With each wet, snow-crunching step through the stinging chill of mountain winds, Archie realized that the concept of summer was just a suggestion. A foolish notion that didn't apply where the air was thin and the birds' song was nowhere to be found. Two days of marching had taken them from the lush grass and valleys of Jakha up north to slushy snow and stony slopes.

"I can't tell…how long…we've been going," Blanche panted.

"The farther north…we go…" Sutton groaned and stopped, resting all of his weight on his walking stick. "The longer…the days…Must be…nearly twenty hours…of sunlight now."

Archie stopped to take a few rejuvenating breaths before speaking. He wanted to put on a strong, inspiring front for the others. "That just gives us more time to move. Better that than twenty hours of darkness."

Blanche dragged her feet through the snow to sit on a dry boulder. "That means we can take…more breaks."

Archie ran his tongue across the sandpaper of his chapped lips as he assessed everyone's fatigue. Blanche and Sutton were always quick to exhaustion, so Archie couldn't tell how dire their state was. Nori wobbled as she walked, but she pulled through. Barley kept his parka hood closed so tightly that Archie could only see his eyes and the top of his nose, the Khalyan swaying as he lumbered along. Out of habit, Archie looked for Hawthorn, frowning at his absence. Without him, the hike was quiet. No funny anecdotes. No jokes. Just hard work and heavy breathing.

"Yeah. Yeah, okay, let's rest for a bit." Archie slid the straps off his arms, his pack falling like a stone to the ground and his muscles aching and adjusting with rejoice. They had reloaded on jerkies and sacks of grains, and they had ground the tariaksuq antlers down into dust and carried them in bags, but the real killers were the tents that they had added to their packs.

They could no longer stay warm through the night while exposed to the stars, and while the tents were thinly layered and small, the few pounds that they added took carrying the packs beyond the threshold from difficult to downright exhausting. The students squeezed to double up, Barley getting his own tent, forcing them to carry three tents. Barley took one, Archie took the other, and Blanche and Nori took turns carrying theirs. Sutton never helped Archie to carry theirs, and while Archie took the burden with stoicism, he couldn't help but get annoyed every time Sutton complained about exhaustion.

Nori slung off her pack and joined Blanche on the rock. Barley didn't remove his burden, just sliding down another boulder and plopping on the ground without a word.

"Let's get our bearings," Archie commanded. "Sutton, maps. Blanche, try to find the grove."

"In a second," Blanche said as she removed her hood and pulled open the chest of her parka. She dug through her pockets and pulled out a piece of dried yak jerky. "I need to eat something first."

"Don't go over your rations, Blanche!" Sutton scolded, his breath fogging up his glasses.

"I'm within my daily a-lott-ment, Suh-tton," Blanche sneered, filling the space between her syllables with potent exasperation. "Now check your maps, map boy."

"Oh! Well why don't you—"

"Guys!" Archie shouted to stop their bickering. Nori turned away to hide her snickering. Archie sighed. "If you have the breath to argue, you have the breath to walk. So should we get moving again, or are you two going to stop?"

Blanche looked away, pouting as she nibbled on her jerky. Sutton rustled through his papers and unfolded a sketched map.

"Ugh, I can't make sense of—Barley, can you make sense of this?" Sutton held out the map, but Barley didn't move. Sutton shook the map a couple of times before resigning and walking over to sit next to Barley, running a gloved finger across the map and pointing at various mountains. "If this is…yeah. Then that's north. And that mountain is this one. That mountain right there…That should be the Katiiq mountain. We need to be on the north side of it. Uhhh…Yeah."

Archie looked to Barley to confirm. Sutton may have spent weeks studying their route, but theory could be a dangerous thing to rely on so far from civilization. Barley stared at the map with glazed eyes.

"Katiiq…double peak," he muttered through the cloth that covered the bottom half of his face.

"Yeah, okay." Sutton pointed at a double-peaked mountain to the northeast. "That's Katiiq. We're going around that one."

"Alright," Archie said. "Let's rest for a bit and then get up this ridge and figure out the best way to get there. Everyone good?"

Nori nodded with enthusiasm. Blanche nodded with forced enthusiasm. Sutton took a deep breath and shrugged. Barley nodded, but it was more like letting his head fall. Archie studied Barley for a moment. Something was wrong, but Barley was doing his best to hide it. The Khalyan offered a feeble thumbs up.

Archie's legs itched to keep moving, but he forced himself to sit. He needed to rest—perhaps more than the others. With Barley still recovering, no one could fight like Archie, and the Bhantla's words rang in his head.

We refer to it as yeti country because they are its stewards, not because they are the only creatures in those mountains. Many things beyond imagination call that land home.

Archie kept his head on a swivel, looking for anything that might be looking for them.

They didn't make it around the mountain before stopping for sleep. They didn't even make it to the mountain. Time and time again, they underestimated the distances between mountains and overestimated how quickly they could move between them. For all of their differences, Sutton and Blanche united to convince Archie to rest for the day.

They were too exhausted to forage or cook, so they ate their jerkies and dried fruits and nuts. Barley set his tent up first, the stakes barely driven into the ground and one side of the canvas buckling in the wind. But he didn't care. By the time Archie had started setting up his own tent, Barley was already asleep.

Their first night after leaving Jakha, the group had bundled together around a fire like they had on their way north from Khaldeer. But after two more days of arduous hiking, no one had the energy to swap stories. It wasn't until Archie and Sutton were settled in their tent, laying with just enough room for their bedrolls to not overlap, that Sutton broke the silence.

"Barley's not fully recovered," he stated.

"I know." Archie had taken more weight from Barley's pack with each passing day, but the Khalyan still got slower and slower. Archie dug his omnihandle out of his pocket, considered his nightly ritual, and tossed it aside.

"I think we might need to head back." Sutton brushed the ceiling of their tent with his fingers, afraid to make eye contact with Archie after such a suggestion.

But Archie understood. "I know," he repeated.

"Maybe he'll bounce back. But if he doesn't…Well, he's slowed down a lot. It might take us five days to get back."

"I know."

"And then we'll need to restock. And rest. We can't go back on the road that quickly."

"I know."

"It might be two weeks to get back to where we are right now."

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"I know."

"We'd miss the Ambrosial Summit."

"I know. They'll understand if we miss a week of class."

Sutton let his hand fall back onto his chest. "You'd miss the chance to retake your exams. You'd be an Orange Jacket for the rest of the year."

Archie's thoughts froze for a moment. An older version of himself reared up from somewhere deep within, reminding him of his desire for prestige and fame. Ranking up was a part of that. Not many great Chefs spent two full years as an Orange Jacket.

He told that older version to quiet down. Now wasn't the time to think about ranks and classifications and legacy. His new mission was much more important than that. His friends were much more important than that.

"That's fine."

Sutton snuck a glance at Archie. "But uh…It'd be the end of the summer."

"I know."

"Nori."

"Oh." Archie forgot to breathe, the thought of losing Nori paralyzing him into a perfect stillness.

"You still haven't told her about the barnacles."

Archie clenched his teeth and cursed the sun that never set. It was easier being vulnerable in the dark. "I don't want to get her hopes up for something that might not work."

Sutton's voice lost his softness. "Look, I understand that my sample size was insufficient for publication, but it was enough to make a conclusion in these circumstances. My theory of growing barnacles will work."

Archie wished he had the heart to laugh. "I'm not doubting your theory. I'm doubting whether or not we'll be able to find the yetis. Whether or not they'll trade with us. Whether or not they'll give us everything we want. I don't know if…No. I know what I would do."

"If you had to choose?"

"Nori is more important."

"Then tell her."

"I don't want to get her hopes up if things don't work out. I don't want…I don't want to give her a chance to protest. I don't want her to feel guilty. She doesn't need to know about the choice. She just needs to know when everything is going to be alright for her."

They laid in silence for a bit, just listening to the wind creep beneath the canvas of the tent.

"The clouds are getting bad," Sutton noted. "There might be a summer snow soon."

"Put something to weigh down the tent. The cold's getting in."

Archie resisted the urge to get up at first light, deciding everyone needed the rest—especially Barley. But after waking up another three times, he made the call for breakfast.

He started by waking Sutton with an unceremonious shake, then moved on to Barley's tent. The Khalyan had slept with the hood of his parka still pulled tightly around his face. He grunted and slowly picked himself, a giant rising from the earth. Finally, Archie went to the girls' tent, taking a peek inside to see Blanche resting her head on Nori's chest. When Archie woke them, Blanche reflexively squeezed Nori and smiled.

Archie let them get up at their own pace, everyone packing up their tents while rubbing the sleep out of their eyes. Barley rolled his things up loosely, the mess making his pack an extra foot taller.

"Let's finish off some of the heavy food," Archie suggested. "Sutton, get the salted venison from your pack. Blanche, can you check to see if there is anything nearby?"

As Sutton got to work unbuckling his pack, Blanche grimaced. "I don't know," she said. "I mean, I can check, but…There's really not much essence anywhere. It was pretty bad yesterday, but today there's almost nothing."

Archie bit a sliver off his lip. "Well, at least that means it'll be easier to find the grove."

"Well…Not exactly. Since there's no essence in the ground, my essence kinda fizzles out. Like it has nothing to travel through."

Archie let his pack fall with a thud to reflect his disappointment. Blanche winced and tried to smile.

"It's okay," she said. "I can still feel it a little. It can't be far, right? The Bhantla said it'd just be a few days."

"Yeah…" Archie tapped his foot against his pack. "She might have thought we'd be going faster."

"We have barely been taking rests, Archie," Nori sighed. Exhaustion had brought back a bit of her short-tempered fire. Archie was glad to see it—even if he was the one feeling the flame.

"Yeah. Yeah, I know." Archie wrapped his tying noodles around the tightly rolled tent canvas.

Sutton looked up from his pack. "I don't have the venison."

"What do you mean, you don't have the venison?"

"It must be in someone else's bag!"

"I put it in your bag, Sutton. It's there. You just need to look harder. It's a three-pound slab of meat in a burlap sack. It shouldn't be hard to find."

Sutton threw out his arms in defeat. "I'm telling you, it's not here! It must be in someone else's bag!"

The Sutton-Blanche alliance was built on fatigue, but it fell apart from hunger.

"Sutton!" Blanche whined. "Did you eat it?!"

"No, Blanche!" Sutton spat back, suddenly full of vim and vigor. "I did not sneak away to eat an entire slab of meat, not that I could! I'm not like you!"

Blanche stomped her foot. "Are you calling me fat?!"

"No! But if you keep eating as much as you do, allow me to be the first!"

Archie and Nori looked at each other, their eyes communicating a shared misery. Archie shook his head and looked at Barley, but Barley didn't look back. He just sat there and stared at the snow, his hands in his pockets.

An alarm sounded in Archie's head.

"Barley? You okay?"

Barley just blinked slowly. His silence spread to Sutton and Blanche, who both stopped to look at him with concern.

"Bar?"

"Enukin," he said at last.

"What's that?" Archie stepped closer to hear better, seeing the sweat on Barley's forehead.

"Enukin," he repeated. His voice was all effort, no life. A flat breath forced from within. "Little people. Troublemakers."

"Hey Bar, let's open this up a bit. Get you some air, yeah?" Archie tugged on Barley's hood, loosening it and revealing Barley's sallow cheeks. Archie's heart sank. The others recognized Archie's panic and approached, standing around Barley.

"Little thieves," Barley muttered. Even though they hadn't begun the day's hike, Barley still had to pause for a raspy breath every few words. "They're weak. Too weak to fight. So they. They steal food. And attack. At the end."

Archie put the back of his hand on Barley's forehead, his knuckles nearly burning at the heat. He exhaled and nodded in an attempt to collect himself. "Okay. Okay, Bar. You're running a little hot."

"How bad is it?" Nori asked. Archie shook his head at her.

"Barley?" Sutton crouched down next to him. "I need to see your midsection."

"Enukin. They steal. While you sleep." Barley's body shifted at the slightest touch, melting this way and that as Sutton tried to get underneath all of the layers of clothing.

Archie cursed at himself. "We used Sutton's bag to hold the tent down last night."

Barley giggled as he broke into a delirious whisper of a children's song. "Enukin enukin, little and meek. They take all your food and then you when you're weak."

Sutton bent down farther, took one look at Barley's exposed midsection, and straightened up, his expression all stone and seriousness. "Archie. It's bad. We have to get back."

Archie looked up at the sky. Nori sucked in her bottom lip. Blanche cupped her hands around her mouth and nose.

Barley smiled through the pain. "Go on. Without me. I know. The way back."

"What?" Archie crouched next to Barley, holding his arm. "No. I'm not sending you back alone. No way."

Everyone nodded and contributed to a chorus of agreement. But then Archie said something that no one expected.

"Nori and Sutton will take you back."

"What?!" Nori balled up her fists. Sutton looked at Archie with understanding silence.

"If Blanche is okay with it, me and her will keep going," Archie added as he looked at Blanche.

She scratched at her lip for a bit before nodding. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine with it."

"I'm not!" Nori protested.

"I've already thought about it, Nori," Archie stated with finality. "There are dangerous things out here. We've been lucky so far, but…Barley's in no state to defend himself. And Sutton can't fight. You have to go with them for protection."

"But—"

"And we can't have Barley carrying everything. Sutton can't carry enough for two, but between the two of you, you can carry enough for three."

"And what about you?!" Nori stomped a foot on the ground. "What if something happens to you?"

Archie looked at Blanche. "We'll play it safe."

"You'll get lost!"

"We have Blanche's foraging. If we end up not finding the grove—or after we do—we'll just head south to get back. Follow the rivers to Jakha."

"It'll be fine, Nori," Sutton added.

"Shut up!" she snapped at him, finger raised to point straight through him.

Tears pooled beneath her eyes. She sucked in her bottom lip, but it still quivered enough to shake her whole chin. Archie stepped forward and embraced her before she could burst into tears. The rest of the group looked away, allowing them a private moment.

Nori pressed her cheek into Archie's chest, her fist feebly pounding his shoulder. "Promise me this isn't goodbye," she half-whispered, half-sobbed.

"I promise, Nori." Archie squeezed her against him. "I promise."

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