rubbed at his face, trying to push some warmth into his cheeks. Then his eyes widened as she clicked her tongue to send the horse wheeling in direction of the path to Spikewrist. “Hey! Wait for me!”

“Then move it, spellslinger,” she called back, not slowing.

She heard him struggle to mount the smaller horse. He muttered about the lack of a saddle and gave a grunt of frustration as he tried to haul himself over the horse's back. The animal snickered as it tested him by skipping in a semi-circle and then refusing to go where he wanted.

Finally, he managed to assert control over what was, essentially, a rather docile gelding. Or, more likely, the animal was simply used to being beside the mare and decided to follow on its own. All the same, Chukshene was grinning triumphantly as the horse trotted eagerly after the elf.

“It's not so hard,” he bellowed into a sudden gust of wind. “I'm good with animals, you know. There's a knack to it. A method. You've just got to let it know who's boss!”

He tugged on the tether, trying to nudge the gelding to the left of the elf, but it ignored the spellslinger. Flattening its ears, it headed right, obviously more used to being on the right side of the mare.

Giving up, the mage tossed the tether aside in disgust and instead wrapped his arms around his chest to keep warm. The rope dangled uselessly from the horse's long neck and eventually the knot tugged itself loose and fell away.

“Fuck you, then,” he said sourly, blowing into his fingers. “Piece of shit horse. Lucky I don't fireball your head off. I could, you know. Melt it clean off.”

“That's the way, spellslinger,” she said with a lopsided smirk. “Make its day.”