Moving was hard. Moving was incredibly hard.
Days went on. The snow might have stopped, but the weather remained cold and wicked, and the pack remained deep and difficult to tread. A journey that should have taken the pair no more than two days took at least double that; Kjell’s legs might not have been injured, but those wounds he had sustained seemed to suck the energy right out of him, and he was often forced to ask Bennet to stop and wait. Never had he felt so useless.
And yet, he was all the kid had – they covered her father in snow and said a prayer to the Mother, and that was that. They had to keep moving, lest that damnable cat come back to finish with it started. The dragon had thrown it off a cliff, but the animal had disappeared, not died where it landed. For all he knew, it was right around the last bend.
For what seemed like the hundredth time, Kjell huffed. “Why don’tcha find somewhere t’bed down?” he asked his companion, planting his haunches in the snow. His sides heaved. His face ached. Hell, but his eye did hurt – was it healing? He couldn’t tell. At least it wasn’t bleeding profusely.
Under the shelter of a pine tree, he settled, waiting for Bennet to come back with news of where they’d stay and rest for a bit.