37. Vesper
VESPER
“New zone unlocked,” Cipher announces in that too sexy voice as we walk from one snow-covered area into another. “Welcome to the Howling Wind Plains.”
“The Howling Wind Plains,” I repeat as I look out across the expanse before us.
As far as I can see, it’s just flat and white.
No trees break up the horizon. Nothing exists before me except for the icy snow and the freezing wind that suddenly whips around us and makes me tuck deeper into my new cloak.
It’s warm inside it. So warm, I barely feel the cold on my body, but my face still feels it as we step into the new zone.
Within minutes, my lips are blistering and chapped.
My nose is frigid, but I don’t grow any weaker and I don’t develop frostbite.
Svetlana stays firmly tucked beneath the cloak.
Its effects don’t work on more than one person at a time, but because it keeps me warm, she’s able to absorb my own warmth and remain alive.
Locke, however, isn’t nearly so lucky.
He’d put off drinking any of his winterberry wine for as long as possible, but by the time we step into the Howling Wind Plains, he’s pulling the bottle from his inventory and drinking one of the servings. Instantly, he warms up and doesn’t seem to be as effected by the cold as before.
But it only lasts for twelve hours, and it feels like we’ve been walking around the Howling Wind Plains for days already.
The Howling Wind Plains are exactly as described.
The longer we walk, the more we realize there’s literally nothing here.
No caves. No trees. No animals. Nothing.
Our footprints in the snow behind us are covered up as fast as we make them, making our trail impossible to track.
It also makes it difficult to know if we’re walking in circles or not.
Locke spends most of his time studying the map and redirecting us one direction or another to make sure we’re still heading in the direction of the safehouse here.
We run into no other players. Apparently, no one is stupid enough to walk straight across the plains like we are.
If they were stupid enough and died, well . . . I don’t think we’ll ever find them anyways. Not with how easily the snow covers our footprints.
My eyes catch on every small lump in the snow. Each time I wonder if it’s just a rock or some poor sap who laid down and froze here. I don’t dig any of them up. I don’t want to know.
“They have lootable inventories,” Cipher comments.
I grimace. “Don’t care. I’m not digging them up.”
Something about that feels . . . inhumane.
Somehow. There’s a lot that never bothered me in Dross, because it was normal.
But here, I’m learning new and terrible things about humanity, and the thought of these plains being littered with frozen bodies makes me uneasy.
How many have been spit into this place from the Harrow Gate, their chances of survival less than one percent?
How many have died because of some bad luck when they were just trying to find a better life?
“I could give you the number. If you wish,” Cipher offers, his voice careful.
“You know my answer,” I grunt. Sometimes, there are things you’re better off not knowing.
What becomes glaringly obvious the longer we trek through the Howling Wind Plains is that without the Cloak of the First Snow and the winterberry wine, we would never make it across. We would have frozen long ago otherwise. Just another two mounds to trip over.
“It says it’s right in front of us,” Locke chatters, his eyes focused on the white scene before us. “The safehouse should be here. I don’t get it.”
I look in the direction he points, my eyes squinting to try and find the entrance of the safehouse. “Maybe it’s buried beneath it?”
“Possibly,” Locke murmurs. He has one more serving of winterberry wine left, but he’s going to need it when we try to get out of this zone entirely.
He’s starting to get too cold, taking on damage to his XP the longer we’re out in this wind.
“None of the other safehouses were this difficult to find though.”
“I wouldn’t call the AppleFrog’s easy to find,” I reply, frowning. I take a step forward, my eyes catching on a strange variation between the snow.
“True,” Locke says, his teeth starting to chatter more violently. “I don’t have much time though before I have to take the last serving.”
“We could share the cloak,” I offer. “Five minutes for you. Five for me.”
He shakes his head. “You freeze a lot faster than I do. It’s best you keep it on.” He strides forward, his map open as he traces his steps and tries to put us right on top of the safehouse. “According to the map, it’s right—ow!”
He bounces backwards, stumbles, and lands on his ass in the snow. He reaches up to cover his nose, his other hand pressing against his forehead.
“What happened?” I ask, wide eyes. “Is it a force field? Some magical trap? Something—”
“No,” he cuts me off, the word nasally with the way he’s holding his nose. “Fucking shit. It’s been here the whole time.”
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“Walk forward about ten steps, arm out. For fuck’s sake, don’t run into it like I just did.”
I do as Locke says, reaching out my hand and taking ten steps forward. Just when I think he’s lost his damn mind, my hand presses against something smooth and cold. My frown deepening, I trace along the hidden structure and tilt to the side. Only then do I realize what it is I’m seeing.
“It’s an illusion!” I say, leaning left and right to see the slight shimmer.
“No,” Locke says, grumbling as he gets to his feet. “It’s just made out of fucking ice. That’s why we couldn’t see it. It blends into this hellscape.”
It’s large, whatever it is. We start to walk alongside it, our gloved hands tracing along the edge as we search for the entrance.
The longer we walk, the more I realize that the building is literally built from the ice, thick blocks of it stacked one on top of the other, forming a structure that blends in almost entirely with its surroundings.
By the time we find the door, Locke is shivering so violently, I’m starting to worry.
There’s a large wooden door that we would have never seen from the direction we came from, but it’s apparent as soon as we’re in front of it. I try to push it open, but it’s sealed and locked. I kick it, and when that doesn’t work, Locke tries.
For once, I’m stronger than the Bone Breaker.
His cold damage he’s taking has made him weaker and that’s when I really start to panic. Locke’s strength falling is a big deal, because that’s his biggest stat. If even he can’t kick that hard, he’s in trouble.
I bang on the door. “Hello?” I call. “Anyone here that can let us in?” Nothing. I knock harder, hitting the door with my fist in the hopes someone will hear. “Hello!”
A small window in the door opens and a man’s heavily mustached face appears. His eyes narrow as he takes in first me and then Locke who is barely holding himself together at this point.
“What’s the magic word?” he asks gruffly.
“What?” I say dumbly.
“The magic word,” he repeats. “What is it?”
I glance at Locke and then back at the man in the opening. “Uh . . . let us in?”
“Wrong,” he says, and slams the opening shut.
“Wait!” I call, hitting the door with my fist. The opening pops back open. “How are we supposed to know the magic word?”
“All players must say the magic word to enter,” he replies, sniffing. “If you don’t know it, you can’t come in.”
“How a-about I come in t-t-there and shove the m-m-m-magic word up your—”
I hit Locke to stop his threat, trying to think. “Is it an obvious magic word?”
“There are no hints,” the man says. “You either know it or you don’t.”
Cipher? I think.
I cannot give it to you, nor can I hint at it.
But I know it? I ask
All players know the magic word. Whether they choose to remember their manners is another matter.
My brows furrow. Remember their manners?
I spent much of my early childhood inside a gathering of Suffer Saints, in a Final Gate Covenant.
It’s where the orphans are always dumped, as well as those too sick to function on their own.
My mother was one of those who was not capable of functioning, and though my memories of her were mostly images of her lying in bed, her eyes open and unseeing, there are a few that differ.
My mother was broken. Her mind had been destroyed when she’d came through the Harrow as a Luxe-born.
She’d had no Tier, no Glitch, but she’d been dragged through anyways.
We’re always told that only Tier Fives can travel backwards through the Harrow, but it’s not because your level prevents you from going through like I’d always thought.
It prevents you from surviving.
Travelling in reverse is more painful than travelling forward.
There are supposedly ways to combat this pain, but only if you’re a Tier Five.
Anything less gets shattered beyond repair.
Not their body, but their mind. Some say that going backwards through the Harrow scrambles your brain if you’re not powerful enough, and I’m inclined to believe that.
My mother was not a person ninety-five percent of her time in Dross.
But those five percent?
There were three moments that stand out to me as different from the vegetative state she existed in.
Once, she’d sat up, gave me her journal, and told me to protect it with my life.
I was five. I learned to read after that, simply so I could read her words she’d left for me.
The second time, she had screamed and screamed and screamed until someone had given her Softlock just to numb her pain.
It’s the third time that pops into my mind now. She’d been lost for years. I was seven, and this was the final time I’d ever see some sort of coherence in her eyes. It’s also the last time I’d see her alive.