Warmth.
Hot, tickling, warmth like a winter day spent by the hearth. It's the first feeling to touch Delia's body since cold. A kind of cold she will never forget. A chill that will always haunt her.
Delia shivers, it's her first movement. Her eyelids flutter and then finally open to a gentle, flickering light.
A fire, she realizes with a start.
As the numbness leaves her body Delia is able to sit up from her place on the soft, dark soil.
She rubs at her eyes to still find her hands clammy and wet. Her whole body is that way. Delia huddles closer to the fire before finally looking around.
Where am I, she wonders.
A boy sits, tending the fire. She can scarcely see his features by the firelight. Light brown messy hair partially covers his amber colored eyes. His skin is tanned. At first glance the boy seems to look healthy but on a closer look she can tell that he definitely isn't.
Droplets of sweat bubble on his brow. His clothes hang on his skinny form. He looks to be a little shorter than Delia and about a year or two younger.
"Excuse me?" Delia pipes up, "But where am I?"
The boy startles, peering at her with wild, frightened eyes. Delia's heart sinks. This isn't just some hungry boy. Adrenaline pumps through her and she forces herself to stay calm.
Delia's seen people with those eyes before in her village. They wander in half dead and starved then they ransack the village until someone cuts them down. No amount of talking to or comforting can stop them. If someone is in their way they'll kill them.
Delia's seen it, it happened to her own Uncle.
"I won't hurt you," Delia amends cautiously.
The boy seems to relax the wild look in his eyes shrinks but is still there.
Thank the fates he isn't too far gone yet, Delia thinks.
"Do you know where my friend is?" Delia asks softly.
The boy nods and juts his chin at pile of blankets. Delia can just see a face peeking out from under them. Kagon.
Delia sighs in relief, she'd hate to admit it but she wouldn't be able to survive without him. He'd saved her life, she'd never be able to repay him.
"Who are you? And where are we?" Delia asks, eyes searching the area they are.
The air is chilly but the fire keeps her toasty. Stars glitter above her. She can almost imagine them smiling at her. Delia nervously presses her palms into the spongy soil. And what of the monster and the icen cave?
The boy coughs and stares unnervingly at her. Delia shifts uncomfortably under his stare. She feels like a bug caught in the amber color of his eyes. She wishes he'd say something, anything even if it were nonsensical.
Delia looks away and down at her hands. She makes small figures in the earth, it helps to calm her down.
She looks back up at the boy and stares at him the same way he is to her, "Please."
The boy coughs again and his voice comes out hoarse, "I'm Kipdale of Lanthos and you are at the summit of Mount O'Haire.
Delia looks around confused, "Then where is the tunnel?"
"Melted. When the ice creature died so did the ice and snow caused by it. I was rummaging when I found you and that man frozen in blocks of ice."
Delia can see that it takes effort for him to speak, her eyes soften. "Thank you for thawing us. You did a good deed. I don't know how I can repay you but for starters would you like a bit of food?"
The boy's eyes widen and licks his lips, nodding quickly.
Delia smiles and shuffles through her pack to find a bag of jerky from the last villiage they were at.
"Here," she tosses Kipdale the bag, "Have it all if you wish."
Kipdale hungrily tears open the bag and stuffs piece after piece of jerky into his mouth. Delia can't help but stare.
She clears her throat, "You may want to eat a tad slower. You don't want to throw up the contents."
Kipdale has the sense to slow down but still he shoves the food into his mouth. Delia looks away to give him privacy. Her own belly rumbles in hunger, too late she realizes she should of kept a couple pieces to herself.
Delia looks up and immediately wishes she hadn't. Strip of meet hang from his mouth and chunks stick to his teeth. Her stomach lurches and Delia averts her eyes.
She dares another glance upward to find the boy using his tongue to get the chunks and strips out of his teeth. Delia had never seen something so...animalistic.
When Kipdale finishes he once again licks his cracked lips.
"Are you thirsty?" Delia inquires.
He nods.
Delia takes out her water skin from her bag and hands it to him.
Similar to when he ate Kipdale quickly opens the flask and guzzles it down in what looks to be only two large gulps.
"Thank you," Kipdale grunts, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
"You're welcome Kipdale," Delia manages a weak smile.
Just then Kagon stirs. Both Delia and the boy's eyes snap over to the hero's form.
Kagon is immediately on his feet, knife in hand. "Go to the abyss beast!" He stabs at empty air.
Kipdale startles like a nervous colt and bolts away.
"Kipdale! Wait!" Delia shouts as he disappears in the dark.
The writer stands to go after him but Kagon's hand on her shoulder stops her.
"Let him go. Don't be idiotic it's dangerous out there."
Delia rips herself away from him and stabs the hero in the chest with her index finger, "You. This is your fault! If you hadn't tried to attack this would of never happened!"
"It was an accident but it's just as well," Kagon shrugs.
"How can you say that!" Delia fumes, "He saved us!"
Kagon holds up a finger, "That is where you're wrong writer Delia. I saved you and the whole town by slaying the beast."
"I realize this you arrogant bastard but he's the one that thawed us from that ice. Who knows how long we would of been entombed in it?"
Kagon once again shrugs, "We would of thawed out eventually."
The anger bubbling up inside Delia makes her want to hit him. The girl clenches her fists about to swing but instead sits heavily upon the ground, turned away from the hero.
She can hear Kagon sit back down, "Do you have any food girl? My stomach rumbles like a beast."
Delia stares at the ground, "Actually no."
"Where's the jerky you packed? We've only taken a couple slices of it."
"I-I gave it to the boy," Delia admits, the anger sucks out of her and and guilt replaces it.
"You what?!" Kagon roars.
"You heard me," Delia says, forcing her voice to stay even.
Kagon leaps to his feet from where he sits and trudges away from the fire, muttering angry curses about stupid girls.
Delia sighs and runs a hand through her locks. Her good dead has cost them a night without meal or water for that matter. And Delia doesn't dare tell Kagon this, fearing if she does he'll strangle her. She wouldn't blame him.
After awhile sitting alone at the warm heat of the fire she gets to her feet, prepared to fix her mistake.
Grasping her bag, she takes out her empty water-skin and looks around for any leftover melting snow. It doesn't take her long, quite quickly she finds a small heap of it.
Digging her fingers into the cold wetness she retrieves a couple good handfuls of it and packs it into her water-skin in which she sets near the fire to melt into drinkable water.
Her next task is far more difficult, food.
Delia scavenges for some sort of nuts or berries but the long freeze over the mountain had caused for all such life to die out. So where can there be food?
After awhile of searching she finds herself wondering around aimlessly, prisoner to her thoughts.
Who was that strange boy, and where can he possibly now? Possibly he's wandering around much like myself, she muses.
The wind picks up and envelopes her like a cold embrace from an enemy, frigid and hateful. Delia shivers and rubs the warmth back into her hands and arms. Suddenly going back to the fire seems like the best plan, even if Kagon is there to condescend her like a tot.
However, as Delia turns in a full circle the fiery molten wave of the flames are inexistent. Nerves grip Delia's lungs, she take a big breath but it does nothing to ease her tension. Soon what was just nerves turns into dread. What if she never makes it back?
Another fresh gulp of cool air is no relief to her aching lungs.
"Kagon!" Delia calls, cupping her hands around her mouth to be heard better, "Kagon!"
But the hero doesn't answer and Delia is left alone in the melting snow.
"No, this is not how this will end," she speaks, determination clear in her voice. "I won't die like a pup who's wondered too far from its den."
Delia's boots squelch on the muddy earth as she carefully attempts to retrace her earlier steps. She couldn't of wondered that far away, could she?
She shoves her fear aside, she won't freeze in terror like she did falling from that mountain or quite literally when the ice beast came for her. She isn't sons porcelain doll of a girl that needs protecting! No, she's a woman! The first to write down a hero's tale and the only to have made it this far.
Delia's courageous words feel as if they are a motivation from an outside force, encouraging her to go forward.
So when the brightness of the fire comes into view her chest swells with pride and accomplishment. Kagon may be her means of survival but by no means does she need to completely cling to him.
She may be but a girl but already the world is developing her into a woman.