var-a langt af því heldr válítit,
unz þær vélar vissi allar. (not long thereafter, but all too soon,
their evil wiles full well she knew.)
- Oddrúnarkviða, 18
The beasts led their squinting guests through the blizzard, who shielded their faces with their arms, Bruce using his fin, all throats chilled with every inhale. The icy winds blew Link's and Luna's frosted hairs back, fluttering clothes shaking off snowflakes.
"Kibou?" Luna asked, "Doing alright?"
He jingled. "Yup! These winds aren't that bad. You?"
"I'm good."
They steadily persevered, going uphill between icebound geology, the lupine guides untroubled.
"How—how much farther?" Link called.
Luna looked back, her long sleeves and hair fluttering. "At the other side of this mountain!"
Link nodded. "Doesn't bother me. How's our shrimp doing?"
Bruce frowned. "This shrimp is doing good. I have the hardiness of a Reekfish."
They trudged through a narrow path flanked by slanting rocky formations, leaving behind superimposed footprints behind them. They soon reached a cliff with several stairstepped projections, the wolves jumping and climbing up within seconds. Some wolves poked their noses over the top drop-off, patiently waiting.
"Hm, how will we get up here?" Link asked.
Bruce threw his spear atop the cliff, then hooked his Dane ax over the edge of the cut-out. "Like this." He gripped the shaft, pulling himself up.
Luna grabbed the helve and climbed next, Link doing likewise. Bruce repeated hooking his battleaxe for each ledge, everyone soon reaching the top, the wolves rushing further up the narrow path between cliff and drop-off.
After Bruce retrieved his ax and spear, the distant howling of two wolves echoed, changing in pitch together.
Link's ears twitched. "They're...singing?"
"Maybe someday," Luna said, "you will sing like Hati and Skǫll?"
The rhythmic howling continued as they ascended the winding paths, several trees visible at an opening below the cliff side path. The wolves leapt up the snowy cul-de-sac. They dug into the mound of snow pushed by winds, gradually pushing it over, creating a little hill for everyone to walk up.
The musical howling was clearer.
Soon, a point of the mountainside came to view, some sort of bored Gossip Stone near the end of it. Hati sat there, head up as he sang his howling notes. The duo finished, Hati turning around as Link steadily clapped.
"Good boy!" Link patted Hati's scruff, who just stared, panting with his tongue out. Skǫll jumped down from above, firmly landing, ears pricked. "Oh, you, too." Link patted him, too.
Link stood straight and turned around, Bruce pushed over by the icy wolves charging the Hero of Time for pets. "Whoa! Watch it! Before I fall off the cliff!"
Luna crossed her arms, smiling as Link fell over, laughing as he was swarmed by happy canines. He rolled away from the drop-off but they kept diving into the dog pile.
Bruce got up, stepping beside Luna. "Ha ha! I've never seen wolves so playful... That Hylian is gifted."
Luna sighed. I wonder what my Wolfoses are doing right now...
After they finished playing, the wolf pack rushed off, everyone following until they reached an open area with some trees.
Kibou looked around. "Now where?"
Few by few, the Snowpeak Wolfoses leapt high, elegantly diving into the snow and disappearing. Hati and his brother aggressively dug, gradually sinking. Bruce used his ax like a shovel, Link, Kibou and Luna using their hands...
The icy wolves slithered through the snow, emerging in a cave, Skǫll and Hati next, their bipedal guests clumsily rolling out. Hati shook his fur free of snow, then looked at Link as he childishly got snow out his head and hat. The wolf frowned, shrugged, and moved on.
"No wonder I could never find the barbarians!" Bruce stated, voice echoing up the cave. "They covered the cave entrance with snow...clever brutes." He waggled his fins, flicking snow off.
The narrow path led to a subterranean cliff. The wolves ascended the shaft by leaping side to side against the stone, unable to understand the tall ladder already in place, which their guests used. The Ice Keeses making residence remained under the ceiling, unbothered by the Snowpeak Wolfoses or their friends.
Afterwards, everyone went up a largely-stairstepped section, which led to another shaft the wolves ascended by jumping to and fro against the walls. Their bipedal friends climbed the jagged, icebound surface. Farther up the path, an icy door blocked the exit. Hati and Skǫll placed their forepaws against the door, rolling it sideways. Revealed was a large, irregular space rimmed by a semi-circle drop-off, overlooking mountainous wastelands.
Once the wolves and everyone exited the cave, the door slid closed behind them. Across the peak, a geological falx arched over, its top broad and round. A lone dead tree stood there, leafy icicles hanging from some branches. The wolves gathered near the tree and sat, taking a break after so much jumping.
Link walked among the wolves, sometimes petting them. The Hero of Time leaned over the edge, an immense downslope awaiting him. "I can't even see the bottom of this hill. It winds through rock formations."
Bruce grunted. "These thick-headed brutes really like seclusion..."
The tree's leafy icicles shook. The wolves' ears pricked as they growled—everyone looked back.
Plumes of snow reverberated down the mountaintop above the doorway, an immense scythed sleigh pulled by two massive goats leapt down. The goats frothed at their mouths, stamping their hooves wildly. They had dark, shaggy coats, each having horns protruding from atop the forehead, tips conjoined, forming a hollow oval.
Perhaps twenty barbarians leaned out either side of the giant, bladed sled. They whirled their axes, screaming like madmen, whilst those in the high back brandished bows.
"Why didn't you tell us about this, Luna!?" Bruce yelled, hurling his spear, though a goat knocked it aside with his horns.
"This I didn't remember!"
"How could you not remember this!?"
The goats scraped the ground with their hooves.
"I think we better run!" Kibou cried, the beasts lowering their heads and walking up the arched path, the very stone creaking from so much weight.
Link shot an Ice Arrow, chunks of ice forming across the giant goats, slowing them down.
The coachman laughed. "Hræva kulði megi-t þínu holdi fara, Tanngrisnir ok Tanngnjóstr!" The Ice Magic shattered simply by the goats refusing to stop moving.
"Dammit!" Link cursed, "They must be used to the cold!"
Bruce gripped his Dane ax two-handed.
"We won't be able to beat this head-on!" Kibou cautioned.
Several by several, the wolves darted downhill.
Luna shook, Link looking around. He looked up the tree—slamming his head against the trunk, Bruce making a quizzical face.
Several leafy icicles fell from the branches, Link hopping upon one. "We have only one way to go!"
Luna and Bruce looked at each other, then jumped on their own ice-boards, sliding after Link as the giant goats charged.
Link and Luna picked up speed while snowboarding, reaching the wolves as they leapt over a ravine, Bruce the furthest behind due to his weight.
Hair and sleeves fluttering, Luna felt her blood rush as she jumped across the gap. Upon landing, she looked back; Bruce jumped backwards, futilely swinging his ax while mid-air at the goats as they leapt after him. The sleigh landed with a great crash, the goats galloping with greater vigor, snorting wildly as the great sleigh pushed them faster.
Luna beckoned. "Bruce! Don't try to fight them! Pick up speed instead!"
Bruce knelt as conjoined horns swung overhead, his posture increasing speed as he felt the goats' hot, bad breath swirl around him. He went to the side, avoiding horns and hooves, the barbarians at the flank already hurling axes. Bruce axed aside a few projectiles, evading others, but had no way to defeat the combined force. He sped away...
Up ahead, Link aimed backwards, swerving to and fro while the barbarian bowmen shot arrows from their elevated position. Link loosed a Fire Arrow, hitting a goat in the chest, though its frosted hairs just momentarily sizzled. Link faced forwards and knelt, arrows and axes thudding against the shield on his back.
Farther downslope, the path narrowed, Luna and Bruce staying low while Link jumped upon the raised section, giving him the height he needed to shoot arrows at the sleigh's passengers. Link often rolled his shoulders and swerved his ice-board, arrows and throwing axes bombarding his area. He put away his bow, focusing on gaining speed...
Up ahead, a chasm was accessible via a narrow bridge, the wolves already leaping across the bridge gaps. Link's eyes narrowed. He jumped off the raised section, landing beside Bruce as he hacked the bridge ropes apart, the structure loosening. Luna and Kibou went over the first gap, Link and Bruce next. They looked back, one goat running faster than the other, reins stretching until it was ahead of the other, they now pulling the sled single-file as they trampled the bridge posts, everything breaking apart behind them as axes whirled overhead. The goats kept going, faster than the bridge could break, avoiding a one-way descent.
"They sure don't give up easily!" Bruce commented, batting aside thrown axes with his own ax.
"Big jump ahead!" Kibou warned, a flurry of wolves already taking it, the beasts rocketing from tree to tree while crisscrossing one another.
Luna was next to go off the jump, followed by Link and Bruce, inertia launching them across several snow-topped evergreens, Bruce using his fins as gliders to keep up.
"Ha ha! Keep that up, you'll turn to a bird someday!" Link joked.
Bruce laughed. "I know, right!?" He looked back...
Guttural bleats echoed as the goats charged, leaping off the cliff, beasts and sleigh howling through the wind as the passengers cheered. The goats and sleigh slammed into a tree, breaking through it, the monstrous momentum smashing through the trees the snowboarders just used, goats unhindered but most passengers nearly falling off.
Link slid side to side, withdrawing his sword and shield, slashing at the goats' faces and legs, though blocking continuous streams of projectiles cracked his shield open. He swerved, hacking at a goat, its horns knocking away his shield. Link sharply turned, evading thrown axes while Bruce attacked the flank of the other goat.
Afterwards, icy projections stuck out the path, which the wolves and snowboarders easily maneuvered around as arrows and axes constantly whizzed past them, the goats breaking through the icebound obstacles. The goats were slowed down just enough for Link and Bruce to make a temporary getaway.
Link noticed the geology diverged into two paths, one low and widely curved alongside the cliff to the right, both allowing access further down the mountain. The left path skimmed across the chasm via narrow arches. Visible down below was scaffolding and unfinished walls encircling a great hall, everything surrounded by the chasm. The wolves split up, taking both paths, Skǫll looking back and growling as the goats.
Link jumped, picking the more dangerous route, Luna and Bruce choosing the safer option, the monstrous sleigh doing likewise. So high up, Link bombarded arrows upon the sled, hitting a few barbarians off the sleigh, though the goats were steadily caching up to their prey. He noticed arrays of cornices stretching across the clifftops...
Some archers turned, waiting for Link to go off the last jump. They then shot a volley; Link kickflipped his ice-board just as he went airborne, using his device as a shield mid-air to block incoming arrows. Link landed on his ice-board, unsheathing his sword, he and Bruce attacking the goats while veering across each other, sometimes jumping over the goats' horns and landing on each others' ice-boards.
"This isn't working!" Bruce yelled, the end of the race imminent, axes and arrows bombarding the area, some wolves hit but not stopping.
"I have an idea—but you gotta get going fast!"
Link sheathed his sword and withdrew...the Ocarina of Time? Confused, Bruce cocked his head as Link played a six-note tune twice, followed by a flourish.
The skies darkened. Thunder shook the earth. Wind screamed across the mountains. Lightning flashed, illuminating every falling snowflake. The Song of Storms summoned lightning bolts upon the cornices, unleashing several avalanches at once.
Bruce and Link squatted, winds pushing their backs and threw them to the fenced finish area—the avalanche smashed the goats and sleigh over the bridge, bleats and screams drowned by the hurtling snow.
Link, Luna and Bruce slid into the stairway then ran up with their lupine guides; the avalanche kept growing, after all! Once atop the stairs, they were safe from the snowy turmoil, though echoes of grunts and grumbles came from within the hall.
"Hoh! Whoa!" Kibou exclaimed, the avalanche subsiding. "That was quite a race... Luna! Are you alright!?"
Luna sighed. "Yes, Kibou, I'm fine. When will you stop treating me like an infant?"
"Once this horrible adventure ends!"
For me it won't.
"Sounds like they're drinking heavily," Link commented, approaching the great hall.
"We're gonna have to do this quick, then!" Luna said, scurrying to the double doors and trying to open them. "It's locked!"
"Looks like they really didn't plan on going outside," Kibou remarked.
"Alright, let's force them out," Link said, the wolves waiting attentively.
"How?" asked Bruce. "If a freakin' avalanche didn't get their attention, nothing will. There must be a window or something for Luna to sneak through..."
Hookshot loaded, Link got himself atop the entranceway of the great hall. "Hihh!" He stepped back, pulling his arms back. "HYAAHH!" A sphere of flames appeared around Link, expanding then retracting then erupting. Flames waved across the top of the great hall, smoke and cinders rising as Link jumped down, Hati stepping aside to leave room for Link's landing.
"Well, that's one way to do it..." the Zora admitted.