The next morning finds the ragtag, weirdly successful, often morally questionable band of adventurers standing at the ragged, shimmering edge of the Cursed Plains.
The air is dry enough to parch a camel, the sky blindingly blue, and the ground ahead flat, endless, and miserable, the kind of place that screams bad idea.
Everyone is packed and ready.
Well, "ready" in the same way a drunk is ready to argue with a lamppost, which is to say, mostly by showing up and hoping for the best.
Raikya is in front, perched astride Frostlick like she'd been born in the saddle, spear angled back over one shoulder to keep it clear of the hound's ears. Penelo and Lula cling to the great hound's snowy fur behind her, giggling like children as the beast's massive paws thud over the cracked earth. Frostlick's tail swishes lazily, a hound satisfied with her lot in life, or at least with the three women hugging her back.
