Bachi held his breath and twirled the little branch between his flattened hands as fast as his aching shoulders would let him. The tiny curls of wood just underneath the junction of his spinning stick and the log it was boring into remained cold and motionless. The skin of his palms, on the other hand, felt like they could have set the whole mountainside ablaze despite the thick snow falling. Gasping and holding his breath again, he leaned into it even harder, wishing the Song were of any use in this activity. Unfortunately, no matter how in tune he was with the green things of the world, they still didn’t want to catch on fire unless they absolutely had to.

The most pathetic wisp of smoke the world had ever seen wafted past his nose, and he thought his heart might burst from relief. Scrambling back and putting his face as close to the smoldering tinder as possible, he blew gently across the smoking spot. A miniscule spot of amber glowed under the wind of his breath, and he held back a sob. I did it! Neither of them can say anything this time!

Then a spray of snow hit him right in the face, getting in his eyes and mouth. “How about that fire, fat boy?” Kanga said sourly from overhead, still stamping his feet. “This snow stuff is the worst.”

Horrified, Bachi cleared his eyes and saw a clump of wet snow right on top of the tinder. He brushed it away as best he could, but the ember was long gone.

Bachi was on his feet with fists clenched before he realized it. “You just kicked it out!” he shouted, feeling like his head was about to burst. “It was about to catch! Twenty heartbeats and I’d have had it going, if you could have just left me alone.”

Kanga’s mouth dropped open in surprise as he looked down at the cold, wet firestart. Bachi could read his face as clearly as a scroll: he hadn’t meant to do it; he was just a thoughtless oaf. I’m being stupid. I should let it go. He felt the tears rising, chasing his temper with shame as always, but something wild inside him refused to be wise and hold his lips closed. “I’m done with this. Make the fire yourself, moron – see how you fare.”

He turned away, both thrilled and sick to his stomach that he’d actually stood up to the awful man, but a meaty hand wrapped itself around his arm before he’d gone a step, Kanga’s fingers digging cruelly into his flesh.

“I’ll fare just fine,” he said softly, “because you’re going to sit that lump of a butt back down and get the fire started. Aren’t you?”

The ice in his guts was colder than the flakes falling all around. “I won’t,” he said, wishing he sounded less scared.

Kanga leaned close, his dark eyes flat and dangerous as a caiman’s. “You sure about that?” He sounded almost friendly, but the fingers trying to poke holes in Bachi’s upper arm said otherwise.

He’s going to break something again. Just say yes. You’re cold too – light the fire. In a few minutes you can make a joke, and everything will be fine.

“Eat rocks,” he whispered.

The taller man smiled, looking lazily satisfied. “Oh, little man,” he sighed, “I think it’s time we had an important conversation.”

“What conversation?” Zulimaya said, appearing out of the swirling white like a ghost. Her hair was crusted with white, stealing all her color, and she was dragging some dead thing by its feet through the snow. It looked like an oversized bat with four wings, and it was leaking a trail of blood. She still had her new bow in one fist. She glowered at them both in equal measure. “Why are you having conversations instead of starting the fire so we can eat and not die in this horrible cold like idiot children?”

“I was starting the fire,” Bachi said, trying to pull the whine out of his voice. “He kicked it out!” His relief at being rescued warred with shame at failing his task in front of Zulimaya.

“I can’t help where the snow falls,” Kanga muttered, letting him go. “I can hardly see anything.”

“You can also not see the bedding branches you were supposed to gather?” Zuli asked, cocking her head.

Kanga gave a put-upon sigh and tromped back out of the camp without another word, quickly becoming a dark smear in a field of white as the snow drew a curtain behind him.

“Thank you,” Bachi said as she pulled her kill beneath the overhanging rock that was their mountainside shelter for the night.

With quick, efficient motions, Zulimaya cleared away the sodden tinder beneath the firestarter log and plucked the spinning stick from his limp hand, using her knife to shave new, dry wooden fluff into the proper spot. Her motions were sure and steady despite her pale hands being red and chapped. Bachi imagined holding one of those hands to warm it and felt an entirely different kind of fear in his belly.

“You should hurt him,” Zuli said, not looking at him as she spun the fire stick in the log’s divot.

Bachi blushed, knowing the woman would murder him if she could divine his thoughts. “Sorry?”

“I would gladly break his legs and leave him in the snow to die, but he is the only one of us that can feel where Tarek is. Since we are stuck with him, you need to manage him. Kanga only knows how to be cruel. It is what comes first to mind for him. A little pain will clear his mind and force him to be cautious enough so that his brain begins working a little. Then he will not mock you so much.” The stick stopped spinning for a moment as she considered something. “No, he would still mock. That is all he knows. But there would be less blood in the mocking.”

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Smoke sprang forth from the tinder, much more powerfully than before, and after a moment of blowing, a small flame flickered to life. He knelt beside her and fed it small twigs, being careful not to touch her. As he did so, he imagined punching Kanga in the face, standing over him, breaking his fingers.

“I don’t think I can do that,” he confessed.

“You will have to, soon or late,” Zulimaya said, moving to her kill and drawing her knife. “I will not always be there to stop him, and he does not know how to stop himself.”

Bachi thought dark thoughts as they stripped the thin hide from the huge bat-thing together, pulled out its guts, and set the meat to roast. Kanga returned some time later bearing the needle branches they’d use to cushion themselves for sleep and said nothing as he beat them against the rock to knock off the snow and then laid them nearby for the now-crackling fire to warm and dry.

As they ate, Bachi kept sneaking glances at Kanga. He was handsome enough, in a Catori kind of way, and if he’d never spoken to the man, Bachi might have thought it a kind face, or at least a neutral one. Why is he coming with us? He hates Tarek more than I’ve ever hated anyone or anything in my life. Bachi couldn’t fathom his reasoning, but Zuli was right: he was the one who could find Tarek. If not for the odious hunter, they’d wander forever, never knowing where their friend and erstwhile leader had gone.

And why are you going, great Singer? Tarek might be your friend, but friendship doesn’t cover crossing mountains in the snow when you don’t know what’s on the other side. The thought made the sweet meat of Zuli’s kill turn sour in his mouth. The fact was, he couldn’t go back to the Land, and he had no reason to besides. His tribe hadn’t bothered to stop him when he’d made up his Song quest, and they wouldn’t care if he never returned. On top of that, he’d rather let Kanga break his fingers every year for the rest of his life if it meant he never had to pass through the mists again and see those awful frog creatures. He still dreamed about them.

Perhaps he was seeking after Tarek because it gave him a purpose. The Catori lad had something about him that made Bachi want to follow him, to help him. Apparently, he wasn’t the only one, because Zuli was right there too. Bachi suspected that the wonderful, frightening woman might secretly be in love with Tarek, but he didn’t like to think about that too much. All of them had been adrift, and Tarek gave them something to work for, to look forward to. The thought that he might actually be the one to save Tarek this time, instead of the other way around, felt so very right to Bachi that despite his fear, he’d never seriously considered any other option.

But in the meantime, he thought, sneaking another look at Kanga, that means putting up with some unpleasantness. What if I hit him in the back? I could disappear into the Song while I did it. He might not even know it was me, and then he couldn’t get mad about it. He let the scenario play out in his mind, enjoying big man’s distress, but then he shook his head. Don’t be stupid, if he doesn’t know it’s you, it defeats the entire purpose.

They ate in silence. Kanga kept his silence loudly, proclaiming his disdain for them in every gesture, every breath. Zulimaya, on the other hand, was silent like a panther, always watching, ever vigilant. Bachi wished they’d ask him to sing. Traveling with Tarek and Tavi had been so much more fun. Even that mad otter Pahtl would at least say something rude occasionally, and that was funny too.

Zulimaya stood, grabbing a handful of snow to wash her hands clean of grease and dirt. “No point in staying awake,” she said. “It’ll be a hard walk tomorrow. Bachi, first watch?”

With a sigh, Bachi nodded and set to picking the bones clean and putting the meat in his journey bag for the next day’s journey while the others arranged their soft-needled boughs in spots that were close but not too close to the fire. His heart sank. Another day slogging up a mountainside in white powder up to his knees and, apparently, four-winged bats hiding in the crevices did not sound like his idea of fun. Please, Blessed Song, let us find Tarek quickly. And let it be in some place warm.

He finished his work by the low light of the embers and threw another thick log onto the flames. He heard Kanga muttering and shifting on the other side of the fire, which gave him the perfect cover to quietly hum the Song to his pile of bedding boughs. There was just enough life left in them to encourage the needles to a downy softness that would keep him from getting poked and –even more importantly – hold in heat. He might have to stay up for the first watch, but at least he could be a tad less uncomfortable doing it. He’d have done the same for Zulimaya in a heartbeat just to hear her gruff thanks, but that would mean doing the same for Kanga, and he couldn’t think of anything he’d like less than helping that smiling pile of rat shit.

Kanga gradually dropped into his sleep-muttering, which was less angry and more frightened than the waking kind. It was a rare night when the man didn’t sit bolt upright out of bad dreams at least once. Whatever private upset he was living through was worse than usual, because not only was the incoherent mumbling getting louder, he was starting to toss and throw his arms about in his sleep. Then Zulimaya gave a sharp, short “Stop!” and suddenly Kanga was on his feet screaming and holding his crotch.

“What’s wrong with you?” he howled, clutching himself. “Are you insane?”

Zulimaya sat up on her bedding, only an arm’s length away from where Kanga had been tossing and turning. Her hair gleamed gold and crimson in the firelight, and her smile was colder than the snow. She pointed at him with a knife that glimmered wet and dark in the flickering flames. “You know not to touch me.”

Kanga gaped at her. He was holding his inner thigh, not his manhood, and red stained his hands. “I was asleep, woman!”

Zulimaya lay back down. “And now you are not.”

The tall hunter sputtered and shook. “You demon! You minx! You think if I wanted someone to share your furs, I’d ever reach for you? You should be so lucky!”

She sat back up, her eyes flinty. “That is a thing that will never happen. Not in any life, not in any way. If you try your little grabbing game one more time, awake or asleep, I will tear your limbs off and eat them.”

Her tone was so matter-of-fact that Kanga couldn’t even muster a sharp reply. He just held his leg and gaped at her. Zulimaya turned to Bachi, who had watched the whole thing in horrified, fascinated stillness, and gave him a look that said, Like that. Soon or late, you must. He nodded dumbly, wondering if he could ever muster a tenth the ferocity she had in a single lock of hair. She laid down and closed her eyes, apparently unconcerned by turning her back to the man whose pride and flesh she’d just skewered.

Kanga, for his part, occupied himself with tearing furred strips from the bottom of his furred parka and stuffing them into his breeches to stanch the flow of blood. Good thing Tarek wasn’t here for that. But I suppose he’s already drunk Kanga’s blood, hasn’t he? I wonder if it would still set him off. He shuddered as he remembered his dear friend’s berserker lust for blood. Even at that, I still wish he were here. Oh, the irony of the one magically addicted to blood being the most level-headed friend I have. I hope you’re okay, Tarek. I can’t imagine things being any worse for you than this. If they are… well, hang on, we’re coming.

Unless we all kill each other before we ever get over the mountains.