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.And those same superheroes liked to bitch abouthow Nightshade would have been be er.Personally, Hex would rather be naked inthe North Pole than have Nightshade as a leader.He had nothing against the guy,Nightshade was pre y much of the good as far as he was concerned, but having theguy as a leader would suck.For one thing, Nightshade wouldn t know diplomacy if itbit him on the arse.Any overtures of peace or war would get the same damn response;ominous silence.And besides, they had a good thing going here with Fantasia takingthe lead and Nightshade being all advisory.Why fix something not fucked up, Hexfigured.With Nightshade s support behind her, Fantasia sounded more confident as shesaid, Then we d like to go to Candy Mountain. Adding nervously because this wasstill Santa Claus, Please. Shockwave came to stand beside Hex and said, snickering, Dude, we re going toCandy Mountain, Charlie. Dibs on the magical leopluradon, Hex mu ered with a snicker of his own.Black Alice smacked them over their heads. Candy Mountain was not made out of candy, Hex was disappointed to discover,but of water in various stages of freezing.Slush seemed to be its favourite form.Onthe plus side, Hex was starting to get warm from just forty minutes of climbing up thedamn thing.He was also more out of breath than he liked.Uni winter break was badfor a lot of things, including keeping up with regular exercise.Hex got enough to foilregular villains, but none of them compared to a mountain that might have been be ernamed Mount Death.It was steep, slippery and cold, and Hex hated to think of what might have hap-pened to them without his luck bolstering each step they d had a few close callsalready.Behind him, he could hear Grayson s ragged breath mixing with his own gasp-ing ones.Ven was on foot too, as flying was a drain on his solar reserves, but he wassilent, though Hex thought that was more a ma er of pride.Fantasia and Nightshadewere doing fine as super-strength and shadow-hopping were damn useful for this kindof situation, and Black Alice was jumping from rock to rock in easy, loping strides.A glove-covered hand appeared in front of Hex, who blinked and followed it upto see Strike staring at him.The thought of refusing lasted for all of a second.Hexgripped it tight and let Strike pull him up onto the ledge. Thanks, Hex mu ered, hurriedly adding so neither one of them would have toacknowledge the word, Why the hell don t you sound like a bellow? The urge to sitdown so great Hex s knees trembled but like hell he would show weakness in front ofStrike.In answer, Strike tapped his belt, where Hex s eyes landed on a small black pol-ished stone, the size of his thumb and inscribed with.Nordic runes? That supposedto mean something? Hex asked, giving Strike a withering look.So sue him, he wasn t into ancient magic stuff.That shit was dangerous, no ma erwhat Marvel said. A rune to boost the constitution, Strike answered.Hex gaped. You cheat! he hissed. That s how you How so? Strike cut in. I m only levelling the field.Your friends can fly andthrow around shadows. At Hex s flustered, voiceless gesturing, he raised an eyebrowand said, Like you wouldn t do the same given the chance. It was a valid accusation, and Hex hated him for it. Whatever, he huffed, turn-ing around to conquer the next ledge.Strike hummed and followed after Hex sedately,because he was a cheating bastard who cheated.Slowly, they made their way up with the demented Christmas elf in the lead. Mathy, Hex sourly noted, almost looked cheerful cheeks pinked and eyes sparkling.The last part of the climb was steep enough to be considered a cliff, and as he lookeddown at the snowy tundra that spread out hundreds of feet below, never ever had Hexbeen more thankful for his powers.Nightshade reached the plateau first and used hisshadows to pull the rest of them up.Hex was almost tempted to hug the guy.The plateau was nowhere near the top, halfway at best, but climbing further wasclearly a bad idea.The rest of the mountain was made of jagged ice and covered in adense mist, and barring the fliers, there was no way they were making it up there.Andthis far up in the clouds, the sun a mere glow in the sky, Ven had to preserve his energy.Hex looked at Fantasia and said tiredly, More? Fantasia shook her head even she looked out of breath and gestured to Ma-thy, who began babbling like they hadn t just climbed the equivalent of Mount Ever-est.Okay, Hex might be exaggerating a li le but the point was still valid huge fuck-ing mountain. No, no, we ve reached the landing place of the blue light! Mathy said, pointingoff into the distance.Hex squinted; he could just make out a cave. Pheran and Thuse-lah said it went in there.We should hurry, a storm is coming soon. Whoever Pheran and Thuselah were, they d forgo en to mention one thing; thehuge arse monster that lived in the cave.Their first clue was when the ground began to shake.They were halfway to thecave and one moment they were on steady surface, the next everything was tremblingviolently, accompanied by the sound of a hundred thousand cracks appearing in theice.Then came a loud roar that made Hex s teeth cha er and ache, and Fantasia barelyhad time to shout a warning before something big, white, and mean came chargingout of the cave.It looked like a polar bear, but polar bears weren t the size of a smallwhale, they didn t have glowing red eyes, and they sure as hell weren t made out ofsnow.Hex twisted around, saw Grayson just standing there so Hex grabbed him by theback of his shoulder and with adrenaline-fuelled strength dragged him out of the wayof the rampaging snow bear.The liquid darkness of Nightshade s cloak appeared be-side him and wrapped around Grayson s torso.Hex gladly surrendered Grayson to histeammate Nightshade would take him somewhere safe and let momentum carryhim forward, angling his feet so he turned as if he were on skates, barely in time to slamshoulder first into a wall of ice.Shock-absorbent suits were an awesome idea, Hex thought dazedly.He shovedaway and took a moment to catch his breath and take stock.Ven had taken to the airalready, a streak of pure light twisting around the monster s head, flinging down hand-fuls of energy, which only seemed to enrage the creature.Fantasia was on the groundbeing a menace; throwing icicles the size of a school bus, while Strike stood behindher, firing arrows after arrows aiming for the eyes, Hex realised. Something dark landed beside Hex, and he threw Black Alice a quick smile. I mfine, he said, You? Black Alice nodded as she pulled her top hat off.She reached into its depth,searching around for something.Her arm tensed when she found it, and she pulledout a.okay, a flaming mallet. Don t suppose you got another one of those things in there? Hex said withoutmuch hope.It turned out she did.Hex sometimes loved being a superhero; they had the besttoys.Burning mallet in hand, Black Alice by his side, Hex charged into ba le.Wielding a mallet didn t require much finesse.Hex ran in when he could betweenFantasia s icicles and the fireballs from above, and swung it at any part of the bear thinghe could reach.There were plenty of close calls, but his power was in full play and theworst injury received was when the bear thing ba ed him into a snowdrift.He wasaware of the others only in the sense that he had to dodge their projectiles too, butmost of his a ention was focused on bringing the creature to its knees.It was a ba le of patience and endurance, and even though his chest felt like itwas burning from the inside, Hex kept going
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