One month later, Artorius Drakkennide and Aia looked out over the peaks of the Anor Mountains. They had been riding relentlessly for the last three weeks and some days. The young Drakkennide was tired, rough of breath. His back and forehead were soaked in sweat and a pair of dark circles formed under his eyes.
Aia was in not much of a better condition. She glanced behind them and saw specks of shadow riding three peaks back. The black riders had followed them through the mountains. The moment that they had left the city, the seven wraiths continued the chase.
On the fourth day after their departure, Artorius had asked as to their nature and purpose in chasing them.
"I do not know why they pursue us," Aia said, "they had chased me and sir Trenewynn seventeen days after we had entered the pass. A curtain of black clouds always following in their path."
"So that is why a storm is always licking at our heels."
"Yes, I studied on the subject in Anor during my stay, though they did not have a copy of Elewynn's Encyclopedia of the Undead on hand. I do not know how they've conjured the power to block the sun, but ghosts should possess a vulnerability to sunlight according to the scriptures of Saint Ramnicus."
"That still leaves the question as to how exactly we are to pierce the cloudveil."
"Unfortunately I haven't figured that out yet, we'll have to consider it as we move forward."
After a brief respite for Artorius to catch his breath, the two rode off again on horseback.
"We will have to take the unbeaten path in order to outride them. Come now, Isthilias, let us show the black riders our speed."
The horse– Isthilias, was a prized gift from Artorius' father. The white destrier was broad enough to carry the both of them and nickered to its master's words. With a sudden jump it fell over ten feet down and pranced again onto countless rocks amid the chasmous gaps in the mountain. In the span of five breaths, they had descended the face of the mountain up to at least twenty Drakefoots.
Where before had been their resting place, Aia now saw only a distant wall of mountain.
Isthilias galloped further on and led them down one mountain and up another. In the span of a day, they had rode through another two mountains, making their progress three mountains per day with a bit of off-roading.
But Artorius was not pleased with this. For the wraiths continued to gain ground.
"It's like they can foresee our every path. Even if we attempt to change roads or split through the wilderness, we still cannot lose them."
There was another fear lingering in the back of Artorius' mind. He glanced back and saw that as sure as the cycle of sun and moons, the riders were still three peaks away from them– staring down at them from the same peak that they had stood earlier that day.
"They're running us down. Isthilias is a great horse, but it would be a heavy marathon even for him to ride all through the mountains of Anor with barely a few minutes of rest."
Artorius turned to face Aia, "have you thought of a way to face these black wraiths yet?"
The priestess called on her knowledge of the geography and remembered a mountain not far off from the Blackwood Forest. It was one that her mother had often spoken of as the site of an ancient battle.
But that was not what was important about it. Aia recalled the particular details of this mountain, including its name: Mount Ézan– where the Primordial son of Éamor had battled Sòl during the War of Choice. The Dragonspawn Demon of Pestilence was regarded as a creature so large that he dwarfed mountains and could swallow cities in his maw. Yet when Sòl cast his rays upon the Terra it annihilated the demon's ill work, and turned Ézan to stone.
The Dragonspawn was nothing if not vengeful. His fierce glare– statuesque and retained to the end of time, would forever point to the heavens in vain. His cage was eternal stone baked under the sun.
All of these stories Aia recalled her mother telling her as a little girl. Yet they were not simply stories– Mount Ézan was real, and it truly existed as a place that forever lay beneath the sun. If the old myths could be believed— no, they must be believed. In which case, Mount Ézan was a place where no shadow or cloud could ever block the sun.
Aia resolved and diverted Artorius' course, "we must move west, towards the coastal end of the mountain range. There is a place we can go to escape the wraiths."
"But that would take us closer to the Dark Mists– we would be approaching the Blackwood Forest and diverting from our destination."
Artorius measured the breaths of Isthilias to gauge the stallion's fatigue and then added, "the journey is already testing our limits without an additional week of diversion."
"Please, have faith sir Artorius. If not, then our deaths are already fated."
The noble had no retort and so whispered to his steed once more.
"Come now, Isthilias. Our lives depend on you, my friend."
With a firm puff and a neigh of resolve, the white horse pushed its great lungs and muscles to the ultimum of their capacity.
They continued their rush through a total of seventeen mountain peaks for eight and a half days of near-endless riding. The worst of it came on the last day of their flight.
At their tails, the wraiths chased in full– no longer content to wear down their prey. But Isthilias was a brave horse and even when the riders chased merely a pace behind, the white steed's haste was not matched. Two of the black riders however had circled ahead a few days before– as if they had known all along that Aia and Artorius would come this way.
They cut off the path and prepared to intercept Atorius on horseback. But brave and strong Isthilias maneuvered beyond the skill of the other riders. The horse feigned one horse and darted past the other with a great leap.
The black rider drew his frost-laden silver sword– as tarnished as his mask, and swung it towards Isthilias' side– but Artorius intercepted the blow, drawing his personal saber– Aeñazerite. In the common tongue it was called the Blue-Bronze Blade, an artifact of the first age held and passed down through the Drakkennide family. It contained the power to compel frost in its edge, and was forged from Aeña, an alchemical alloy of copper, tin, and crystalized water spirit's essence.
It was an enchanted saber– a rare item of which no more than a few dozen like objects were held within the empire's borders. Its edge was broader than a common saber and had a gentle curvature designed for slashing. It was weighty and intended to cut through both metal and flesh altogether. When the blade clashed with that of the black rider's, the queer permafrost on the rider's blade receded and the wraith flinched in shock.
Then, once through the encirclement, Artorius and Aia– on the backs of Isthilias, charged up the peak higher and higher, until the thinness of the air left Isthilias breathless and suffocating, still the white stallion charged onwards and above. Until they entered the grey and black cloud veil and could not see a hand's length before them, and were beset by supernatural cold that cut into their veins and squirmed like a parasite into their blood until it ran equally cold. Even still, Isthilias pressed on.
The magic of the wraiths was unbearably cold, but unbeknownst to anyone, Artorius' saber had kept the worst of it at bay. Perhaps it was lucky chance that Artorius had agreed to escort Aia through the mountains wielding a magic sword and a white steed. Perhaps it was happenstance that Artorius had ended up in Anor to begin with. Regardless, Aia's journey would not have been possible with any other companion save for Ramnicus himself– who is tethered down to his city by the nature of his own spell.
Through an unconscious will, Artorius had warded the two from the wraith's shadow and frost magics– primarily the latter.
Although the cold still bit into them, ordinarily, it should have been enough to sap the lifeforce of even a fully grown wyvern instantly. But Aeñazerite's power over frost was ontological and absolute. The wraiths could not transmute their blood into ice, nor freeze their eyes, nor summon the powers of winter to halt their horse. Many of the arcane powers the black wraiths wielded were closed off thanks to Artorius' opposition to their will.
In fact, the head of the seven was shocked to see the saber Aeñazerite such that it had not reacted in time to stop the horse from passing it by earlier. Any mundane sword upon coming in contact with the black wraiths' swords would radically accelerate in its decay. It would rust and freeze quickly— as if dying right before one's very eyes. But Aeñazerite was of the old world, and older than even death. It was forged in the War of Choice to slay demons and Abyssites, and it could not be overcome by the magics of the third age that sought to subvert ontology, rather than transcend it.
Despite these boons, the cold was a terrible bane all the same. For although Aeñazerite held the power to compel frost, it could not compel the cold– only hinder it. Thus, the three endured the darkness and bitterness until their limbs trembled and breath fogged. To Aia it seemed as if they had spent another month just crossing the cloudveil. But it was, in reality, only a few moments.
When at last they burst from the fog and arrived at the peak of mount Ézan, they were kissed by sunlight. From the high peak above, the ragged riders turned to look back down at their pursuers– still half veiled in the fog and looking up at them eerily. One by one, the seven riders receded back into the clouds. Relenting– for now, but far from abandoning their pursuit, the wraiths would wait for them to come down the mountain.
Isthilias immediately collapsed onto the ground as soon as the adversaries were out of sight. Artorius also had to pull himself to the ground and sprawl out, though he still dragged himself over to Isthilias to pat the horse on the snout.
Aia was in the best shape of the three, no less worn by soreness and sleeplessness though. She knew that all wished no more than to shut their eyes collectively, and go to sleep soundly for the first time in months. But she could not yet afford to rest. Aia pulled legs up and gathered what she could to craft seven crude torches. Then, before the sunset below the clouds, she placed each at the perimeter of the mountain summit and lit them all.
Just as the sun fell below, the white moon rose high. Its soft luminance reflected Sòl's light onto the mountain. Just as the legends would say– Ézan was a mountain of stone eternally baked under the sun.
Behind the white moon however, the black moon of Amos soon crawled after it. Its glaring red eye stared at Aia fiercely.
"The fires of the torches and the unclouded moonlight should be enough to drive back the wraiths for tonight. It is not a complex ward, but it is enough."
Artorius, half asleep already, nodded his head until it sank into slumber. Aia sighed herself, letting the exhaustion take over at last. She sat beside Isthilias, who was still breathing heavily, and brushed the horse's side.
The mountain air was thin, and difficult to swallow. Doubtlessly it was nauseating for the horse, as it was difficult for Aia and Artorius too.
"Thank you, Isthilias."
The horse but let out a soft sputter, its head remaining set on the ground like a stone. There was still a journey left to go. But the marathon had paused— for now.