Svartis's brain hilariously and coincidentally operated by snowballing. One thought and idea tumbled into another and got bigger and bigger - he blinked, "... and that someone is probably going to come back?" Icy eyes stared into the storm.

"We can ask them, then... ?" Dread made sure his children - and all of the children in their little family - knew their manners and were polite. Please and thank you was very important and integral to survival. Svartis had latched on to more than just those two phrases, but being nice got you places. "Maybe they'll give us two of them."

Wait - "a shield... might be nice if we can make one at home." His fins flared again, thinking about the Alpha that'd brutalized him. "If it can keep certain things out, I mean." Pretty and functional.

@Dread

Dread huffed, tilting his head. He didn't grasp what Svartis meant; after all, he could move in and out through the crystals, so barring other Gembound didn't occur to him. Keeping out the cold, however...

"A good shield," he agreed, and then rapidly wing-walked forward, thrusting his head into the snowstorm. (He hated that cold.)

He struggled, for a moment, to see anything beyond: to peer for someone setting out crystals, perhaps, or stealing them... he wasn't sure. But as before, when he'd been here before the crystals had mysteriously appeared, he saw nothing at all.

"I don't see anything," he informed Svartis, which may have seemed odd without context: as it stood, Dread simply looked like he'd shoved his head into the snow to stare outward. And given how his magic had failed, that was exactly what he'd done.

@Svartis

Svartis didn't question his father's methods of attempting to scan for lifeforms, because he was having a thought occur to him: wouldn't it be a bit intimidating if two full-grown dragons appeared before you, asking about your shield-crystals and if they can have some? Politeness only got you so far where looks were concerned.

... what if someone was a dragon... ?

He blinked and shook himself free of a powder-dusting of snow. "No?" he echoed a bit mindlessly, "maybe they're deeper in the storm?" Svartis flared out his fins, wings raising preemptively. "I can look... ? You stay toasty out here." If he could've smirked, he absolutely would. His tone was clearly and gently teasing - but, a smidge concerned.

Y'know, sparing his dear old father the frigid cold as best he can. Anyone could see Dread not frolicking eagerly in the snow, and see him shivering intermittently.

@Dread

Dread glanced with some surprise to Svartis. Somehow, he'd expected his son to have already explored the depths of the storm, so it was with slow confusion that he explained:

"You can't go far in." The older dragon then rallied himself to actually detail what this meant. "The wind is too bad. It's as bad as home, but you can't see. So it pushes you back. I looked in, but it is too hard to fly in there." Relatively coherent, at least.

Dread nodded out into the swirling white, thinking for a moment. Warmth flickered up around him as he did so.

"We can both look-? Maybe. I don't know if it will make it better. Or easier," he added, staring off into the snow.

It sounded like there should be some 'but' on the end of that, some idea, some offer--but there wasn't. Dread just fell silent, glancing to Svartis for confirmation.

@Svartis

Svartis'd been too caught up in the euphoria of snow to know that there was a world of more snow just beyond this wall. The idea of it excited him; it could be a test of his finesse, and ability to suit what he'd almost been shaped for — sleek, aerodynamic, but strong enough to cut through a fierce wind. Leave it to him to be disappointed by his father's explanation, though.

Fins flattened somewhat and he grumbled bereftly, "I'll take your word for it." Monoceros was one thing — visibility was still rather good — this was another. "No way to know you're hitting a wall 'til you hit it, huh?" Icy eyes narrowed, a faint note of challenge in them. He could manage it — ah, wait, "it might be too narrow for wings anyways... ?"

Best not to chance shattering them on rocks.

Walking might be best, in any case. Svartis gave a single dip of the head, "I could make ice walls for us to rest behind, if we need to." It'd break the flow of the wind, he supposed. It wasn't outright yes-of-course-let-us-go-in but it was jumping the gun eagerness.

@Dread

Dread eyed Svartis, and then just sort of draconically-shrugged his agreement, looking forward. He didn't know what Svartis meant by 'narrow'; so far as Dread knew it was just the broad northern expanse of Polaris. But he didn't bother asking: he didn't always understand a lot and it wasn't, to him, alwys worth questioning.

For now he reared back, trying to peer magically into the snow again. "There are things in there. At least one big thing. On four legs. With a tail," he said, at last. "But it's very far back."

"Try it. The walls. If you can make them big enough for us," he agreed. He knew the wind was strong enough to shove them out; large wings were powerful, yes, but they also just gave stronger winds more surface area to work against, as Dread had discovered the hard way. They were like... big umbrellas in a wind tunnel, basically, billowing out like sails and sending him tumbling the other way. Skillful maneuvering helped, but didn't fix it all.

"I can't do much. My magic is still bad," he explained, though he couldn't... even remember if he'd told Svartis about the trial.

@Svartis

Svartis'd just been guessing at the width; who knew how long the wideness of Polaris could last? It very well could just be a constantly shrinking diameter in there! He was... just thinking ahead of time, that's all.

His head twisted around to watch Dread rearing up and staring, not immediately catching the purpose of it. The ice dragon never particularly bothered with learning how to hunt prey - and spot Gembound - by blood alone. Sight and smell got him far enough, unreliable as magic tended to be. Svartis returned the not-questioning favor by... not questioning the explanation of things-that-lay-within, because: a.) maybe Dread knew more; b.) maybe Dread saw more. It was awfully specific, but helpful nonetheless.

'We can try to get to it? Or signal it?" His magic wasn't particularly bright, but someone's was. What if it's an attacker - "Here, let me -" Svartis inhaled, and spat at the snow in front of himself and his father. The resulting wall of ice was barely large enough for either dragon to hunch down behind, but it was decent enough. A good enough hideaway for Dread to do... whatever it was that he'd do... ?

"My magic is still bad," "... huh? What?" Evidently, no. "Did something happen?" Svartis craned his neck, as if he could see Dread's tailtip from all the way over here.

@Dread

He shook himself, as if trying to remember; and he tried to keep his heat bound to him as he wing-walked swiftly toward the first glacial barrier. Svartis had set it up neatly, and Dread hunkered down, head low, in an almost serpentine manner as he hurried for it.

"I did a TEST. Thing. There was an owl! There were gemstones falling out of rocks. And a bowl," he 'explained.' "When I finished, my magic was strange! Broken. But I think it may become stronger." He said all of this almost absently, eyes still searching the snowstorm, spined flattened back against the cold.

It was bitter. He didn't like that. But so far, he couldn't really tell where they should go from here--and so he simply waited for Svartis to decide, to make another barrier--or to retreat.

@Svartis

Svartis blinked slowly. That was... a great many details that didn't quite add up. Clearly, the gemstones went into the bowl, maybe, probably - and then... magic goes kaput!? The black dragon's spines lifted while his father's flattened irritably. "Weird," he offered halfheartedly, too confused to offer anything more constructive. "Stronger... how?"

If it was bad... how could it be stronger? Was Dread being forced to hold back because it was uncontrollable now? (Moreso than before, because it was... literally fire.) Svartis blinked again and shook himself, peering above their impromptu barrack and working to conjure another. It was just as short as the first, but sturdier-looking and with a particular lip to throw the wind up, rather than over.

The dragon vaulted over their current digs and shoved for the safety of the next. Once Dread was there (he hoped) he tried, "... where'd you take this - test with the owl? I've never heard of anything like that." Not that Svartis ever got out anywhere.

@Dread

Dread flinched against the snow, and glanced at Svartis as his son spoke.

"No... Hm." He tried to think of how to describe it in some way that made sense. "It is like... falling out of the sky. And your wings hurt. But you can feel that you will fly higher when they heal?" He wasn't sure that all made sense, and with an irritated huff he called on his magic again to warm him. It hadn't done anything, last time.

"The owl-thing is strange. It is very big," he added; "It's cave is somewhere past here. That is why I wanted to come here--to ask why it took my fire! Maybe it put all this snow here... so I can't find it, again," Dread lamented, his tone one of mourning.