We flew South for hours.
I soon realized Erin's wings were meant for speed, not long distance. She started slowing down in the first couple of hours and by sunset she was exhausted.
"Scott- Scott we have to land." She panted, her voice hoarse. I guided her to the ground, and she collapsed onto her hands and knees, gasping for air.
"We need to find somewhere to camp out for the night..." I said, looking around. There was a lone mountain surrounded by hills covered in snow covered pines.
Erin nodded and stood up. She rolled her shoulders blades a few times. "Let me see." I said and looked at her back. Her shoulder blades were red, and her wings were bleeding around the joints from overexertion.
"Is it bad?" she asked.
"I'll take care of it once we find a place to rest." I told her.
"Will that work?" she pointed to a cave, near the top of the mountain. It looked large enough from here.
"Will you be able to fly up there?" I asked.
"Yeah, I'll manage." She answered confidently.
We shot up and landed in the mouth of the cave. Erin staggered forward. "Phew." She exclaimed and wiped the sweat beading up on her forehead, despite the temperature, before pressing one of her hands to the stone wall.
"Sit down." I said. I pulled out the small first aid pack I had brought with us and cleaned her shoulders off. It took a while because she kept fidgeting. "There you go."
"Thanks." Erin looked around the cave, that had been frosty previous to our arrival. Several different tunnels led to different parts of the cave. We could explore later. "At least you can't do any damage here."
"Yeah, except to you." I said and bit my already chewed through lips.
"That, won't be a problem." Erin pulled a ton of blankets from a pocket in her bag, hitting it with a muffled thud. "I'm all set."
I snorted. "Alright then." I pulled my fur lined cloak from my bag. I wasn't cold but I wasn't sure that would last so I threw it over my shoulders and clipped the clasp. Erin pulled the old one I had given her months ago out and put it on. She was practically buried in it, and I had to hold in a fit of giggles.
Erin yawned. It had been a long day. She pulled some of her blankets around her and leaned against the cave wall. I stole one of the blankets as well. I folded it up and used it for my head as I sat against the wall, thinking.
Where would we go from here? Keep moving? Would I ever be able to go back? What about Jimmy? Would I ever see him again?
I forced myself not to think about him and instead thought about how grateful I was that Erin had forced me to let her come. I don't know how I'd do this alone.
"Scott, I'm cold." Erin said from underneath her mountain of blankets, interrupting my thoughts.
"Well, I don't really know what to do about that." I said, suppressing a smile. Erin stood up and came over to sit next to me. "You know I'm just going to make you colder." I said.
"I don't care." Erin answered and sat down on my lap, resting her head on my chest and wrapping both of us in the blankets. I couldn't help laughing at her controversial ridiculousness.
I wrapped my arms around her and squeezed. Erin sighed. "This might be better than the palace." She mumbled.
I laughed. "Seriously?" I asked.
"Yeah, no one annoying us... No council meetings... No schoolwork..." she listed.
"You know I brought all your books." I smirked.
She looked up at me. "You didn't."
"I did."
She groaned and collapsed onto my chest again. "I really hate you sometimes." She said grumpily.
"And I really love you sometimes." I said with a small smile. "Honestly, I don't know what I'd do without you. I'd have gone mad by myself."
"I'm really that important?" she asked quietly.
"Of course."
I felt her face stretch into a smile as she laid against me but a minute later her breathing became slow and even. She was asleep. And in a few minutes, so was I.
I woke up before Erin the next morning right as the sun was rising.
She was still sprawled across me, clutching to the blanket and my shirt.
"Wake up sleepyhead." I said into her ear. She moaned a little and shifted her weight, but she didn't open her eyes. "Come on, we have work to do if we're going to make this place livable."
"But I wanna sleep." She mumbled. "Just five more minutes..."
"No, not five more minutes, you'll fall back asleep."
"Exactly."
I rolled my eyes before standing up. Erin tumbled onto the floor. She sat up groggily and rubbed her eyes. "You're the worst." She mumbled.
"I know." I said and began to unpack the food from one of the bags Erin had got. "What do you want for breakfast? We have...cereal and cereal."
"And." Erin said with a glare. "It's too early to eat, Scott."
"Alright. Fine. But help me unpack." I said as I started pulling the books I had brought and stacking them in a corner.
"I'm going to burn them." Erin snarled.
"If you do, I will throw you off this mountain. Most of these are pleasure reads." I said, my eyes narrowing.
"Hmph." She exclaimed with a crabby scowl. "So, are you going to build us an ice palace or what?"
"I can try." I joked.
"Well then what are you waiting for?" She said, standing up from her pile of blankets. We both stepped outside onto the ledge that bordered the entrance to the cave.
I put my hands on my hips. "So, how do I do this?" I asked with a sigh, staring at the entrance as if it were an empty canvas.
"Maybe twirling around and singing will help. Like all the princess's do in the fairytales." Erin smirked.
"I don't see you doing any work." I snapped.
"You haven't asked for my help yet." She said with a raised eyebrow, crossing her arms.
"Fine." I grumbled. "Can you help?"
"What's the magic word?" she asked with a smug grin.
"Please?"
"Nope."
"It's not please?" I asked, very confused.
"Nope."
"Then what is it?"
"It's, "Erin, I know you always do all the work and are the best so please help me.'" She said in one breath.
"That's..." I counted on my fingers. "17 words!"
"I know. Now say it." She said, her eyes narrowing into that familiar 'I'm better than you' glare.
"Erin, I know you always do all the work and are the best so please help me." I mumbled.
"You have to mean it." She said.
"Erin." I growled.
"Do it."
I rolled my eyes. "Erin, I know you always do all the work and are the best so please help me." I said in a false peppy voice.
"Good enough." Erin said. "Now let's build this thing. I'm freezing."
"You forget I still don't know how to do this." I pointed out. "I'm not used to magic just coming out of my fingertips."
"Oh right." She rubbed her chin thoughtfully. "Just try."
"Wow, great advice." I said sarcastically, rolling my eyes. "Really helpful."
Erin slumped. "I don't know how your magic works."
"Can you at least try to teach me?" I said. I hope I didn't sound as desperate as I thought I did.
"Ok...well give me a sec to put it into words..." she said. I watched her think for a moment. Although her eyes stayed weirdly blank, as if nothing was going on behind them. "Do you ever get a- a feeling when you're casting a spell? Because if you don't this will be a lot harder to explain."
"Sort of like a rush of energy?" I suggested.
"Yes, exactly. Well, in this case, I feel that rush of energy constantly, but you don't, right?" she asked.
I shook my head.
"Try and create that feeling yourself and then let it out like you'd do with a normal incantation." She explained. "Got it?"
"Kind of." I said nervously.
"You ready?"
"Not really. But ok." I said nervously, tugging at one of my earrings. We both raised a hand toward the entrance to the cave. I felt the same feeling in my gut. As magic exploded from Erin's fist, something left my palm. Two huge pillars of ice shot from the ground and flanked the entrance.
Erin's magic started to carve the stone into designs and darken the rock itself. Ice peaked across the two pillars creating a grand entrance and a sheet of it created the walls with an archway door.
"Wow." I said when it finished. "A little really does go a long way."
"Sick." She said and nudged me with her hip. "See, you did just fine. Who cares if you can't unfreeze it?"
I rolled my eyes, but I followed her inside. The magic had even done the inside. The walls were smooth, and it looked like an actual room now. Hallways had been carved out going into other rooms and there was even a staircase in the right wall going up made from crystal clear ice.
"Now, we have an ice palace." Erin smirked. "Come on!" She sprinted up the staircase to check out the rest of the rooms. They were all smooth and carved out with detailing around the edges. One of the rooms had a snowflake design in the center. Sunlight poured in through a window of ice in the roof and glinted off the ice.
"You know, you might be right. This might be even better than the palace in Rivendale." I said, looking around in awe. "It's roomy."
"No one will find us here. We're finally safe." She said.
My mind flitted to the crystal in the secret room. "Yeah. We're safe." I said, forcing it out of my mind. Nothing could go wrong. The crystal was safe...no one knew about it. Yeah, no one did...