Forged Destiny [Book 2: Ch. 7, Ch. 8]

At about twenty metres, however, the pattern stopped – and the closest one lunged and dashed towards me.

"Fight!" Pyrrha, yelled.

The Cervus struck like a rampaging horse, except five times as deadly. The jagged horns skittered off my shield, pinging above my head, their tips glinting in the light. One threat avoided did not mean the other, however, and its body slammed into me.

Snow gave way beneath me, and a strange hardness beneath it that drove the breath from my lungs. My muscles ached but I staggered back onto my feet and faced the beast, confident that without its momentum, it would now be easy prey.

[...]

Something slammed into my back and drove me down. Sharp objects clattered on my armour, muffled somewhat by the thick cloak. Snow pushed into my mouth and face, threatening to suffocate me.

[...]

"Behind you!"

This time, I was prepared. My feet dug down, the shield whipped about as I spun on the spot, crashing into the antlers and driving the beast's head down. Its frame struck me once more, but I squatted and bore it, pushing back and twisting my arms to the left.

[...]

"This isn't a snow plain," Kaedin cried, "It's an ice sheet!"

[...]

The world before me shifted. Or rather, I shifted – and the ground that was under me. A great crack rent the ice, a fissure that cut across the ground like lightning through the sky, and the grinding of ice against ice as the world gave way. The others cried out. I did too, even as I struggled for purchase and to stay standing. One hand grappled with the ice, as my feet struggled for grip.

"Jaune!" Blake's voice reached my ears, the Assassin visible before me, on the safer ground and with one hand extended over the edge. "Jump," she shouted, "it's your only chance!"

My only chance, yet the rapidly giving way ground didn't give me it. I staggered forward as the ice behind me gave way, fell onto one knee with a gasp – but as the cracks grew larger, I pushed forward and leapt for her.

My hand missed by an inch, and for a moment I expected my death. Blake howled and reached further, and with a gasp, her hand gripped my wrist, holding it tightly.

It was a mistake.

My height, my weight, not to mention the armour I wore… Blake had not the time for to scream, only to stare into my eyes with wide golden ones as she was torn from her spot and dragged into the depths with me.

The world lost all light, little more than blue glimmers of reflected sunlight as the walls seemed to shudder and quake around us. In one last attempt, more desperate than hopeful, I dragged the girl close to my chest.

Ice slammed into my back as I struck and bounced off something. A gasp and a cough escaped me, followed by a startled shout as we fell again – cut off by another impact on solid ice, and then another. Blake's face was crushed into the fur cloak over my breastplate, my bruised and battered body taking the agony as we skittered and slid across jagged protrusions and the icy walls. Rather than fall elegantly to one, merciful impact, our bodies struck every piece of rock and wall on the way down.

With a cry, we both landed on a slanted outcrop, slipping down as gravity and momentum took us. My eyes opened, past the pain and the agony, to see a solid wall of ice approach.

I flipped us over, kept Blake before me – and as my body struck the ice – knew no more.

—Forged Destiny [Book 2: Ch. 7]


She glanced nervously about the cavern, which was crafted entirely from ice. It looked like we'd fallen from a chute a little further up. "I'm not sure this would hold if another earthquake like the last struck."

"I guess so… have you tried calling the others?"

"My voice echoed and was lost among the ice," she said. "I've been unable to hear anything from them, either, and my hearing is better than most. I think we fell a long way, Jaune. I'm not sure we're even close to them anymore."

—Forged Destiny [Book 2: Ch. 8]