“You are here,” the venerable elder says, “Because the Frigid Mountain sect is dying”.

The room, a circular chamber wrought in plain stone, was as silent as the grave.

A smile tugged at the edge of the cultivator’s lips. “You may speak, children. My face is thick enough by now that I can afford to lose some”.

****************

Jack stared at the ornate wall of the carriage to avoid looking at the girl perched on the bench across from him. The Frigid Mountain sect was known for its intricate stone and metalwork, cold-forged it was said, though he had no idea how that could be true, and the wood of the carriage was laced and held together with intricate metal threads. His eyes slowly traced the designs across the wall until his gaze caught the girl, then snapped back.

She was glaring at him. She was beautiful, but still glaring at him.

He had attempted to introduce himself. Just a few minutes into the journey, he mustered up his best smile and gave her his name and home village, to try and ease the tension in the spacious, but confined carriage. There were no windows handy to give them something to look out of, and the only things of note in the carriage were him, the girl, and their bags. She had only dialed up her glare in response.

It had been hours since then.

The air in the sealed chamber was growing uncomfortably hot, the carriage perfectly insulated against the biting cold outside, and that only added to the uncomfortable atmosphere. Jack and his adversary sat, stewing in the discomfort, and as he felt a bead of sweat trail down his back, the oppressive heat straining at his skin, he gave in to his nervousness.

Blast it, he thought. It’s not like she can like me any less…

He sucked in the heat. The air in the carriage cooled as energy flooded into his lungs, and he reflexively began spinning it around his chest in a wide loop. He wasn't accomplishing anything, not really, but performing the metaphysical equivalent of fidgeting calmed him. He allowed himself to focus on that for a few minutes, breathing in sync with the motion and feeling the comforting warmth before risking a glance at the girl. She had her hands in her lap rather than clenched at her side, and was staring down at them, pensive.

Hey, not glaring anymore. Progress.

He got back to his fidgeting. It was a bad habit, he knew, holding on to energy without cycling, and the nervous tic had gotten him in trouble more than once. Authority figures tended to be unhappy when the subject of their lecture was so obviously ignoring them. However, it was good to have something to focus on, something to distract, to calm his ever-racing mind. It was a few more minutes of this before a spoken word made him look up.

The girl’s voice was lower than he expected from such a small frame, but had a sharpness to it, an edge that let it cut through the silence like a knife. “Fire?” she asked, hesitantly.

Now it was his turn to glare. “Heat.” he asserted, voice hard.

“Yes, heat.” She nodded, thoughtful. “And?”

He studied her, searching for judgement in her eyes, and upon finding none, deflated. “Growth.”

She sucked a breath in through her teeth. “Inferno…”

********

“Elder, please forgive my ignorance”, a boy spoke up from the front of the ranks of teenagers. He wore the traveling clothes of a merchant, and his face was tall and gaunt. “But the Frigid Mountain sect is the most powerful in the province after the Blue, and the closest other sect is Climbing Ivy, a three week journey by caravan. The Blue are twice the distance away in the other direction! After the destruction of the Sunbelts, who would dare challenge you?"

"Challenge us?" The elder barked a laugh, eyes glinting like the sunlight reflected off snow, and the gathered children started. "We are cultivators! Our existences challenge the heavens themselves! Most of us issue two challenges on the way to breakfast!"

The elder’s mirth died down as he continued to speak. “Regardless, this is not a matter of challenge. Not every tribulation can be conquered with strength of arms.” He tapped a foot a few times in rhythm, sending an arc of frost racing out from the toe in a thin film across the floor. “Tell me, do you all know what happens to cultivators as we ascend? Obviously we grow in power and live longer, that is the obvious answer, but what else?”

*****************

Jack turned away, eyes downcast, and pressed a hand against the wooden wall of the carriage. He discharged the swirling energy out though his hand, letting it radiate out through the wood where it should dissipate outside. “I’m not a Sunbelt,” he muttered.

“Obviously,” the girl said. Jack looked up, surprised to find sympathy written across her face, rather than judgement or fear. “You’re too young. Were your parents…”

“One.” he said, both hesitation and deep sadness coloring his voice. The only thing worse than spilling his guts like this was keeping it inside. “My mother was an auxiliary sect member, farming with father on the outskirts and barely cultivated. He’s Earth and Light, which made them a good match. They knew the odds were low, so they gave it a shot…” he trailed off.

“And got you.” she finished. “That’s some shit luck. Did she make it?”

“No.” he said, scowling. “There was a draft four years before the fall. She had to start actively cultivating. By the end...” He could feel the oppressive heat creeping back. “I hardly recognized her.” He looked back at the intricate stonework. “Not that I blame Frigid Mountain. It was… necessary.”

“I'm sorry.”

“Yeah,” Jack said, hands balling into fists at his sides. “Me too.”

*************

The room was still for a few moments before the elder resumed speaking. “The answer you know but are afraid to say for fear of causing offence, is that more and more, we reflect our element. We begin to embody our cultivation method body and soul, and most importantly to our discussion today, gain the ability to warp the world around us. I'm sure you have all heard tales of cultivators so powerful that the world changes wherever they walk?”

There was some hesitant nodding from the assembled teenagers, and the Elder flicked a sleeve towards a girl at the back. She stood tall and willowy, with long light brown hair pulled back into a tail. “Violetta. Tell me a story.”

“Well,” she began, hesitantly. “My parents used to say that the founder of Climbing Ivy was so strong that plants always grew around her, even on stone”.

“Good. Go on.”

Emboldened, she continued, picking up speed. “They said that when she walked through the forest, the trees would all bend in to get a closer look, and that she had two vines, as thick as a man’s arm and as long as four men together that followed her around like pet serpents!”

“Ah yes, the vines.” The elder shook his head, ruefully. “Climbing Ivy has certainly always had us beat for pageantry. However, they are a good demonstration of the phenomenon I would have you understand.” He gestured towards the sharp-faced boy who had spoken up before. “Luca. Have you visited the compound where the Ivy cultivators are housed?”

The boy blinked. “The Ivy fortress? No, the cultivators keep a path clear to the trading village a day south, so caravans can get in and out of the Tarrik Forest, but the brush gets so thick the closer you get that only cultivators that forest walk can get any closer. I don't even think that fliers can get through the canopy.”

“Truly?” the elder said, eyebrows furrowing. “Has it been that long?” His eyes frosted over with memories for a moment before he shook his head to clear it. “Regardless, children. When I was but a young cultivator, newly 40 and ready to go out and experience the world, I visited what was then known as the Ivy Compound to learn from their founder and help them with some… problems they were facing.” He turned to the tall girl, who was looking at him with wide, reverent eyes. “A question, Violetta?”

“What was it like?”

“The Ivy compound I knew, from almost a century ago, was a square mile of verdant farmland in the middle of the Tarrik desert.”

*******************

“Reaper.” the girl said quietly, interrupting Jack’s musings.

“What?” he looked at her, quizzically. “What about them?”

“I am one.” She said, grimacing. “You know, Reaper. Dark and Decay”.

He looked her up and down, cocking an eyebrow. “Sure.”

“What does that mean?” she said, her tone affronted.

“Everyone knows Reapers are pale! With grey eyes and jet black… hair.” He studied the girl, who was once again glaring at him, with a critical eye. Looking closely, he supposed that her eyes could be described as a light gray. Her hair, which haloed her head and fell to her shoulders in tight curls was definitely black. And while her skin was brown, it was the lightest tawny brown he had ever seen on a person, almost golden. Certain he had talked himself into a corner, he doubled down. “And you’re too pretty!”

“I… what?” her eyebrows somehow bunched up even more, which barely seemed humanly possible.

“Besides, I've seen a Reaper! He was the most creepy thing i’ve ever seen in my life!” He said, spitting words out as fast as they came to him. “And! If you’re really a Reaper, why are you here? Why aren’t you training in the Order?” He folded his arms to his chest, resting his case.

His torrent of words seemed to have done their job, leaving the girl more puzzled than upset. “I wasn't born in the Order. My parents are weak enough that they don't know their affinities, so they didn't even know I was possible. I probably could have joined up, but becoming a mythical knife in the dark and assassin of kings didn't really seem like a good fit.”

“Can't say I blame you.” he said, tone sympathetic. “That’s some shit luck.” he echoed.

A smile quirked at the corner of her lips. “Yeah.” she said, then fixed him with a quizzical eye. “Have you really seen a Reaper?”

*********************

That got a reaction from the assembled disciples, and the room was awash with hushed muttering and fidgeting. The elder let it continue for a moment, before raising a hand for silence. The room fell still immediately.

“Now, that was near a century ago, but it helps to illustrate our lesson today. Climbing Ivy’s situation is, if not a common issue for powerful cultivators, certainly not an unexpected one.”

A girl with curly black hair and pale gray eyes raised a hand.

“Yes?”

“Then why haven’t we all frozen to death? Isn't the sect head of Frigid Mountain at least as powerful as Climbing Ivy’s?”

Many of the eyes present widened. One doesn't question the strength of your local sect leader. Not if you wanted to keep your head, at least. The Elder’s eyes merely crinkled, however.

“Well, I should certainly hope so. She is not as… public with her strength as some others, but I assure you, she is no slouch.” The ground rumbled, and the students gasped and backed up as one, when a pocket opened in the stone below the stone beneath the Elder’s right foot. The Elder didn't seem to notice, standing perfectly still and steady, one foot on stone and one foot in the air. “She does, unfortunately, have the poor habit of reusing her tricks,” he continued.

The ground rumbled again as the stone rose up to meet his foot, and the striations of stone on the wall behind his head rearranged themselves to form the word “Spoilsport”, for just a moment before returning to their natural state.

*******************

“Oh, yeah. He was awful. He moved like he wasn't using any of his muscles, just sliding around through the shadows with his Qi.”

“When would you have seen one? I'm pretty sure they aren’t supposed to show themselves to anyone but their target and client.”

“I don't think he wanted to be seen,” Jack said. “It was six years ago, because I was ten I think? Yeah, ten.” He rolled his fingers across his knee, resisting the urge to draw in the growing heat. “This was just after Lord Asher” he scowled, “declared war on Frigid Mountain, and he threw a festival to celebrate. All of the sect members and their families had to come, or risk giving insult.”

The girl winced and nodded along, leaning forward on her intricately-carved bench. “I think I heard about that. No one knew why it was cut short, and the Sunbelts would never say”.

“Well, just before midday on the first day, Asher called everyone together and made the announcement that he had summoned a Reaper, and was going to contract them to remove the sect head of Frigid Mountain”.

“From the fact that she’s still alive, I take it that he didn't?” she said, a rueful smirk taking shape.

“He tried. When midday came, a person melted out of the shadow of one of the buildings near the crowd and said” his voice took on a breathy affect, “I would prefer to have this discussion in private, my lord”. “Of course not”, Jack said, switching to a pompous tone, “I have nothing to hide from my sect!” Back to the breathy voice, he continued. “Very well, then. My order has no interest in accepting your contract at this time. If I may express my regrets and beg your leave.” Jack returned to his normal voice and finished. “Then he melted back into the shadows and disappeared.”

The girl bent over at the waist, laughing uproariously, hands clutched to her stomach. After a moment, Jack joined her.

****************

The Elder tapped his foot, reclaiming the attention of the aghast students. “The question was why we have not suffered the fate of Climbing Ivy. Or, more poignantly, the fate of their predecessor, Scorching Sands. There are two reasons.”

He stepped back and gestured to the wall, which formed a series of diagrams in the shifting stone. “The first,” he said, pointing to the diagram of a flowing river, with several pockets that formed breaks in the stream. “Is that us old monsters are Very Careful” he projected those two words louder than the others, looking up as he did so, “In how and where we use our qi. The less we use qi, the less we imprint ourselves on the environment. These days, it requires an emergency for one of us to move.”

He looked out into the audience, to see Sylvia’s hand shooting up. He traced her gaze to the wall behind him. “These small manipulations are aura control, not Qi. You will receive instruction in this later, if you grow strong enough to warrant it.” he reassured. “Any further questions? No? Excellent.”

“The second”, he said, calling attention back to the task at hand, “Is these”. He held up a silver cube, wrapped in a leather band. “Glacial Stone is our sect’s main export. When the disciples of this mountain cycle, rather than releasing cold energy back into the environment, we instead deposit it into one of these stones.”

“And formerly, there was a third.” His gaze scanned through the crowd, barely pausing on Jack for a fraction of a second. “Until recently, our sect lived in harmony with another sect known as the Sunbelts. Where our Qi of cold and earth met theirs of heat and growth, they reached an equilibrium of sorts. With them, unfortunately, gone, we are at something of a tipping point.”

****************

“Serves the bastard right.” the girl said, wiping tears from her eyes. “What did he do?”

“I didn't see. The second everyone figured out what happened, mom threw me and dad over her shoulder and ran like hell. Last I saw, he was just staring at the spot where the reaper vanished.”

“Smart woman.” she said, and extended a hand. “Sylvia. Sil.”

“Jack”, he said, reintroducing himself, and took her hand.

“Well.” she said, extending the syllable into a drawl. “I wonder what Frigid Mountain wants with a couple of pariahs?”