41st of Frost, 120
True to her word, the journey to Tyrclaid was little more than two steps. Fayeth apparently struggled to make portals that stretched that far, and by the time they arrived in the wilderness of the north's snowy reaches, she was panting, out of breath. Arkash steadied himself once he gathered his bearings, then rubbed his eyes before he looked to his exhausted progenitor and pulled at the weight of his backpack.
"'Ew orite?" he asked with a tilt of his head as she leaned on her legs for support.
"Since when did you travel by portal?" she asked with a huff. "You should be spinning right now..."
Ah, yes. The dizziness that accompanied transposition had been suffered already with Taelian. He didn't experience such effects to any notable degree anymore. Clearly, the usage of portals caused the dranoch some strain; he imagined that was why they were bound to stay in Tyrclaid for two weeks; so that she could recover. Arkash merely shrugged at her question, then directed his gaze to the mountainous fields they'd landed upon. "Jus' tough, I guess," he lied.
"Liar," the cardinal returned, then pressed her hand to her head. With a deep sigh, she straightened her back and drew a lungful of the frozen air before she too began to scout.
With a motion of his claws, Arkash directed her down the mountain, and began to kick through the knee-high snow there. A forceful gale drew a shiver from his bones, and he bared his teeth to brace against the cold winds, but it ultimately only quickened the speed at which they descended the mountain. The cold only just grazed his bones beneath his thick winter clothes by the time they spotted a settling of cabins and smoke-puffing chimneys. The area was too remote, to be a city or a town, though there was a road that lead to the belly of the settlement... more of a hamlet, possibly a village? Either way, Arkash couldn't be in the cold much longer, they had to take their chances.
There was activity in the settlement too; he saw all sorts of shapes and sizes wandering the snowy... were they streets? He'd not seen a place so small and undeveloped. What were they doing? Shovelling snow? Dividing logs for fire? There was a forest nearby. Perhaps they were hunters?
As they came to be level with the village, Arkash hesitated. They were all rathor; he could see them from where he stood. There was a lion, a bear, some sort of horned fuzzy thing, all standing upright. He'd never beheld such a thing; all the rathor he'd ever met were in groups of one or two at most and were sporadic in their appearances until he arrived at Astoria. But there they were, gathered, speaking to one another as though it was normal to encounter another one of their kind. For them, it likely was.
Arkash had always assured himself that the reason that he didn't fit in in Rien society was that he was rathor. It was why he was often found to be an outcast and had difficulty making friends; he wasn't like the humans. The universe had presented him with the opportunity to be proven wrong.
So much of his self worth hinged on that idea, that it wasn't the fault of his awkwardness or poor social exposure that he was alone. It was just a matter of the population. Endless rejection and isolation had undermined his self-worth and damaged his pride; he knew he was strange, quirky, and awkward; he knew he'd find rejection there, too. Even among his own kind, he'd be an outsider. The idea that there was nowhere in the world that he belonged brought him an unprecedented level of grief. His legs froze in place, but not by cause of the cold.
"Fay," he called as she'd taken a few steps ahead of him. The dranoch turned to meet his yellow eyes with her own strained, blood-red irises. "...I wanna go back," he admitted after a pause.
"Back?" She asked with a rub at her temple.
"T' Lorien," he continued.
The dranoch furrowed a brow and scoffed. "...Why? We just got here."
"I can'," he paused, and shook his head. She'd told him off for dropping the T in his words before. "I can't," he corrected. "'Ew was right, orite? Am ske'd," he confessed at the cost of his pride and pressed his lips in a frown. "Please, can we jus' go back?" Came his pitiful plea.
"Arkash..." The cardinal began and shook her head. "...What are you scared for? I can bet money that the two of us could wreck just about everyone here."
Again, he shook his head and clenched his fists. "It's no' that..." he continued with a squint. "Please... Please, Fayeth. I dun' wanna be 'ere."
The Cardinal paused at that, then nodded as she turned around and began her approach on the rath. Arkash sighed in relief, then also turned around to head back up the mountain. The tension in his bones immediately softened, and he shut his eyes, completely content to abandon the idea of ever learning more of his people. In his bout of relief, however. Fayeth seized him from behind. At once, the rath's eyes shot open and he hissed as his numb digits gripped the warmth of her arm. "LEMME GO!" he called as she lifted him clean off the floor, and his frozen, snow-caked legs kicked.
"Don't be stupid, Ark," The Cardinal spoke as she slung his meager weight over her shoulder with impressive cardinal strength. "You're so frozen that you can barely move your fingers, and I'm spent on ether. We passed the point of no return after the second jump; you're going into that village whether you like it or not." Upon her shoulder, he saw a number of the villagers look their way between the wooden homes with clear concern and interest.
This, he decided, was even worse. "Fay, pu' me down," he spoke in haste, but the Sil'norai paid his words no heed. Instead, she turned to face the village and put Arkash's eyes on the mountain that they came from as she walked toward those that had spotted them. "FAY!" he cried and thrashed in her hold in an effort to break free. He even went as far as to hammer-fist her back with his weak, frost-locked arms.
"Keep that up and I'm going to drag you instead," she threatened with a tone most dour.
"I'll bite 'ew..." he warned with a defeated hiss.
"Arkash..." She growled in a way that made his mouth dry. She wasn't playing around.
His heart beat quickly in his chest as the sight of the wooden logs of one of the homes filled his peripheral. He drew a shaky breath through his freezing lungs
"You two alright?" Called an unfamiliar, low voice in vithmi. Arkash, again, froze.
"What did she say, Ark?" Fayeth asked then with her voice hushed. She?! That voice belonged to a she?!
"Ah... Askin if 'ew's orite liek," he clarified in common. "We're fine!" He called back in vithmi.
All of a sudden, gravity shifted around him, and the crunchy, wet, numbing cold of snow met his foot claws once more. Fayeth looked down at him with her hands on his shoulder, and his whole body went tense. He could just about feel the warmth of mammalian breath behind him, and the thuds of a few beating hearts. He swallowed hard before the dranoch forcefully turned him around to face those that had met them at the entrance of the hamlet, and he beheld the bear, a coyote, and a rakura. He couldn't tell if they were beastalt or neoalt, but all eyes were on him until his progenitor spoke.
"Cold!" Fayeth exclaimed in common, and pointed a finger at the rathor she held as a defensive wall. "Arkash! Cold blooded! Need heat!"
"Fay, please stop..." he returned in common while he cringed, but his eyes remained locked on the bear.
The ursine merely rose a brow at the elf before she lowered her gaze to the lizard. "You speak vithmi right? I heard ya jus' now. What's this outsider blabbing?"
Outsider? Were they not fond of outsiders? "I..." he started, only to be cut off.
"And whatchya doin' out here in the cold? You a neoalt?" She referenced his reptilian nature. If he was a neoalt, then there was a chance he was born warm blooded. Again, before he could answer, the bear reached for him with both sets of claws and held his head, only to immediately reel with a garish roar. "Cold as ice!" She called and rubbed her paws together.
"Sorry, we just-"
"-Tav," the grizzly again spoke over him as she looked to the coyote. The canid looked up at her inquisitively. "Take 'im to the bathhouse with the rest of the icebloods?" She asked in a way that sounded like an order.
"Sure thing," he replied calmly, then looked at the elf before he lowered his gaze to the rath. "Come on, let's getchya warmed up," he spoke with a brief smile, and motioned the rath to follow.
Again, he hesitated, and looked back to Fayeth. The dranoch shrugged a little, then asked a brief "everything good?" He wasn't sure, so he shrugged.
"Didja wanna freeze to death, kid?" The bear spoke as 'Tav' continued without him.
Arkash widened his yellow, misty eyes, then shook his head before he willed his stiff, lead-like-legs to move, and broke into an awkward, stilted run after the coyote. A look over his shoulder saw Fayeth wave to him before she withdrew from the village boundaries and disappeared from view. Likewise, the bear and the rakura laughed and proceeded to the middle of the hamlet, where a pile of chopped logs waited with a hefty axe.
Continued here.
