It didn't matter if there was four feet of snow on the ground or if it was summer, they would still be out guarding either way. Vedette certainly didn't mind the fact that they'd had to walk around in circles to pack the snow down so they could stand around without the men's legs freezing. In fact, she delighted in it. At first it'd begun as a journey out into the woods and changing shifts with another five soldiers, but it had soon turned into three of the men that accompanied Vedette and Ithacles complaining about the cold. Even Ithacles, when he felt like talking, complained. His cot was finer then the rest of theirs. Vedette's was merely made to look like the other men's coats, but it wasn't nearly as warm as theirs. Two of them had built a fire after clearing the snow away from the ground completely, and the other man set about fixing what Vedette assumed was stew.

( It could have been poison. They tasted the same. )

There were at least twenty of them. Broad shoulders spoke of their training in the art of war. Sneering expressions as swords twisted and shifted in their hands, bristling like the quills on a pin-pig. Skandra might have thought about talking them down. Hell, he'd probably saved at least one of their lives at some point or another. Whatever connection they'd shared was probably one these soldiers believed to be imaginary, a figment of dream and invention, some other feeling that was not connected to their true face. He even opened his mouth to say something smart. Yet it closed again, just as quickly. There was no point to it. He could not think of a way to avoid bloodshed, and he could not think of a way to avoid being the one whose blood was shed. They were coming closer all the time - and there was nothing he could do to slow the advance except start a fight.

( Oh, he should have stayed in jail. )

It was precisely as Koe thought it would be.

The hardest parts of the journey had been the bodies. Souls that deserved rest, and proper burial, dragged behind a pair of horses who were anything but pack animals. Horon's had been the more difficult - and yet they managed to bring him back to Red, armor and all. Horon had never discussed with Koe a preference. That he be buried, or burned, or even receive a water burial. Nothing at all to suggest that he wanted or needed anything after his death. Yet it would have been a cruel sensibility, leaving him in that cavern to rot away along with the creature who had ruined so much of his life. Wrapped in a shroud, with nothing adorning his body save those scales of which he'd been so proud. The sled they'd rigged, out of camp supplies Horon had insisted upon bringing, was holding up well enough.

( Then there was the son. )

Every jagged tooth of the increasingly narrow cavern was a reminder. Koe did not feel he needed those reminders, but they were there all the same, pushing and testing his will. The idea of transforming into a dragon in this cave system was entirely out of the question. Even so small as he was, he would either collapse the delicate network of caves or he would impale himself on the stalactite he did not see. Either would do to end his journey in this world. Magic was a strong thing, and if there were no dragons down here - entirely likely - then there would be no need to transform himself into one. At least, he hoped there would be no need. If there was a need, he would probably find himself dying on gray rock for a vampire's oddly personal battle.

( Well, there were worse reasons to die. )

Nothing about the massive cavern could be called welcoming. Stalactites and stalagmites rowed the mouth of the thing, aptly appearing as teeth might. Koe was amused by the thought. He did not suggest that they search for eyes. There were undoubtedly openings which could be classified as eyes, and that might take this entire experience to a level that no one at all was comfortable with. Certainly none of them - himself, Iluq or Horon - wanted to imagine the mouth of this cave as an actual mouth which some demonic presence would use to devour them. Koe did not believe for a moment that he would in honesty receive an answer to any of the questions he had for Horon. There were some things he did not care about, of course, but there were other things he had to have answered as soon as possible.

( There was not enough time for rest. )

Skandra's glove nearly slipped - for at least the fiftieth time - and he cursed the day he'd ever come to Faustben looking for a good time. Ithacles was the sort of prince to never let you forget a damned thing you did, good or bad. Maybe after this he'd try to pin something on Skandra's coat. How willing Skandra was to let the pinning commence would be directly related to how much such a fanciful brooch could be sold for. Nobody had a use for hero's marks, especially the people who wore them with pride, but Skandra did have a use for all the ale he could consume and a hero's welcome. Maybe he'd even drink for free one or two nights. More than that might make it seem like he was doing something untoward. Touchy about their honor, these soldiers. How many of them would escape punishment for what they'd done?

( It remained to be seen, this idea of what they'd done. )

Wind could bite more than the flesh. It struck at memory with harder hands, more lethal weapons, than it ever struck at skin and bone. One mountain was nothing like another. Yet the kiss of pine, the brittle taste of frigid water on your tongue - that stately emptiness in the air, a lack of civilization smelling as pungent as a boon of it - all of it conspired to remind him of the wife he'd known and then alienated. Perhaps it was easier to think that Minaht had estranged herself from him. Perhaps that was easier than facing the truth, most brittle and bitter of all things which confronted him. There were two parties in a marriage, in any relationship, and if one or th eother fell out of step then the march became disorganized. Perhaps not the most flattering terms for a marriage, this idea of a military procession, of a march, and yet that was what it turned in to. Not a dance in which each partner was expressing only joy. A march, which could be filled with the joy of a dance but also the solemn vow of duty. He told himself time and again that he'd done his duty to his wife.

( A bard could weave a lie in any tongue, or any song. )

A man's vicious groan cut the darkness around them. Skandra took that opportunity to strike a match - but it wasn't enough light, to frighten their colleague or pretend they were intimidating. So his fingers snapped, a loud crack rang out, and the match flew into the glass cage of a lantern. Despite the sudden rip of wind it managed to light the oil, and Skandra got a closer look at his target's face. The man was middle aged, not possessed of a razor by all appearances, and he had a wicked cut on his chin. For a moment Skandra thought he enjoyed getting into tussles - but then he remembered, oh yes, poor fellow had a bottle smashed on his face. That was likely to hurt his standing with the ladies. Not that this fellow was one to care about what women wanted. The king's brand on his neck said everything that had to be said. And then some. So there really was a plot - and more than that, it involved some of the king's own men.

( Maybe this fellow knew a little something about it. )

A journey out of a village had never been so strange. Koe could feel it even as he secured his saddlebags, before they left the stable. Mirram and Horon were involved in a hushed conversation on the far side of these wooden stalls, with carefully laid straw and carefully arranged troughs. Red pushed his head against Koe's shoulder as the dragon worked - but Koe's hand was absent as it stroked the dray horse's face. Whatever they had been discussing was for their ears alone. Eavesdropping was not a gentleman's sort of business. He was a storyteller, not a gentleman, but even with that distinction clear in his mind Koe still could not hear what they were saying. A trick of the wind, perhaps, which was rushing through the stable from one set of open double doors to the other. Or perhaps it was something else and he chose not to think so. Thinking that they were hiding something would have cast a pall over this entire affair. Well. That was nonsense. If he believed it he was lying to himself. Horon was hiding something. The question was simply whether or not that unknown element was going to cause trouble for them. Two dragons and a knight of Bahamut had nothing to fear.

( Nothing at all. )

There was always one. A table, a corner of the common area. Maybe leaning on the wall by the tap, peering into the relative darkness from beneath your hat. Skandra was used to taking up such a position to get a feel for the room, but this time it was even more important. You could see glimmers of a man's true nature in the things he didn't control. The way he casually threw his cards on the table could tell you that he had a bad hand, or that he was a bad actor. If you'd seen his face in the same tavern more than a few times you knew he didn't throw his cards down that honestly - so you knew it was a lie. That was the pulse of the room. A feeling, or even four or five feelings, or a thousand of them strung together making a chain of sensations you could feel and see and explore. It was not an easy thing to learn how to do, but for him it began as instinct. Survival as a thief was based on knowing the strength of your target, and one of the fastest ways to do that was to be able to size a fellow up just by looking at him. Standing a post by the tap was not the least conspicuous way of doing it, but having a view of the whole room was important. And if no one could see you turning your head they couldn't tell who you were looking at.

( It was a skill that Cavras, Vedette and Ithacles had not yet perfected. )

There were details that you noticed about a place in one situation that you would not notice in others. Such as the number of windows. There were fifteen windows, at last count, from the inside and the outside. Not that they would need windows - but at the same time, Koe did not want to think that it would come to that. What he'd told Iluq was the truth. He did not trust Horon, but he did believe that Horon was telling the truth when he said he would not betray their secret. Whether or not it counted as a betrayal if he told this person, or that one, was a question for someone more intelligent by far than Koe. These were distinctions that it was important to make - because just as there was a difference between trust and believe someone was being honest, there was a difference between perhaps arguing with Horon and being forced to fight him to the death.

( Obviously, Koe did not want to pursue the second option. )

You didn't find taverns in castles. There was no merry place where men drank together except in the dining hall, which only served ale. And even that was not always a merry place. Especially when the entirety of the king's guard was waiting for a chance to get you alone. So here they sat, in one of what must have been hundreds of nondescript rooms. Cavras swore that it was a room he'd been given for the duration of his stay, but none of his personal effects were in the room. Only a wooden table coated in dust, a tapestry which depicted two nameless faceless armies marching against one another, and a misted window which revealed light - but nothing of the outside world. Safely ensconced behind fortifications and the iron determination of military men there was no chance of a scuffle or an encounter of chance. So he and Cavras had gambled for coppers a little while. Only when Skandra offered to make change for his silver pence did Cavras abandon the gambling.

( The mood of the room was sour. )

Koe woke from his slumber to find himself in the middle of a bright, clear day summoned from some place other than the miserable weather they'd endured on their journey here. What was the name of this village? He wished he could remember. His skull did not precisely ache, but it did not rest comfortably within his flesh, either. Perhaps a cause for concern. He'd given himself worse injuries than this simply by enjoying the product of fruit which man seemed to value and cherish above many others. In short, he'd consumed far too much wine, and now his body was informing him of his error. Or so it seemed. Within a few moments of rising he thought he would be all right. Or so it seemed. Iluq was nowhere to be seen. Yet he knew that he'd fallen asleep with her body cradled against him. Far more cunning than he'd first believed, if she'd slipped away without being noticed.

( She would bear watching. )

Time.

It was a strangely appointed conference room. The sort of thing you never imagined seeing in all your long years of life. Skandra could look up from under the brim of his hat and see the wooden beams, which were not covered as they were in other sections of the castle. The stone ceiling actually arched above them. It looked almost like a temple of some kind, and perhaps it had been, before they realized that temples weren't as useful as large conference spaces. Then again, those were not especially useful, either. It was too early in the morning to be awake. Especially the day after your knock-down drag-out brawl resulted in twenty-five men being put to rest in the infirmary. Rumor had it that Ithunvel was ready to tear down walls. He hadn't spoken to his son yet, and the only face he'd seen so far was Lethe's. As soon as she arrived back from the farm. Apparently she'd been keeping some things from Ithunvel, as well.

( Not that Skandra suspected her of anything. )

Vedette had forgotten what it was she'd been mad about after the fifth, or sixth cup of wine she'd ordered. Or was it ordered for her. Simple mountain folk hardly ever saw people as glamorous as people like them. Like a Prince and his Captain. Or so the page had told her when he bought her third. Yes, it wasn't as if she didn't have a line of men waiting for her either. Oh right, that's what she'd been mad about. If Ithacles could be so casual about how he felt, then she could too. Who cared? She was a dragon, it wasn't as if she couldn't take off and have someone on the side without anyone ever knowing about it. Of course it wasn't really on the side when she wasn't in anything to begin with.

( Was she? )

Dark walnut suited this room. From the wood panels that coated the walls, to the circular spot of a table, to the high-backed chairs, to the bed frame. All of it stained as dark as could be, rich in color and deep as the night's sky. Koe thought the wine was rapidly ruining his sense of verse and rhyme. A child could have announced that it was deep as the night sky. With an annoyed sort of grimace at the pitcher - still half-full despite his impaired state of being - Koe hefted it, and poured more into his goblet. Wine was the sort of thing that could affect a dragon - if it was a dragon, full and entire, drinking from a horse trough. If a dragon shaped as a man took to drinking, he had all the same difficulties as a man of similar height and weight might have. Which was to say, he began to grow extremely intoxicated.

( Koe had not been intoxicated in some time. )

A courtyard was a broad sort of opening purposed for nothing. It had smooth stone, sometimes engraved, always carefully cut and arranged just so. In this case, a flat square pattern that ran the length and width of the courtyard, made from gray stone - cut in the center with a hollow circle of red stone. Around the edges of said courtyard was a covered walkway, sloping ceilings of still more stone supported by columns. Not just any columns, of course. Square-cut columns that had scenes from Faustben's history engraved upon them. A chariot aflame, its rider being dragged behind as a chimera followed. Skandra did not believe for a moment that anyone from Faustben had ever fought a chimera - hell, he did not even believe that a chimera could truly exist - but there it was, right next to depiction of battle after battle. This was a courtyard that belonged to soldiers, made by soldiers for the express use of soldiers.

( Probably why it made him nervous. )

They made a strange party - of that, Koe had no doubt. What concerned him was not the fact that there was no traffic on the street, so late at night. What concerned him was the absence fo any signs of life at all. When you peered through the cracks in a shutter you saw no light. When you made your way through the town to the square, you found nothing but a fountain that did not flow. Red made not a sound - he was used to approaching something or someone in the dead of night - but Koe could not keep his hands from shifting uneasily on the reins. In the dead cold of mountain winter his leather riding coat was stiff in the collar, in the shoulders, so every movement gave a loud creak that announced him to the world. Breath misting on the air and Vedette's presence behind him were the only company that Koe had. And though he tried not to let his nerves show, he was beginning to grow anxious regarding the whereabouts of this place's citizens.

( Perhaps just asleep, or perhaps in a dragon's belly? )

One small trip to the healing houses for their band of soldiers had left them with half their men in sickbeds, and the other half ready to nurse their wounds with tankards of ale. Already the streets of Tauberwald were lit with news of a Dragon, something none of them had seen in quite some time. Not to mention stories of Ithacles' bravery against the orcs and the dragon itself. Some where painting stories that he'd single handedly killed the Orc and the Dragon. Vedette tried not to glare when she overheard such stories, and from the looks of it Ithacles was trying to drown himself in his ale.

Tauberwald was a small village deep in the forests at the northern end of Faustben. It's height in the mountains left the stream that ran through it frozen nearly solid most of the year. The locals were often seen chipping away the ice and melting it down in large pots so that they continually had water through the winter. Snow hardly found it's way through the thick trees amongst the village. Some of the houses themselves did not see the snow as they were low enough to the ground to be under a tree. But people hardly kept outside, even with the somewhat dry ground around them, it was far too cold for such things.

( Vedette preferred it outside as she was boiling to death inside the tavern they had found themselves in. )

Every bit of light assaulted her senses day in and day out since she'd waken up alone in her room with the door fastened shut so well that not even the servants could get in. Oh how they'd pounded on the door the next day. Every thump reminded her that she had left herself get carried away in her emotions far too much. It was easy to make excuses for the tightly closed door. Many people were sick during the long winter stay in Faustben, and servants would always believe the ever honest Captain Uthral. She felt the guilt heavily in her chest when she sent them kindly on their way and then proceeded to find anything to fill the day in the room while it was light outside.

No one else knocked, not even Ithacles. But if he had what would she have told him? What could she have said to him?

( Saying sorry when you weren't really sorry didn't mean a damn thing. )