My, my. This wasn't here the last time she came through this way. The striped woman stood at the mouth of a long expanse of ice. Paws still firmly planted on land, she looked down the long path with olive colored eyes. She was interested. Terribly interested. Hmm... well it wouldn't hurt to walk out a little ways, right? Ignoring the wind, Dusk took a few hesitant steps out onto the slick ice, testing its thickness. Would it even hold her weight? The leggy woman gave a little bounce with her front paws. She strained her ears listening for little cracks but there was nothing. Or at least she couldn't hear anything over the gusting wind. Dusk took a few more steps and then a few more. Mist from the churning sea spattered her coat so she attempted to stay as close to the center of the path as possible. Each time the wind gave a particularly hard shove, the woman stopped, dug her claws in and held on until the sky gods needed to take a breath once more. Where did this even lead? Was she going to find out or was she going to be a chicken shit and turn around? Dusk stopped and curled her neck, looking in the direction that she'd come from. Oof. Had she really gotten that far already? The woman looked ahead again. Well, she'd already come this far. Might as well keep on keepin' on. And so she did. "Speech"

Kiela had spent most of her time in the far northern reaches of Boreas, so it hadn't caught her by surprise that something unusual was happening. The winter had been unusually harsh, with snowfall much higher than she'd experienced here last winter. As she trekked further north it became apparent that something even stranger was occurring than just the weather. A strange land form had appeared, seemingly overnight - or perhaps it had taken longer, but she'd been absent from these parts for a few weeks now. A long stretch of ice extended seemingly infinitely into the sea, and Kiela's interest was immediately piqued. She doubted this was a route her reindeer would chose to take but she still wanted to scope it out.

Carefully she navigated down toward where it began. It was a sheer plane of ice that met land and snow; nothing noteworthy, as far as she could tell, but she'd never seen anything quite like this before with how it extended out into the sea. The surface wasn't too slick at first, coated with a fresh dusting of snow, and warily she began to walk. Before long it became much more treacherous, the ice bridge (and her, now) abruptly being battered by the sea's harsh winds. Kiela's movements were slow and deliberate, cautious not due to fear but rather out of self-preservation. If she deemed this place too dangerous she would be happy to retreat, but she wanted to get a good sense of what was going on first.

And apparently someone else had the same idea. She squinted, shielding her eyes from a gust of alarmingly strong wind, as she tried to get a better look at the figure up ahead. It was a difficult feat though and she settled for simply quickening her pace until she was hopefully within earshot, though the wind might prove that more difficult. "Hello?" Kiela called out, her voice heavy with her family's native accent. "This place, it was not here before?" It was unlike her to overlook such a striking formation in the land, but perhaps she had. She'd like to be certain this was some anomaly rather than just make assumptions.

Traversing such terrain was treacherous and Dusk was already terribly tired. Her toes were frozen and they ached a bit from digging her claws into the ice to keep from being blown off the side of the bridge. The only thing that really helped was that the bridge wasn't entirely flat. The edges were raised and frozen thanks to the cold temperature and the constant onslaught of waves. She braced herself against the edge and took a small break. That was when she heard the voice calling from behind her. Turning her head, Olive colored eyes rested upon the approaching form of a russet colored woman. Carefully and slowly, Dusk moved backwards towards the woman. Not only so they could hear one another more easily, but so she could feel a little bit of the woman's warmth. It might make her feel a bit more alive. Right now, she felt like she could be frozen to the bridge at any moment. Already a sheen of ice clung to the longest layer of her fur. Any more and she might just become part of the bridge whether she liked it or not. "An interesting thing, isn't it?" Her tones were amiable despite the precarious situation that they both shared. "Do you think it reaches somewhere? It could end in the middle of the ocean and we'll be out here for nothing." A scoffing laugh was released before Dusk looked back out into the unknown. "I'm Dusk. It's easier to keep your strength if you crouch and take breaks." She felt nice enough to share a little tip with the pretty woman. "Speech"

It was becoming increasingly apparent to her just how much danger she might be in, especially as she ventured further out onto the ice. For now Kiela was intent on holding her ground and navigating this thing safely... though she had no idea how far the ice might stretch. She had no intention of leaving Boreas though and she worried if she went too far that it might be a deadly feat to try to return. Kiela squinted her eyes tightly against the bitter wind as it continued to lash at her face mercilessly. She had a feeling conditions were only going to get more brutal as she headed out further onto the ice, but her curiosity hadn't been fully sated yet, at least not enough to send her back.

The stranger pulled back toward her. Kiela was hardly one for physical contact in general, but she didn't deny that the stranger moving closer to her was a comfort. Even her thick coat, accustomed to the harsh winter weather, seemed incapable of fully blocking out the chill of the wind here. She let herself linger a bit closer to the stranger than she might normally, though she'd refused to let her guard down completely. She wasn't too far from the shore, but still, slipping off the edge of this ice bridge would surely be a death sentence - and it was a risk she wasn't willing to take. "It is.. very strange. Beautiful, but.. I am not sure what to think of it."

Her wariness stemmed from self-preservation above all else. Was it really wise to trek so far out into the sea, on a questionable bridge of ice? "I do not know," Kiela answered earnestly. "Lands do not just.. appear. They are not like sun or moon." There were many elements to life that were cyclical - from the weather to the seasons - but land forms like this did not just come and go overnight. Something strange had happened here. She mused over this for a moment, nodding at the stranger's advice and shifting her position so she was crouched down slightly as she took a few tentative strides forward before pausing. "I am Kiela," she introduced herself.

The minimal warmth that emanated from the other woman was enough to give Dusk a little life. She wasn't warm by any means but it reminded her what warmth was. Unlike the other woman, Dusk didn't have an extremely thick coat. She was a midland wolf and, while her coat was thicker in winter, it never got as thick as those that lived year round in the northern territories. Olive eyes looked out over the length that they still had to traverse. It was rather beautiful like the russet fae said. With that, Dusk could agree. A strong gust blew and the striped lady was forced to close her eyes against it. Not being able to see on such a slippery surface made her nervous and her paws flexed, trying to dig her claws in even more. Once the gust let up, she cracked an eye. "No, lands don't just appear, but this is far from land." They were just on some hard ass water. Not land at all. The lady gave her name as Kiela and Dusk nodded in acceptance. She was glad to have another with her while on this treacherous journey. "Well, Kiela... I'm going to keep going." She shot the other woman a confident grin. "If everyone decided to turn back when things got tough, we'd never find anything new." Whether the other woman followed or not, Dusk was going to keep going. Unbridled curiosity fueled her. With claws still digging into the ice, the crouched woman began to move forward once more. Slowly but surely, she would make her way to the other side. "Speech"

As accustomed as she might be to the cold, it was impossible to ever get used to frigid winds like this. She was reminded briefly of many nights during her youth spend huddled up close to her family for warmth during those long, dark winter nights. This was a type of cold that must simply be endured and one could never really get used to. Hopefully standing closer to Dusk would help maintain a tolerable level of body heat, though she felt her comfort declining rapidly. Only when it reached near dangerous levels would she make the decision to turn back.

Kiela squinted as a powerful gust of wind struck them, crouching further as Dusk had suggested. Digging her claws into the ice provided her some traction against the strong force of the wind, and only once the moment had passed did she warily open her eyes and refocus her attention on Dusk. "Maybe," she replied, rather non-committaly. She didn't have the faintest idea what this place was and she wasn't about to debate it regardless; this was nothing like the glaciers she'd explored in her youth, though similar in some ways. This was something else entirely, Kiela was certain of it.

She nodded at Dusk's words, fully agreeing with the sentiment. She held tradition as most important above all else, but part of the Jarvela tradition was to venture onward into the unknown. There was no growth without exploration, which was why she'd come to Boreas in the first place. "You are right," she sounded solemn in the face of another brief wind that touched them, this one more gentle than the last, though she suspected the wind's mercy was short-lived. "You - are from around here? The north?"

Her own determination seemed to ignite the same in Kiela and the other woman agreed that they needed to keep moving if they were ever to know what lay on the other side. Carefully, Dusk crept forward. There were times when it was easier to move across the ice, then there were times when the wind caught her just right and threatened to send her sliding over the edge. Couldn't let that happen, so Dusk crouched every time the wind gusted hard from the side. Couldn't be too safe on a slab of slippery ground. Kiela asked if Dusk was from around here and the striped woman laughed aloud, lips pulling back in a grin. "Here? No. I'm from midland. Warm summers and cold winters. Nothing like this though." Pulling her attention from the ground below her for a moment, she spared an olive colored look at the woman. "You are from the north though. You look better equipped for the cold than I am." An observation. Kiela's fur seemed to grow more thickly than Dusks own. What would they find on the other side of this bridge? Would it peter out in the middle of the ocean and leave them dissatisfied? Perhaps there would be some brilliant new land on the other side. Something that no wolven paws had ever touched. Or maybe there would be tons of wolves. New challenges for the bisexual woman to conquer. A soft snort of amusement was released as Dusk lost herself in thought. Speculation was all fine and dandy, but they'd never truly know until they got there. "Speech"

This ice bridge was beyond intriguing. Perhaps it was some kind of siedi, a sacred place? It was hard to view it as anything else since it had seemingly appeared suddenly out of the sea. Kiela had no doubt it had been shaped by strange, unusual forces that were definitely out of their control. This winter had been a particularly brutal one and it didn't seem out of the realm of possibility that a section of the sea could've simply frozen over to create this mass of ice, a process exacerbated by the season's intensity.

She was reminded with each second that passed, just how strong these gusts of winds were. She felt them threaten to take her away with each step - she swore she felt the ice itself creaking beneath her paws, swaying as if threatening to spill her over the side of the ice bridge. "Ah," Kiela responded thoughtfully. Even in the north the summers could be warm - at least comparatively - but she had a feeling Dusk meant something far different. "Yes. The cold, I am used to. I am surprised  it has lasted so long. Usually by now, I expect warmer."

Even in the far north, the cycle of the seasons was unavoidable. The bitter cold ebbed and flowed like the tides of the seas; or the rising of the sun and the moon. Things were all cyclical, and though the pattern often shifted it still remained largely the same and often predictable as far as she had learned. Until this season, at least. This was something different entirely, something she couldn't have predicted as much as she tried. But still she pressed on, one deliberate step at a time, keeping her footing as she took slow strides forward and kept herself low to the ice.