Chapter 14
“Wait, what?!” said Storm, because it tends to spring to the tongue after an unexpected accusation.
Fjóla stared at him. After a moment or so she asked, “Wait for how long exactly?”
“That’s not—” Storm paused, took a steadying breath. “Why do these goðar think that we’re behind the weather here?”
“I imagine that they will tell you, but… you can control it, can you not?”
“Well, sort of…” Storm turned away, biting his lower lip. “…Some of us better than others, admittedly.”
Fjóla nodded. “Enough to have earned a place in our songs.”
“Songs,” echoed Check. “Fannar and Brynja made mention of them before.”
“Yea, they are one of our greatest means of keeping history.”
“Huh. I think we mostly keep ours in books and museums and stuff,” noted Crack Shot in speculation. “You know, out of the way.”
“Is less attention paid to it? That seemeth unfortunate,” said Fjóla, frowning slightly. “If one doth not know history, one is unable to repeat it.”
“I think that’s supposed to be ‘doomed to repeat it,’” said Crack Shot.
“Well, that is a rather pessimistic outlook, is it not?”
“Different ponies afford history different levels of attention,” said Check, diplomatically. “But, though you stress a strong oral tradition”—his hoof raised automatically to Crack Shot’s mouth before there was comment—“I’d note that we found what we believe to be writing on the walls of other caverns within these mountains.”
“You recognized it as such? That supriseth me. Our writing is not something one would oft notice without prior familiarity.”
“Waiting for the blizzards to abate gave us time enough to take note of it,” said Check. “Although there was certainly little writing on the wall regarding the circumstances that awaited us,” he added quietly.
“Dude, was that a joke?” asked Crack Shot, as he batted Check’s hoof out of his face. “And on the subject, I wasn’t going to make one—it’d have been too easy.” A conspiratorial grin formed on his lips. “Too easy like your—” the hoof returned.
Fjóla watched this with fascination, her bright, black eyes glinting with ethnological intrigue.
“And what exactly does this history say about us?” asked Storm.
In response to this, Fjóla closed her eyes and began to rock in place, her antlers swaying like birch branches caught in the wind. There was a moment’s uncertainty where Storm didn’t know if he should move to catch her, her antlers threatening to catch him if he did, though he did take a step forward. But then she began to sing to them, to hum to them, something that seemed a hymn to him.
Whereas Síofra’s song had been the voice of spring, Fjóla’s was the winter wind, soft as an elegy. A shudder rolled down Storm’s spine, a frisson beginning at the base of his neck, tingling down into the small of his back. It was born of a chill apart from the one drifting into the guest room through the doorway, and it went far deeper than bone. The words Fjóla sang, gentle and unfamiliar, came slowly, reluctantly, like the gelid waters of a river that’d finally begun to freeze. Dulcet, doleful, and as haunting as the gales that had torn through the mountains.
As the song ended, Storm was left with the smallest sense of sorrow.
“That… was about us?” he asked, quietly.
Fjóla opened her eyes, smiled, and gave a small nod.
“Man, that felt heavy,” said Crack Shot, letting out a breath in a gout of steam.
“Did it?” asked Fjóla, genuinely surprised. “Greasy seemed to enjoy it though! Is that not right, girl?”
Síofra quirked her head, before looking back and realizing with small horror that her tail was wagging. She quickly clamped the traitorous thing between her jaws.
“Can you, uh, translate it?” asked Storm.
Fjóla pursed her lips. “Um, a translation? That… well that presenteth a difficult task.”
“Truly?” asked Check. “Thou seemest remarkably fluent in our tongue.”
“Well, there is but one problem…,” she trailed off, looking down between her cloven hooves.
“…And that is?” asked Storm.
She looked up towards him. “Scansion.”
“Bit of Vitamin C will clear that up in no time,” said Crack Shot.
“That would be the remedy for scurvy,” noted Check.
“Bed rest maybe?”
“Erm, a healthy activity for anybody,” said Check, catching the look Fjóla was giving them. “But the verse structure is the issue, Fjóla?”
Fjóla nodded. “Your language is just so different. Trying to match it in song to ours is no mean feat.”
“Could you not sing?” suggested Storm. Fjóla stared, wide eyed, as though he’d just asked if she could break off an antler and use it as a fork. “So no?”
“I would not be much of a skáld if I did.” Fjóla sighed. “But, I suppose that I could improvise.”
The four of them watched and listened as she once more closed her eyes and began to sway. These would be the only things that the second performance would hold in common with the first.
“Yea, verily! Perched in firmament most merrily! Cloudscaping, bolt shaping, thunder scraping airily! Lookest once, lookest twice, and the world is wrapped in ice, and the sun hath thawed it out when at it thou lookest thrice!”
The guardsponies crossed that subtle line between watching and gawking.
“Is… is she rapping?” whispered Storm.
“Dude, she totally is!” hissed Crack Shot.
“Rain, sleet, or snow, thou shouldst look out below, forsooth they’re martial and impartial to—bleh!” finished Fjóla, sticking out her tongue. “Scansion.”
“That-that final line,” said Check, finally, after having taken a second to recover and then deciding he’d need a minute. “About the pegasi being martial?”
“Yea, the songs say”—she frowned, clearly upset that she wasn’t actually singing them—“that they’d manipulate the weather, ransoming it for food.”
“What?!” said Storm and Crack Shot.
“Jinx,” said the latter.
Storm glanced sidelong at Crack Shot. “Really? Now? Come on.”
“Pssh, you come on.”
Storm shook his head and returned his attention to Fjóla. “Ransoming the weather?” he asked.
Fjóla nodded. “To another of your kind that I notice isn’t with you. In exchange for a portion of their harvest, those with wings would ensure that, oh, nothing bad would happen to it otherwise.” She raised an eyebrow as she said it.
“Wait, what?!” said Storm.
Fjóla’s voice had contained no judgment in its consignment, no condemnation in its implication, and somehow that made it worse. It was as if she’d simply described a cat clawing at the drapes, or a dog digging up the yard. Or some nettlesome castle visitor contorting their face in an idiotic grimace at him and his cohort. As if it were just an unfortunate but inexorable part of the natural course of things.
“Pegasi aren’t some kind of—of—jingoist racketeers!” he continued. “We have a helpful relationship! It’s…” Symbiotic didn’t seem quite right, and parasitic definitely wasn’t the word. “Mutualistic!”
Fjóla shrugged. “Well, we just know that the weather here tendeth to do well enough on its own, without intervention. Or that it once did,” she added, as she studied the guardsponies. “But the goðar are better suited to make a judgment on this matter than I, and you may expect theirs to be a just one. They were each chosen for their position because their constituents trusted them as representatives. And on the subject, we should not keep them waiting.”
“Yeah, and none of that says anything about representing us,” muttered Storm. He pulled on his armor, his saddlebags, and the camping gear on top of them.
“Art thou going to bring all of that with thee?” asked Fjóla, eyeing the load.
Storm nodded as he shifted his withers to settle his gear. He’d carried it for a few hundred miles already; he wasn’t about to leave it behind now.
Crack Shot and Check gathered their items, Síofra gathered herself, and the four of them followed Fjóla back through the long house—Longhouse, that’s what they should call it, thought Storm, idly—and out its entrance. Víðar, Björn, and Leif were waiting outside, or at least as ‘outside’ as the subterranean expanse could be called. It was warm out there, warmer than the longhouse, and a thin mist filled the still air.
The stags each said some words of greeting to Fjóla and even went so far as to regard Crack Shot with a nod, before forming a perimeter around them. Nice to see that one of us is making friends, thought Storm wryly. Fannar was nowhere in sight. Storm assumed he’d gone ahead to wherever the meeting, or, perhaps more accurately, the trial would be taking place. Whatever kind of thing the Thing was, they’d be finding out.
It was to his surprise that he and his friends weren’t fettered for it.
As Fjóla led the way back towards the main avenue, Storm felt a nudge in his side. He turned to see Crack Shot grinning and watching him from the corner of his eye.
“Dude, don’t worry,” said Crack Shot. “We know we didn’t do anything.”
And that was Crack Shot for you. If you asked him if the glass was half full or half empty, he’d just quaff it in the certainty that the refill was on its way.
Storm, however, found the thought a bit hard to swallow. He pressed his teeth together, letting a sigh sift through them. Yes, that was true: they hadn’t done anything. And, if they were lucky, maybe that would mean something.
“’Sides, if push comes to shove, we can always just bail,” noted Crack Shot, watching as Fjóla paused for a beat. “If you’ll, ah, pardon my slang.”
“And to where, exactly?” asked Check.
“Grandma always said you could figure that part out later,” answered Crack Shot, as the eight of them reached the main avenue and turned towards the distant staircases. “She once told me about how she had to wing it after she, well, winged it through a courtroom’s plate glass window.”
They followed Fjóla in silence for a moment.
“…And this is the same grandmother who would on occasion find herself ‘skipping town’?” asked Check.
“Only when her wings were tied up and skipping was the only option,” said Crack Shot. “She did joke that she liked when places tried to tar and feather her, since it’d just end up givin’ her wings a bit of extra lift.” He bit his upper lip. “Least, we think she was jokin’—it was always hard to tell with her.”
“She sounds like a fascinating pony,” said Check, neutrally. “I think it would be an education to meet her.”
Crack Shot shook his head. “No way she’d go for it. She doesn’t like the idea of her information being shared with the fuzz.”
“You realize that includes you, right?” said Storm.
“Yeah, and she does too, which would explain the letter I got after joining that said that she’d been lost at sea,” said Crack Shot. “Probably would’ve been more convincing if she hadn’t signed the bottom of it, though.”
Setting that particular aside to the side, Storm returned to his earlier worries. Brynja had said during last night’s dinner that the caribou didn’t fear the cold, but it was obvious that they weren’t happy about the snow. What would happen if these goðar decided that responsibility for the weather lay with Storm and his friends? No doubt their response would start, unpleasantly and unequivocally, with Storm and his friends, but it certainly wouldn’t stop there.
As they made their way to the next terrace of the caribou’s city, the camping bag felt just a little heavier on his withers.
---
The staircases rose up the precipice in a gradual zigzag, and a smoother section of path ran alongside them. Climbing them brought the group into what appeared to be a large market, or possibly a business park, perhaps the caribou’s downtown, or would that be uptown? Whatever one would call it, there was a lot of it.
The main avenue continued forward, an artery from which several roads and streets split and curved out of view. It was filled with vendor stands and storefront patios outside of squat, icy structures. It was filled with the smell of steam, spice, and simmering vegetables. It was filled with the hoarse back-and-forth of haggling and the rhythms of street performance. Which, to sum it all up, is to say that it was filled with caribou, many of whom were taking an interest in the guardsponies.
Storm was no stranger to escorting from the castle the odd pony who’d gotten a little too at home and felt that the place could do with a bit of redecoration (or, if they had a set of saddlebags and thought nopony was looking, a bit of de-decoration), and it had always become a spectacle. Often it became more of an attraction than the castle itself. Few commands met with such stellar success at accomplishing the exact opposite of their intent than, ‘Nothing to see here, move along!’ and most of the guardsponies had quickly learned to cull the expression from their vocabulary. To be fair, those that heard the order always followed it to the letter: they’d happily move alongside the guardsponies, curious to see if the nothing was in any way noteworthy.
“Farið frá, það er ekkert að sjá hér!”
Storm was almost certain that Víðar was shouting the caribou equivalent.
And so as their entourage grew in size, Víðar grew more frustrated, his voice grew louder, this intrigued even more caribou, rinse and repeat.
There was nearby movement in the corner of Storm’s eye. He slowly turned his head to meet it, whereupon he found himself face-to-face with a stag walking in step beside him. A glance a few inches upward revealed a fawn perched between his antlers. Father and son, or older and younger brothers, Storm guessed: they both shared the same gigantic, bewildered stare. He slowly turned his head forward again.
“They’re, uh, not quite as reserved here as the last place we visited, are they?” he said quietly, though not so quiet that it didn’t spur a twitch of the ear from Síofra.
“I suppose we should not take amiss their curiosity. Erm—” Check leaned back as a doe leaned forward, scrutinizing his horn.
“Farið frá, það er ekkert að sjá hér!” repeated Víðar, attracting another pair of caribou to the scene. Björn stepped back and nudged him in the side, shaking his head.
“Did word spread about us already?” asked Crack Shot. “I mean, excluding what’s happenin’ now.”
“Mayhaps the word that your kind hath appeared,” answered Fjóla. “However, I believe that the goðar have elected to be discreet about their suspicions. For the time being,” she added brightly.
“Well that’s nice—er—good of ‘em.” Crack Shot looked down, where another fawn was watching the movement of his hooves. “Alright, the wings I can understand, but what’s so interesting about my friggin’ forehooves?”
The fawn stared up at him with bright, black eyes, before scampering off.
“Hmm. It may be that he hath some curiosity about thy golden shoes,” said Fjóla. “…Or, perhaps, it was thy fetlocks that drew his attention?”
“Ah? What about ‘em?” Crack Shot looked down, watching his hooves as they clinked against the frozen road.
“Their orientation, mayhaps.”
Crack Shot turned and made the comparison between his hooves and Leif’s beside him, noting little difference beyond the cleft in the latter’s. “There are options?”
“There were,” sang Fjóla. “The past is as wide as the future, and the former ever overtaketh the latter. There is much and there are many that occupy it.”
“Yeah, and if you were any more cryptic, I’d be surprised if you didn’t start coughin’ out grave dust.”
“Then allowest me to say that in our history there were those who were both like in appearance to you and unlike in appearance to you.”
“And that had backwards hooves.”
“Yea, so ‘tis sung.”
“Dang,” said Crack Shot, pausing to flex a forehoof. “Hope for their sake that they had the wings to get around with too, then.”
“Mm. Would those that thou speakest of have been enemies of yours?” asked Check.
“Nay,” said Fjóla, her head shaking as she continued forward. “Progenitors, rather. But mayhaps I speak too much? I am told that I have a habit of it.” She gave a small chirp of a laugh.
As they marched up the avenue towards another distant staircase, Storm became aware of the sounds of an argument.
Farther ahead, a stag stood before a cart piled with kale. He wore a satchel of blankets on his side, from which he had placed a couple in front of the cart’s owner. He growled something, its rising lilt marking it as a question in Storm’s mind. In response the cart’s owner shook her head, frowned sympathetically, and spoke what sounded like an apology.
The stag grumbled, sighed, and finally took a few more blankets from his satchel and placed them on the cart. The cart owner tied together a large bundle of kale with a splash of flash-frozen water and lifted it towards him.
Neither of them looked happy about the transaction, and a dark look crossed Björn’s face. Realization dawned in Storm’s mind.
“Reason enough to fear the cold, or at the very least the weather,” said Check, softly.
Storm nodded his response. Getting as much sunlight down here as the caribou did was a feat in itself, without the added worry of it getting through a layer of cloud cover first. Fear the cold, fear the weather, or fear starvation. But if that was the situation, why had Fannar, Brynja, and even Leif been so generous with the food they’d shared? Storm realized the answer as soon as he thought of the question. After all, Fannar had said as much himself. Hospitality.
They eventually left the market district and its crowds behind, and began the ascent up the next run of stairs. Like those that preceded them, these staircases climbed in a series of turns. However, they had an extra addition: wherever there was a bend in the stairs, a sculpture rose, formed of the caribou’s ice.
Does and stags stood in proud postures, in armors and circlets and robes and rings, forelegs lifted and heads held high in a manner that only a sculpture could manage for any period of time without getting a cramp. Their detail was exceptional and went as far as the wisps of their fur, and with glass stares they silently watched the guardsponies’ passage. There were dozens upon dozens of them, and each looked like he or she could spring to life.
“Who are they?” asked Storm as they rounded another bend.
“Oh?” Fjóla glanced back. “I guess you would call them heroes.”
As they came upon the last sets of stairs, Storm’s mind populated itself with images of where the Thing would take place. He first imagined a tall, stately building, littered with statuary, pillars, and all of the other architectural excesses meant to let you know it was important. This was then replaced by an expanded version of the longhouses from the residential area, adding a dimension of ‘tall’ as well. Then came a giant refrigerator. He wasn’t sure why his mind went where it did on that last one. But what they found when they climbed the last of the steps was nothing like he imagined. This was because there was nothing at all.
All they found was a plateau of sparse, yellowing grass, smooth stones, and slow, quiet streams running over its edges. And in the distance, in the middle of it, a line of figures turning to face them. The goðar.
“Dun dun dun dun dun, dun, dun dun dun,” hummed Crack Shot.
“…Colst’s ‘The Bringer of War?’” asked Check, after listening for a moment.
Crack Shot nodded. “Just kinda felt like it fit the moment, you know?”
“Not a bad interpretation.”
Fjóla led the guardsponies forward to meet the goðar, while Björn, Víðar, and Leif remained near the edge of the plateau. Síofra followed along as silently as she had for the earlier part of the walk.
As they neared the goðar, Storm was able to recognize Fannar standing on the far left, beside a shorter, younger version of himself. There was no doubt in Storm’s mind that this was his son. The younger stag had vivid slashes of purple beneath his eyes, just like his mother, though his expression was as inscrutable as his father’s. He wore a full set of armor: barding, circlet, and bracers around his pasterns. Well, Storm figured, it was nice of him to dress up for this.
To his left there stood eight others, a mix of does and stags of all different sizes, though the stag next to Fannar’s son caught Storm’s eye in particular, possibly due to gravitational pull. He looked like all of those other different sizes mashed together into one that’d have to get every outfit custom tailored.
He towered over the others like a snow-covered mountain, and half of his face hid behind a thick white beard that would’ve put Gray Mane’s to shame if the hoary old wizard was capable of the emotion. A hammer with a short handle and a head that seemed to overcompensate hung from his side. It had a pragmatic severity that made it seem unsuited for use as something as ceremonial as a gavel, although it certainly looked capable of administering a heavy judgment.
He rumbled something to the one on his left, an almond-eyed doe who nodded once in response, a ripple of light rolling down the white gold of her fur. She had a lithe figure, sleek and sharp from hooves to antlers.
“What did he say?” asked Storm.
“That he thought you would be taller,” answered Fjóla.
Storm’s brows creased and his tail thrashed once of its own accord. “Hmph. And he doesn’t think he might have a bias?”
“Are you gonna be translatin’, then?” asked Crack Shot. “I kinda wondered if they’d understand us.”
“Oh, they may,” said Fjóla. “I know for a fact that those two, Þorgnýr and Elisif, are familiar with your tongue. But as thou mayest imagine, between each other they will likely tend towards our own.”
“Yeah, fair enough.” Crack Shot scratched his chin. “Gosh, it sure is convenient though, how all these different places have folks that somehow speak the same language as us.”
“We trust that you have been informed as to why you have been brought here,” came a voice as cold and soft as snowfall, from a doe as white as winter herself.
She stepped forward from the middle of the line, the long, yellow grass folding beneath her hooves.
“But if this is not so, allow me to tell you. Our weather is wrong. It hath been wrong. The past year hath been naught but a shadow of the centuries that preceded it, and it hath been cast by clouds of an unnatural make.”
She narrowed her eyes.
“And then your kind is found within our mountains after a millennium of absence. The timing is too remarkable to be fortuitous.”
“Objection!” shouted Crack Shot. All eyes fell on him.
“…Thine objection being?” asked the doe, lifting a pale eyebrow.
“We thought you guys did it.”
Glances were exchanged between the goðar before the doe finally asked, “…And what dost thou expect in making such an allegation in the face of ours?”
Crack Shot shrugged. “I kinda figured they’d cancel each other.”
A stag on the far right, one with several rings twining around his antlers and, Storm was shocked to see, a foreleg made of ice, smirked and said something to the others.
“Valtýr Goði just said that ‘tis fitting that thou seemest the type to keep thy head in the clouds,” explained Fjóla.
Valtýr and Storm turned towards her in an expression of cross-cultural exasperation and in unison began:
“Thou dost not need to translate—”
“You don’t need to translate every—”
They paused, turned, then glared at each other.
“…Jinx,” whispered Crack Shot.
Check placed a hoof to his brow and sighed. “And we’re off to a lovely start.”
Fannar and his son watched all of this silently.
“Sharper words aside,” continued the doe, glancing sidelong at Valtýr who smiled and raised his frozen hoof in mock contrition, “what reason would we have to believe thee?”
Storm took in the panorama of the goðar’s expressions, a mix of impassiveness, distrust, and amusement. “What reason would you have not to?”
“Prithee,” said Valtýr, slowly tapping his chin, “what would your reaction be if your home was intruded upon by invaders showing the dress one would wear into battle?”
“First off, none of us are wearin’ dresses,” said Crack Shot. “Also, battle? Dude, we might be armored but it’s not like we’re armed.”
“As I have been told, thou carried a spear with thee.” Valtýr lifted his nose. “Mayhaps thou hast forgotten this?”
Crack Shot blinked. “Oh, heh, that?” He gave another small laugh and rubbed the back of his helmet. “Honestly, I kinda just thought of that as a souvenir more than anything. ‘Sides,” he added, pointing at the bulk of Þorgnýr, “two-ton with his hammer over there looks way scarier, like he’s all ready to play judge, jury, and executioner at once.”
“What?! This is an artistan’s tool!” bellowed Þorgnýr. “What dost thou think I am”—he snatched his hammer, reared into the air with it, and slammed it into ground, rocking the plateau—“some sort of barbarian?!”
“Easy, dude, it’s a good look for you,” said Crack Shot. “But am I gonna get that spear back by the way? I promised it to a friend back home.”
“Hm. A souvenir indeed,” repeated Valtýr, flatly. “But it doth not elude us that a weapon”—beads of white erupted around his antlers, and the rings adorning them splashed together and thinned into a long, slender blade—“may come in subtle forms.”
He snatched its handle out of the air and with a whisper of movement sent several blades of glass rippling into the air before him. The first had not touched the ground before the sword was once again nothing more than rings around his antlers.
“Perhaps the sight of your armor is a reassurance to those of your kind, but you cannot expect the same of others,” said the winter-white doe.
“That first point is debatable,” grumbled Storm. “But all of this is speculative, circumstantial! There have apparently been some coincidences, I guess, but nothing that proves that we’re the ones responsible for the changes in weather!”
“Yea,” said the doe, “but for us circumstance is enough.”
“Engh, Check,” groaned Crack Shot. “Say something smart.”
Check hummed. “She has a point.”
Crack Shot gave him a lidded stare. “Dude. Not helpin’.”
“I imagine,” began Check, “that upon recognition of the worsening of their weather, the goðar wasted no time in pursuing the cause of it, or at the very least, a solution for it. There can be no doubt that we show promise as a lead, possibly much more than anything else they’ve found, and even were we to say otherwise, even were we to make compelling arguments or supplications, there is always the possibility that we are lying, and that we are simply good at it.”
“Yeah, but we’re not lying, and you’re terrible at it!” Crack Shot stamped a hoof. “I don’t see why you guys have to be so friggin’ stubborn!”
“Because they cannot afford not to be,” said Check. “Their duty is to their people, and livelihoods, lives in fact, are at stake.”
“Well said,” noted the winter-white doe. “Though, accordingly, thou knowest ‘tis not enough to allay our suspicions.”
Check nodded, Crack Shot groaned once more, and Storm pursed his lips. Something was bothering him.
“Well, have you seen anypony besides us?” asked Crack Shot. “I mean, somebody here has to have hopped outside once or twice—were there any pegasi pushin’ clouds around?”
“From our vantage, we would only see a cloud were a pony above it.”
“So thou wouldst argue subterfuge?” asked Check. “What need would a pegasus have for it?”
“Clouds do not think, and so are insusceptible to the threat of retribution,” said Valtýr. “We would not think to march against the weather, but seeing your pegasi would be impetus enough to march against those on the land.”
“Yet here we are revealing ourselves,” noted Check. “Doth that not seem counter purpose?”
Valtýr shrugged. “Mayhaps impatience spurred you to see the end of your work, mayhaps mercy had it that you did not wish to find a tomb.”
“Come on!” yelled Crack Shot. “Why are you shooting down every argument we make?! Yeah, there’s doubt, I get that, but why can’t you give us the friggin’ benefit of it?!”
“Because this would not be the first time your kind hath brought us darkness and shadow,” said the winter-white doe.
“Yeah, well, I don’t know what to tell you ‘cept that our answer isn’t gonna change,” growled Crack Shot, his face reddening.
“Then perhaps you could give another answer to another question?” asked a new voice. The guardsponies turned towards its speaker. Fannar’s son.
“Yeah, whatever…,” grumbled Crack Shot. “Ask away.”
Fannar’s son considered Check. “I understand that yesterday thou spoke with my father, and that thou gave him your purposes for coming here. Is this true?”
The plateau went quiet. After a moment Crack Shot turned to Check, an eyebrow raised in question of his friend’s silence.
“…Yea, ‘tis,” said Check, eventually.
“‘Twas an interesting answer, from what we’ve heard,” said Valtýr. He lifted his frozen hoof, turning it in one way and another as he examined it dispassionately. “To visit and measure those lands beyond your borders on behalf of your shadow princess, and, most interestingly, to investigate the instability of our weather.”
“Yeah, you’re welcome by the way,” muttered Crack Shot.
Valtýr grinned humorlessly. “But that leaveth us with the question: what would you know of it?”
“…Huh?”
“If you are but travelers venturing our way, why would our weather give you pause? As unnatural as the snows have been, we approach that time of year when snow is common. And as unpleasant as a mountain storm might be to those vulnerable to the cold,” said Valtýr in faux solicitude, “there is no reason to mark them as queer.” He set his hoof down. “Out here, where your kind doth not bridle the weather, why would you have any expectations of it?”
The guardsponies exchanged glances as the goðar waited for a response.
Now, if you’re truly close to someone, a lot can be said with a glance.
Storm’s quirked eyebrow asked whether or not they should bring up their encounter with the pookas. The wandering of Check’s eyes down and to the left said that he was feeling uncertain about that course of action, and that it might be a breach of trust. Crack Shot’s blink asked Storm’s eyebrow if it could repeat the question because there had been something in his eye and it didn’t quite catch it the first time around.
“Well?” said Fannar’s son.
“Because somebody asked them to, and they’re just bloody dumb enough, or bloody kind enough that they’d choose to keep mum for a bird they’ve known little more than a week, rather than sell her up the river.”
The goðar turned to the wolf sitting in between the guardsponies, and Fjóla gave a delighted squeal. Again, there was a moment where someone could’ve said, “Did that wolf just speak?” or, more accurately, “Talaði úlfynjan?” but, like the guardsponies, the goðar thought better of it.
What Þorgnýr said was, “What?”
This is because there is always an inherent risk of complication when two separate speakers of two separate languages try to share a third. Often, between the accents and colloquialisms, they’ve gone and split it into a fourth and a fifth.
Fannar’s son, setting aside the pressing question of a potamic avian slave trade for the moment, said, “And who or what art thou?”
“Now, my kind could answer those questions in all kinds of ways,” said Síofra, as she slowly stood. “What I am is, well… that’s a riddle, innit?”
As she spoke, her tail shortened, her legs lengthened and hardened at her toes, and a pair of black antlers sprouted between her ears. A susurrus passed between the goðar as she stepped towards them, as if one of their shadows had decided to try out the third dimension.
“I suppose ye could say I’m a little bit of anything and everything,” she noted with a wink. “But, if it makes it easier, ye can call me a pooka, or ye could call me Síofra, though I’d much prefer it if ye didn’t call me Greasy,” she added, turning just slightly to catch Crack Shot in the corner of a golden eye. “And, I suppose, ye could call me ‘neighbor’ as well. I’m the one that asked these muckers to see into the weather around these parts, since, ye see, it’s becoming a bit of a problem in my parts as well.”
Check’s hoof rose to Crack Shot’s mouth.
Fannar’s son watched Síofra. “I wonder. What I do see is one deception that hath just now come to light.”
“Aye, I suppose it has, hasn’t it?” sang Síofra, giving a dismissive shrug. “But it was my deception, and, as dry as it might be, those three never uttered a lie about me that’d matter, or a lie about anything else.”
She moved to rejoin the guardsponies, and as she did so her antlers rescinded, her tail extended with the long hair of a pony’s, and the clefts in her hooves closed.
“I’ll stand by that and I’ll stand by them as well.”
“Fjóla,” said Fannar’s son, “dost thou know of any historical mention of these pookas?”
It didn’t escape Storm’s notice that Fannar’s son had used language that Storm and his friends would understand. Did he consider it deceitful to do otherwise?
“Oh!” Fjóla jumped at the sound of her name, her attention yanked from this newest phyletic curiosity and now suffering a case of whiplash for it. “What?”
“Pookas,” repeated Fannar’s son, gently. “Hast thou knowledge of them or anything akin?”
“Hm, I wonder…” Fjóla puffed out a cheek and tapped it with a hoof. “Ah, mayhaps…”
She cleared her throat.
“And though thy voice is lovely,” interjected Fannar’s son, “a summary shall suffice.”
“Generations of skáldunum sing their disapproval,” sighed Fjóla. “Nay, I do not recall ever hearing mention of the word ‘pooka.’ But there are certain rumors and fables.”
“Few likelier places to find us than in rumors and fables, I’d imagine,” noted Síofra, loftily.
“What do these rumors say?” asked Fannar’s son.
“They tale of swarthy, yellow-eyed creatures in valleys south of here, though, as far as I can recall, there is no consistent description of the shape these creatures take.” Fjóla tilted her head one way and another. “Also, trade with them was dissuaded, as they tended to pay with a strange metal that never lasted to a second transaction.”
Síofra grinned. “Aye, that’s us, alright. And although ye might be gutted to have more brakes thrown on yer scapegoating of these three, know that yer in good company. Me and mine weren’t all that keen to trust them at first, either.”
The goðar glanced between each other, an uncertain murmuring among them.
“They’re uncertain,” explained Fjóla.
“Erm, right, thank you,” said Check, before lifting a hoof for the goðar’s attention. “If I may,” he began, “I will cede that it is with your people’s best interests at heart that you fear the worst of us; however, please consider if it might be worth accepting our assistance.”
“What could you accomplish that we have been unable to?” asked another goðar who hadn’t had a chance to speak yet, and wasn’t about to let the opportunity slip him by.
“Mayhaps these two pegasi will take it upon themselves to keep our skies clean?” is what another of the hitherto silent goðar would have snorted if Þorgnýr hadn’t bellowed it first. She frowned and kicked at the dying grass.
In answer, Check opened one of the flaps to his saddlebags, releasing a gentle, blue light that reflected off the side of his armor. He levitated the smart stone free and into the full view of the goðar.
“Ah, ‘tis almost as fair as the stones that light our streets,” mused Elisif.
“But ‘tis lit by a different means,” said Check. “One that hath strengthened its glow the deeper we’ve ventured into these mountains.”
“What is the stone’s purpose?” asked Fannar’s son.
“‘Tis a way for us to report our travels and to keep in touch with our loved ones,” answered Check, simply.
“And how canst thou claim a relation between the grounds of our weather and the glow of your stone?”
“Honestly?” said Check, as he tucked the stone back into his bags. “I cannot. But for a lack of other avenues, I feel it worth investigating.”
“Prithee,” said Valtýr, lifting an eyebrow, “what do you three stand to gain from involving yourselves in this?”
“Well, I wouldn’t mind gettin’ that spear back sometime,” said Crack Shot. “That’d be good enough for me.”
The goðar fell into another conference.
“Can you tell us what they’re saying, Fjóla?” asked Storm.
“From the sound of it, they are considering the idea, though they feel that one of them should be involved in whatever search it would require.” Fjóla continued to listen as the goðar fell into a small argument. “…However, as they each have responsibilities in their respective cities, there are none that wish to abandon them for what may be a fruitless trek.”
“There are other cities down here?” asked Crack Shot.
Fjóla nodded. “Yea. Doth your kind not have more than one?”
“Heh, touché.”
“Two what?”
Valtýr pointed towards the winter-white doe, who shook her head tersely and pointed to another.
“Ah, it seemeth they are having some difficulty coming to a decision,” said Fjóla, unnecessarily.
Valtýr hummed to himself. Then, his eyes widening with inspiration, he quickly placed his frozen hoof to his snout. The other goðar stared for just a moment, before racing to do the same. Fannar’s son brought up his hoof just a fraction of a second slower than the others and gave a low hiss at the realization.
“They have decided,” said Fjóla.
Crack Shot blinked. “Wait—they made their decision with a game of friggin’ ‘Nose Goes’?!”
“Oh, is that what your kind nameth it?” asked Fjóla. “Yea, they did.”
Fannar’s son sighed and approached the guardsponies as the other goðar encouraged, cheered, and generally shooed him along. He stopped a couple of yards in front of them, taking in each of them in turn.
“If you are willing to attempt this search, then I shall join as well,” he announced. “Check Mate, Storm Stunner, Crack Shot, and… Síofra is it?”
The four of them nodded, Síofra a tad more noncommittally than the others.
“My name is Áleifur. I apologize that we did not have a proper introduction earlier.”
“Whatever, dude,” said Crack Shot. “It’s cool.”
Áleifur gave him a puzzled look. “Yea, it hath been, though it is but a symptom of graver issues… did we not just discuss this?”
“Like father like son,” whispered Storm.
“‘Cool’ hath a meaning of good or acceptable these days,” explained Check. “My friend meaneth to say the he beareth no ill will.”
Áleifur considered Check. “If thou art choosing thy words for mine understanding, please refrain. Thou needest not alter thy language for my sake.”
“Outside of the ‘thee’s and ‘thou’s and what not, he really isn’t,” said Crack Shot. “Anyways, here’s to workin’ with you and hopefully provin’ our good intentions.”
Crack Shot lifted his hoof towards Áleifur. Áleifur stared at it.
“Is thy hoof injured?” he asked.
Crack Shot shook his head. “Nah, you’re supposed to hit my hoof with yours.”
Áleifur’s eyebrows could be seen furrowing through his circlet. “Dost thou wish for thy hoof to be injured? That doth not seem cool. Warm, mayhaps?”
While Áleifur received this crash course in a thousand years of cultural evolution, the other goðar began to take their leave of the plateau, walking in separate directions. Storm noticed Fannar still waiting some yards away, and decided to bring up what had been bothering him.
“Yea?” said Fannar, as Storm came near. “Doth something trouble thee?”
“When you spoke with Check yesterday, you said that you didn’t trust us,” said Storm.
“Yea, that is correct. Dost thou take offense to it?”
“No, I understand that. Still…” Storm tapped a hoof. “With that in mind, a few things don’t make sense to me.”
Fannar’s dark eyes, like before, were unreadable. “What would those things be?”
“Well, this is my own professional experience speaking, but there were a number of things you did and didn’t do,” said Storm. “You let us stay in your home, you didn’t search our bags, you didn’t shackle our wings or legs. It seems like you gave us a lot of leeway. Er, freedom that is.”
“Bear in mind that the skiltvakter that walked with you, Björn, Leif, and Víðar, are very capable. Also, they are not alone in their work. If thou or thy friends had attempted something untoward, they and others would not have hesitated to act apace.”
“You make it sound like we’d be so easily put down,” said Storm, keeping his expression neutral.
“Mayhaps I do.” A corner of Fannar’s mouth angled a few degrees upwards, the hint of a smile. “However, although I said that I did not trust you, that doth not mean I had no interest in giving you the means of showing yourselves worthy of it.”
“I see,” said Storm. “But I’ll be honest: we did consider escape as an option, if it was the only option left to us.”
At that, Fannar actually did smile. “I would imagine so. ‘Twould have been foolish not to.”
He began walking towards the staircase the guardsponies had ascended. Before moving more than a few yards away, however, he turned to Storm once more. “If you are honest, my son will strive to keep you safe. I would ask that you do the same.”
Storm nodded. “Of course.”
With that, Fannar resumed his march, calling out a greeting to his son before disappearing down the stairs, leaving the rest of them to plan their next steps.
---
The next step was breakfast. The steps taken up all those stairs on an empty stomach made for a compelling argument for it.
Storm noticed that as the skilitvat—sklivat—the guardsstags, Björn, Víðar, and Leif, followed along, their attention had shifted from the guardsponies to Síofra. They spent much of the time staring at her as if she might grow horns, which, to be honest, was not a baseless assumption, and, to be fair, was something she actually did when she noticed their attention. Storm guessed that she must’ve seen no harm in having a bit of fun, given that the cat was out of the bag, along with rest of the menagerie.
Fjóla tagged along as well, insisting that if any history was in the making, there was no way that she wasn’t going to be a primary source in the singing of it.
Áleifur led them back down into the market district and off of the main avenue to find a place to stop. The group still attracted looks as they walked, but since Víðar was no longer shouting at anyone and everyone to mind their own business, most ended up doing just that.
Rather, the caribou filling the roads focused instead on their errands, trading goods, and words, and sometimes one for the other. The group walked past a stag offering a pair of sweet-smelling bottles at another’s stand in exchange for a large satchel of peat moss.
“Hm, I notice that barter seems to be a popular means of transaction here,” noted Check, watching in passing as the stag gathered the peat. “Is there also some form of currency?”
“Yea,” said Áleifur, “your kind calleth it honor.”
“Honor, huh?” Crack Shot glanced between the stalls on either side of the road, then upwards in thought. “Sounds like it’d make it hard to make change. Do you get a two-for-one discount if you keep your promises or somethin’?”
“Thou makest a jest—”
“I do?”
“—but to us, honor hath a prominent meaning. It is the upholding of law, it is the defense of property and status against insult, and yea, it is the keeping of promises as well. Good works elevate status, earn favor, strengthen bonds in the community. A deed is remembered and another requiteth it; she who requiteth it is then honored and requited in turn. Is this not as your kind?”
“Nah, we use bits,” said Crack Shot. He pulled back a flap of his saddlebags, plucked out a couple of coins, and placed them on the edge of a lifted shoe.
Áleifur leaned toward them and narrowed his eyes. “Little pieces of yellow metal are enough to measure your worth?”
“And silver ones, too. Makes our worth that much easier to carry.” Crack Shot flicked his hoof, sending the coins spinning through the air. They clipped the open flap, drawing it back down over them as they clinked back into his bags.
Áleifur shook his head in disbelief. “In that case, it seemeth that you may as well just carry colored strips of parchment instead. I am sure they would be lighter.”
Crack Shot pondered this. “…Nah, I can’t see that catchin’ on.”
Storm felt he should say something in defense of his country’s economic policies—
“Ohh, many of my kind would find it right convenient that they take gold,” chimed in Síofra.
—something better than that.
“Well, one nice thing about bits is that everypony will accept one, and everypony agrees on how much one is worth,” said Storm, gingerly ignoring a whole host of his dad’s past pontifications beginning with, ‘Back in my day, two bits and a hoofshake would buy—’. “I don’t think you could say the same for a bottle of perfume.”
“Nay, I could not,” said Áleifur, continuing once more down the road. “But ours is yet a system that hath stood the test of time.”
The mob of transitory vendor stands thinned out along with the calls and pitches of their owners, giving way to an area of the city populated by a scattering of silent edifices. There were several fountains between them, gurgling purposefully, perched with solemn, crystalline effigies like those guarding the ascent to the Thing. A pair of fawns sat beside one, making simple frozen jewelries from its waters, too enraptured by their task to take notice of anyone or anypony walking past.
Storm smirked. He remembered that age when a bit really was a fortune, when a colored glass marble was as much of a treasure as an emerald or a diamond. Back when you were too young to know which glittering items you were supposed to covet. He thought back to those foals flattening coins on the rails when he and his friends had departed Canterlot. It felt so very long ago.
Áleifur finally stopped outside a squat rectangle of a building. Embellishments climbed up its walls: flowers blooming at their bases, fir trees reaching for their upper edges, fattened clouds swelling in between. He opened its double doors and nodded for the others to enter.
The majority of the interior revealed itself at once. An unlit fire pit occupied the center of the floor, littered with the ashes of an earlier use. The two longer walls had benches running beneath them; a small group of caribou sat on side, laughing at some earlier joke. The rolling laughter rolled to a stop when they noticed the guardsponies stepping inside. Crack Shot smiled and waved, and, after a moment of consideration, a couple of the caribou waved back. As the guardsponies took a seat with the guardsstags on the opposite bench, the conversation resumed, though Storm assumed the topic had shifted, if the eyes shifting to him and his friends were any indication.
A young, pretty doe came out of the backroom as the entrance’s door closed behind Áleifur and Fjóla. She gave this newest crowd an appraising look. Then she smiled warmly and sang a word of welcome. Her youth must’ve belied her experience if she could look at a group as odd as theirs and see customers first and foremost.
Áleifur approached her and said something that earned a nod, before returning to the group.
“Victuals shall be brought out forthwith,” he announced, before fixing on the guardsstags. “Björn, Leif, Viðar, gætuð þið komið út með mér í eitt augnablik?”
The three of them nodded and stood, following as Áleifur led them back outside.
“What’d he ask ‘em?” asked Crack Shot, watching the door fall shut.
“If they’d go outside with him,” answered Fjóla.
“Who’d have thought?” said Síofra.
“I imagine he will wish to hear their impressions of us,” said Check. “Whatever of those they may’ve formed in our short time with them.”
“Well, they should be interesting, then,” said Storm. “Given that one of us ate enough to feed a small family, and another was speaking in barks for most of it.”
“Don’t forget your face plant, dude,” said Crack Shot, bumping Storm in the side.
“I didn’t hit my head hard enough for that.”
The food came as forthwith as Áleifur had promised, and started with a warm, bitter soup. Fjóla explained how the fjallagrös in it gave the added benefit of several medicinal properties. After some prompting, she explained that fjallagrös was a kind of lichen.
So they ate, as beside them four bowls began to cool.
---
Outside, a conversation was taking place. It was, of course, not spoken in the language of the guardsponies; however, it shall be translated via the expedient of parentheses.
“(So, what do you think of those guys?)” asked Áleifur, as he leaned against the side of the dining hall.
“(I like them,)” said Leif. “(The one with the gold in his fur has an appetite like the world serpent. Speaking of which, maybe we should’ve warned the hostess about that.)”
“(Heh, but how about the one with dirt in his fur?)” asked Víðar. “(I hope all of his landings aren’t as clumsy as the one we saw.)”
“(You’re one to talk,)” said Leif, pointing at the stump on Víðar’s head. “(I didn’t know asymmetry was in style.)”
“(Oh, shut up,)” growled Víðar. “(I’ll have a fresh pair of antlers come spring of next year.)”
“(Yes, and then you’ll break one again like you do nearly every year.)”
“(Assuming spring comes,)” said Björn, the voice of seriousness. “(What was the conclusion of the Thing, Áleifur?)”
“(Believe it or not, the four of them say they’re trying to fix the weather as well,)” said Áleifur. “(They claim to have a way of finding the source of it, but it all sounds a bit dubious to me. Of course, I’m the one stuck finding out if they know what they’re talking about,)” he added with a frown.
“(So those ponies aren’t responsible?)” asked Björn.
“(I don’t know yet. But the other one with them, Síofra, corroborated their story.)”
“(The talking, shape-changing wolf?)” asked Víðar. “(What’s her deal?)”
“(From the half of what she said that I could actually understand, she calls herself a pooka,)” said Áleifur. “(According to Fjóla, they or something like them live to the south of here, so it’s possible they’re being affected by our weather as well.)”
Víðar shrugged. “(Well, I’ve never heard of them.)”
“(Dear Víðar, I don’t think that proves a thing,)” said Leif, with a grin. “(Though, I’m surprised Fjóla didn’t say something about these pookas sooner.)”
“(She probably didn’t think of it, and had less than a day to try,)” said Áleifur, a bit defensively. “(Who’d look at a wolf and think to compare it to rumors a thousand years old?)”
“(Ah, my mistake, Áleifur Goði.)” Leif’s grin widened.
“(Still, I think it’s suspicious that she hid her identity,)” said Björn, glancing at the door into the dining hall.
“(Yeah, but you think everything is suspicious,)” said Leif. “(Besides, you saw her going all blah, blah, blah) hello how art thou my name is potato (or however their crazy language works—if she was that worried about revealing her identity, choosing to do so in front of a bunch of goðar is one hel of a way to go about it.)”
“(Yeah, it is. It looked like she was willing to take the risk to defend her companions,)” said Áleifur. He stepped out towards the road and stared off at one of the fountains, at the figure posed atop it. “(I suppose there’s some nobility in that. I suppose I’ll be learning if that’s the norm.)” He sighed. “(I hope this doesn’t turn out to be a waste of time.)”
“(We could waste it with you,)” said Víðar.
Áleifur shook his head. “(I’d rather you be up here where I know you’ll be put to good use.)”
“(So does that mean you’ll be bringing Fjóla along, then?)” asked Leif.
Áleifur shot him a look.
“(I don’t like the idea of you going off alone with those guys,)” said Björn. “(You’ll be outnumbered.)”
“(You really think they’ll try something?)” asked Leif. “(They didn’t make a move against us when we found them, and it would’ve been three on four.)”
“(Keep in mind that we had the earth above us and two of them fly),” said Björn, waving a hoof through the air for emphasis. “(They would’ve been at a disadvantage.)”
“(They didn’t move against us when we went out into the open either,)” noted Víðar. “(Though, I wonder if that gray one can do much with that single horn of his.)”
“(You manage somehow,)” said Leif.
Víðar spun towards him and lowered his head. “(Keep it up, and I’ll show you that this antler is more than a match for your two,)” he snarled.
Leif grinned and lowered his head as well, adding a stamp of his hoof. “(By all means. It’ll make the morning more exciting.)”
Björn casually glided in between them. “(I’d be satisfied knowing if they were strong,)” he continued. “(It’d mean that they didn’t just submit to us out of fear. Also, it’d be a nice bonus to know that they’d be useful to Áleifur if they actually do run into any trouble.)”
“(And how are you going to find that out?)” asked Víðar and Leif, their squabble set aside for this newest line of interest.
Björn looked between them. “(I’m surprised you two need to ask.)”
---
The guardsponies’ group had started into a few pieces of fjallagrös bread, when the skiltvakter (Fjóla had coached Storm on the pronunciation) stepped back inside of the dining hall. Crack Shot waved them towards where they’d set their soup bowls, but they remained standing.
“Is something wrong?” asked Storm, a bit uneasily.
Áleifur stepped forward. “Before we depart on our errand, Björn hath a request of thee, Check Mate.”
Check blinked, before turning towards the stag in question. Björn gave him a neutral stare. “Um, of course, how may I be of assistance?”
“He would like to duel thee.”
This would’ve been a good opportunity for the guardsponies to shout, ‘WHAT?!’ or for Crack Shot to perhaps perform a spit-take as per narrative tradition. However, the latter would’ve been a waste of food and thus impermissible. “Why?” asked Check, which was as close to the former as it was going to get.
“He wisheth to measure your characters through a test of martial prowess.”
“Why a fight?” asked Storm.
“Why him?” followed Crack Shot.
“Honestly, given some of the reactions ye’ve received, I’m surprised someone didn’t pick a fight with you,” noted Síofra, glancing sidelong at Crack Shot as she bit into a roll.
“I know, right?”
“To answer the first question, it is to know that it was not cowardice that stayed you from aggression when you first met,” answered Áleifur.
“And the second?” prodded Storm.
“He doth not fly.”
“Wait a second,” said Crack Shot.
Áleifur did and then continued, “Dost thou accept, Check Mate?”
“Not a literal friggin’ second!” snapped Crack Shot. “I mean, like, why doesn’t Björn wanna fight one of us if he considers flyin’ an advantage?”
“On the contrary, he doth not,” said Áleifur. “There are many low ceilings in the connecting caverns that are well within hoof’s and antler’s reach.”
Storm wasn’t about to argue with that. But he did have to ask: “How do you feel about this, Check?”
Check placed his hoof to his chin as he considered the proposal, as he considered Björn before him. “…Very well, I accept,” he said at last, with a small nod.
No translation was needed, and Björn nodded in kind. He, Áleifur, Leif, and Víðar turned towards the door.
“I do have one request, though,” added Check.
Áleifur turned back towards him. “That being?”
“May I have thirty minutes before we begin?” Check glanced at his empty bowl. “I did just eat, after all.”
---
More than a half hour later, Check and Björn stood facing each other in the road outside of the dining hall. The city’s mists swelled around their hooves, but the air was otherwise still. Heavy. The fountains babbled softly as the figures posed above them watched on, ancient heroes judging the two of them across time.
The other caribou in the dining hall had followed the skiltvakter and guardsponies outside. They knew something was going to happen. They didn’t know when it was going to happen.
“How long are they gonna stand there?” asked Crack Shot, tapping a hoof impatiently.
“Björn… is not the type to make the first move,” said Áleifur.
“I don’t think Check is either unless he’s playing white,” said Storm.
Check and Björn continued to watch each other. A tiny spider watched them as well and considered spinning a web between them.
Crack Shot scratched his chin. “Maybe it’s like, you know, how in some martial arts flicks a couple of guys will be squared off and not movin’, but they’re actually fightin’ it out in their heads?” He mulled this idea over. After a moment he shouted, “Keep it up, dude, you’re doin’ great!”
“Any longer and they’re liable to start growing moss,” mused Síofra.
“I am sure there are many farms that would value their aid,” said Fjóla.
Síofra stared at her.
Beside them, Víðar and Leif shared a groan.
As he watched Björn and Check, Storm became vaguely aware of the fact that he hadn’t seen either of them blink. “Maybe,” he began, to Áleifur, “seeing as this was Björn’s idea, he could take the first swing? You know as a, uh, courtesy?” he added weakly.
Áleifur considered this and then relayed the suggestion to Björn. After weighing it, Björn nodded, narrowed his eyes, sprang forward, and the fight began.
---
Björn’s antlers whipped towards Check, the tine of one glancing off his champron with a high metal sound as he ducked beneath them. The sound was still ringing through the air when Björn came back around, his hooves bearing down like a pair of claw hammers. Check uncoiled from his crouch, narrowly skipping a step out of range of a stomp so quick that it sent Björn’s circlet clattering between Check’s hooves. He sucked in a breath as he fixed his eyes with Björn’s. There was a flit downward. A flicker of white light.
Check leapt to the side, letting the breath go. His gilded hooves nearly lost purchase as the road beneath him wetted, and Björn came in like a shot at the opportunity. However, Check was just a bit faster and he managed to twist away from a blow aimed at his midsection. Björn wasted no time in swinging around, and it was only by a flash of Check’s horn that the skiltvakten’s antlers struck air.
Check reappeared a few yards away from Björn, panting from the effort, as the two of them locked eyes once again. Björn’s gaze didn’t waver as the puddle splashed off of the road and once more shaped into a circlet on his brow, none of its delicacy lost for the haste of its reformation. It was a clever ploy, Check had to concede. He wondered if the caribou played chess.
Björn came in once more, but Check had grown versed in the literature of his body language. Every feint was nothing more than a prologue, every muscle twitch a tell, every saccade a foreshadowing, and as the distance between them shrank, so did the number of Björn’s potential actions, leading to an inevitable denouement. Check was already pivoting as Björn rose up, driving out a rear leg as Björn came down, meeting momentum with his own, and—the street echoed with a CRACK!
Björn’s armor was hard, harder than ice had any right to be, and Check’s leg went numb from the shock of it. But, as he and Björn broke apart from each other, he could see his work written across the skiltvaten’s breast plate, and he wondered, idly, if it’d mean anything in his tongue. A spider web of fractures had woven itself across Björn’s breast, spreading from a splintered impression of Check’s hoof. The blow had staggered Björn though his armor had stopped much of it, but Check guessed that another kick—
The lights dancing around Björn’s antlers brightened and began to quicken, wreathing around his peytral. His armor lost its rose tint, the air immediately around it began to mist, and, with a ripple, the spider web was mended, washed away. The mists melted away and the armor was solid and whole and rose colored once more. His face remained impassive.
Crack Shot groaned from the sidelines, Víðar and Leif whooped, but Check saved his breath. He felt that he would need it, having just seen an opportunity.
His horn low, the insides of his armor damp with sweat, his breath heavy, he dashed forward for a second shot. Björn lowered his head and stamped a hoof in challenge, bracing himself to perform a stop thrust, not expecting the burst of light that filled his vision and robbed him of it. He flinched back and covered his face with a hoof, leaping back far enough that he almost avoided the kick that fractured his armor a second time. He swiped his antlers blindly, fiercely, but Check had already leapt well out of reach.
Björn grit his teeth as the spots of color left his eyes, leaving only one glowing from his opponent’s horn a few yards away. He didn’t bother examining the damage on his armor because it wouldn’t be there in a moment. However, upon letting his magic leave it, upon letting it thaw, he realized something was wrong: he couldn’t freeze it again. He glanced down to see why—
And that was all the opening Check needed. Less than second later Björn’s armor rippled in gentle, perfect, concentric circles, catching and throwing the light of the horn that had just pierced it.
Check glanced up, sweat stinging his eyes as he met Björn’s, before stepping back, the glow leaving his horn. Björn’s armor finally solidified now that there was no longer anything to stop it. He stared dumbly at the unicorn for a moment. Then he smiled, doffed his circlet, and bowed his head.
Check smiled in turn, removing his sweat-soaked champron and returning the gesture.
---
The others gathered around.
“Heh, checkmate, dude,” said Crack Shot, clapping his friend on the back.
“Yes?” asked Check, levitating his champron back onto his head.
“Oh, nothin’.” Crack Shot grinned, shaking his head. “Your name makes for a good win quote.”
“I am impressed,” said Áleifur. “By what means didst thou geld Björn’s galdur?”
“I think he attacked the wrong end for that,” said Crack Shot.
“Björn’s magic,” stressed Áleifur.
“Well… I didn’t exactly,” answered Check. “I simply made a presumption about its nature. When his armor changed phase to a liquid, the air misted around it, much like when Leif demonstrated his talent to us yesterday. I guessed that to be because he was drawing heat into it from his surroundings, and doing the opposite to cause it to freeze. I merely provided additional heat for him to draw, when given the opportunity.”
“I’m glad you’re alright though,” said Storm, watching Björn. “He really didn’t pull his punches, did he?”
Check hummed thoughtfully. “I’m not so certain about that,” he said, taking in the road, the fountains, the rest of a city made of water and ice. “I think there are a number of advantages he could have given himself if he so elected.”
“It supriseth me that thou focused so on close combat,” said Fjóla. “I thought thy race capable of all manner of offensive wonders.”
“…Yes,” said Check, eventually, “I suppose some of us are.”
“Regardless, thy performance was… cold,” said Áleifur, by way of compliment.
“I think you mean ‘cool,’” said Crack Shot, thinking that on his way Áleifur might’ve taken a wrong turn.
“Is cold not superlative?”
“Nah.” Crack Shot shook his head. “‘Cold’ is like harsh, ‘cool’ is good, ‘warm’ can be like friendly or nice, but only for, like, the good meaning of nice—since that word apparently gets around—but not the one that means ‘sweet’—though sweet can also mean friendly, I guess—and ‘hot’ means good looking, though a lot of ponies use it when they want to call something cool. Does that make sense?”
Áleifur stared at him for a beat, before finally saying, “I like the cold. I shall say cold.”
Crack Shot met that with a shrug. “That’s cool, I guess.”
One of the spectators from the dining hall approached Check and asked him a question in the innocent presumption that, since everyone else he knew spoke his language, everybody else probably did as well. Fjóla translated it as: “With movements as fine as thine, why didst thou not simply kick yonder fellow in the face?”
Check knit his brows in dismay. “Well that sounds unnecessarily savage.”
Fjóla relayed this, to which the stag replied, “Pbbbt.”
“He expresseth his disdain,” translated Fjóla.
“Yes, I gathered,” replied Check. “In terms of cross-cultural exchange, it would appear that raspberries pass through Customs with little to no incident.”
“So now that we’ve presumably and inexplicably shown our good intentions by letting one of our friends pummel one of yours,” said Storm, “are there any other trials awaiting us, or will we be able to make it to lunch, first?”
“The next trial,” said Áleifur, solemnly, “shall be the search you have proposed, and I think it may well require provender beyond lunch alone. But first, I wish to see more of this stone, before I come to rely on it. Let us away to open air and higher ground so that I may see if it behaveth as you claim.”
He began up the road, not turning to see if the others were following.
“He could at least have the decency to act embarrassed about all of this,” muttered Storm.
“Cultural differences, I suppose,” said Check, shaking his hind leg in an attempt to return a bit of feeling to it. “But, his suggestion is sound. We should determine if whatever is affecting the smart stone is reversible, and if it will be of any use.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” said Storm, though with little enthusiasm.
Check nodded, then blinked away a bead of sweat that had dripped into his eye from the motion. “Although I’d have appreciated a chance to bathe first.”
---
The skiltvakter went their separate ways, and, after some protest, so did Fjóla, with the promise that if anything exciting happened, Áleifur would give her a full account, and if nothing exciting happened, he’d still do the same.
He led them from the city into another far too narrow, far too dark tunnel, one filled with far too many turns and more forks than a scullery. Storm glared at the glowing moss spattered on the damp rock, too intermittent to get any sense of direction from unless you followed your nose. Why couldn’t it give off its light with a tenth of the effort that it gave off its stench?
The tunnel eventually opened up into another spiraling staircase not unlike the first the guardsponies had taken, and, up that, into another dim, snowed-in cavern antechamber. The muffled soughing of the wind outside lent it a somber ambience.
Check levitated the smart stone from his bag and held it out for the others to see.
“Hey, it’s back to almost normal,” said Crack Shot as he tapped it with a hoof, sending it wobbling in the air.
The bright blue of its panels had thinned and thawed into the featherings of luminescent frost that had colored it before their fateful descent.
Áleifur gave a small frown. “There may be some correlation between its brightness and its depth,” he said, “but I still find it hard to believe that the darkness of our skies hath roots beneath the earth. Could there be no other phenomena that light your stone?”
“Besides the letters we get every now and then?” said Crack Shot. “Not that I know of, dude.”
“Although I appreciate and echo your skepticism, Áleifur,” said Check, “the only way to prove or disprove that hypothesis is to test it.”
Áleifur sighed and paced towards the snow-filled cave mouth. “Mayhaps, but where do we begin? There are many caverns in these mountains, many of which we do not occupy, many of which we have not explored. You came from the south; who is to say that the cause of your stone’s glow doth not lie even farther north?”
“Then we could follow those caverns farther north,” suggested Crack Shot. “Maybe leave a trail of bread crumbs so we don’t get lost?”
Storm did not like this suggestion. He thought of squeezing through more lightless tunnels with no guarantee of a light at the end of them, of hoping that the air would be good to breathe, and that a sudden collapse wouldn’t crush it out of them. It weighed on his mind: the fear that the earth could, with an errant tectonic shift, weigh on the rest of him. It is said that necessity is the mother of invention. It’s possible that desperation is the father.
“Or I could just fly north a bit with the stone,” suggested Storm, with faux calm. “See if it brightens up as I do so. I’m sure it’d be faster.”
“Allowing one of you to abscond from here so readily?” said Áleifur, narrowing his eyes towards him. “I cannot agree to that.”
“Why do ya think ye’ve got a choice?”
Áleifur spun towards Síofra, who he found was not the same Síofra that had followed behind thus far. She watched him with large, lupine eyes like two wells of golden flame burning in the dark, a black figure of teeth and claws and muscle.
“Is this treachery?!” growled Áleifur. The cavern brightened as wisps of white bloomed around his antlers.
“If it were,” said Síofra, padding towards him, “there wouldn’t be a thing ya could do about it.”
He lowered his antlers towards her. “What maketh thee think that I could not try?”
“Numbers,” she said, “four to one,” with a grin that served no other purpose than to show off just how very sharp her teeth were.
Áleifur’s circlet lost its color, rippling softly as mists suddenly formed around it. He widened his stance.
Síofra’s grin didn’t lessen in the least as she continued to stalk towards him. “Although, to be honest, that’s only secondary to the fact that it’d take more than ice and antlers to do in someone like me.”
She stood before him, over him, the gold of her eyes glinting off of the black of his. The muffled wail of wind continued to fill the cave.
“However”—she continued past him towards the snow blocking the cavern’s exit and began to dig into it—“I’m not looking for a row, since I think this morning gave us our fill of them. But like it or not, I’d suggest ya try trusting these feens. It’s going to make for a long trip otherwise.”
“And what of thee?” asked Áleifur. He still watched her with suspicion, but slowly the beads of light around his antlers began fading one by one.
“Well, I could tell ya to trust me as well, but that’d probably be bad advice.” She grinned once more, before disappearing into the snow.
“I won’t be gone long,” said Storm, peaceably, as he took the stone from the air and tucked it under a wing. “I promise.”
Áleifur continued to frown. Then, finally, he gave a small nod.
Wind began to blow through the hole Síofra had dug, and it was followed by her voice. “The way’s clear and so is the sky for the time being!”
Storm set down the rest of his gear and followed after it. After a bit of shuffling, he at last crawled out into open air. He took a moment to breathe it in deeply, to savor the taste of it. The wind tugged at his mane, its chill cut through his armor, and the realization of how much he’d missed it, missed the movement of it, surprised him. He gazed upwards into the sky in appreciation, unable to believe that it could be that blue. He then took the smart stone in his hooves and spread his wings, relishing in the way his feathers caught the wind, a feeling of flight without flight. Before he took off, however, he turned to Síofra.
“A wolf again, huh?” he asked.
“Oh, aye, ya know me. It’s hard to stay in one shape.”
“I can’t help but notice that your fangs and claws look a lot sharper than before as well.”
Síofra gave him a look of innocence that started at her eyes and ended at her teeth. “Made it easier to dig with, innit? And it’s probably a good thing, seeing as that spa didn’t seem like he’d be using his uniquely suited talents to help. I’ll see ya back inside.”
Storm smiled and shook his head as she disappeared into the snow tunnel, and then took to the air.
He flew north, watching the smart stone and fighting against the wind. The snow-capped peaks and cliffs sped by underneath him, a contour map of white. There, in the periphery of his vision, that region of sight where imagination and invention compensates for the loss of focus, they looked almost like clouds.
Though he did his best to maintain his altitude as he continued northward, the dusting of blue on the stone began to melt away like frost in the sun. Whatever was causing it didn’t seem to lie ahead of him. He adjusted his course towards the east, beginning a circuit around the cave mouth.
The northern sky was clear at his left, as was the eastern sky clear just ahead of him. He glanced to his right and then slowed into a hover, nearly dropping the smart stone from the astonishment of what he found.
Dark clouds rolled towards the south, piling over each other. Turning towards the west he saw the same. And then he looked up.
Black, boiling swaths that had been absent just minutes earlier were now forming above the peak of the mountain he’d exited, roiling and billowing and pushing each other out of the way. Fat flakes of snow tumbled from them, whipped away in the mountain gusts. More and more clouds came from nowhere, blossoming out of the sky above the mountain from nothingness. They began to spread east and north as well, in defiance of the wind and in defiance of natural law.
This was all he needed to see. He began to hurry back towards the tunnel into the cave while the tunnel still existed. As he raced towards it, the lines of glowing frost quickly retraced themselves across the smart stone. He didn’t need to look to know they were there, and any doubts he held about their significance disappeared like the blue above the mountain.
He landed beside the snow tunnel just as the blizzard began in earnest. Tucking the smart stone beneath his wing as the flakes stuck to his feathers, he hastened back inside to tell the others that they should start gathering that provender and anything else they’d need. Whatever force was behind the weather was acting, and he guessed that it was doing so from somewhere directly beneath them.
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Another great chapter, Sage. Fun to read, enjoyed prereading it, can't wait to see how things turn out.
Had a great time proofreading this. Well done, Sage. Merry Christmas!
Lovely
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My thanks to the both of you =).
I wonder how the elk are going to respond to the problem that their very civilisation structure is causing the climate change that is causing their problems?
Thankyou for this Christmas/Hearthswarming update. It put the icing on my evening.
I don't know how you do it, but each chapter is so, so more-ish.
Keep up the awesomeness, and enjoy the rest of your holidays :)
Nice to see this story update again. Probably one of my favourites on this site.
I still enjoy this story. The characters are interesting, the settings are interesting, and I can't predict what the next chapter is going to bring. I also have fun plugging the non-English language into a translator.
Glad to see you're updating again! Another wonderful chapter. Hope to see the next soon!
So who do they meet next on their journey? Kirins?
(Yeah, I'm a bit of a mythology/linguistics/folk music nerd)
3682570 oh, I like the sound of this theory. More please?
Another excellent update and wonderful to see Check keeping us all apprised of what does and does not pass through linguistic customs unmolested.
3687905
I thought the change in weather was suspiciously similar in time to the discovery first of the illumination sources, which advanced available food sources, then the increasing flow and use of magical energies in manipulating the ice and water into optical lattices.
Am waiting to see what author has decided the variation is going to be, as this affects which other story universes are compatible, crossable.
Nose Goes. So is it written. So it is law
I'll bet that by the time this is done, Crack will have introduced to them the tried and true legal reform of Eenie Meenie.
3702707
I'm glad to know the faerie world satisfied =). I've so far resisted the temptation to write a blog detailing where each of its denizens and places get their inspiration (though I might put together a primer at the end of the fic on its various mythological influences), mainly because I love it when readers recognize something or somewhere and share with each other what they know. It often gives me a chance to learn something as well.
3709752
I see EqueRail as being pronounced with stress on the first syllable, such as in 'equity.'
Storm is primarily thinking about time in general spent with Nomde, rather than the specifics of any activity, though his thoughts in that scene stem mostly from him just being in a new place.
3710530
Ah. Thank you Sir for the clarification.
“Yeah, and if you were any more cryptic, I’d be surprised if you didn’t start coughin’ out grave dust.”
That's a GOOD one! I've never seen it before but that's AWESOME! Took me a second to get, though.
The whole "nobody doing the first move" between Bjorn and Check reminded me of this comic:
http://basicinstructions.net/basic-instructions/2009/9/23/how-to-riff-on-an-idea.html
3725276
No worries, I appreciate the catch. It's easy for those little things to sneak past prereading, but they're even easier to fix.
Calling it now: King Sombra trolling the Scandeernavians with cloud powers because their mole city is made of crysssttalsss.
I love Síofra so much.
As always, the wordplay in this story is just so delightful.
3747929
That character is what's known as the long s. It was used a few centuries back, before it was decided that 26 letters did a fine enough job as it stood.
fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/060/f/5/princess_celestia_approved_by_ambris-d4rftlj.png
Approved for Celestia's Library.
...you didn't. Oh gods, you totally did. You put a "your mom" joke in this fic. You bastard!
"I can't just tell you what the song means! It'd go against everything I stand for if I didn't get the meter right!"
Nooo! Not rap! Just tell it! Really, it's okay! We won't think less of you for it!
That build-up was perfect
Heehee. I like Leif
Checkmate in less than twelve moves. Calling it right now.
It really was. Check Mate fights like that. Cold and calculated.
)
(also, checkmate in less than twelve moves
Well, at least she's honest about being dishonest
Whoo. That was a thrilling end! Looking forward to the next part!
Curse you, Sage! You made me have to listen to excellent music just to get the "Mars, The Bringer of War" joke! Currrse yooouuuu!
...Ah, who am I kidding. You knew people would look that up, didn't you?
Finally cachet up with this story, it's nice to see things with consequences are actually happening, too bad our mane3 have barely evolved.
But Síofra really is a breath of fresh air, a highly interesting character with a complex and charming personality that managed to shake up the interactions between characters, too bad she has been at best left as a support, hopefully now that she no longer has to hide will have a far bigger role in whatever's next.
And never though I would said this, but I'm really missing Canterlot and it's inhabitants.
Been way too long with this sitting on my faves list. Anyways... glad to see a friendly match between one of the guards and one of the ponies, but why did Check have to get close? He could have done that without moving.
I really hope this story will finish.
It's one of the rare ones I would love to read through again.
*scans story with tricorder* Jim, it's dead!
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6135681 We even tried regenerating the story by shoving it into a photon torpedo tube and firing it onto the embryonic Genesis planet... but all it did was burn up in the atmosphere. Ahhhhhhh... the atmosphere! Ahhhhhhhh!
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6140320 But yeah, story's totally dead. The author hasn't even logged in once in 61 weeks.
Such a shame.
6142328
Yeh, it is a shame, but you never know. Mayhap they'll come back to it.
I'm just not holding my breath.
6168748
You could hold your breath, you know... just because?
If you need a reason to hold your breath other than just wanting to do so then, eh...
Read the first story and loved it. Saw the sequel and was over joyed. See the last update and am saddened.