"Quite the view" he shuddered as the wind blew crispness to his cheeks, a sigh between them mistaken for the wind. There was a hushed longing to be away, as the cliff invited them through glaring sun and knee deep snow.
"Quite," she whispered amid a roar of blustering air flourished with white flakes that bounced around her head, filling the empty spaces of her mind. The pair stood in almost silence, save the chattering of their teeth and the crunch of footsteps on the trail behind them, "It's times like these I wish I could be a whole different person"
"Gwyneira, hey," he hissed sharply, gently catching her by the wrist to grab her attention, "You know shouldn't say that out loud. Be more careful… The Keeper won't like it, much less your parents"
"Be calm, Bleddyn," she glared, a sharp look freezing him more than snow ever could, blue eyes like frozen lakes and pupils dark as coal. She remained still however, her wrist held in place by his gloved hand. A glance backward reassured them both no-one had overheard them, "They're nothing but thoughts, you know that" He smoothed the snow from her mittens and dared not meet her gaze, though he knew her eyes remained fixed on him.
"I know that but do they?" He sighed but began to chuckle, shaking his head slightly, "I can just imagine the look on the Keeper's face if you were to tell her what we talk about"
"Ha! She's your mother. I'm relatively sure she'd be more horrified at what you say to me. She's disgusted at the thought of you being near a woman, let alone one that would put 'dangerous and disastrous' thoughts into your head". They grinned at each other as though the wind had carved a smile in the rocks that were they're faces. A shuffle behind them tore them away while snow was pushed aside by their feet and a large stick thwacked into the frozen earth.
"My apologies, falons (friends)," a voice croaked out, tired and rasping and out of breath. A wispy stream of thick grey hair fluttered about as two shaking hands crept their way to the top of the stick and settled heavily with the weight of the hearty old elf connected to them. Bleddyn looked startled, his grin still carved into his cheeks though as he turned to the man.
"Dai! Uhm, we were just-"
"Bah! You think it matters to me what you two discuss," the man cracked a crooked smile and wiped his reddened, button nose with the back of his sleeve, "Keeper Elena is pushing to find cover just past this ridge by nightfall. The Frostback Mountains are no friendly place to be after the sun goes down, believe me. So she's pushing hard and fast to get us there. Of course, she's no sympathy for an old man…" He continued to mutter his complaints about his back and the cold and the holes in his socks but Gwyneira merely sighed and looked down the cliff into the canyon below. Her eyes followed a ridge of rocks down to a deep frozen lake that looked as though it had not seen the sunshine from outside of a layer of ice. She had hoped she'd be given a way to explore down there but the more they walked the more she realised they were walking in the opposite direction. She'd never see the lake again; never feel just how cold its icy face was; never know its deepest secrets. Bleddyn took her shoulder and turned her around. With a small jerk of his head, they set off after Dai down more of the churned up trail. Bleddyn took hold of Dai's arm as the old elf steadied himself with the stick in his other hand. Gwyneira trudged just behind them, her eyes tracing the canyon walls around her. Her cheeks burned with the slow returning heat as the canyon sheltered them from the harsh ongoing wind. Her body was wracked with shivers and her teeth continued to chatter from her snow soaked furs. Even her hair felt wracked with ice and tangled with the thickest knots known to Thedas under her chunky red headscarf and fur hood. She played with the tassels at the ends of the scarf and remembered the lush green fields of the Lothering village farms with the smells of the baked goods and the heat of the glorious Summerday sunshine as she roamed the market in search of such goods. There she found the scarf drooping around the hooks of a wooden stall and bargained away a day of hard hunting and labour for the woollen 'rag', or so her mother dubbed it, disapprovingly. Those days were long gone now though and the thought of such happiness reaching Lothering seemed distant and forbidden as news of the defeat at Ostagar spread. If such creatures did lurk then surely they would seep through the Korcari Wilds easily and overrun the small hamlet in mere weeks. "It's not fleeing, for we've nothing to fight for!" Keeper Elena had told the clan, "This is not our land. If we were in danger from lack of food, we would leave! If we were in danger from lack of water, we would leave! It just so happens to be that we are in danger and, so, we must leave". So they packed up the aravels and began their trek before it became too late. They had walked for so long she had lost count but each day felt more of a chore than the last as the ice bit into her very soul. She tripped and stumbled over rocks and boulders in the canyon as snow filled the footprints behind her and concealed the entrance in which they'd just come through. So how long had they been walking? Dai and Bleddyn were still in front of her and the aravels and halla were not too far away. Her head hurt to think of any colours other than icy blue, black rock and stark white though she longed for it as each step felt endless. One step after another. Would it ever end?
