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"It's big."
I was currently in front of the world's most
magical mountain, and all I could say was, "It's big." I felt so intelligent.
I was doing better than Treali, who seemed to
lose all use of her voice.
Basically, what I saw was a veil of blinding
fibers of light obscuring the mountain, but the veil was BIG. Treali touched
it and swiftly pulled her hand back out. "Cold. Like ice, but a thousand times
colder. You'd be a frozen Lupe-block if you tried to walk through that."
"There's got to be a way in…" I muttered, pacing
back and forth around the shield. "Somehow, I mean, whoever wrote the legends
about what exists on the mountain; they got through it."
"Remind me again why we're doing this?" Treali
groaned, throwing her hands up in despair. "It's impossible, Tessa."
My patience was wearing thin. "Don't say 'impossible'
in my presence right now. Just don't, please," I snapped. "Besides, if what
Grindomara says is true? This isn't just about you. This is about the future
of Neopia."
Treali snorted. "No need to be so testy." She
inserted her hand in the web again, as if there was a possibility that the temperature
might have changed within the last thirty seconds. Judging by the shiver that
ran down her spine, it hadn't.
"What if we could heat the barrier?" I asked.
"Melt it or something."
"How in Fyora's name could we do that? We're
not from the Space Station. We don't have laser beams or hi-tech ovens or anything
like that."
"We don't need any of those things. I was thinking
of heating it the blunt way. Fire."
"Fire? You think fire will be hot enough to
melt it? How do you know it'll even melt?"
"I don't."
And so we set to work, Treali gathering wood
from the few trees surrounding the mountain and me frantically hitting two dry
rocks together, trying to get a spark. "Finding dead, dry wood around here is
nearly impossible," the faerie complained.
I tore my gaze from the two rocks long enough
to give her an annoyed look. "There are plenty of trees around here! Pick one!"
"Saplings," she replied, her voice soft. "Young
little saplings. I can't take wood from them! They're the future of the forest."
I gave a wry half-grin. Even though she was grey
now, Treali was still the Daughter of Trees. "Very well. Just get all of the
dead wood you can find."
A few hours later, my paws were growing weary.
The clacking and clanking of the stones echoed in my head, making it feel like
it was about to split with the noise. The glaring light of the web wasn't helping
my headache much either. Treali had finished gathering all of the dead wood
in the immediate area and was assisting in banging rocks together in hopes of
creating a spark.
"This is insane," she moaned, putting one stone
down and gazing at the tiny pile of firewood before us. "What makes us think
that we can beat all of this magic with this tiny stone and these puny twigs?"
"Please don't start this again," I moaned, my
eyes watering from staring at my rocks for so long.
"I will 'start this again' Tessa, because I
think we're being fools!" Dramatically, she waved her hand and the rock in it
went flying. As if in slow motion, it soared, fell, and struck another rock
that had somehow found its way into the pile of twigs.
And created a spark.
The spark caught immediately one of the drier
branches and started burning. Treali let out a small gasp as the fibers of light
near the fire grew dull and vanished like smoke on the breeze. A small hole,
large enough for a full-grown Grarrl to squeeze through but small enough so
as not to dull the radiance of the rest of the web, punctured the dome of light.
Only one problem.
The fire was blocking the doorway to success.
Once again, Treali threw her hands up in "Oh
that plan was just genius, Miss Tessa. Just genius."
"Relax," I said, my mind racing to think up
solutions to the problem. "What if we wait for the fire to heat up? It'll melt
some more of the dome."
"Tessa, with the amount of wood in that sorry
little woodpile, it's not going to last another five minutes."
"Can we simply put the fire out?"
"We can try."
So, Treali grabbed an armful of dirt and dumped
it on the fire to smother the flames. The fire was out. The hole remained…
For about three seconds. After that, the web
started to heal itself again. Within moments, the hole was mended, covered in
glaring, bright white fibers that felt even colder than before. It took all
night to find enough wood to start another fire.
By the time the sun rose the next morning, I
was hungry, irritable, and ready to give whatever aggravated me next a taste
of the claws of a mountain Lupess. Thankfully, Treali was too tired to do anything
but follow my orders, no matter how snappishly I gave them. Once or twice, she
fell asleep in the middle of gathering wood. I had to come and wake her.
A couple of hours before the sun reached its
zenith, we had a woodpile as big as the first one had been. Exhausted, Treali
rested her head on my shoulder and began to nap. Even though I felt like following
suit, I had to remember that we were in hostile territory. Grindomara and Maloporg
were hunting like mad beasts for Treali, and I had to be ready in case either
of them came. Fishing a branch of suitable thickness and length out of the woodpile,
I used a rock to smooth the bark around the bottom to make an even paw-hold,
and broke the biggest of twigs protruding for the branch off, and cast them
back into the woodpile. Not the greatest of staffs, but it would have to do.
Finally, fatigued by the effort it had taken
to find the wood, build the woodpile and make the staff, I fell into a deep,
dreamless slumber.
* * *
I awoke to that mind-numbingly painful sound of two stones clacking together.
Noon had passed and Treali was nibbling on a slice of bread from our provisions
pack while trying to create a spark again. Seeing that I was awake, she offered
me some bread. "Good afternoon. I see someone was very careful about keeping
their guard up."
"Mock me all you want, Treali, but you're not
the world's greatest sentinel either." I said dully, massaging my temples to
try to rid my head of the constant banging noise. "Falling asleep on my shoulder
and expecting me to be your guard."
Treali gave me a slightly miffed look. "I didn't
'expect you to be my guard. I was just resting my eyes while you volunteered
to take first watch."
"I volunteered to do no such thing!"
"Tessa, Tessa, Tessa. There are the comments
that you hear, and then there are those mutual silences in which two friends
agree on what will happen and Tessalea volunteers to take first watch. And if
Tessalea had woken Treali up when it was her turn…"
"Treali would have gone straight back to sleep."
"How does Tessa know that?"
"Same reason Tessa is wondering why we're talking
in third person. Common sense!"
Treali giggled. A light giggle, a joyful giggle.
A nice change from her usual mood swings of tears and half-smiles. "I guess
you're right. But hey, sitting here and talking isn't going to get us to that
mountain. We need to get another spark going."
So, I grabbed two stones and started clacking.
Again. After a few minutes. I was able to get a spark to catch on to the dry
tinder. Eagerly, I blew on it, and soon it became a roaring blaze. Once again,
the fibers dulled, melted, and broke. We had carved another hole into the dome.
But once again, we were faced with that same
problem. How were we going to get through the hole? Then, like a thunderbolt
from the blue, an idea hit me.
"Looks like there's only one way to get in,"
I said quietly. "Through the fire."
For a few moments, Treali just stared at me,
jaw agape and eyes bugging out. "Tessa… you've lost your marbles, haven't you?"
"No one accused me of having marbles to begin
with." I joked. "But I'm not crazy. I really think we can do this. The fire
isn't big, the hole is the perfect size…"
"Do you want to be a toasted Lupess?" Treali's
voice was growing frantic now.
"It's our only chance!" I nearly shouted. "Maloporg
and Grindomara will be looking for us! We need to get in there before they do!
We need to…"
Before I could say another word, a raucous cry
sounded from the southwest. Like a demonic beast from a myth, Maloporg soared
grandly among the mountains, screeching his battle-call and holding his sword
aloft. "Get in there!" I shouted to Treali. But my companion was frozen with
terror, unable to move. Roughly, I poked her with the handle end of my staff.
"Get in there before we become mincemeat!"
Awakened from her shocked stupor, Treali raced
towards the fire and dived through, lost to my vision through smoke and flames.
Risking one last backward glance at the maddened Eyrie pursuing us, I followed
suit.
The smoke stung my eyes, making them water and
itch. Before I hit the fire, I covered my face with my paws. I howled in pain
as the blaze burned my paws and other areas of skin unprotected by my shaggy
coat. My belly in particular, was burning painfully.
But as quickly as it had begun, it was over.
I was on the other side of the flames, and looking
at Mist Mountain.
To be continued...
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