The Moon Goddess' Chosen

435 Plotting a New Course

Crysta took out the old map from the bag Wyatt was carrying and laid it out in front of the two of them while the royal continued pacing about. She made sure there was space for Lina to join them in case she felt up to it.

After taking a short look at the map, Wyatt spoke up first, “This map only spells bad news for us. Without the mountain pass, there is no way we could make this much distance in one day as we’d originally planned.

Not to mention the predators that reign supreme within the mountains. Mountain lions! They are rumoured to be quite territorial in these parts,” Wyatt pitched in, sitting crosslegged beside the girl.

“Rumours?” Crysta raised a brow at him.

“I was just trying to be positive. There are definitely mountain lions here. We just have to be careful. Luckily for us, they don’t travel in a pride as normal lions do, so we won’t risk finding more than two of them at the same time at which they won’t be working well together.”

Crysta shuddered at the thought of finding just one. “You think bowing to one of those things will get us off the hook like the last one?” the girl asked in a lower ponderous tone.

“I’m not sure bowing to a jaguar was ever meant to get anyone a free pass in the first place. That was nothing short of a miracle. We cannot rely on miracles. There is an old saying that suggests miracles only happen once,” the man responded.

While his argument made sense, Crysta was sure Lina would be less inclined to agree with him, “We can’t rest here tonight. We must make some of the distance into the mountains.”

“You must have a few screws loose. What distance can we make now? The mountains are vast and hunting within them is even more of a myth. I’ve never heard of werewolves surviving within the Sirius mountains. Not to mention they are really steep and finding an entry point is next to impossible.

.....

Finding a way out after finding said entry point is a dream. We could find ourselves at a dead end. Going around the mountains will take days for the three of us. We won’t be able to make any difference if we exhaust our muscles now. I have my limits, you know,” Wyatt argued.

“We don’t need to go around the mountains or even look for an entry point. Take a look…” the delta pointed at the map, tracing the path of the stream that came from the mountain, “That river doesn’t allow much movement to be made when you chose to use it, but it does create the smoothest path up the mountain, not like these steep slopes that we keep staring at.”

“You intend to use what little river bank the stream has to make it to the top of the ranges?” Wyatt asked.

“Yes, on the other side of the mountain, the slopes are gentler, not like what’s on this side. If we can make it using that route, we cut our journey short by a couple of days,” the delta explained thoughtfully.

“I know what you’re trying to say but what happens when we find a part of the stream that’s completely water and no shore, just steep sides?” Wyatt pinched the bridge of his nose.

“We’ll swim,” the girl responded eagerly.

“You make it sound so easy. From what I can see on this map, the stream doesn’t really start all the way at the top,” he tried voicing his observations.

“Haven’t you wondered why the water from the creek is so cold? The water comes from the melting ice at the…”

“I know it’s a glacial river. That’s why I was about to ask if you had some kind of death wish. We could freeze up there,” the man argued, cutting her short.

“You’re so full of negativity,” Crysta raised a brow at him.

“No, I’m your voice of reason. With the wild suggestions you keep making, one of us has to stay reasonable,” Wyatt countered.

“I am being reasonable. There is no telling how much time we have already lost now. Following this path will only help us reach our goal faster. If it so happens that the prince has taken the long way around, we could make up for lost time,” Crysta tried explaining.

“There it is again. ‘Reaching our goal faster.’ You’re the one that said this was not just a test of speed. There is a lot that can kill us out here. We can’t just get irrational and disregard something that could very well be our doom… all in the name of reaching our goal faster. The cold on that mountain can kill us,” the man argued.

The argument was about to continue when a voice interrupted them. While the voice was loud and commanding, it rattled within their minds instead of through their ears. “I’ve heard what you both have to say about it. You can stop arguing now. Let me provide a third option then.”

Lina’s voice sounded more stable over the mind link. The panic that had plagued her when they found the decimated mountain pass was gone, “Something is fishy about this sudden collapse of the mountain pass. If my brother had been injured really badly by this rock fall, I would have known, but I felt nothing through the mind link, so he must be fine.

However, that doesn’t mean this was something that happened naturally. It’s far too coincidental for the mountain pass to collapse when we were just about to cross it. We cannot rule out the possibility that this could have happened on purpose to target the contestants of the Trials,” Lina had been doing some thinking during her pacing.

“Are you trying to say that someone could have brought down the mountain pass? Could your brother have done it to slow us down? Even though I know that’s not like him at all,” Crysta suggested.

“I was surveying the rocks to see if we could still cross, but they are far too unstable. One wrong move and you could break your leg with a simple misstep. However, I did come across an unfamiliar scent. And it was one that belonged to a werewolf,” the girl explained.

“Rogues?” Wyatt’s voice was panicked. What were the odds that rogues were involved in this sort of accident? High… very high. There hadn’t been any mention of rogue activity for nearly two years.

Aside from the sudden disappearance of a Seeker right after the escape of the Rogue King, there hadn’t been a sign of Rogue activity. The hunters had swept the entirety of no-man’s-land and come up with nothing which was even more unsettling.

However, in the end, there was nothing that could be done. The Rogues seemed to have vanished. Some theories cropped up that their numbers had been reduced so much that what was left of them would be able to hide really well at which point they would no longer be a threat.

Even then, however, there wasn’t even a single sighting… and that was what made this very frightening.