Things Lost and Found (a Waglington and Mianite fanfiction)

Chapter 79

The song for this chapter is "Wake Me Up" by Avicii. Does better travel music exist? If so, I haven't found it yet. :)

*is jamming out to the song and notices my evil muse peeking around a corner to watch me* "No, don't you dare! It's not time yet!" *chases after my evil muse as it disappears back around the corner*

Chimalus had mentioned that the bts team had wanted to build Thel Olihm in a snow biome (they never could find one, and then budget issues came up). Here's my take on the dwarven city the heroes never got to see. :)

*Waglington's POV*

Well, this was...interesting. The rise we'd been climbing dropped back into a relatively flat valley. I could see mountains surrounding it in a wide arc. We had climbed one of the lowest points in the ring. The road we'd been following dipped down into the valley, but it appeared to be underwater in several places once the valley leveled out. The water didn't look normal either. It started a vibrant blue in the center that bled into green, yellow, then orange at the edges of the pools. None of the water was frozen, despite the ice and snow coating the ground, and steam rose from the pools, obscuring them somewhat. There was a familiar smell hanging in the air too—sulfur.

The others caught up to Mot and I and stared at the road ahead. Mot turned to look at us. "Okay, we're going to have to stray from the road to avoid the water. It looks harmless from here, but it's extremely hot. You fall in, you're dead. Got it?" Mot glared at Tom a few seconds longer than everyone else. "Good. Oh, and if you hear any hissing or bubbling, get as far away from the water as you can, some of these will be geysers."

"Um. Don't geysers only form in volcanic areas?" Jordan asked.

Mot didn't even turn around as he answered, "Yes." He and Martha started down the slope. The rest of us looked at each other nervously before following. Snow started falling in tiny flakes as we descended into the valley. I cast a wary eye at the "ring" of mountains I'd noted, wondering which of them might be a volcano. (Oh, Wag... You've never been to Yellowstone, have you?) As we carefully skirted the hot springs, I noticed how each had a visible vent at the lowest point where the water was rising from. I also noticed the lack of living vegetation aside from sparse lichen and moss growing on the rocky soil. There were plenty of dried husks where shrubs and trees once stood. They had died when the hot springs expanded to this part of the valley. The horses were understandably skittish, occasionally dancing sideways or throwing their heads when the dead branches rattled in the wind. More than once Martha had to use magic to calm the beasts. I was mildly concerned by the abundance of near-boiling water. I didn't know if my armor's enchantments would protect against that, and I didn't plan on finding out.

We didn't stop to rest when evening came and the snow stopped, though we'd made it almost halfway through the valley. Mot was worried about our not seeing any active geysers so far and was muttering something about eruption intervals under his breath. We could see the edge of the geyser field a short distance ahead. A forest of evergreens lay beyond it. We camped once we were safely under the cover of fir, spruce, and pine trees. We set our tents by mage light, ate a quick meal, and collapsed on our sleeping bags. I was pretty sure I heard a geyser spout off as I drifted into a dreamless slumber.

The next day we set out through the trees, finding and following the road again. The snow got thicker on the ground and trees as we traveled, and I noticed the others shivering. Jordan went to his spectre dimension at one point to fetch some jackets. Mot had brought his own coat, and those of us with magic were relatively unfazed by the cold. Memento greatly disliked the snow and took to flying to avoid getting his feet wet.

My friends found this amusing. Tom finally caved to the temptation of a moving target and chucked a snowball at Memento. He dodged of course, but the snowball ended up hitting Sonja in the back. There was a moment of silence; then all hell broke loose. Snowballs flew fast and furious in a free for all. Donella, Mot, and Martha steered clear of the action, but the rest of us enjoyed ourselves immensely. Tom and Tucker were keeping score at first but lost track after the first ten minutes. Things started winding down when I landed a solid hit to Tom's face at the same time Jordan hit him in the stomach. Tom fell dramatically yelling, "I'm hit! Go on without me! Everything's going dark. Tell Doughnut I love him."