We’re a day behind now, and are camped in the same place as last night. It’s not because we wanted to remain in this nice, warm shelter, but because I worked up the courage to eat an iceberry last night before bed. It made me violently ill, so I’m not sure how the horses tolerate the berries.
However, since just tasting the berries without swallowing didn’t make the others ill, Niahla’Sen thinks the juice might be edible for us in small quantities. She mixed some of the juice with water, and so far, after drinking it all day, she and Pelmarco remain unaffected. I’m still recovering, so I haven’t tasted any of their iceberry water mix, but I’m not sure if I want to. They both say it has a tart flavor, and find it very difficult to drink. Niahla’Sen is certain these are the same type of iceberries the Barbidons use in Sarda. She claims it doesn’t seem quite as cold as it was yesterday, so she thinks the acclaimed ability of the juice to warm a person is true.
Pelmarco uncovered a fragment of parchment in our current shelter. Niahla’Sen examined the ancient writing, and concluded it wasn’t anything significant, at least by her standards. She believes it was part of a letter written from a soldier to his family. It mentions several familiar places, such as Atalan and several other cities of Tanarad, along with a few other things we would not know about. Pelmarco took it back rather than allow Niahla’Sen to discard it. He believes the piece of the letter is significant in a historical sense because it provides an insight, however brief, into the lives of the soldiers who fought so long ago. He’ll probably have it delivered to Atalan and presented to the library there.
We should continue south tomorrow, although by now we’re so far south I’m not sure how much farther we can go. It’s likely just an illusion though, and we probably have more than another month until we reach the absolute bottom of the world.