After dinner, the fire was doused; Simone didn’t want to take any chances of being detected by the elves of the Mountains.

  “I miss the sky.” She muttered to herself, but Mercedes picked it up anyway.

  “You can see the sky, you know.” the taller High Elf observed, pointing up.

  Simone shook her head. “Not like this. Out on the plains, there are no trees, no mountains, no... nothing. Just land and sky.” the shaman replied wistfully. “It’s wonderful, being able to see it all. No matter where you turn, sky, sky, sky.” The brown-skinned elf shook her head. “I hate it here.”

  “Tell me about the People of the Plains.” Mercedes urged. “What are they like?”

  Simone gave Mercedes a baffled look. “People are people.” she replied, as if that explained everything.

  “I’ve heard that the Plains elves are nomads, moving from place to place.” Mercedes offered.

  Simone shrugged. “Somewhat. We move with the seasons, heading south in the winter, heading north in the summer.” She glanced over at the tall, fair-haired High Elf. “We do plant crops and herd animals, you know.” She added pointedly. “We’re not savages, we choose to live the way we do.”

  Mercedes let out a tense breath; her first reaction was to argue. Instead she asked a question.

  “Do you- are you sure you know where we’re going?” She asked. “We’re so far from either of our homes I can’t help but worry.”

  Simone herself immediately bristled, but Mercedes’ concern was a valid one. Rather than taking the bait, she answered the question.

  “I know which direction to go.” Simone answered truthfully. “Auguries can be ...difficult, but if you ask simple questions, you get simple answers. We’re heading the right direction.”

  Mercedes nodded at that. There was a lot she wanted to say, but she didn’t know what questions to ask, or what she’d do with the answers once she got them.

  “Aren’t you... scared?” Mercedes blurted without thinking.

  Simone’s eyebrows climbed wonderingly at the question. “...I hadn’t thought-” Simone started, but cut herself off.

  She tapped a finger against her lips thoughtfully. “A... bit.” She mused. “When we saw the Protean.” Simone looked to the side, trying to find the right words to say. “I ... didn’t think I’d see something so dangerous. I thought the spirits would keep me from danger.” Simone offered a twisted half-smile. “I had to radically re-think what the spirits protect us from.”

  “The ‘Outside’?” Mercedes volunteered.

  Simone nodded. “The spirits don’t protect us from harm; they don’t intervene when a predator raids the camp, or when illness strikes, or even when a Protean attacks. They will offer wisdom and guidance, and will let us borrow their power, but their protection is from the dangers of the Outside. Things we can’t protect ourselves from.”

  Mercedes nodded at that; she could understand that.

  There was a comfortable silence for a minute, and then Simone wrapped herself up in her shawl and curled up in her usual sleeping posture and appeared to go to sleep.

  Was it safe to just do that, though? If they were in the territory of the Mountain Elves, wouldn’t it be safer to keep watch?

  Mercedes glanced around; Simone’s spear was once again standing upright, defying physics. It seemed the smaller elf had set up her customary boundary when Mercedes wasn’t paying attention.

  Still, would it be enough?

  Mercedes laid down in her bedroll, adjusting her position carefully. She could sleep in her armor if she had to; it wasn’t comfortable, but it was something that could be done.

  Let morning see to itself.

  The morning was cold, colder than either of them expected, the cold of early-morning winds blowing down from unassailable mountain peaks. The abri protected them from the wind, but not the frigid cold; their breaths steamed in the air.

  Breakfast was eaten cold, washed down with cold tea as they hiked the difficult and rocky grounds of the higher foothills. Looming over them, blotting out the morning sun, was the massive peak of N’Granek itself, its top shrouded in clouds.

  “Do we...” Mercedes panted as they scrambled up a rocky hill, “...have to climb that thing?” She asked, “...because I don’t think... I can.” She reflexively moved to wipe sweat from her forehead, only catching herself at the last moment from dragging her gauntlet across her face. She retrieved a handkerchief and used that, instead.

  “No.” Simone replied, just ahead of her. “I would never set foot on its slopes, even if I were abandoned by the spirits.”

  Mercedes nodded, and taking the brief stop as a respite, took a swallow of water from her canteen.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  As the high elf lowered her canteen, Simone crouched, and flapped her hand at Mercedes to do the same. The young shaman’s urgency transmitted itself to Mercedes, who immediately crouched, hand going to her sword.

  “What is it?” She hissed at the smaller Plains Elf.

  Wordlessly, Simone pointed ahead; Mercedes carefully moved over to Simone’s side. Ahead was a small boulder; Mercedes cautiously peeked around it, and saw a Mountain elf for the first time.

  At first, Mercedes wasn’t certain what she was looking at. It took a moment for everything to come together in her mind. The Mountain Elf, at first glance, deemed no different from any other elf on the continent, but that was just a superficial assessment.

  The man had skin as gray as the stones Mercedes crouched behind, a wild mane of unkempt black hair, and eyes that seemed to catch the early morning light and glow a sickly green color. He was dressed similarly to Simone in that he wore stitched hides and leathers that were painted in esoteric patterns, but that was where the similarity ended.

  While Simone’s patterns were geometric, patterned triangles and spirals and interlinked squares, the symbols that adorned the man’s hides had a strange, alien quality to them, weird zigzags ending in sinuous curves and jagged swirls.

  There was a strange twisting in Mercedes gut; she found herself grimacing in disgust despite not understanding why.

  Her gaze flicked to Simone; her own disgust was reflected on the face of the smaller plains elf. Her guts churned in revulsion, her muscles trembled. There was a part of her, she realized, that wanted to charge from cover and tear the offending man limb from limb.

  She couldn’t understand it, could barely describe it; the man radiated a sense of twisted wrongness that triggered an irrational rage within her.

  A woman joined him; she looked the same as him, gray skin, black hair, green eyes. They exchanged a few words that sounded similar to Simone’s tongue, though strangely incomprehensible. The man laughed, a grating laugh that sounded like a handful of pebbles rubbing against each other. He grabbed the woman possessively around the waist, and the two of them walked away.

  When they were completely out of sight, Simone let out a breath and sagged with relief. Truthfully, Mercedes wanted to do the same- there was something inherently wrong with those two, something that wound her up inside.

  The Mountain Elves seemed normal at first glance; the strange skin color could be overlooked, she supposed, but there was just something incomprehensibly wrong with them that every fiber of her body rejected.

  “What... was that thing?” She heard herself ask, bewildered and somewhat frightened at the depth of revulsion and rejection her own body had thrown up.

  Simone didn’t need to answer; Mercedes already knew.

  “I knew-” Simone panted, “I was told that I would know-” The shaman shook her head. “I didn’t realize it would be like this.” Simone shook her head again. “This place is dangerous. We should move.”

  Simone glanced around, and then gestured to Mercedes. The smaller elf scampered north, keeping low, moving on hands and feet.

  Mercedes followed, inwardly wincing at each metallic rattle from her armor. Did it have to be so loud?

  They crouch-walked for what seemed like forever; Mercedes legs were trembling and the muscles in her back, at first mildly complaining over the night spent in sleep, ratcheted up into a dull burn.

  “How far do we have to travel like this?” She complained to the smaller elf.

  Simone twisted back to look at the taller High Elf, but didn’t say anything for a moment. Instead, Simone sat down on the rocky ground and let out a sigh. Mercedes noted even as she sat down, that Simone was occasionally reaching back to the long knife she kept at her waist, as if to remind herself that it was there. Without looking behind her, Simone jerked her thumb over her shoulder at the ridgeline that they had been following.

  Mercedes cautiously moved to the thin ridge they’d been crawling alongside, and peeked over.

  On the other side of the low ridge was a plain that was carpeted in some small, flowering ground plants that covered the ground in tiny blue and white flowers. Normally Mercedes would appreciate the beauty of such a thing, tiny flowers braving the high altitude to bloom in defiance of the harsh weather, but she spotted several gray-skinned mountain elves wandering the plain.

  Mercedes frowned, and her hand touched the pommel of her sword briefly, but she stayed put, even as a dull rage grew in her at the sight of the mountain elves.

  “What are they doing?” Simone muttered next to the crusader.

  Mercedes studied the gray-skinned elves. “They look like they’re... looking for something.” She muttered. “See how they’re moving? They’re looking for something.”

  Simone sneered. “Probably for the Pearl.”

  “We have to stop them!” Mercedes exclaimed, gripping her sword.

  “No...” Simone objected, “we have to get to the Pearl before they do.”

  Mercedes turned away- it was a difficult thing, she wanted to race down the gentle slope, sword in hand and cut them down- and sat down.

  “Any idea where it is?” Mercedes asked, struggling to contain her roiling emotions.

  Simone rolled her eyes, a frown on her face. “Why don’t you do some thinking, for once?” The normally ebullient shaman shot back hotly.

  “Where did that come from?” Mercedes argued, confused. “You know I have no idea where we’re going!”

  Simone bared her teeth at Mercedes in a feral snarl, balled up her hands into tiny fists, and then stared at them, confused. After a moment the haman unclenched her hands, and set them on her knees. “It seems... we’re affected by them.” She reluctantly admitted, turning away to avoid looking at the taller elven woman.

  “Can you augur where we need to go?” Mercedes asked. “From what I’ve seen, it doesn’t take too long, and I can keep watch while you do it.”

  Simone grimaced. “I need a flat place to cast the bones.” She complained, and gestured around them at the broken, stony soil. “Do you see such a place?”

  Mercedes frowned in thought. “I think the first thing we should do is put some distance between them and us.” She pointed southwest, down the slope. “There’s some large rocks and shrubs down that way; we can find a spot to at least take a moment to catch our breath- away from them.”

  Simone nodded. “Down the slope then.” The smaller elf glanced in the direction of the Mountain elves.

  “Away from them.”