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In the upper district of Zantile, high up on a little cliff, sat a large passenger airship. Even from at the base of the stairs leading up to the "harbor," one could easily see the ship. It looked like a common ship one would see along the waves of the ocean. The biggest difference was, of course, the spinning blades along the sides and rear. Supposedly, the blades only moved it along, while the rhubrum core of the ship was what allowed it to float and soar through the skies. I didn't know much about it, so I just assumed that must have been the truth.

We had left the Rusty Dagger almost as soon as I had proposed the idea of an airship. No one spoke the entire walk there. The jaunt over to the ship lasted just long enough for that silence to start to become a bit awkward. Thankfully, around the same time I was getting worried about this awkwardness, we'd reached the stairs up to the harbor, if one could call it that. There was only one airship, so perhaps calling it a simple dock would have better suited it. Looking up the long flight, I began to think back on the first time I'd ever ridden an airship. It wasn't much of an 'experience' as some might like to make it out to be; I sat down and fell asleep, and when I awoke, the ship had arrived at my destination. All in all, I'd say it was fairly uneventful.

Taking the first few steps up the flight of stairs, someone finally broke the odd quiet.

"You do have all our tickets, right?" Vaughn's rough voice came from just beside me. I hadn't even noticed he'd been so near until he spoke up.

Patting the small leather pouch at my side, I gave an affirmative nod. "Everything's all together."

"Good good," chimed Pram. "No good if not bring ticket. Then walk all way for nothing."

"Yea, yea," I waved her off.

She took objection to this.

With a quick movement, she swatted my arm with the tip of her blasting rod, and mimed as if she was going to shoot. It would take only a single push of a button for her to engulf me in flame. Of course, she'd never actually do it.

But that didn't mean I wasn't cautious whenever she swung that thing around.

To appease her, I let out a quick, "Ok, ok, I'm sorry."

Seemingly satisfied with the response, the small smith put away her weapon and marched ahead of us up the stairs. As she made her ascent, she yelled back to us, "No dawdle. Get trip started."

Vaughn's rough laugh came out in a short snickering. "She's certainly something."

"You don't know the half of it," Albert mumbled out, and though I didn't see it, I could tell he was rolling his eyes.

My shoulders came up in a half-hearted shrug. "She'll calm down some once we get on board."

"Only some?" One of the blue-skinned man's eyebrows raised during his question, and his gaze flicked between me and Albert.

No answer came. We simply trudged upwards, leaving our escort behind us. Honestly, I didn't even have an answer, which was why I abstained from saying something Vaughn might repeat in Pram's company, thus earning myself another threat from her. Perhaps the same was true for Albert. After all, great minds think alike, as the saying goes. As we climbed, I could hear the alb from below make his way up, his heavy bootsteps making a noticeable thud on the cold stone.

In silence once more, we marched on until eventually we caught up with the vixen blacksmith, who stood unmoving at the top step. Eyes wide and mouth agape, she stared at the large ship they lay before us. As noted before, it was relatively the same as a seafaring ship. Probably on the same scale as most passenger crafts. Then again, with Zantile being a landlocked city, even such a common water boat would be a sight, I suppose. Pram's little body was still as she gazed at our transport. Someone had to break her out of this trance.

That someone was me.

I dropped a hand on top of her fluffy little head with a bit too much force put into it, unintentionally knocking her goggles off, leaving them to dangle around her neck. Her entire body shook at the sudden impact, and she nearly lost her balance despite not even moving. Were I a different--or more stupid--man, I would have openly laughed at the sight. I thankfully knew better. Rather than turn in a huff and unleash a few choice words at my action, Pram just pushed away my hand with a sharp slap and walked on, her feet bringing her up to a small tent near the ship.

The three of us followed after her once again, and inside the tent was a small counter/desk. Behind said desk was a young alb woman, her dark eyes moving over the customers before her. When those eyes landed on me, a slight flash of recognition lit up her gaze, and she sat up a big straighter.

"Welcome back, sir," she said with a note of practiced speech, having said this line possibly hundreds of times. "Are these your fellow passengers for the trip?"

"Indeed we are," Albert cut in, not allowing me the actual response. "What time are we taking off?"

In the same manner of a rehearsed line, she responded, "Once you're all on board, the captain will be happy to get going as soon as you're ready." Afterwards, she waved a hand towards the ship, directing us to head on our way.

Not one to stand around doing nothing, Pram shouted out, "No more dawdle," and marched her tiny feet towards our transport.

Without missing a beat, Vaughn chuckled and followed after, mumbling to no one in particular, "Never knew a kobar this funny."

As we all made our way onto the airship, I took note of the lack of any real crew. Recalling the last flight I took, I could remember seeing more people at work. As the current moment, there were only two or three odd deckhands. There was a small below deck area, but certainly it couldn't have been large enough to hold the entire crew.

As if sensing my thoughts, the doors to this underneath place burst open and out came a baffling amount of people. Over two dozen...well, 'sailors' didn't seem the right word, but they were something tangentially related in a sense. Over two dozen of them wandered out and took their places manning the ship; sails, masts, ropes, the whole shebang, really. If one didn't know better, they could easily mistake this situation for a normal 'anchors-up' sequence, which technically it was quite similar. Only difference was the fact we wouldn't be taking a voyage out to sea, but instead to the clouds.

A low whistle came from Vaughn then. "Wasting no time. I like it."

"No sense waiting around when there's a job to be done," came a familiar voice.

Well, familiar to me, at least.

To our right, the owner of the voice was one simply dressed man of roughly middle age. A face hidden behind a scraggly beard made it next to impossible to make out much of an expression from him. All that could be seen beneath his overgrown hair curtaining most of his head were his eyes. Those bright pinkish eyes glinted with an air of joy, as if every waking moment of this man's life was nothing but wonderful. Or perhaps he was just good at masking his true feelings. Either way, he took a look at the four of us and offered up a large mitt in a welcoming gesture.

"Captain Zell," he boasted. "I know Cedric there, but can't say any of your faces are ringing a bell."

A tiny fur-covered hand was the first to meet the captain's. "Pram named Pram," the little smith happily barked out. "Never ride airship before."

Albert stepped forth and quickly recited his own name as he shook the good captain's hand. Next in turn was Vaughn, who also offered up his profession and reason for his being here.

Zell waved him off, however. "Yes, yes, Cedric already told me. Whitefall. Wouldn't much tell me what he was hunting this time, though."

Giving a half-hearted shrug, I responded, "If you knew what it was, you might try to kill it yourself."

"Ha! Not likely." After barking an order at some passing crewmen, he turned back and continued on. "I don't care if it's the secret of eternal youth you're after. If it's in Whitefall, you're welcome to have it all to yourself, boy."

"What's the matter, old man? Scared of the spooky forest?"

"Ain't the forest," he said with a sniff. "S'what lives in it that concerns me. Should concern you, too."

"Save it," I retorted, bringing a hand up to stifle any further talk on the subject. "I've heard enough of it from those two." A thumb pointed towards my friends, who weren't paying the captain and I any mind, and were staring off at the airship.

"Anyway," interjected my escort, "what's the over-under on how long it'll take to get there?"

A hand was brought up to rub at the captain's massive beard. "According to my navigator, we'll be coming up on our destination a little before midnight." He paused and gave a small wave to the helmsman and made some odd gesture. "Speaking of, we're taking off in a minute."

Turning around, Zell stood up tall and proud and belted out, "Get this old girl flying already! We're wasting daylight!"

At the sound of his call, the entire crew moved in doubletime. Bodies were a blur as they set to work, everyone moving this way and that, just barely avoiding crashing into one another as they worked. It was a type of organized chaos. And sure enough, before you could utter "look at that," the ship's rhubrum core roared to life and the rotating blades began whipping into action. Before too long, the slight rumble underneath my feet was an all too recognizable feeling of the airship moving away from the dock and slowly upwards.

"Woah! Ship actually fly." The sheer shock in Pram's voice made me think she might have believed the ship wasn't capable of such a feat. Her little feet quickly brought her over to the side of the ship, where she looked down at the town below becoming smaller and smaller as we ascended. Wide eyes glimmered with joy as we were coming closer to touching the clouds.

Now that the journey was upon us, the fast-paced crew slowed down to their initial meandering about, and Zell was overseeing it all, his hands on his hips as he stood in pride of his ship and her crew. The bushy beard hid a smile, but if you looked close enough, you could see a very faint upward pull along the hairs where a mouth would be.

The good captain faced us all again and stated, "Welp, this is where things get boring. May as well settle in. Like I said, it'll be quite a while 'till we touch down again."

He didn't have to tell me twice, though I suspected my fellow travelers might have realized just how long the trip would take. I sure didn't the first time I payed Zell for a ride. Thankfully, I now knew better, and had brought ample boredom removers; cards, dice, a few research papers on unicorns to help my hunt. I wouldn't be caught up staring at the sky, hoping to see even a simple bird like I did on my first ride.

A certain alchemist appeared at my shoulder. "You didn't tell us this would take most of the day." He actually sounded rather miffed, his tone harsh.

My face warped into a look of bewilderment at his stupidity. As if I was explaining to a child, I told him, "Zantile is in the southern region, and Winterfall is all the way north and borders Bristole. Of course it would take a while, but an airship was the fastest available route." I went further on, "Besides, it's not like you can just go back now. Unless you wanna take your chances jumping off the side."

A long sigh was his only response as he wandered off again, only to replaced by Vaughn. The blue skinned man eyed me for a moment and asked rather pointedly, "Just how much money do you have?"

"Enough to know not to boast about it," I scoffed mockingly.

"Smart man." Flashing a grin, he faked a yawn. "Think I'm gonna find a free spot somewhere and waste away the day."

I offered up the possibility of some card of dice games to while away the hours. Surprisingly, he took me up on that, and we even rounded up Pram and Albert for some friendly gambling. Not having much in the way of spare funds any of us would be willing to let go to the wayside on a game, we opted to instead play for small amounts of food. A bit of dried pork here, a handful of nuts and berries there, and such it went. So engrossed in our game, we didn't even notice the sun slipping behind the horizon until a crew member rang out a tiny bell to alert everyone to dinner.

Down in the crew quarters, things were cramped. More so than one would imagine for a large ship such as this one. Everyone was standing elbow to armpit down there, but through it all, I could detect a delicious odor. The scent of grilled meat reached my nostrils, and I was in heaven. It was a meat I had eaten myself on many an occasion; venison. It was enough to make my mouth water at the smell of it. I waited in that line, slow moving as it was, and when it was finally my turn at the front, I was greeted to the beautiful sight of a number of slabs of meat slowly roasting over a makeshift grill being powered by a fire rhubrum. Some people have said using rhubrum for cooking didn't give the same quality taste as classic open fire grilling.

They were dead wrong. The taste was unlike any I'd had before. So tender and juicy, and the added spice rub only elevated the whole of it. No ordinary fire roasting could compare to this, not without a lot of time investment. The meat was damn near falling off the bone, and it had only been sitting on the rhubrum stove for less than five minutes. You couldn't get that from an open fire that easily.

As we were all enjoying the hearty meal, Zell came by and sat down at an open seat across from me. With that big damn beard of his, I began to wonder how he even ate. But, rather than catch a glimpse of this mysterious process, Zell chose to speak up.

"I want to remind you we aren't gonna be dropping you off right on the outskirts of Whitefall."

With a shrug, I noted, "I remember our agreement. Why bring this up now?"

Scoffing, he replied, "It's more for your friends. I'm assuming you forgot to mention the specifics to them?"

"Cedric," spoke the short vixen to my left, "what Captain talk mean?"

I opened my mouth to explain, but Zell reacted faster. "What I mean, little lady, is that ya'll will be setting down in a nice little field a few miles southwest of the forest. Mostly due to me n' me crew not wanting to get too close to that hellsite."

"Speaking of the hellsite," Albert pushed into the conversation, "how much do you know about it, Captain?"

A slight pause came before the ship's master responded. When he did open his mouth, he began with a sigh. "About as much as anyone else, I suppose; big forest, dangerous beasties, such and such."

"Been inside?" Pram's tiny voice shot up in volume to be heard over the noises from the crewmembers surrounding us.

"Never in me life," he confirmed with a nod. "Don't want to, neither."

Vaughn chimed in with, "Guess that's not much of a shock. I mean, I'd have never gone in there had I not been paid to. No different from this time, really."

"Aw, ya mean the big bad blue boy ain't got the stones to wander into Whitefall without getting some sol for his troubles?"

Zell's little teasing actually made Vaughn's lips crack into a small smile. "Says the old man who's dropping us off some miles away from the spooky forest," he joked back.

"Fair enough," the captain concluded.

Someone appeared at the top of the stairs then to announce we'd be arriving at the drop off point within the hour. A collective murmuring arose from the whole room, not to mention my own table. The crew would have be glad to head to a nearby town and have their fun, I imagined. My body moved on its own, and I saw myself depart the table and back to the deck of the ship to see our surroundings.

The boards creaked underfoot as I made the small ascent up the stairs. The night sky was spilling out in front of me as I passed the doorframe, and there off in the distance was an immense expanse of trees. Tall--no, giant--oaks shot up from the earth below, so thickly packed together, it made sense why an airship wouldn't be able to land within even if Zell wanted to risk it. As the tell-tale name implied, the forest was blanketed by an eerie snow, a shroud of frost that only extended to the edge of the trees and nowhere else. Whitefall was strange in that way; an eternal winter covered the area, and no one could ever explain how or why.

This late at night, without any sound around, the forest looked almost serene, like something out of a painting. So still and silent, it was hard to believe that just within those woods lie all manner of awful beasts. As if Whitefall itself could hear my thoughts, a loud roar echoed from within the oaks, and birds took flight to flee the source of the noise.

"Sounds like a drake." Vaughn's rough tone came as a shock to me. I hadn't even heard him approach, those heavy boots of his somehow as quiet as a doormouse.

Leaning against the railing, the words, "I saw a drake once," fumbled out of me.

"On a hunt?"

"Nah, nothing like that," I answered. "Back before Zantile, I used to live in Astril."

Recognition lit up Vaughn's eyes at the mention of my old hometown. "Oh, Astril? I've been there before."

"Really now?"

"Yea, yea. Few years back, I had a job with a traveling merchant, and Astril was on our route. Nice place. Beautiful apple orchard."

"Best damn apples this side of the Temsik River," I boasted. "So juicy and sweet, it's like a piece of candy melting right in your mouth." It'd been some time since I talked about my old town. It was actually sorta nice doing so.

A short, happy sigh escaped the blue skinned man. After the short breath, he urged me to continue my own story. "About that drake you saw?"

"Oh yea," I remembered. "Anyway, when I was a kid, some performing troupe came through town, and they had this drake with them. Claimed they had it since it hatched, and trained it to do a couple tricks; flying in a circle above the crowd, jump through a little hoop, spit acid at a target a few yards away. Just some basic things, I guess, but being a drake, it impressed people, ya know."

"Heh. Yea. Seen some tamed monsters before. Never goes well, though." A hand was brought up to his neck and he mimed a knife sliding across his throat. "Eventually, their feral instincts kick in."

"Hm," I mused.

A knife appeared in one of his hands and he began to clean out the dirt beneath his fingernails with it. "So, was that the end of that little story? You saw a drake, and that's it?"

"Pretty much," I affirmed with a nod.

A small, hoarse laugh bubbled out of him. It sounded almost painful with how scratchy his voice was. "You are awful at telling stories, friend."

Despite how slightly chilling the man's laugh was, it also had an infectious quality to it, and I couldn't help but join in. Unbeknowst to either of us, as we were laughing like idiots, Pram and Albert had wandered up onto the deck and came to find us. To the two of them, we must have made a peculiar sight.

A loud stomp ceased the laughing. Pram had lifted one of her feet and heavily shot it back down to the wood beneath us. Now that everyone's eyes were on her, her face lit up in a wide grin.

"Pram have question."

No one responded to her. The silence dragged on, as if the air itself was also waiting for the little blacksmith to just get on with it.

Undeterred by the lack of the desired responded, she continued, "How Cedric track unicorn? He not see before, yes?"

Albert's hand clasped together as the shock hit him. "That's a fine question." He turned his attention to me and, "Do you even know how?"

And just like that, the full force slap of their collective doubt struck me again. How could my own friends not trust me? They knew I was one of the best hunters they'd ever known. I mean, who else could regularly take down dangerous beasts and then sell off all their pieces parts? Some stupid would-be hero? No, those idiots would get themselves killed trying to look cool or some such lunacy.

When the hurt left me, I cleared my throat and, with chest puffed out, I stated, "I've done my research, like any good hunter would. There's not a whole lot of information on unicorns, but what there is, I made sure to study. I know their usual eating habits, the exact patterns in their hoofprints, the color of their urine, everything I'd need to know to..."

The tiny shrill of a bell being rung cut me off. From up above us, the man in the ship's crow's nest was alerting the crew our destination had arrived.

We were at our dropoff point.