Owlknight

downhill again. They were out in the sunlight at last; the air was considerably warmer, and the hordes of birds and small creatures that startled and fled before their headlong rush testified that the cold-drake didn’t hunt on this side of the mountain.

Darian got a brief glimpse of something shining off to the west - it might have been water, but he didn’t get a good enough look to tell for certain. Then they plunged into the forest shadows again.

The dyheli kept running for a good candlemark, and only when their flanks were soaked with sweat and their sides heaving did they finally slow and stop beside a trickle of a stream.

Darian was off his mount in a heartbeat, as were the rest. Snatching up handfuls of coarse grass, they began wiping their mounts down. They pulled off the tack and did what they could, then the dyheli themselves walked off to cool down and take occasional sips of water.

Only then did Darian turn to Keisha. “You got into its mind? What was it that you two used? Fear?” he asked.

She nodded. “Fear. But I guarantee you, it is not in a way you would have expected.”

Steelmind commented, somewhat amusedly, “These two’ve certainly scared me before, so I can understand that. I thought it had to be something more. I didn’t think my arrow was that effective.”

Keisha grinned. “Effective enough. When you hurt it, that was the first time anything had ever touched it since it had left its mother and been on its own in the wilds. Literally it had never felt pain since the last time its mother disciplined it. And do you know how drakes discipline their babies?”

Darian shook his head dumbly.

“They bite the baby’s nose!” She laughed breathlessly.

Steelmind knit his brow, and shook his head slightly. “I still do not understand. You two are just humans, not the cold-drake’s mother.”

Shandi stepped over, her sweat-scraper and curry-brush still in hand, after tending briefly to Karles. “I’ll try to explain. The warmth Darian summoned was making it delirious and disoriented. It became more and more unfocused mentally, it felt more vulnerable as its armor’s ice layer melted, and its eyesight clouded, too, much like a developing infant’s. It thought about the last time it felt that way - when it was just a pup. So instinctively, even though we were just snacks for it, when that nose wound hurt so sharply, the drake felt as if we were bigger and more powerful than it for just a moment.”

Keisha picked up the explanation from there. “It’s like with a pony, if you pick it up off the ground as a foal, even when it’s full grown, it will think you can still do that. Lessons learned early in life stay just as big in any creature’s mind, and when someone is in pain they tend to act more childlike - that’s something we Healers know and use. That wound-scream jarred me out of my own fear and my Healing knowledge sort of welled up, and I remembered where I’d sensed that sort of reaction - from other wounded animals, and some badly injured people. The cold-drake didn’t know what was happening to it, and its instincts made it think of dear old mama. We just pushed more fear at it, using what we sensed its own memories of an angry mother were. I don’t know if I could have driven it off by myself, but when Shandi and I joined, there was enough to push it over the edge.”

Steelmind shook his head. “Empaths,” was all he said, but it was in a mix of bemusement and admiration.

“Well, how many more doses of that scream could you take?” Shandi retorted, glancing around for Kel. “I thought blood was going to pour out of my ears in a moment. I was in such pain from the scream I was damned well going to do something about it!”

“I have no arguments with what you did!” Darian assured them, waving his hands in the air for emphasis. “It worked, and that’s all I care about!”

Kelvren limped up, his left side somewhat scraped up but only slightly bloodied. “It isss good rrreass-soning,” he added, sounding complimentary. “It isss the mind that trrruly winsss orrr losssesss each battle. Talonsss would not accomplish in ten daysss what one well-placsssed bad memorrry of Motherrr did.”

Keisha frowned at the gryphon, and gestured with one finger pointing downward at her feet, then snapped her fingers. “Come here, hero. Let me look at that.” Kelvren gave her a withering look, but approached obediently and gently mocked, “Jussst do not thrrreaten me with yourrr Fearrrsssome Pow-errrsss, and I shall obey,” as he lay down to be tended to.

Shandi’s face abruptly clouded, and she looked back up the pass, anxiously. “Getting back, though - ” she started.

“We’ll worry about getting back when we have to.” That was Wintersky, who had been dragging their belongings into a rough circle. “I’ve been checking what we have left. Anybody object to staying here for the night?”

Darian shook his head. “I feel like it was me carrying the dyheli, not the other way around.”