With Zed thoroughly embarrassed, Orion turned to Ril.

“So what’s up with you two,” She gestured to the two identical Rils, “Is it some ability- oh wow. What is...is that a powder beast?”

Orion finally spotted Sin hiding inside of Ril’s hood. Her eyes widened and she took a step forward, getting into Ril’s personal space.

“Uhm, yeah.” Ril took a half step back, his right hand half raised. Unsure if he needed to ward her off or not.

“Were you answering yes that is an ability or yes it is a powder beast?” Orion prodded.

Ril checked on Sin, but the black cat seemed utterly uninterested in what the two girls were saying.

Ril frowned, and shook himself. This was ridiculous.

“Yes to both. Please don’t get into my personal space. And before you ask, yes it is also an ability that I have which allows me to have this powder beast around.”

Orion straightened up, looking mildly hurt. “I was just asking sheesh.”

“It is important to know each other's abilities, so that we can rely on each other. There is no need to be rude.” Delilah cut in, disdain tainting her tone. “Will the powder beast be joining in combat, and what are the capabilities of your clone?”

Ril winced, they were already getting off on the wrong foot, but something about the two gir- ahem women was rubbing him the wrong way. “Sorry, I just like my personal space, and no Sin won’t be fighting and my clone has all the capabilities of myself to a limited degree.”

“Oh! So like a pet?” Orion perked up, all traces of her previous discontent gone.

Ril bristled, “more like a partner.”

“Oh. That’s fine,” Orion said. She looked disappointed for some reason.

“How about you? What do you bring to the party?” Delilah asked, turning towards Zed who seemed to have recovered slightly from their previous attention. At this, Zed’s blush partially returned but he managed to cough and center himself.

“We-well, we are both Outriders, so we c-can scout and fill in any deficiencies in your team.” Zed said, his slight stutter evident.

Delilah snorted, and Orion giggled at this, which made Zed’s face go red again.

“We can also fight. We a-are skilled in swords, bows, and daggers. As well as va-various forms of shadow magic.” Zed continued, slightly flustered.

“Well that is slightly useful,” Delilah sneered, “but you will find that our group doesn’t have deficiencies, as you put it.”

“Oh yeah?” Ril retorted. “How were you planning on dragging the cart Gael is renting through the snow? I don’t think the horses would appreciate pushing through snow all the way to Menteridge.”

Orion giggled but it was Delilah who responded. “Mastering travel is necessary to become a successful adventuring team. We have enchanted artifacts that will help with the snow. You’ll see.”

Just then, Gael stepped out of the stables leading a grumpy looking horse attached to a heavy timbered cart. The cart was open topped, and had only two wheels but its bed was wide enough that six people could sit beside each other if they were willing to sit thigh to thigh. On either side of the cart were two slabs of wood that acted as makeship benches for occupants to sit on.

“Well, welcome to the party, let’s get outside.”

Ril immediately felt a warmth suffuse him. A faint rush of power that felt distinctly Delilah in every sense of the word. He shot her a glance but she was ignoring him, following primly in the steps of Gael as the larger man led the horse and cart outside.

They stepped out of the main gate, past the guards, and into the snowless space directly outside of the gate. For the first time in three months Ril stepped outside of Sela.

The landscape had completely changed. A smooth blanket of snow covered everything as far as the eye could see. Ril had seen the landscape when he had spoken to Siorraid after the conversation with Alex Farquant’s parents, but seeing the snow at eye level was an entirely different experience. It was knee height and it sparkled.

Ril squinted, his eyes aching slightly at the influx of light that the snow reflected. The road was faintly visible in the distance as a faint dip in the snow, but not enough people had traveled upon it since the last snowfall to make it discernible.

Around him, he noticed a small area devoid of snow. Shovel marks still clearly visible where the guards had created a sort of staging area before travellers braved the snow.

Gael had stopped and was prodding the mare. He stood at her side, and gently lifted her front hoof. The mare snorted, slapping him with her long tail, but relented. Then from his bag, he slipped a white furry boot onto the horse's foot. The boot glistened softly, as if hairs were slightly transparent. After a moment, Ril realized that the boot was open on both ends. More of a sleeve than a boot.

“What’s he doing?” Ril asked Liam who had stopped at his side.

“Preparing the horse for over snow travel.” Liam said, his deep voice reverberating in the cold stillness of the snowy expanse.

Gael lowered the mare’s front hoof and repeated the procedure with her other three hooves.

“Those sleeves will allow the horses to walk on the snow.” Liam continued, “Come, I’ll show you how we keep the cart from sinking into the snow.”

Liam gestured and stepped up to the front wheel of the cart. He pulled out a delicate chain more akin to one found on jewelry and wrapped it around the wheel. Ril watched curiously as Liam forced the chain to conform around the axles of the wheel, and locked it in place with a silver clip.

Liam repeated the procedure for the other wheel and pointed proudly at his accomplishment. “See! These chains will harden the snow and keep the cart from sinking. The sleeves Gael is putting on the horse do something similar.”

Ril nodded politely, but inside he was getting excited. Enchanted items were rare, and aside from Avir’s mirror he didn’t own any. The Fellowship on the other hand, seemed to have plenty to go around.

Ril watched avidly as Gael encouraged the mare and the cart onto the snow. The mare took a step onto the snow. Her hoof sank in a millimeter before it stopped with a crunching sound of cracking ice. The snow under her hoof turned bright blue and glassy, preventing her hoof from sinking in farther.

The mare whinnied, stumbling slightly at the unexpected shelf, but quickly got used to it as she took several more steps onto the snow.

“Wonderful! Let’s get this show on the road.” Gael said with a firm nod to himself, then he turned to Delilah and gestured to the cart, “After you, my lady.”

Delilah nodded imperiously, before daintily ascending the cart and sitting primly on the right side bench.

Gael hopped onto the cart behind her and sat at the driver’s seat. He grabbed the reins and gently urged the mare to start pulling.

“Come on,” Liam said, patting Ril’s shoulder and hailing Zed, “I’ll show you how we walk.”

“Walk? Why not get on the cart with Gael and Delilah?” Ril asked.

Liam shrugged his massive shoulders, “We got legs for a reason, ‘sides, horse ’as gotta get used to the snow first. Come.”

Liam stepped forwards up to the point where the cart had crested the knee high snow and was now proceeding to trundle away at a sedate pace.

“See those two blue lines.” Liam said, gesturing to the two icy ruts that the cart had left in the snow. “We’ll walk single file on them. Or I guess double file if you really think about it. Much easier than wadin’ through the snow.”

Ril nodded appreciably, he had been worried of a slogging trip but if the hardened ice could support the weight of the cart then it would definitely support his own weight.

“What about the horse tracks?” Ril asked, pointing at the intermittent dents of hard ice in the center of the two tracks. “Can I walk on those?”

“Sure,” Liam shrugged, “is just harder than walking on the ruts.”

Ril shot Zed an excited glance, before jumping onto the tracks of the horse. The icy tracks were hard and slippery. Like walking on wet, mossy stone, but the ring of soft fluffy snow around the track made slipping a non-issue.

* * *

And so the group set off on their adventure. Gael sat at the driver's seat of the cart and gently coaxed the mount to pull Delilah’s palanquin through the snow. Behind them, the rest of the party marched on the icy trail that the cart left behind. Liam, for his part, seemed to have trouble balancing on the straight line of the cart’s rut, and kept stumbling, his heavy boot disappearing into the knee high snow.

Each time he would grumble good naturedly before lifting his snow-covered boot out of the snow and resume his march. Despite Ril's suggestion, Liam refused to walk in the path of the horse, saying that it hurt his hips.

Ril began the journey walking on the horse's path, but quickly tired of the novel form of travel. The problem was that the stride length of the mare was exactly the wrong length. It was too short to be comfortable, making Ril have to use these baby steps if he wanted to step on each one, and skipping every other track wasn’t comfortable since he had to stretch to reach.

All this is to say that Ril joined the others on walking in the cart’s ruts. He walked behind Zed on the left side, while Liam stumbled behind Orion on the right.

It was rather similar to walking on a tightrope. A thick slippery tightrope.

It wasn’t long before Orion awkwardly hopped around Liam’s large form and took her place beside Ril. She turned to him and Zed and smiled excitedly.

Ril glanced at her, before looking down and made sure to orient his feet properly. When he looked up again, Orion was still smiling at him.

“Uh, hi?” he asked.

“Hello!” She perked, her smile getting wider.

“...hello.” Ril replied, not sure where this was going.

“Hello to you too.”

“...Is there something you wanted?”

“Yup,” she said, still smiling, “when we fight something don’t help us.”

“What?” Ril frowned, confused.

Orion’s smile faded slightly, “when...we...fight...” she said, speaking slowly and leaving large pauses between each word.

“I heard what you said,” Ril snapped, “it’s just that what you said doesn't make sense.”

Orion’s frown deepened. “Ok, well. Hmm. Right!” she perked up.

“We!” she made a gesture that encapsulated the entirety of the Fellowship of the Bling.

“Fight!” she punched her fists together.

“You!” she pointed at Ril and Zed.

“Sit!” she pointed at the cart with a big smile.

Deep breaths, Ril thought to himself, closing his eyes and counting to ten.

While he was busy, Zed replied for him. “I think what Ril was asking was why you d-don’t want us to help you fight monsters. To be honest, I thought that w-was one of the reasons that you hired us to join you.”

“Oh, well yeah, just--” Orion started saying.

“Oi! Orion, could you take over the cart?” Gael called from the front.

Orion looked up, “Sure” She elegantly slingshotted around Liam who pettered precariously on the ice for a moment, before he slipped and was forced to fall off the thin path.

[That girl. She is bothering me. May I eat her?] Sin whispered into Ril’s mind. His claws scraping softly at the hardened leather of Ril’s mantle.

Ril shook his head near imperceptibly, but silently wished that he could unleash the vicious cat.

Gael hopped off of the cart and took Orion’s place behind Liam. He helped the bigger man get back on the path before turning to Ril and Zed.

“Sorry, about that.” he said, giving a pointed look at Orion. “What she meant to say was that we would prefer it if you stay out of the way during the first couple of fights. It’s not that we don’t trust you or need you during these fights, it is just that we found that it is far easier for us to work when we aren’t distracted with other...distractions.”

Ril crossed his arms, “So we will just be scouts on his mission.”

Honestly, Ril couldn’t care less. If the Fellowship wanted to do all the heavy lifting, more power to them. What did bother him was that Orion seemed to think that he was stupid.

Gael quickly waved his arms in front of him. “No, no, don’t get me wrong. We would greatly appreciate it if you could help with the powder beast slaying. What I mean is that, for the first few fights, it would be cool if you could watch from the side lines. Learn how we fight, and where you two can fit in. Once you figure that out, you can join in a way that doesn’t endanger any of us.”

Ril nodded, it was a surprisingly mature request. It would be strange if they could just fight together with no issues mere hours after they first met.

“Alright, that sounds like a fair request to me.” Ril said, giving Zed a questioning glance.

Zed nodded so Ril continued, “After we learn not to get in the way, what would you like us to focus on?”

“Thanks for understanding, we’ve had bad experiences in the past,” Gael smiled, “As for what your role would be, I believe that you should primarily focus on relieving pressure off Liam. He draws a lot of aggro,” he paused at Ril’s confused look, “aggression, with a secondary role of disrupting the powder beasts. We don’t have a proper control Overseer, just a buffing Overseer so if you could try and keep the monsters preoccupied, maybe lead them away, slow them or distract them so that they arrive only in a trickle that would be great.”

“Sounds good, anything else?”

“Sure, Orion works best when she can see her opponents. If you can make it so that she can see weak spots on the powder beasts it would make her job easier. You know, armpits, stomach, throat. As for me, I do best when the powder beasts are lined up in a straight line. Not the easiest thing to accomplish but,” Gael shrugged.

“And Delilah and Liam?”

“Don’t worry about Liam. He will be swarmed with monsters and you should try to pull them off him, but he can handle it for the most part. As for Delilah...hmm, I would like you to try not to focus on her, though it would be helpful for you to stay within her range of around two dozen meters. We will handle keeping her safe. Also speaking of Delilah, it would be nice if you two could give her a gift sometime soon.”

“A gift?” Ril paused, surprised at the strange request.

“Yeah, jewelry or a scarf or something. It would make her power much more efficient at buffing you.”

“Right...we will find something,” Ril said slowly.

Gael nodded happily, “wonderful, It is nice to work with professionals.” Then he turned to Zed, an apologetic expression on his face, “Would you mind if we switch places? I’d like to talk with Liam side by side.”

Zed nodded amiably. “Sure, It would be nice to talk with Ril without straining my neck as well.”

The two quickly swapped places and Ril found himself walking side by side with Zed. They glanced at each other and immediately started lagging behind the main group. When they were a dozen meters away they began to talk.

“What do you think? Of them.” Zed asked quietly. They were far enough away that the Fellowship shouldn’t be able to hear them, but there were plenty of abilities that granted empowered senses. In fact, both Zed and Ril could listen to the conversations on and behind the cart if they focused hard enough.

“I don’t like the girls.” Ril replied darkly, “Delilah is just...you know. And Orion thinks we are stupid for some inexplicable reason.”

“And the guys?”

“Gael seems reliable, and Liam seems capable if a little goofy.”

Zed nodded, “My thoughts exactly, what do you make of the gift that Gael said we should give to Delilah?”

Ril’s frown returned. “It’s sick. Her power is gross, making people give her gifts for her power to work.”

“I think it’s actually a function on how beautiful she thinks she is, and gift giving is an easy way to increase that.” Zed paused, “so we aren’t going to give her a gift?”

“Of course we are, it is an easy way to make this mission safer, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.” Ril replied.

Zed grunted, “Any idea on what we could give her, it’s not like we brought any non-essentials with us.”

“No idea.” Ril replied, “We’ll think about it.”

They marched behind the cart, idly scanning the area for any movement. Several minutes passed by as they simply absorbed the crisp beauty of the frozen landscape.

“She is pretty cute though.” Zed whispered. A small shiver racked his body.

“Hmm?” Ril replied, “who, Delilah?”

“Yeah,” Zed blushed.

Ril snorted, “Focus on the mission love boy--”

He was interrupted by peeling laughter coming from Orion up ahead.

“Awe...He thinks you’re cute.” Orion said, shooting Delilah a teasing glance.

“That’s quite unusual in my experience.” Delilah replied disinterestedly while inspecting her nails which were admittedly immaculate.

“To be cute?”

“Thinking.” Delilah replied.

“Alright! That’s it.” Ril shouted, from the back. “Stop treating us like we are stupid. We aren’t, so please stop.”

Ril immediately began jogging back up to the cart. He had gotten used to the icy footing by now and only slipped once briefly before he caught up with the rest.

“I’m not stupid, and Zed is not stupid. In fact I bet we are smarter than either of you.” Ril said, his voice lowering now that he got closer.

“Oh, we don’t think you’re stupid.” Delilah replied, looking down on him, “Right Orion?”

“Of course not, I think you are very smart!” Orion said, with a beaming smile.

Ril narrowed his eyes suspiciously, “It certainly doesn’t sound like you do.”

“Misunderstandings are common when you love someone. It is alright, I forgive you. It is good that you came to me with this issue. We can now work on it.” Delilah said kindly.

Ril choked, unable to comprehend what just happened. He closed his eyes, rubbing the bridge of his nose aggressively.

“I don’t love you, Delilah. I barely know you. In fact I met you less than an hour ago, how could I love you in such a short span of time.” Ril said slowly, his eyes still closed.

Delilah frowned. “You don’t mean that. You definitely fell in love with me the moment you saw me. I saw it in your eyes.”

“I did not.” Ril stated firmly opening his eyes and giving her an angry look. “And I doubt I will fall in love with you if you keep insulting Zed and my own intelligence. Both of you.”

Ril shot Orion an angry look.

“We may be hired members of your team but I ask that you treat us with respect.”

“Ok I promise we will treat you with respect, but say that you love me.” Delilah said a pleading look entering her eyes.

“No.” Ril met her gaze.

Suddenly a weakness suffused Ril. The gentle warmth that was with him since he left Sela faded. The empowerment to both strength and endurance that Delilah’s power granted faded away, leaving barely a whisper of its presence behind.

Delilah turned tearful eyes to Orion, and grasped the other girl's hands. “You love me right? Right?”

Orion hesitated leaning away from the distraught girl. “Uhm...normally I’d say yes without hesitation, but I feel like this is going somewhere and I don’t like it.”

“I love you, Delilah!” Liam said gruffly from behind them, but Delilah ignored his confession.

“Say that you love me!” Delilah cried, shaking Orion’s hands as big fat tears fell down her face. The reins slapped uselessly against the mare’s back, and she whinnied indignantly.

A big hand fell onto Ril’s shoulder, and he immediately turned to face Gael’s sour face.

“My apologies for my friend's behavior, but could you try not to hurt their feelings?”

Ril shrugged off the big man’s hand. “I can try, but I won’t promise anything if they keep treating us like idiots.”

Gael nodded amiably, and turned to the still hysterical Delilah as Orion and Liam tried to calm her down. “I understand, but I hope you know what you are doing. Delilah’s abilities could save your life in the coming days.”

Ril glared, but nodded, before stepping back. Regretting his actions but at the same time not sure he would have done anything differently.