I crawled from the castle keep and into the sunny courtyard with unsteady legs. I’d not slept so well in what felt like years. Whether it was simply the fact of having somebody to hold as I drifted off to sleep, the comfortable bed we’d been in, the activities before we actually slept, or the emotional release of finally recognising the feelings that had been brewing for a while, I couldn’t say.

  All I knew was that I felt rested. The morning air was still cool and crisp, but the sun was bright and warm. I looked around, up earlier than most, and feeling eternally grateful that nobody had decided to invade the Marchlands this morning. Almost everyone in the strange tree-bound castle was otherwise occupied, most of the rebels seeming to be either still insensate or at least nurturing heavy hangovers.

  Jacyntha and I parted ways early in the morning, somewhat reluctantly it had to be said, but we both had preparations to make. Nathlan wasn’t exactly in a rush to be leaving ahead of schedule, but when I swung by his room that morning, he was in the midst of packing supplies.

  Food and sundry items littered the floor of the room in neat little piles that he was packing away into his storage device even as I arrived, and he wasted no time in running me through a catalogue of what he’d acquired. It was amazing to have his analytical mind on this, and it seemed to me like he had already thought of everything. By mutual agreement, I had left him to confirm things and headed outside for some quiet contemplation.

  I looked out at the courtyard and sighed. I felt...restless. There was a goodbye lingering on the horizon, and we were only dragging it out. I almost wanted to cut ties with everyone and run for the hills, just to get it over with. My limbs itched to move, and I felt anxiety clawing its way up my belly.

  Perhaps it was the legacy of the hectic battle that was still lingering within, or maybe I just felt trapped beneath the ever-present canopy…

  I looked up, grinning to myself as I had an idea. I wanted freedom, space and a little time to clear my head. Where better than above it all?

  I checked my weapons belt was secure and nothing likely to fall out and then strode towards the tree. I had a storage ring now, so my spear, fang dagger and armour were stored away, but I still kept my hatchet and the new ornate dagger I’d acquired yesterday strapped to my left hip and the small of my back, respectively. I wasn’t sure why really, but I just felt secure to know they were within easy reach.

  I started to climb, taking my time and enjoying the process as I rose, meter by meter, into the sky. I gripped great ridges of bark, hauled myself easily up onto branches, and scuttled my way along the bigger limbs shooting out from the main bough every now and then.

  I found myself relaxing, grin stretching my face as I began to play, leaping from branch to branch and swinging my way around the massive trunk. Falling was no longer a matter of life and death, what with my mastery of Break-Step, instead just a minor annoyance. I could take risks I wouldn’t have dreamed of before and push my enhanced body into precarious and outrageous movements that felt fluid and graceful.

  By the time I reached the true canopy above and slipped my way with a rustle of leaves out into the unfiltered sun, I felt happier than I had in many days. The bleak malaise that the Riverlands and Barrow-Under-Tine had draped over me was long gone, slowly dissipated by a day of violent struggle, a night of wild passion, and now a tenth of a bell of silliness in a tree.

  I breathed deep, smelling the resinous scent of tree sap and hearing the twitter of small birds. I looked around, legs wrapping the branch below me to keep me secure as I rotated to view the ancient forests all around, shot through by the occasional stream or road.

  Closer to home, I saw the brown fields surrounding the former Castle Ryonic, a few hundred feet below, the spots where the pyres had burned the day prior barely visible against the mud. I lifted my gaze to view the horizon; the last blush of pink fading from the world as the sun brought day with it as it rose high above.

  Spring was in the air, despite the chill, and I smiled at the chittering songs that flitted back and forth around me as nests were prepared and the finest twigs and moss argued over.

  It made me wonder if our actions were any more important to the gods and pinnacle creatures of the world; the leviathans that Sadrianna had mentioned once that swam in the deep lakes, the World Tree herself that had rocked the world so recently. Were our struggles so insignificant to them as well? Did she feel anything for all the lives she had changed in an instant?

  I had an aversion to gods and powers beyond mortal ken. To have such power and fail to use it, or use it too profligately, seemed so obviously wrong…but it wasn’t as if I had a fully fleshed out ideology to draw on to determine the right course of action either. It was far easier to critique than to create, after all.

  I sighed, letting the worries drift away on the breeze as easily as my breath.

  Jorge had faith in the World Tree – Illyn Solynia, as he called her – and I had faith in him. It didn’t concern me at any rate, since I had given up the seed I’d been blessed with to save the old bastard. I’d keep a careful eye on Nathlan, make sure he didn’t start acting all…’culty’, I suppose. But otherwise, I wouldn’t look for problems where none currently existed; if Jorge was happy, that was good enough for me.

  Of course, speak of the devil and he shall appear, and so while I still yelped in panic, I wasn’t completely surprised when Jorge yanked on my leg before appearing next to me, already laughing at my strangled noise and shocked face.

  “Got ya!” he crowed, and I narrowed my eyes dangerously at him. It wasn’t working, as he continued to chuckle as he got comfortable, tactically arranging some small branches to stand between us like a bristling phalanx of tiny spears.

  “Thought I might find you up here, lad,” he said, once snuggled against a large branch with a good view of the plains and forests below. “I bumped into Jacyntha, and she mentioned you’d headed out for some air.”

  “Yeah, just needed a bit of space from it all, I think,” I mused. “Was that all she said?” I tried to ask as nonchalantly as possible.

  I failed obviously, and Jorge quirked a smile. “Might have been, aye. She’s nearly as easy to read as you though, lad. Not hard to piece together what happened after you both ducked out last night.”

  There was a lazy smile in his words, but when I looked over, I saw no mockery on his face. “You both deserve each other,” he said, and at my raised eyebrow he chuckled. “It’s a complement, lad. You seem good for one another.”

  I sighed. “I’m not sure we’ll have much time for that, Jorge. Nathlan and I are leaving today, and she is bound to another cause.”

  My voice was wistful, and though I was sad to see her go, I didn’t regret my choices. We’d needed one another last night; the comfort, to know neither of us had been wrong, and to know that had things been different there could have been something real there.

  “Ah, I forget how young you are sometimes.”

  I grunted a laugh, but Jorge ploughed on.

  “No, I mean it. You’ll live a long time – despite your best efforts, I’d wager – and there will be plenty of time for you both to meet once more. Hells lad, she’ll be finished in the Riverlands before the end of summer by my best guess.”

  “You expect her to be done so soon?” I asked, surprised. “Surely it will take years to stabilise the place? And I can’t honestly imagine a single person doing much on such a scale, anyway, despite how scary she is with that axe. A couple of villages and towns, sure. But how will she keep the bandits away from the places she has saved once she moves on?”

  Jorge tsked. “I’d thought you hadn’t understood. She’s not going to save the Riverlands, lad. She’s going to find herself.”

  I paused in thought, considering.

  “She has gone through probably the biggest shift in personality of all of us, my young friend,” Jorge said softly. “Her life has changed and so has she. She needs time away from the only people that know this new version of her, to prove to herself more than anything that it’s real. That she is who she has tried to be these last months.

  “In fact, I’d bet tarrots-” he started.

  “…to toenails, yes I know. It’s a ridiculous expression Jorge, and you really need to stop using it,” I said with a scowl, transitioning into a smirk when he tried to feign hurt.

  “Right, well – hurtful comments aside, lad – I’d bet that she simply needs some time away from all of us to see if she truly is the woman she pretends to be.”

  “It’s not an act,” I said immediately, with more certainty than I would have expected. “She has changed, Jorge, she’s not pretending.”

  “Aye, fair enough lad, I know that, and you know that. But she doesn’t. Still feels fresh and fake and liable to fall apart at any moment for her, right? Give her a little time to realise she is who we know her to be.”

  “And you think she’ll only need a few months? That’s seems optimistic to me.”

  He tsked at me again, looking out over the forests of oak and elm below, glorying in the late winter sun. “You’ll see her again soon enough. Don’t rush yourself to grief before it’s warranted. Take that from an old man intimately familiar with it, aye?”

  I smiled at his words, the casual reassurance something I had needed to hear. He was right; we had time. Nathlan’s mission – mine too, I supposed – would be a long one, likely measured in years rather than months, and there was no point trying to predict things too closely.

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  “Thanks mate,” I said with feeling. “You want to talk about it? From what I can piece together, Markas’s appearance was tough for you.”

  Jorge waved me off though. “An old wound, one long since sealed.”

  “Not healed?” I asked carefully, and he only stared out at the view, not turning my way for a long while.

  “No, never healed,” he said softly.

  “Tell me about your class,” he asked after a while.

  “Not much to tell, it’s barely changed. I’ve been thinking about it, and I suspect that’s why I woke before the others,” I said. “I had this knowledge, this certainty, that I could have whatever I wanted. Go anywhere, be anything…and I realised that where I wanted to be was right here.”

  “In the middle of a battle, about to face a cavalry charge you were completely unprepared for?” Jorge asked, not exactly sceptical, but definitely curious.

  “Well no. But it was more that wherever I wanted to go, I knew I wanted to get there the way I had been going.”

  I stopped, picking a young leaf off a nearby twig and brushing it against my cheek absently.

  “More like – my class wasn’t the problem. I wanted to be in Tsanderos, wanted to grow and explore here. With you all, I suppose. Didn’t need the seed to change anything to get what I wanted, so it just didn’t.”

  “…hence you waking before the others,” Jorge finished. “Makes sense, lad, can’t deny that.” He sniffed. “Why did you give it up? Could have grown stronger than almost anyone, with the start you’ve had and your combat class, you’d be a terror in a few months.”

  “I don’t want to be a terror, Jorge,” I said simply. “And I didn’t want to lose you.”

  I turned to watch him as he stared at the horizon, and I saw him smile a sad smile. “I’m sorry, lad. You never should have had to choose between me and your own future.”

  “That sounds…ominous,” I hedged. “I get that I’ve given away a fairly substantial opportunity here, but I’m still me, right? Just have to do things the old-fashioned way.”

  I tried to inject some cheer in my tone, and was relieved to see Jorge brighten a little. “Aye, I suppose you’re no worse off than a week ago. Better even, from that little time you had the seed. But you did give up on unimaginable power, Lamb.”

  He pursed his lips. “You didn’t urge any changes at all?”

  “Nah, it just bumped my skills up to level 10 and seems to have tightened some up. They’re more…stream-lined and complex at the same time, somehow.”

  “Gods, imagine,” he whispered. “If you’d have kept it to yourself, I wouldn’t be surprised if you’d hit 3rd tier mid battle.”

  “That’s possible?” I asked.

  “Aye. The 2nd tier is all about aligning your skills to your path. Essentially making each a pathbound skill. The seed would have done that for you effortlessly, if it had no need to waste energy on reconfiguring your soul and granting new skills or even entirely new classes.”

  I whistled. “And to think, I gave all of that up for a crochety old man whose knees complain when he squats,” I said as casually as possible.

  I then ducked the twig he sent shooting my way with expert precision, only using Break-Step marginally to give me enough time to avoid it. We shared a chuckle and a quiet moment, the conversation needing to move on, but neither of us willing to go there quite yet.

  Eventually, I broke the silence. “We’re leaving today,” I said, gesturing down at the canopy below that obscured the castle beneath.

  Jorge sighed. “Aye,” he grunted, before levering himself up and beckoning me to follow. He ducked through the several meter thick bushel of leaves and small twigs that crowned the top of the giant tree, and we descended a good dozen meters or so further, until we sat on a thick trunk directly above the courtyard, looking down as our friends gathered below.

  “What will you do now?” I asked, though I knew the answer.

  “Same as I did with you, and them,” he said, pointing at Vera, Jacyntha, Sadrianna, and Nathlan.

  “Find broken people, and try to fix them?” I asked, but he shook his head.

  “Just give them the tools to fix themselves. Most people only need a direction and a bit of hope, I’ve found. I’ll spend less time with each of them though I expect. Too many lost souls to shepherd,” he said, snorting at his own pun.

  “Sounds lonely.”

  “Aye, true enough. I’ll be checking in with Vera every year or so though. She can point me your way. You’ll keep in touch with her, aye?” he asked me, and I caught the hope in his tone.

  “Of course, Jorge,” I replied without having to consider. It was as obvious as breathing, after all. “Do you think she’ll be alright here? Without all the excitement and chaos?”

  “Oh, I don’t know, lad. I expect Vera’ll be feeling all sorts of chaos playing house with Fandar.”

  He grinned, picking a ladybird up off a leaf from where it had gotten stuck on its back with delicate fingers and bringing it up to his eye to examine. He smiled as it unfurled its wings and buzzed away.

  “She’ll be fine though,” he confirmed a moment later. “It might take a while to settle down into a life less…nomadic than we’ve lived, but I’ve no doubt she’ll be here for the next decade at least. She’s made to be a guardian, Lamb. That woman is as fiercely loyal as I’ve ever seen, and once she’s built something here – which she will, mark my words – there ain’t a force on Tsanderos that will be able to harm it.”

  “’The Guardian of the Marchlands’” I quoted. Then a thought occurred to me, and I asked, “What do you think they’ll call it?”

  “The battle?” Jorge hummed in thought for a moment. “Not sure. Something poetic about sunsets and the dawning of a new age, I’d wager. You got any suggestions, lad?”

  “I think you might be right. Fuck if I have any good ideas though, you’ve heard my attempts at poetry,” I said with a grin, and he chuckled.

  I looked down to the courtyard to see Nathlan discussing something with Vera, probably going over our preparation and logistics, which I knew he had thought over a hundred times already. I had my things in my storage ring and had filled it with emergency supplies of food and water, and a few dozen other little essentials like rope and twine, though we would stock up properly when we travelled through a border town.

  Jacyntha and Sadrianna were talking to one side, and I smiled to see their animated gestures. I didn’t know what they were discussing, but it didn’t hurt to assume it was me, and besides, my ego needed the help after nearly dying so many times in quick succession.

  Jorge wrapped a friendly arm around my shoulder as I sat there, looking down at the people that I’d shared my life with in this new world. My friends, companions, and in many ways, my family.

  “Aye lad, you’ve done well here in your short time. Make sure you take the time to appreciate it, you hear?”

  I understood the words for what they were and settled in to watch for a few moments longer.

  “Thanks Jorge, for everything.”

  “S’alright, lad. I’m proud of you.”

  Mind made up, I pushed off the branch, feeling the wind whipping my braided hair into a frenzy as I plummeted nearly a hundred meters to the cobbled ground below. A moment before I hit the stone, as Vera had turned and raised an arm protectively in front of Nathlan to ward him from whatever danger fell from the sky, I activated Break-Step.

  My feet hit the cobblestones with the force of a small leap, kicking a brief bit of dust into the air, but nothing more. My knees flexed to absorb the impact, and I stood slowly to take in my surprised friends.

  “Did somebody pray to the heavens for a dashingly handsome warrior?...Because here I am.”

  Raised eyebrows all around, unimpressed faces, and Sadrianna giving me a thumbs down gesture somewhat took the wind from my sails, but it didn’t take long to warm them up to my brand of humour once more. I felt alive again, energy bursting from beneath my skin as I itched to be underway, even as I wanted to avoid the final goodbye.

  It wasn’t final though, I reassured myself, and that thought more than any other made it possible for me to reach out to those I loved and connect with them, rather than hiding away.

  I clasped forearms with Sadrianna as Jorge landed behind me. “I’m proud of you, even if it is not my place to be so,” I said to her as we parted. “It was a brave thing to do, to give up your class like that.”

  “Let’s hope it wasn’t also stupid, shall we?” she replied with a slight grimace.

  “It wasn’t,” I said simply. She held my gaze for a few long moments before nodding and looking away.

  “At least I can say I’m not a hypocrite,” she mumbled, and I grunted in agreement.

  “Laashvagaul,” I said, before having a thought. “You know, the Leviathan Coast has some of the most advanced printing presses in Tsanderos from what I hear…”

  Her gaze instantly snapped back to mine, and I saw the glint of desire within them.

  “Yeah, yeah,” I said with a laugh. “I’ll get my hands on any books about romance and pirates and romantic pirates that I can find, alright?”

  She blushed slightly before straightening once more. “That would be most kind of you, Lamb Red-Spear,” she declared formally, and we laughed and shared a true hug before stepping away from one another.

  I turned to find Jacyntha staring at me, eyes alight with promise. “Don’t go dying on me, Lamb.”

  She spoke softly, a subtle edge of threat in her voice, and I picked up the underlying tension with ease. I squeezed her hands in my own. “Same to you, Jacyntha. You know where to find us. We’ll check in with Vera before the year is out, but…I’ll be waiting. Take your time, do whatever good you can, but know that there is a place for you…”

  I saw her eyes pinch, a slight wince on her face as I spoke, and I suddenly felt a moment of fear. I backed away from what I had meant to say, and ended lamely; “…with us.”

  She searched my face before nodding and going to pull away. I kicked myself silently, and then took a breath. “Wait.”

  She turned back to me, and I spoke quickly, in a rush to get the words out. “There’s a space for you with me. No rush, but the offer’s on the table.”

  She narrowed her eyes once more, searching my face for something, so I let my emotions play across it as openly as I could; Hope, fear, excitement and wistfulness...dreams of a future not so much defined as felt. Ultimately, she found it, and I gathered it was a good thing by the tentative kiss she gave me before nodding and stepping away.

  I then turned to Vera, who grinned at me like a smug cat. “You finally grew a spine, little Red-Spear.”

  I just punched her in the shoulder and then flinched a little. It was like punching a metal plate. She did have a new system-granted title though; ‘The Iron Wall’, so perhaps I should have known better.

  Either way, we shared a smile and a long hug, and I was reminded of all the times she had helped me through my woes. I remembered thick fingers brushing my hair as she sliced away with her knife, regaling me with stories of her brother.

  “You did it,” I said thickly. “He’d be proud of you, you know?”

  The smile she gave me was crooked, tinged with grief but still wide, still glorious to behold for the joy it spoke of as well. “I know. Thank you, Lamb.”

  We shared a few more quiet words as Nathlan gave his goodbyes to the barbarians, and I was impressed to see how little he tried to hide his sadness at our divergence. Long gone was the nervous scholar that would hide behind a bitter word and an imperious mask.

  And then it was time. I wanted to linger for another day, to try and soak up as much of my friends’ presence as I could; to bottle it up and carry it with me, but that is not the way things work, sad as it is to realise.

  I took a few deep breaths, and then we were giving final goodbyes and stepping out of the courtyard, past the crumbling walls. Down steps freshly carved in the wooden trunk, wider than the castle itself, and before I knew it, we were trudging along a crushed stone road between muddy fields.

  We were silent for a time, neither knowing how to let go. I turned when we reached the treeline, looking back at the colossal tree that dominated the skyline, castle picked up and supported by its arboreal embrace.

  I saw a couple of figures moving away from the castle, Sadrianna and Jacyntha leaving in the opposite direction to us as they headed towards the Riverlands and beyond. I traced their path back up to the tree and saw two figures on the wall looking after us. One short and stocky, sun glinting off a long grey braid, and another tall and broad, her strong features facing towards us as she watched us leave.

  I turned back to my friend who was waiting for me patiently. We shared nervous smiles before we turned to the trees before us. The path extended on out of sight, and I knew the forest it crossed was not large. Beyond it would be a hundred miles more of open fields, wild forests of ancient oak and winding rivers.

  And beyond that? Storm-wracked seas, unknowable leviathans, and our uncertain future.

  “Come then, Nathlan,” I said with a growing grin. “Let’s see who’s faster, shall we?”

  The End