"Are you alright?" Eldin asked as he hoisted Inpheria to her feet.

She laughed, though without true amusement. She had spent the entire incident hidden away in safety, coming out the other side without a scratch, and Eldin was asking if she was alright. He, who still bled openly and could barely walk. It was so absurd, she almost wanted to yell at him.

Of course, that selfless concern for others is what she fancied about him. That, and his shaggy mop of black hair that he ran his hands through when he was nervous. And the cocky smile that showed all his teeth when he was showing off. And the fact that she knew he was actually rather humble deep down, despite that. And his--

"Inphy?" Eldin said. There was some concern in his voice.

"Oh, yes. I'm quite well, thank you. But really, El, you're dripping blood on the deck. Should you not concern yourself with matters that actually merit it? Here, let's fix you up." Inpheria strode to the emergency medical kit fastened to the nearby bulkhead and collected what she needed to clean and bind Eldin's wounds. After instructing him to remove the top half of his windsuit, she sat him down and began to mend his cuts.

"You're upset about something," he said as she worked.

"Pardon?"

"You bite the corner of your bottom lip when you've got something on your mind."

"How could you possibly know that? El, I didn't even realize that."

"Oh, I've just seen you pissed off enough times to have noticed it." He laughed at her glare. "But really, what's up?"

"Just a little shaken from the experience is all."

"I don't think so. When we were young, you climbed to the top of the flagpole on a dare and rode the halyard all the way down to the deck. You're fearless. This is something else."

Damn this boy and his occasional bouts of observation. She sighed heavily. "It's only a small matter of pride. I was absolutely useless in that altercation. Were it not for you and Fen, the entire mission would be forfeit, only three days from its onset. And what did I do during the action? I cowered in safety. What is my purpose here? To chronicle your magnificent exploits. That's all well and good, but I wish to feel truly useful."

"Inphy," Eldin said, "your notes of what we find could help the others figure out a solution to the windstone problem. You're the smartest person I know from all those books you read, and your memory is incredible. Nobody is better suited to documenting what we find. It is vital to the mission."

"Yes," she said, unwrapping a length of gauze from the roll, "but other people will truly figure out the solution. I am merely supplying the data. Fen devised the machine that allows us to travel to the source, and your affinity with the windstones will surely be of use to us regardless of what we find out there. My books and my memory will never truly save the day, and I... I want to save the day. Growing up with you and Fen, with you two always competing against each other--I've developed the same taste for achievement. I want to be able to stand with you two at your side, proud of what I have done and what I can do."

Eldin was silent for a moment. When he spoke again, it was with that voice--the one she loved so much. Reserved only for the moments he lowered his guard to speak his deepest feelings, it was soft and smooth. It sounded like honey to her ears. "Inphy, you talk about my achievements, but I couldn't have done any of them without you. I've always wanted to be someone you admire, and that desire is what keeps me trying so hard. Everything I've ever done has been to impress you."

She stared at him for a moment, and he at her. Oh El, she thought. Just kiss me. How many years have you kept me waiting? She had finished bandaging a cut on his arm, but kept her hand upon his afterward.

Eldin breathed deep, as if mustering his courage. A dreadful few seconds passed. Then he blushed, looked away, pulled his arm from her touch to run a hand through his hair and said, "And Fen. Everything I do is to impress you and Fen."

"Of course," Inpheria said flatly. She stood and said, "Well, I've done what I can for your wounds. At least you won't bleed all over the shuttle. I'll go see if Fen needs to be patched up too." She strode forward to the helm, leaving Eldin sitting alone.

The incident with the cloudhawks was the sole noteworthy event for the majority of their voyage, and Inpheria was grateful for it. The days passed slowly and uneventfully, with Fenric keeping to his mechanical duties, Inpheria to her journal, and Eldin to the windstone meditations that he claimed kept his powers sharp. She still toiled inside over her feelings of uselessness, and the romantic struggle with Eldin only added to her unease. The latter was especially bothersome, for she had never lived with the boy in such close quarters before, and the tension between them became as thick as the clouds outside the shuttle. She became short with him on more than one occasion, and the subsequent guilt only tormented her more.

Each time a windstorm approached, Fenric activated his clever device to allow the shuttle to pass through unmolested. After two and a half weeks of sailing, the windstorms had become tremendously powerful. Fenric had voiced his professional opinion that judging by the strength of the storms, they were drawing close to the source of the windstones. Their collective anticipation grew to an oppressive strength, until soon, none of them could focus on their respective tasks, for they couldn't help but peer outside the forward ports every couple minutes, hoping to see--well, something. None of them could fathom what they expected to find, but each hoped beyond hope that whatever it was, they could somehow learn enough about the windstones to devise a means of increasing their efficiency when used as fuel for the Ventus's great engines.

It came early one morning. Inpheria had already awoken and was penning a journal entry at the rear of the shuttle. Fenric was the one who noticed it, and he immediately roused Eldin, who habitually slept late. The three of them gathered at the helm, where Fenric pointed out the foremost ports of the shuttle at a small, dark dot in the distance. Upon drawing nearer, they realized it was the peak of a colossal mountain, one tall enough to spear through the clouds. This wasn't extremely unusual, for there were a handful of other mountains of such height--most of which populated with cloudhawk nests--but none were as large as this one.

Fenric took the helm manually and sailed toward it. As they approached, Inpheria examined the mountain with scholarly curiosity that bordered on fascination. The vegetation was sparse--little more than sporadic patches of dry, yellow grass survived in such a climate. Because of this, most of the mountain was no more than a massive projection of bare black rock that--at its apex--ended in a tip so thin that two people could not stand side by side to share the highest point. It was due to this shape that Fenric was forced to land the shuttle far down from the peak, the only place he could find a flat and large enough surface upon which to land.

No one spoke during the approach. Inpheria belatedly recalled her responsibilities, and hastened to her journal to sketch the mountain and to take notes. She detailed all that she saw with an excitement that transformed her usually neat handwriting into almost illegible scribbles. She continued writing until the shuttle had landed and Fenric opened the doors, whereupon she packed her journal and writing utensils into a small carrying case to bring with her before descending from their vessel onto land--the first time any human had done so in over 700 years. The boys followed just behind her, and all three looked around at their surroundings for a moment.

"There's nothing here," Eldin said, disappointment clear in his voice. Indeed, the mountain seemed barren of anything of note, with the utter absence of anything windstone-related being the most keenly felt of all. There wasn't even a breeze of natural wind, much less purewind.

"It may be a coincidence that this mountain lies in our path," Fenric said. "But the calculations indicate that the windstones can't originate from much farther away. The last windstorm passed us just a day ago. If they do come from this mountain somehow, we will have to wait a couple days for the next one, and see what happens."

"This mountain is very large," Inpheria said. "We should at least investigate all of it in the meantime. Let's hike to the peak to get a better view." She began to wind her way up, Fenric and Eldin following just behind her.

The ascent was steep, but not overwhelmingly so. Still, it pushed the limits of their stamina, and by the time they neared the top--some thirty minutes later--each of them were huffing in exertion. Inpheria was walking with her eyes to the ground to avoid stepping on loose pebbles, but just before she reached the peak, she heard a sound in front of her and looked up.

Straight into the massive eyes of a monster that had loomed up from the other side of the mountain.

The creature's head was of colossal size--larger by far than the shuttle they had arrived in. Its features were reptilian in nature, with a snakelike body, green scales, and vertical slit pupils--though it bore two great ivory-colored horns that were as thick as oak trees. Fleshy tendrils lined its mouth; they bobbed in the air as if they were submerged in water. Sharp-looking teeth the size of sword blades lined its mouth.

Inpheria collapsed backward, muttering nonsense from shock. The beast's head withdrew, only to appear again behind them as it wound itself around the mountain's peak several times, trapping them inside the coil of its snakelike body. It appeared to be several miles in length, and was a dozen meters wide. Inpheria was suddenly pulled to her feet by Eldin, who gripped her firmly. Fenric staggered close, and the three of them stood back to back as the monster continued coiling itself around the peak. It finally stopped, then leaned its head frighteningly close to the trio and exhaled sharply. Its breath was strangely cold, and fluttered their clothes and hair like a gust of wind.

Inpheria heard a gasp at her side. She managed to tear her eyes from the beast to look at Eldin, whose eyes showed not startlement, but realization.

"Its breath!" he exclaimed. "I know that feeling. That's purewind!"

Inpheria opened her mouth to speak, but the creature's booming voice overpowered her own when it said, "Humans--you have finally arrived."

A few seconds of stunned silence passed before Inpheria found her voice. "You... knew we were coming?" she said.

"You can speak our language?" Fenric said.

"You can speak at all?" Eldin said, obviously much more incredulous than his companions.

The massive serpent was silent for just a moment before it said, in a low, deep growl, "Has humanity been separated so long from their past that they have forgotten who granted them the ability to fly--who gave them the tools they needed to flee from their demise?"

Inpheria stammered a response. "We don't-- We don't know anything about that. The Ascension was 700 years ago. Knowledge from those days is scarce, and not just due to time. A fire in our archives over four hundred years ago destroyed much of our pre-Ascension literature."

"To have forgotten your own origins," the serpent said sadly. "A most awful tragedy, though not as tragic as the one that has led you to me today: the threat of humanity's extinction due to your dwindling windstone supply."

"Yes!" Eldin exclaimed. "That's why we're here! We need to find out where the windstones come from and how to make sure we never run out."

"But wait--how did you know about our supply problem?" Fenric asked.

"Because I am able to sense the windstones. No matter how far I send them, I know where in the skies they are. The collection of windstones you keep aboard your ship is a large cluster of energy that I have instinctually tracked since the beginning of your endless voyage, when I began supplying them to you. That energy source has been steadily dwindling for centuries, so I know that you are no longer able to maintain your supply as you once did."

"So it's you who sends the windstones," Inpheria said. "What are they? We've wondered for so many years." She had drawn out her journal and was now furiously documenting their exchange. Despite the dark topic of the conversation, she could not help but feel exultation at the momentous discoveries she was making. Centuries of lost knowledge, right in front of her, and all she needed to do was ask for it!

"The windstones," the serpent began, "are fragments of my heart."

Inpheria's pen froze. She looked up, mouth open. "What?" she whispered. A glance at Fenric and Eldin showed that they too were shaken by the announcement.

"I am known as a windwyrm. My heart is solid as stone, and produces the phenomenon you know as purewind. At my choosing, I am able to sever a piece of it from the whole and disgorge it. I have sent those chunks--known to you as windstones--to the Ventus since she launched to escape the extinction of your people all those years ago. But here--I may show you directly."

It raised its head and turned to face eastward. A great rumbling could be heard from its body, its muscles contracted, and then it opened its mouth to release a tremendous gale of wind. Inpheria could just barely make out the windstone, little more than a greenish speck, at the core of the windstorm, before it blew away. The purewind was so powerful with such a fresh windstone that it wasn't until several minutes later that the outlying winds of the storm could no longer be felt. She knew that in some weeks, a Windchaser from the Ventus would capture that windstone and add it to the ship's dwindling supply. She looked to Eldin and found him fascinated, eyes wide. He had likely never flown in a windstorm of such intensity.

The creature snorted then, and Inpheria sensed a surprising amount of annoyance in it--a very humanlike gesture--before it said, "It is truly pitiable that humanity has forgotten its past. I assume you have also lost the knowledge of my kin, who played essential roles in the construction of the very ship you fled upon. Rockwyrms supplied the metal to construct your hull, and flamewyrms the preternatural heat required to work the ore. Many others contributed to ensure your survival, most of whom did not survive the calamity that still lurks beneath the clouds.

"But I did. I had given humanity a large chunk of my heart to power the Ventus for several centuries, expecting the disaster on the planet's surface to pass. But when hundreds of years elapsed and it did not, I realized that I would need to contribute further to keep your ship aloft. It is at that point that I began conveying windstones to you."

Inpheria documented the closing remarks of the serpent's speech, then said, "I promise to ensure that everyone aboard the ship knows of the assistance you and your kin have given us. But what is just as important is the reason for our voyage here. Why have you begun sending the windstones less frequently? We cannot keep the ship flying for much more than a couple decades at this rate. Our extinction that we delayed for centuries will finally catch up to us at last if we cannot collect more windstones."

The windwyrm closed its eyes. "I was forced to slow the rate of windstone distribution because I have nearly exhausted my own supply. My heart shrinks with each windstone I send you, and each time I do so, my body weakens further. I send you fewer windstones so as to prolong my life as long as possible, while still providing you with what you need to survive as well. Your people are in danger, human, but so am I, and with more dire circumstances. I do not expect to live another two years.

The implication of this struck Inpheria like a blow to the stomach. If the windwyrm were to die, windstone production would cease entirely. After that, the Ventus would burn through her supply of windstones at a much quicker rate. The twenty years that the engineers had projected would be closer to five, or even fewer.

She said nothing. It took all of her willpower just to continue documenting the conversation in her journal.

"I am sorry," the windwyrm said. "No one could have anticipated the catastrophe that occurred beneath the clouds, nor that its effects would linger this long. I would give you this mountain to live upon, but is not nearly large enough to accommodate thousands of humans, and without usage of your ship, you would have no means of providing water and food for yourselves. I am sorry," it repeated, and nobody spoke for a long time.

The conversation ended shortly after that. The trio said their somber goodbyes to the windwyrm and descended the mountain's peak to the shuttle. Soon, they were in the air on a return trip to the Ventus, bearing the dark news that the situation was even more critical than they had first thought, and with little promise of hope to soften the blow.

"I'll devote my every waking moment to devising modifications to the engines," Fenric said an hour after their departure, and the first time anyone had spoken since then. "I'll find a way to increase efficiency--I swear it. I'll gain us as much time as possible before we run out of windstones."

Inpheria looked over at him. He was at the helm, though the autopilot was controlling the shuttle. He was staring forward with an intensity she had never before seen in her friend. She then looked to Eldin, who was near the shuttle door, staring out the window down at the passing clouds. He, too, wore an expression she had never seen before: the dark shadow of despair, thickened with more than a little fear.

Nobody answered Fenric, and the remainder of their voyage was blackened with the quiet, choking atmosphere of hopelessness.