Taking the Initiative [Dark]

[Bee]

After the incident with the Narrator--or, rather, the creepy little frog-beast that had been residing in a tree--their passage down the path went mostly without incident. Monty suffered some mild indigestion from consuming the frog: probably it had been slightly poisonous. But Monty had a stomach of steel, and could probably process an entire house coated in arsenic paint and filled with cyanide gas--s/he could handle a frog.

She saw something in the distance, then, as they stood at the crest of the hill they had been climbing. A sand-colored structure, smallish but proud, bedecked the colors of the Club suit. Holy living hell. They had actually made it somewhere. There was light at the end of the tunnel. The Court of Clubs was dead ahead. Which meant--yes, she could see mountains in the distance, as well. The Sorgaire Range. Once they got through both of those places, they would be in the Marsh. At last.

In her wonderment, she took a moment to stare and be thankful, and Mnem also wished fervently that nothing untoward popped up between the top of this hill and the Court.

[Dark]

Minh trudged along behind Mnem in relative silence, glancing at Monty as the bander let out another foul-smelling belch. It was surprising that digesting the frog hadn't killed her, but Minh almost wished it had. The side-effects were not at all pleasant. She wrinkled her nose.

She wasn't entirely comfortable with approaching the Court of Clubs, but they were in desperate need of fresh supplies and water for the canteens. A bath would be inordinately welcome, too. It was just... authority made her itch.

They approached the gate, and Minh summoned up what she hoped was a pleasant smile. They passed by without much fuss, and were directed towards the traveler's lodge. Out of courtesy they would be allowed to stay the night, with dinner and breakfast provided, and even hot water for a bath.

Minh flopped down on the single-wide bed allotted her. The sheets were a bit rough, but after sleeping on the ground for so many days it was heaven.

[Bee]

Mnem was grateful for the lodging, as well. They were safe at the Court. Nothing was hiding in trees, there were no crazy old bats in strange cottages seeking to drug them and knock them out, and there was no quicksand lurking in odd parts of the woods to engulf them and spit them into a fire swamp.

First on the agenda was a shower. A very hot, very cleansing shower. With actual soap. She had missed soap. She stayed under the hot spray for quite some time, and then considered filling the tub and relaxing in a bath for a while. But she was hungry, and so she put off the sweet soak for later, perhaps before curling up into the bed.

She beckoned Minh. She planned on taking full advantage of the hospitality provided; they were going to have a lovely meal. A Court was bound to have above-par food, even for brief visitors.

[Dark]

By the time they were ready to leave the next morning, Minh had somehow managed to charm the chief chef--an older, matriarchal sparrow that didn't give off any homicidal-crazy vibes as far as Minh could tell, and seemed to find a strange delight in Minh's innate paranoia of Court--and they left the kitchen fully outfitted with several weeks worth of rations. The woman had even salvaged some of her son's older traveling packs, which turned out to be substantially better than the bags they'd lifted off the bandits so many days ago.

It was actually rather nice to be on the road again, and Minh bounded ahead with Monty feeling well-rested and deliciously clean. Granted, her effects of her long soak probably wouldn't last long, but for the moment she was perfectly content.

She looked at the moments they were headed for, enjoying the cool breeze blowing down in their direction, and turned to Mnem, "Just over those mountains, right?"

[Bee]

"Yes, just through the Range. After we make it over the mountains it should dip right into the Marsh," said Mnem, as they began to get into rougher territory.

More rocks, more trees, and a few rough trails that looked like they were definitely tending upwards. Enormous tree roots to crawl over and everything. Very lovely. But she was fairly sure that the charted territory of the Range was going to be a lot more fun to traverse than the terrible trail between Capital City and the Court. She didn't think anyone in the history of travel had experienced such difficulty. And such wretchedly odd difficulty, at that. So much for attacks being infrequent.

She wished she could just fly over it, but Minh, Monty, and their things would be too heavy to carry, and she couldn't very well leave them behind.

Walking through the mountains it was, then.

[Dark]

Minh hooked broken nails into slippery, slimy tree bark, and hauled herself up and over another exposed root. She almost immediately went plummeting back down when she couldn't find a solid enough purchase in the gooey mud that composed most of the the trail.

It was utterly ridiculous that the trail wasn't in better condition, considering this was supposed to be such a frequently used trail. It didn't seem like anything was really fit to travel this trail except maybe mountain goats, and Minh couldn't imagine trying to get all the way up here with a wagon. The range wasn't so self-sufficient that they could survive without trade. It didn't make any sort of sense.

She jumped up several boulders, momentum the only thing keeping her from slipping, and immediately flopped in the mud. It oozed into her belly fur, and she thought fondly of the last bath they'd had.

Monty settled on her back, a little mud-monster with glowing blue eyes.

"Mnem, are you sure this is the right way?"

[Bee]

"We need to head due east," Mnem said impatiently. "We are. This is the right way, at least."

She hated the upward travel, but there was nothing for it. There was a stream just ahead, too, on slightly flatter ground, littered with wide-spaced rocks that they would apparently need to use as stepping stones. The hell with that. Non-stop flight may not be an option, but damned if she wouldn't use it to get over some of the more annoying obstructions. Let the cats hop across.

So she floated gracefully to the other side and waited for Minh to come across. With any luck Monty would fall in and clean hirself. She was looking mangy again.

Waiting for Minh to come across, Mnem looked up ahead. There was a small clearing, and then the path began to go straight up, zig-zagging back and forth at steep inclines. Switch-backs.

Damn it all to hell.

[Dark]

Minh was careful picking her way across the boulders that spanned the little stream, making sure she had firm-footing before putting her entire weight on the extended leg. Washing off the mud would be exceeding nice, but it's just make her even more miserable when she clambered out and started to get dirty almost immediately again. She was also fairly certain it was snow melt, and as a result bone-chillingly cold. She didn't need to catch her death up here on their little quest, as well.

Monty went bounding ahead of her, hit a rock in, and slid right into the water. Minh tried to not laugh; Monty looked absolutely miserable as she climbed onto the opposite bank. The mud hadn't so much washed away, as become more evenly spread throughout hir fur, and the poor thing was shivering from cold. Still

"Serves you right."

[Bee]

Mnem waited until Monty and Minh had cleared the stream before pressing on, perching lightly on a rock. They paused a moment in the small clearing, mostly so Monty could shake off the water and then spend five minutes shrieking and pouncing at the stream as though s/he were going to make it pay for the damp dirtiness it had inflicted upon hir. S/he growled and hissed and batted hir paws.

Nearing the end of hir little freakout, Monty gave one final, triumphant huff, kicking dirt at the water as s/he walked away, like she had taught that stream a lesson, and Mnem almost laughed.

But looking at the switchbacks killed her joy well and good.

"Well, this is going to be a delightful little hike," she muttered, adjusting her pack on her back. She wondered how far they would before their legs simply gave out.

[Dark]

Minh kept climbing until the burning sensation in her muscles was a distant memory, replaced by leaden legs that quivered alarmingly whenever she stumbled and threatened to stop working completely if she even thought too hard about a break. At rough estimate, she was fairly certain they'd climbed about 2000 feet of elevation in the last two hours. And then still had a long way to climb.

It wasn't really dark when they stumbled across a relatively bramble-free meadow, the sun has just dipped below the skyline and the light had barely begun to redden, but Minh was tired and wouldn't have cared if it was high noon. Not bothering to confer with Mnem, she collapsed in a comfortable looking tuft of weed, and promptly passed out.

She woke sometime in the night, lulled from sleep by a gentle glow she attributed to the moon. Monty was a warm mass curled against her back. She opened her eyes.

The plain looking meadow had been transformed into a diffused carpet of light. She sat up and took a closer look--they were flowers, the blooms having transformed into tiny pinpricks of iridescent light, creating halo of silver. She didn't remember there being any flowers before she'd fallen asleep.

"Mnem, wake up. You've gotta look at this."