• Published 9th Jul 2019
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The Dusk Guard Saga: Hunter/Hunted - Viking ZX



An ancient, lost empire is on the verge of returning from its imprisonment, and the Dusk Guard have been dispatched. Their mission? Retake the city, secure it, and above all, keep its ancient ruler from seizing control once more.

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Chapter 23

I take it back, Hunter thought as he sat back on his haunches, hoof moving without thought to rub against a foreleg for warmth, only to stop as it came into contact with the heavy coat he was already wearing over his armor. I have never been anyplace colder. Not even the Jetriver Canyons, where the wind was sharp and cold enough to freeze open water into ice, had been as cold as the Crystal Mountains were now.

Maybe, he conceded. I didn’t spend half as long in the Jetriver at a single go as I have out here. He forced his hoof down, eyeing the thick growth of trees around them, and let out another faint shiver. At least they were breaking the wind somewhat.

But only a little. He glanced at the trees around them, noting the thick, ridged, heavy bark and the straightness of their trunks. Mountain pine. Bark that can be as deep as half a foot thick, and a very low-level magic usage that keeps the heartwood from freezing solid during the winters. Plus compartmentalized growth patterns that allow it to literally kill parts of itself to protect others if the weather worsens.

And even that didn’t protect it sometimes. The trees around them were thriving and alive, but he’d seen dead ones before. And there probably will be a few more on the mountain after tonight.

He shivered again as the wind howled. Magic or not, this is bad. And when the sun sets … Well, they’d either run the boilers hot aboard The Hummingbird … or build the deepest, warmest snow shelter they could and hope for the best.

“There.” Hunter looked away from the trees as Nova stepped back, a spark of magic sputtering out from his horn. “Got it.”

“You’re sure?”

Nova fixed a flat stare at him. “Am I sure?”

“Right. Wonky question.” He stood, shaking his body and dislodging some of the snow that had built up on him while he’d waited. “What was it, anyway?”

“The trap?” Nova asked, shaking in a similar manner and sending a spray of snow whirling away in the heavy wind. “Not sure, honestly. Some sort of mental nightmare spell.”

“He seems to like those.”

“He does. Anyway, had we stepped into it, it would have … put us into a trance, or something? Some sort of stunning spell was mixed in there, plus a whole lot of that fear magic.” He shrugged. “I don’t know if it would have broken through the armor, but …”

“No sense taking dodgy chances.”

“Yeah. Plus, there was a second component I couldn’t identify.”

Hunter frowned. “Meaning what?”

“I don’t know,” Nova said, shrugging again. “It might have just been some sort of weird alert, or it might have tried to wipe our memories. Who knows? This spellwork is archaic and unfamiliar as it is.” He rapped a hoof against his muzzle, clearing away ice. “Or should I say, was, because as good as this guy thinks he is at laying traps, he’s clearly never had to deal with someone like me!”

“Hah!” Hunter shook his head. “Glad you’re on our side, Nova. Let’s get moving again.” Another shiver ran through him. “Before we freeze in place.”

“Well,” Nova said as they began moving forward again, Hunter’s eyes following the faint path their quarry had left through the trees. “I did have some good motivation. I couldn’t cast a heating spell on myself and work on that trap.”

“Is that how you’re making do on only the one coat?”

“One coat and the wishes that I’d stolen Sabra’s heat mod from him before we left.”

“Tempting thought.” Ahead of them the path began to twist, bending around some of the larger trees. But never enough to double back. Where is he going? He can’t be this lost.

Another gust of wind swept past them, the thick flakes in the air momentarily covering the distant traces of the king’s passage. Then it was gone, but not without depositing another bed of flakes across everything. And still we’re following.

He led the way, Nova beside him as he tracked the faint furrow through the snow. At least he’s leaving more of an imprint now, Hunter thought as he forged ahead, one hoof in front of the other. If it had been snowing this hard yesterday with that little track he was leaving, we might not have even found him.

He peered up at the thick forest branches as somewhere above them, The Hummingbird’s engines shifted in pitch. The reaction was mostly by habit; even with what clear sky he could see through the branches, the snow was too thick to see any more of the airship than a faint shape somewhere above them. For a moment he wondered what it had to be like for Sky Bolt, flying in snow so thick she was almost blind.

A shiver ran down his spine, from the cold or the thought, he couldn’t quite say. Make a wrong judgement call, end up in the wrong possie without knowing it, and she could slam right into the side of the mountain. Not as much of a risk at the moment given their position on one of the flatter parts, but if the mad king kept his current course …

We’re going to end up in the peaks, Hunter thought, slowing for a moment as the path ahead of them faded, widening into a small gap in the forest with a vicious, cutting stream of wind sweeping through it. Nova pointed, and Hunter nodded as he saw the trail resume on the far side. Still winding back and forth among the trees like it’d been left by a pony that was off his face.

“Seriously,” Nova said, pausing at the edge of the channel in the trees and looking up and down its length. “Where does this guy think he’s going?”

“If I knew that, we wouldn’t be following him,” Hunter replied, watching Nova as his horn began to glow. A moment later he shook his head. The path ahead was clear. They moved forward once again, hooves crunching over the snow.

Another howl of wind swept past, and Hunter tucked his wings tighter against his sides, frowning as the morning light caught the sheen of frost coating his feathers. Around them, the forest seemed to swallow their slightest sound, entombing them in silence and wind. He tried to think back on the size of it from below. How far along are we? The forest had to be ending before long. The snow beneath his hooves was starting to slope upward once more, the roots of the trees ahead—well, trunks if he was accurate; the roots were long buried—steadily rising above their compatriots as the mountainside started to climb.

“So … how much longer are we going to chase this guy?” Nova asked, his voice soft against the snow.

“Good question.” Hunter slowed for a moment, stretching one of his legs and easing the burning from slogging through so much snow. “This isn’t what I expected. Guy was supposed to make a run for the empire. Instead …” He came to a full stop as the trees ahead of them began to thin, gaps of white, open snow visible standing out against the dark bark like bleached bone. “Instead it’s like he’s cracked a fruity. We’re chasing him away from the city, which is our job, but …”

“Doesn’t feel right, does it?” Nova asked.

“No.” He started moving forward once more, snowshoes eliciting a soft crunch with each step. “Don’t get me wrong, we definitely did something good when we dropped that tree on his crystal cocoon or whatever it was, but at this point I’m starting to wonder if we should be falling back.”

“Really?”

He shrugged. “Why not? Our job is to make sure he doesn’t head for the city, and he’s not doing that. I can’t say what he is doing, but he’s not headed for the Crystal Empire.” The gaps in the trees widened, exposing another icy, windswept plain. Here and there bits of bare, craggy rock poked through the snow like ancient, weathered sentinels, blurred by the thick snows. And across it, the depression left by Sombra’s passage wound like a snake.

“I mean, what are we really doing at this point? Chasing him away? Or is he headed somewhere else anyway?” The wind rose as they stepped out of the protective cover of the trees, and he raised his voice. “I’m not trying to whinge, but what are we doing? The only reason we’re still following him is because I keep getting worried he might double back and try to play us, but …” He waved a hoof at the path across the open plain ahead of them. “He keeps going.”

“If he did fall back, we’d probably never see it from the air,” Nova said. “Not with this weather.”

“Right.” It was a shame their helmets covered the muzzle. Part of him wanted Nova to be able to see the scowl on his face. “But we could fall back to closer to the city. Get out of the mountains. At the same time …”

“If he realized we stopped, he could make another one of those crystals.”

“Yeah. And then he gets stronger, and we miss out on the ‘harass’ part of our mission.” He let out a short sigh, the wind whipping it away as soon as it left his muzzle. “But then if we keep chasing him like this … I don’t know about you but I feel absolutely stuffed. Like my legs are going to fall off.”

“I’m too frozen for that,” Nova replied, shivering. “But if I were warm, I’d probably feel like you.” For a moment they stood there, freezing amidst the howling wind.

“So … you’re in charge, boss,” Nova said after a moment. “We calling it?”

Hunter frowned. We’re not wrong. We’re wearing ourselves out here, and the only thing we’re managing to accomplish is having some idea of where this cloud of smoke is going. Which is … away from the city. Which is what we wanted in the first place.

And if we keep following him … what? He peered up at the shrouded shapes of the mountains around them. At some point, given he keeps heading northwest, he’s just going to reach a peak somewhere and pass into the Ocean. Where we can’t follow anyway. But …

“We keep going,” he said after a moment, shaking his head. “At least until we have a better idea of what he’s trying to do.”

“Wear us out and hope we fall into a trap?”

“Well, at least we’d know,” Hunter said as he led the way out into the open plain. The sky above them looked odd, the air full of so much snow that it gave what light there was a muted, soft appearance. He could still hear the faint rumble of The Hummingbird’s props carving their way through the sky, but the falling snow was so thick he couldn’t see it.

On the other hoof, if this snow gets much thicker, Sombra could lose us just by faking a split in the trail. For whatever reason the shade hadn’t shown any sign of doing such a thing thus far, but … If he did now, as thick as this snow is, we’d have to pick one, and if that wasn’t it, well … that’d be it. There’d be no chance of finding him until the snow cleared again. Unless we got very lucky.

A distant rumble rolled over the side of the mountain, thunder cascading across the peaks off in the distance and light diffusing across the sky. Thundersnow? Or just distant lightning from the storm? It was impossible to tell from the ground, though the latter seemed more likely. Not that either was good. It feels like the storm is still getting worse, he thought as he followed the shade’s faint path around one of the massive stone crags. For a moment they were in the lee, wind whipping around them but not touching, and then they moved out into the fury of the storm once more, wind so strong Hunter could see green lines on his suit glowing slightly just to keep him upright.

Ahead of them the ice and snow stretched on, an undulating slope of greyish-white that stretched out until it blended with the very sky in a shapeless fog. And still Sombra’s trail moved through it, winding back and forth but always moving in the same set direction. At least, that’s what it felt like. It was difficult to tell without any real frame of reference in the distance save the faint shadows of the peaks. Just as it was difficult to guess how long they’d been walking when there was no sun and no shadows, only diffused light refracting off of the snow from all directions.

Another craggy spire of stone poked from the ground ahead of them, its edges jagged despite the years of weathering it must have endured. Sombra’s path, Hunter noted, wound its way to the leeward side once more.

At least that’s consistent, he thought, angling his direction where the trail bent around the backside of the craggy wall of stone. Maybe the wind bothers him somehow as well. And the stone would provide some good protection from the howling winds. It’s what … twenty, thirty feet wide? Even a half a minute out of the constant, growling wind would be worth it.

“Wait.”

Hunter froze as Nova spoke, stopping in place as the snow swirled around him. “What?”

“Something’s not right ahead,” Nova said, stepping up alongside him, horn glowing. “On the back side of that rock, where the wind isn’t.”

“The lee?”

“Yeah.”

“Is it another crystal? A trap?”

“I’m … not sure,” Nova said with a slightly shake of his head. “It feels … similar? To the crystal. And maybe the trap? But it’s not the same.” He shook his head a little harder, the faint yellow glow around the tip of his horn fading. “But it’s definitely something.”

“And we’d have walked right into it,” Hunter said, nodding and looking a little more closely at the path.

If it’s a trap,” Nova added. “It doesn’t feel quite like one, but then it does.”

“So … it could be anything. Right. At least we know it’s something. What do you say we cut—” South? Is has to be, but … “—that way.” He pointed. “And give it a wide angle so we can see what’s up. He stepped back, retracing their steps until they were a good distance back from the stone clump, out in the open once more.

“Right. Cut it wide.” They broke from the path, looping around the lee of the stone. “Keep sharp. For all we know, he’s waiting back there and just wanted us out in the open.” He wasn’t sure what they would do if that were the case. Think on our hooves, I guess.

“Why not just use your mod?” Nova asked as the lee began to come into view.

“Not yet. It takes a bit to recharge, and I want … to …” His voice trailed off. “Feathers.”

Thick, jagged spikes of black crystal covered the back of the stone, growing out of both it and the snow like quills on a hedgehog. Each was twisted and gnarled, as if they’d been unable to decide on a direction save “up” and grown in sudden, violent spurts.

“That’s not good,” he said, stopping as he looked at each of the crystals. There didn’t seem to be a pattern to them that he could see. At least, not one that made immediate sense. Though there was a center point about halfway across that was strangely clear, save for a few small “walls” of the crystal growth, though now that he was looking at it, they looked more like roots the way they’d moved out from a central location.

“Hold up,” he said, a pit growing in his gut. “I don’t think that’s a trap.” His eyes followed the outward growths, watching as the met the base of each crystalline talon.

“What is it?”

“I think it was … self defense.” He pushed at his mod, and it reacted, a pulse of magic rolling out of him and over the surrounding area.

“Hey!” Nova said, his horn flashing. “Warn a guy!”

“Sorry.” The apology slipped out half-heartedly as he stared at the crystal growths. They were dark, as was the air around them, a sharp contrast to the soft glow of ambient magic in the air. But at their centers … a familiar, pulsing shape.

“Iceworms.”

“What?”

“That’s what’s in the crystals,” Hunter said, fighting a shiver that had nothing to do with the cold. “There must have been a colony of them nesting under the ice beneath the rock.”

“What’s an iceworm?”

“It’s a giant flatworm, adapted to life in arctic conditions. Not very intelligent. They live in colonies, or packs, and feed on anything that’s warm or living. One or the other, not really picky.” He took a few steps to the side. The central point made sense now. “They’re dangerous if they’re big enough, and they use magic to “swim” through ice and snow at good speeds. This colony must have been napping in the lee, and when Sombra came around it, they sensed … well, whatever he is, and decided he’d be a good snack.”

“That didn’t work.”

“No. It was a definite blue. They’re all encased in those crystal things.” Guess I know now what would have happened had one of those attacks of his earlier hit me.

“Probably similar to the encasement trap I disarmed earlier,” Nova said, stepping forward. Hunter waved a wing at him, but he shook his head. “I need a better look.” His horn began to glow, and a moment later he nodded.

“That’s what it is all right,” he said, a faint tone of revulsion in his voice. “It shouldn’t be dangerous to us, but … I think I see how those things work.”

“Work?”

“The crystal growths. They’re magical in nature. I think it’s what’s holding them together. They’re … feeding on those things inside them to stay going.”

“So …” He thought for a moment. “Like a prison that uses the strength of its prisoner to stay locked.”

“Exactly. Well, not exactly,” Nova said. “It’s not drawing that much from them, but surrounded in stone like those things are … Do they need to breathe?”

“Not much.”

“Well, that’s probably the only reason why they’re alive. Hit a pony with that, though …”

Another shiver crawled down Hunter’s back. If the tendrils that had been after him earlier had connected … “It’d drain their magic and suffocate them.”

“And immobilize them.”

“Yikes.” All the more reason not to get hit. “That would be … it?”

“Depends on how strong the crystal is,” Nova replied, taking another few steps forward, horn still glowing. As Hunter watched, the glow from his mod faded, the soft ambience of magic—as well as the hard clarity around each of the crystals, returning to the more diffused light of the snowstorm.

“Okay … looking at it … and …” Nova shrugged. “Hard to say. Probably depends on how much magic he puts into it.”

“So …”

“Anywhere from ‘as hard as magic can make it’ to ‘glass.’ It’s magical crystal, so who knows what rules do or don’t apply though.” He moved forward again. “I think it’s safe to approach, but …”

“After you?” Hunter suggested.

“Right,” Nova said. “That’s kind of what I was getting at. I don’t feel anything, but if it goes wild …”

“No worries.” He gave his wings a quick flap, ignoring the cold chill at the edges of his wings. “I’ll get you out of it.”

Nova nodded and moved forward with slow, plodding steps. The crystal growths looked like clawed fingers cutting out of the earth, waiting to clench their grip.

But they didn’t, not even when Nova walked right up to a small one and rapped his hoof against it. “It’s not too hard,” he called as a piece broke off. “Sort of like … stiff glass? What’s that black, volcanic rock?”

“Obsidian?”

He nodded. “That’s it. I can feel it tugging at my magic though. Not hard, but it’s trying.” His horn glowed brightly once more. “And … there it is.”

“There what is?”

“Part of the spell,” Nova said, stepping back. “So it needs a burst of magic to determine how hard it is at first, and then it keeps pulling magic to try and stay that tough. But I can already see the magic destabilizing.”

“Just like the other crystals came apart.”

“Yeah.” Nova backed up again, horn glowing as he looked at the rest of them. “Let me try something.” He stared at one of the larger pieces for a moment, and then without warning a burst of light shot out of his horn and bounced off of the crystalline surface. Then the steady glow returned.

“Well,” he said after a moment. “That’s not good.”

Given what had just happened, Hunter made a guess. “It get stronger?”

“By a bit, yeah,” Nova answered. “So using magic to try and fight getting wrapped in one of these would be—”

“Bad,” Hunter finished, and Nova nodded. “Any way to counter it?”

“Sure,” Nova said quickly. “There’s probably some magic that can be used to overcharge the effect, or maybe turn it on itself. Probably some sort of countered emotional magic, given how this works. But finding it?” He shook his head. “Could take time.”

“Think on it anyway. We might need it.”

Nova nodded and stepped back up to one of the crystals. “Should we break these guys out?”

The answer came quickly. “No. They’re pretty mindless. We break them out, they’re just going to attack us. They might break out on their own, but if not …” He shrugged. “Iceworms are a pest and a nuisance. I’m not rapped at what happened to ‘em, but I’m not about to say let’s let them out. Let’s keep moving before we lose the trail.” Nova nodded and began to move away from the crystals.

“Still seems like a lousy way to go,” he said as they moved out of the lee, the wind rushing over them once more.

“They get stuck in ice sometimes and just go into hibernation until they get out.” Hunter tucked his wings in closer as snow swept into his sides, rolling off him or getting caught in the crevices of his armor plate. “If they’re smart, they’ll do the same thing from that, but again, I wouldn't worry about it. In a way, Sombra did us a favor. This way they aren’t munching on us.”

Nova said nothing, and they moved on in relative silence, wind howling around them. The trail Sombra had left swept back and forth across the open side of the mountain, meandering between lows and highs on the snow-covered plain and around more of the sharp, craggy rocks that poked through it. The snowfall grew thicker, painting the world around them in white and making even the nearby crags grow fuzzy and vanish.

“Wow.” Nova’s voice was muffled even at their close distance. “I can’t even see The Hummingbird anymore. Can you?”

“No,” Hunter said with a shake of his head. “I can still hear it.” He paused, pointing with one hoof in the direction of the faint, low rumble. “Off that way, though I doubt she’s having any luck keeping an eye on our quarry either.”

“What are the odds that he’ll double back?”

“That’s the thousand-bit question, isn’t it?” He shook his head, dislodging a number of snowflakes that fell down over his visor. He brushed them away with one hoof. “I mean, unless he’s got some sort of compass spell, he could end up just as lost as we could if we weren’t careful.” He turned, stopping as he looked back at Nova. “Would you try to double back in this kind of storm?”

“Me?” Nova shook his head. “Are you kidding? I’d end up going in circles. Or freezing to death. Or rather I would have before all the training we’ve been doing. I still wouldn’t be very confident without someone who knew what they were doing, though. I’d probably hunker down until this storm left.”

“But Sombra,” he said before Hunter could speak. “I don’t know. He’s a shade now, right?” He shrugged. “Maybe he doesn’t feel cold. Maybe he can’t freeze? He holed up last night, but that was to regain power maybe, rather than the weather.”

“I get it,” Hunter said as Nova let out a scoff. “We’re working with bodgy information.”

“It’s not that,” Nova said, shaking his head. “Though that doesn’t help. Point being I wouldn’t want to be out in a storm like this, but for all I know, Sombra can see through it. We know so little about what he can and can’t do, I wouldn’t want to make plans based on it. Though …”

“What?”

“We do know his speed.”

For a moment Hunter stood still. Speed? Then he nodded. “You’re right. We’ve seen him run. So if he did double back—”

“All we’d have to do is make sure we were waiting,” Nova agreed with a nod.

“Well, I was going to say we could wait out the storm in The Hummingbird, and then do a search pattern based on how far he could have gotten once the weather clears. It’s not like it’s giving us a chance to do much else, and the snow’s getting thick enough it’s covering his trail anyway.” He nodded at the faint traces. “We won’t be able to follow him for long, between the wind and the snowfall. I’m good, but I’m not that good.”

“So …?” Nova probed. “We calling it?”

“Unless you’ve got some magic that can track him when I can’t.”

Nova let out a short laugh. “If I could, I’d be doing it from the deck of The Hummingbird.”

“Fair point.” The Hummingbird’s sound had grown even more distant, though whether it was due to the ever-thickening snowfall or just it moving further away, he couldn’t say. “Got a spell to call The Hummingbird back?”

“If we get close enough.”

“Well, Bolt’s supposed to double-back if she doesn’t see us.”

“She couldn’t see anything in this soup.”

“Probably won’t be long, then.” He cocked one ear, listening. It did sound like it was starting to flip back a little. That, or the wind had just shifted again. Still, he could tell what direction it was in. “This way,” he said, starting forward through the thick snow. As he moved he could hear ice scrape between the plates of his armor, the sound harsh until it broke free and fell to the ground. Just standing still for a minute or two had been enough for the melting snow to freeze over. “Once we get close enough, send up a signal.”

“Believe me, I don’t need much convincing.” Nova’s horn flared, a yellow glow flashing around his muzzle. Steam rose from it, torn away in moments by the storm, followed by chunks of freed ice slipping out of the grating. They vanished into the snow, buried almost as soon as they had appeared.

The distant rumble of The Hummingbird’s engines shifted again, and Hunter glanced up at the sky. The snow was coming down so thick now that it seemed like the world itself was in a fog. I hope she doesn’t miss us in this storm. If it gets any worse, we’re going to have to hunker down in tents and wait it out. Plus try not to get buried.

They pushed forward, slowly moving across the plain. It was almost impossible to tell where their quarry had traveled now, and twice Hunter lost the path, only to find it again a minute later. By the second time, it was entirely luck.

However, his ears hadn’t misled him. The Hummingbird was circling back, the drone of its propellers growing louder and louder. It was still invisible through the thick snows, but— “It’s getting closer!”

“I hear it,” Nova called. “See it?”

“Not yet.” He slowed, twisting his head and searching for any sign of the airship’s envelope. “It has to be close though.” The roar was getting louder.

Then, like a behemoth rising out of the deep, the shape of the airship loomed out of the snows, filling the sky almost directly above them.

“No—” Hunter began, but he was already at it, his horn flashing brightly. The roar from The Hummingbird’s propellers changed almost immediately, pitch shifting as the airship pivoted, momentum bleeding and fighting against the storm.

“She sees us!” Hunter called as the running lights along the side of the airship’s structure began to flash. “I’ll fly up and drop the rope.”

“Reel it!” Nova shouted as Hunter spread his wings. “Weather’s bad enough.”

“You got it!” A few quick wingbeats took him into the air, his magic fighting to clear a path through the heavy winds and the massive, turbulent downdrafts rolling from The Hummingbird’s propellers. By the time he reached the side door, pushing it open with a heavy shove, he could feel his wings beginning to burn from both the weight of his gear and the force of the storm. Door open, it was all he could do not to collapse on the deck.

Drop the rope. The clips for the end were by the door, as well as the steam-powered winch, and he swung them out into the storm, the wheel letting out a rapid buzz as the heavy rope dropped down to the snow. A minute later it was stretched tight as the winch wound it back up, Nova trailing from the end and swinging wildly in the winds.

“Oh sun above,” Nova said, falling to his belly as soon as he was aboard. “I think I’m gonna hurl.”

“Don’t do it with your helmet on,” Hunter said as he swung the door shut. “It’ll just—” Nova bolted for the head, his magic detaching the harness from his armor and trailing bits of partially-melted ice as he went. A moment later the sound of someone heaving up a mostly-empty stomach filled the hallway, and Hunter grimaced.

Guess that ride was worse than it looked.

He brushed the snow and ice from his winter coat, then hung it by the door before grabbing one of the towels and giving himself a quick wipedown. Water trickled in rivulets down his sides and legs, the melting residue of the storm cascading through the metal grating by the door. You’d think I’d just come in from a monsoon, rather than just some crook snowstorm.

He gave his armor one final work over with the towel, then returned it to its place. There were still streaks of moisture across his armor, and as he watched another bit of melted water worked its way out from the join in his right shoulder plates, but it would have to do.

From the bathroom the sounds of retching halted, and there was the distinct sound of the head flushing away whatever Nova had managed to put into it.

“I’m heading up front,” Hunter said, glancing through the open hatch. Nova had his head under the small sink, and he pulled back enough only to give Hunter a quick nod before ducking back into it. “Be sure to clean up the snow and water when you’re done.

Nova lifted a hoof and made a loose “Acknowledged” signal with one hoof, head still buried in the faucet.

Well, at least he’s getting those signals down pretty well. Hunter turned and rounded the T, heading forward toward the front of the airship. The hatch to the main cabin was open, as was the one to the cockpit.

“Sky Bolt?” he called as he stepped into the main cabin. “How’s it going?”

“Good and bad,” she answered as he stepped across the open hatchway frame and into the cockpit. Sky Bolt was sitting right in the pilot’s chair, as he’d expected, hooves on the controls though she still found a second to glance at him. “Nova aboard yet?”

“He is.”

“Good,” Bolt said, wings relaxing slightly. She leaned over and adjusted a few of the controls, and The Hummingbird vibrated as it began to turn into the wind. “Holding that spot was a little tricky. That, and with all the rocks around, I really didn’t want to be that close to the ground.” Through the cockpit glass, the craggy pillars he and Nova had been working around began to shrink and fade, the thick snow obscuring them from view as the airship rose into the sky.

“Sombra?”

Bolt shook her head before he’d even finished saying the shade’s name. “Lost track of him about five, ten minutes ago. Snow just got too thick.”

“Where?”

“Northeast, same path as always,” Bolt said, eyes on her instrument panel. He didn’t blame her. The world around them seemed to have been reduced to shifting shades of white. It made his wings itch.

We’re flying blind. Visually anyway.

“Shouldn’t be too hard to pick up his trail when the weather clears, though,” Bolt continued, and Hunter snapped his eyes away from the scene outside the cockpit.

“Why not?”

“Because he was on the edge of the glacier again.”

“Wait, the same glacier we found him in the first place?”

“According to my maps? Yeah,” Bolt said with a nod. “Right on the edge of the mountain.”

“Huh.” He frowned, sitting back on his haunches. “Why would he do that?”

“Head for the glacier?”

“The whole thing,” he said. From behind him, the sound of hoofsteps announced Nova’s arrival to the main cabin. “Nova and I were just talking about this. Where’s he going? Why isn’t he putting up more of a fight to get to the city? Isn’t that supposed to be his target?”

“I don’t know,” Sky Bolt said, hiding a yawn behind one hoof as soon as she had finished speaking. Then The Hummingbird shook under a gust of wind, and her hoof snapped back to the controls so quickly he’d have missed it had he blinked. “All I can tell you is where I lost sight of him.”

“Where was it?” Nova asked as he stepped up to the open hatch.

“The edge of the glacier,” Hunter said, turning to look at him. Anything to keep his eyes off of the swirling snows outside.

Nova’s eyes widened slightly, an expression of confused surprise on his face. “The same one?”

“The same one,” he said with a nod. “And no, Sky Bolt doesn’t know why he’s there either.”

“Huh …” Nova sat back with a frown. “Back to the glacier? What’s important about the glacier? I mean, we did sort of drive him away from it at first.”

“Did we?” Hunter paused for a moment, thinking back on the—had it really been only a day prior? “We did, didn’t we? Sort of?”

“Not intentionally,” Nova replied. “But when you’re running from someone, sometimes you’ve just got to take the best avenue you can.”

“He has been heading northeast ever since then, and the glacier is … Hang on.” Sky Bolt reached up and flipped her charts down, pointing with one wing pinion even as she brought her hooves back to the controls. “There,” she said, her wing tapping the glacier’s sinuous shape on the map. “Glacier runs about the same. Sometimes east, sometimes north, but sorta both until that sharp north turn before the … start?” She glanced at Hunter.

“Glacier head. It’s not a very glamorous term, but it’s not going to trip up your gob, either.”

“Right,” she said with a nod. “So yeah, the glacier head.”

Hunter nodded, eyeing the map. “Where are we right now?”

“About here.” Bolt’s feather moved.

“And where did we start?”

“One second …” The Hummingbird vibrated slightly, then dropped several feet before rising back up, Hunter’s wings popping out slightly to stabilize against the sudden shift before he caught them.

“Okay, we’re good,” Bolt said, pulling one hoof from the controls and turning to look at the map. “We started following him here,” she said, her wingtip moving to a grey line marked over the plastic. “The grey is our rough path over the last day or so.”

“Huh.” Hunter ran his eyes over the line, following it as it moved across the map. Northeast, like we’ve been saying, but … The glacier moved east, and then north. “It does kind of look like he was trying to get back to the glacier, doesn’t it? But at the same time …” He extended a hoof, and Bolt withdrew her wing, allowing him to tap the map where the line they had followed was only a mile from the edge of the glacier. “If he wanted to get to the glacier, he could have gone to it here. Instead, he pushed up the mountainside.”

“So maybe it’s not the glacier he’s after. Or a point across the glacier.”

“Bolt? Straightedge?”

“Above it. In the storage.” The Hummingbird jerked again, the deck tilting slightly underhoof as Hunter followed her instructions and pulled a small, clear plastic ruler with a metal core out of a tiny compartment behind the map’s recessed space.

“It’s magnetic,” Bolt said, glancing at him as he looked at it. “Enough that it’ll stick to the map board and shouldn’t move, but not enough to mess with Hummingbird’s compass.”

“Clever. Do we pay you enough?” True to her words, the ruler popped out of his hoof as soon as it was close to the map.

“I’m starting to think not remotely,” Bolt answered. “But since I’ve pretty much got an unlimited budget, it’s a fair trade off. Besides, I didn’t come up with that one.”

“Still clever,” he said as he slid the ruler into position. “And if Sombra keeps on his current path, he’s going …” His eyes followed the edge of the ruler along the map.

“Nowhere,” Nova answered for him, stepping halfway into the cockpit. “That’s just more empty mountain.”

“As much as I wish it wasn’t true, I’m getting the same vibe.” Hunter pulled his gaze back, checking the nearby features on the map. There weren’t many. “A few frozen lakes, some trees … If he’s actually heading to something out there, I don’t see it.”

Still, the answer didn’t sit right. He’s obviously heading the way he is for a reason. There has to be something to it.

But what? That’s the real question. He stared up at the map even as around them, the skies began to shift, the snow fading into thick, grey cloud.

“Well, I’m not seeing anything,” Nova said from the doorway. “And I’m feeling kind of hungry now that my stomach has settled.”

“Settled?” Bolt asked. “What happened?”

“The ride up had a lot of spinning,” Nova replied. “A little too much.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. Glad the toilet’s right next to the door.”

“You didn’t throw up on my deck?”

“No. Or in the helmet.”

“Eugh.” Sky Bolt shook slightly. “That would not work well. Please don’t.”

Hunter let the banter fall to the back of his mind, still staring at the map as the pair spoke. Something about it just didn’t quite make sense.

There’s the path he’s been on, he thought, glancing at the grey line. And there’s where he’s headed if he stays on the same path … Once more his eyes moved out into the empty mountainside. Then further. Could he be going that far? he thought as his eyes fixed on a distant peak, a good thirty miles from the end of the ruler. He’s heading straight for it, but …

Something about it didn’t feel right, and he frowned, staring at the distant peak. Wait a minute. I recognize that. Before the snow was coming down. Tiny print stared back at him from next to the peak’s top. 24,000 feet. One of the taller mountains in the Crystal Range. And definitely the tallest in the local … Wait a minute.

He reached out and tapped the ruler, adjusting its path so that one end pointed at the next closest peak, to the north. Then he moved it again, to the one south.

“Boss?”

Now further back … He moved the ruler once more, this time back to where Sombra had broken out of the glacier. Again he checked the lines.

“Boss?”

That could be it. He pulled his hooves away. Because of all the snow—

“Lieutenant?”

His attention snapped away from the map. “What?” Bolt was giving him a curious look, and it took him a moment to catch up with why.

“Right, I’m the boss when Steel’s gone. Sorry, Sky Bolt, I was just noticing something interesting.”

“You think you know where he’s going?”

He shook his head. “No, but I think I know why he’s heading the direction he is. The peaks.”

“Oh.” Bolt’s face lit up. “Oh yeah, that does make sense. He’s been gone for more than a thousand years, right? They’d probably be the only familiar landmarks if he knew the area.”

“Right!” Bolt was jumping ahead of him now, filling in a few of the gaps he hadn’t thought of. “And we haven’t been making use of them because of the storm. But if he knew the area—”

“He’d have something to roughly go off of,” Sky Bolt said with a nod. “Though that still doesn’t explain why he’d head northeast, rather than to the city.”

“I can’t answer that either,” Hunter said. “But I like knowing that there is some destination in mind, even if I can’t say what it is. Should make it easier to keep track of him.”

Bolt nodded, then hid another yawn behind her hoof. “Good.” Another yawn. “I should have asked, but we’re waiting for the weather to clear, right?”

“Yeah,” he said with a nod. “No point in getting lost down in that storm.” Outside the cockpit the sky had started to brighten, the grey clouds clearing.

“Good, because I need some actual sleep,” Bolt said, eyes going back to the controls. “I’m taking us up above the storm; should be fairly easy for you to hold position once we’re above the clouds. Just stationkeeping. You keep my baby right here, and when this storm blows out, or at least clears a bit, we’ll drop down. At least,” she said as The Hummingbird broke free of the clouds, ascending into a welcome clear blue sky. “If you’re okay with that.”

“That sounds fine. Get some sleep.”

Bolt nodded, then leaned over and engaged the autopilot. “Just keep us here,” she said as she slid out of the seat, stifling another yawn. She did, he noticed, have the forethought to grab her helmet from her bunk and tuck it under one wing before sidling past him and into the main cabin. He kept an eye on her as she trotted over to a spare bunk—Sabra’s, he couldn’t help but notice, though he wasn’t sure her decision had even been conscious—and collapse on top of it.

She was asleep in seconds, wings twitching aimlessly.

“Wow,” Nova said from the galley. “She really was tired.”

“Comes with the job,” Hunter said, taking a moment to peer out the cockpit glass and pull in a deep breath at the sight of the clear blue sky around them. After so much grey and white it was a refreshing—if cold—view, one that made him want to dive out the door and just fly through it.

Not that he would, and not just because someone needed to be at the helm. As high as they were, the air outside would be hard to breathe. And likely just as cold, if not colder, than it had been at ground level.

He slid himself into the pilot’s seat, eyeing first the controls, then the roiling snowstorm beneath them. A couple of hours, he thought. Maybe four or five. By then, hopefully, the storm would have spent most of its fury, and the snow would abate.

And then, he thought, eyes fixing on a distant peak poking through the heavy clouds. We’ll see if Sombra switched direction on us once we were gone. And if not …

As long as he kept heading away from the city and gave the rest of the team more time, then they’d have to call it good.

Author's Note:

Maybe Sombra's just lost? Yeah, that's gotta be it, right? Right?

As always, new chapters Tuesdays and Fridays, as well as every hundred upvotes! If you're enjoying the story so far, don't forget to check out my website or my published works!