Back at the settlement, Ganainm tried awkwardly to remind the trolls of the deal they had struck. The hillfolk went about their daily duties as if nothing special — such as disenchanting a literal werewolf — had happened. Seeing her struggle with that, Katsugi interjected right before she was about to not talk with the spokestroll.
"Our revered host," began the Knight, "we are thankful for the hospitality you have surrounded us with, but our path must now lead us elsewhere, beyond the verdant beauty of your hills, and the cloudy whiteness of your sheep. Could we ask for directions, or better yet, guidance, across your realm?"
"Ah!" the troll exclaimed. "Of course. Forgive my forgetful mind, I do not have to bear so many thoughts at once on an ordinary day. Which this of course, is not. Yes, we will provide you with guidance and even more."
"More?" Katsugi asked."
"More." Said the troll. "Allow to but call upon a brother of mine, he lives far from here, way beyond where my own flock feasts. He does not herd sheep like the rest of us. He has something else forming his flock, he calls them 'goats'. I hear they're strong, stout creatures of great endurance and stamina. They will serve you well in the Peaks."
"Th-thank you," the Knight staggered in his answer for the first time since forever. He then observed as the troll began performing the distinct call. He brought his large palms together, bending them both into a shape where once converged, they formed a large tube. The troll then let out a song (?) though the Knight was more than unsure if it could be described as such.
The sound coming from the troll's mouth was that of a raspy, yet somehow deep and clear voice, darting up and down, raising and lowering in pitch. It then penetrated Katsugi's head, as if drilling into the very matter of his brain. After less than a minute of hearing it, he had to cover his ears and that helped only slightly. A good while later, the troll's pitch rose to a height Katsugi couldn't stand, and so the Knight turned around. He then saw that the girl had left the vicinity much earlier and then he too headed away.
By midday, the troll's strange sibling had arrived. He appeared far more rugged, gritty almost, when standing beside his brother. Taller, broader in the shoulders, and of an overall unpleasant face. At his side, there stood two monsters.
Both were alike, only the colour of their fur differing. Right. Fur. It wasn't so much as fur as it was more a collection of hanging columns of stuck-together hair. One grey, the other a toned won beige — if such a thing was even possible — both creatures huffed clouds of air with every breath they expelled.
Their horns, each of them as tall as Katsugi himself, a total of four spikes, curving gently along their line. They were chipped in a few spots on the front, likely from the butting the two goats did with one another. And — although their headdress was far mightier than what the Knight bore on his own helmet — that wasn't the most demonic component of their appearance. That role had been graciously granted to the eyes.
The eyes. Bloated, horizontal slits of blackness for pupils, like islands of jet floating atop a sea of the rotten yellow of their irises. Both goats' blink were audible, each producing a distinct, sticky sound every time it happened. And the hooves...
Blocks of polished, black rock sticking from below pairs o thick, furry trousers. With every stomp the earth itself shook down to its deepest foundations. With every step the gras bent and broke below their downward force. The Knight could only imagine the oncoming storm one would hear if those creatures were to be battle steeds.
Katsugi then looked at the girl standing beside him. She observed the goats with her usual, careful and measured gaze. He could not tell what thoughts were going through her head, nor would he make any mental bets on the subject.
Having exchanged a few words of gratitude with the trolls and after one last conversation with Scath, the pair climbed atop the goats. Both, being the stature that they were, had to grab onto the thick fur and use it as a ladder to bring themselves onto the goats' backs.
Then, the two were given rations — mostly sheep cheese and a very rudimentary kind of bread — with a couple dozen strips of dried lamb jerky too. After that, they were provided with instructions from the spokestroll's brother as to how the steering of the beast was to be conducted.
"Ye pull 'ere," he pulled on fur left of the goat's neck, "goat goes left."
"Ye pull 'ere," he then pulled on the other side, "goat goes right. Ye pull both, goat stops. Ye smack it, the goat runs. Understood?"
Katsugi and Ganainm alike nodded.
"Well, g'luck then!" the eccentric troll exclaimed and gave the two goats a heavy slap on their sides, which made them bolt forward. "Dinnae worry! They know where yer going!" the troll somehow managed to shout over the hailstorm the goats' gallop had begun producing.
The two goats ran through the trolls' realm, the landscape not changing much as they did so. Differently sized hills accompanied the travellers as they traversed the land, waves of green rolling beside and below them.
They rode for several days, the goats stopping by themselves as soon as night fell and feeding on the ever-present tall grass whenever they did. Both goats snuggled with their riders for the night, the two pairs warming one another better than more than a few fires.
The routine continued for about a week, until the grass became more and more sparce, the ground turning from earth into solid rock. Eventually, the act of sailing through the verdant sea was wholly replaced with the clicking sound the hooves made when meeting the bare stone of the mountains. They were here. Or there.
The goats considerably reduced their pace once they'd entered the mountains proper. Though they were confident in their pace, and every step each of them made was deliberate and thought-through, they were very much aware of the dangers a falsely laid foot — or hoof — could bring in a place like this.
The advance was slow, but steady, for the Knight and the girl alike that was enough. As long as they were moving forward, all was good. Progress, regardless of how slow, as long as it went onward — as progress usually does — it was fine.
To both of the traveller's surprise, they were on a path. As of now, it seemed that all the surrounding mountains had pathways carved on their sides. Some were wide enough for the two goats to walk beside one another — with much space between them — while others where so tight the two animals had to rely on their anti-gravitational hooves to traverse them. Not that their hooves were magic. They simply could walk on walls.
Overall, the journey itself was quite peaceful. The goats munched on whatever thin blades of grass shot out of the cracks in the mountains' walls, their riders chewed on cheese and jerky. An almost idyllic experience.
Click-clack, click-clack, went the goats up the mountain. Click-clack, click-clack, sounded their hooves on the grey stone beneath. Whoom-whoom, whoom-whoom, went the dragon's wings. Swirl-swirl, swirl-swirl, snaked the dragon's body. Whoosh-whoosh, whoosh-whoosh, went the dragon fire. Whoosh-whoosh, whoosh-whoosh, it grazed the rocky spires.
