While waiting for the caravan, they burned their dead. Three of the guards had fallen to the bandits. Graiden said a few words, and others, who’d considered them friends, added more.

  Tibs had nothing to say.

  He was annoyed that he’d hadn’t protected them. Reminding himself it had been impossible to keep track of everyone in the mess of faint essence the battle had been, didn’t help. He fought against blaming Graiden and Jeremy. That if he’d been left to deal with them on his own, there would have been no death on their side. But they’d done what they thought was best.

  Graiden, at least. Tibs was still confident that Jeremy’s determination was borne of vindictiveness.

  The caravan’s arrival wasn’t joyous. Too many injured, three deaths too many. Sarnita spent the rest of the day’s travel seeing to the injured, of which Tibs made sure he was among the lasts.

  How lucky he’d been was voiced too often, but he let it go unchallenged. Now was not the time to point out this had been the result of good planning on Graiden’s part and bad one on Tibs. But having dealt with the worse of his injuries before anyone could look him over meant he only had to limp for most of the trip until they reached the village, instead of well beyond that.

  It took two telling, for the battle to turn from the grim affair it had been, to one of excitement and adventure. And it hadn’t been for the benefit of the children. On the fourth retelling, the overwhelming numbers were no longer spoken of somberly, but with challenge. The injuries showed with pride. The dead remembered with a bowed head.

  By the time they reach the village of Iritel, the dead weren’t mentioned anymore, and short of adding adventurers who’d come to their rescue, any bard could have been proud of what the story had become.

  *

  As with the previous village, Iritel came into view as a wall. A wooden palisade no more than twice the height of a person, as protection against the unknown of the forests surrounding them. After speaking to who Tibs expected was the village leader, Rigel led the wagons to an expanse of trampled grass between where the road bent away from the village and their wall.

  As soon as it was apparent there were enough recruits and volunteers to deal with setting up, Tibs headed to the gate with the handful of veterans who didn’t feel like working.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” Graiden demanded, and Tibs looked over his shoulder. Jeremy, three steps behind him, did the same, and found the chief’s gaze locked on him, stopping him.

  “With the others.”

  Tibs was amused at the confidence in the tone.

  “No, you aren’t. Recruits do the work.”

  “But there’s already—”

  “You, get back to work.”

  “But Tyborg…”

  “He’s not a recruit,” Graiden replied. “But he still waited, ready to help, unlike you, who made sure no one noticed. What happened to all that eagerness to get underfoot under the pretense of helping?”

  “Please. I’ll work harder, I promise, I just want…”

  Graiden’s resolve faltered.

  Tibs had no idea how Jeremy did it, but he had a knack for having people go along with what he wanted.

  But this time, Tibs wasn’t letting it stand. “How about you do what you hired on to do?” The young man would hang around him the entire time, and Tibs wanted to be on his own.

  “But…” Jeremy looked at the ground as Tibs’s expression turned severe.

  “The work’s part of what being a caravan guard is. It’s just going to be for a few hours. You’ll have plenty of time to enjoy the village’s hospitality afterward.” He sighed at the pitiful expression. “And if I’m back before you’re done, I’ll help with whatever’s left of the work you’ve been assigned.”

  “That isn’t your job,” Graiden said, expression firm again.

  Tibs shrugged. “I just need to nurse an ale away from everyone. I won’t be long, and you know I’d help, anyway.”

  Jeremy looked torn, but then headed toward the wagons under Graiden’s watchful gaze.

  The others had waited for him by the gate.

  “You shouldn’t be so nice to the boy,” Loren said. “He’s not going to learn anything with you always rescuing him.”

  “You mean like he was going to learn with you chopping off his hand for something he hadn’t done?”

  “I know he took it.”

  Lidia elbowed him. “Then why was it doing in the satchel on your horse?”

  “Someone’s covering for his man.” Loren glared at Tibs, who rolled his eyes.

  “All I’m doing is making sure he doesn’t have to deal with screwing up more than he can handle.” They paused before the village guards, who didn’t seem to know what to do with them, before motioning them to enter. “It’s his first time away from everything he’s known. I wish… I wish there had been someone there to help me when I left home.”

  Why, Tibs?

  Even after all these years, the pain in Jackal’s voice, when Tibs adamantly refused to let him run from the guild with him, hurt. He could have used his help, but his brother had someone more important to look after.

  “Coddling him isn’t helping him,” Afread said. “He’s going to make a mess of whatever he’s got to do without you around.”

  Tibs shrugged. “If he hasn’t learned by then, he deserves what happens.”

  He kept going when the others entered the tavern. The village was large enough it would have another. It might even have something else.

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  He’d been surprised at how uncommon inns were.

  The one in Kragle Rock had been built while it was more tents than buildings. There were always some in the cities he’d travel to when he was a Runner, but transportation platform meant a lot of people visited.

  It had turned out that villages needed to be large before they’d built one, and there had been towns without inns. He’d been in village so small they hadn’t even had taverns, just one of the villager cooking some. The caravan merchants hadn’t done much business there.

  Even if this village didn’t have a second tavern, by the time he returned from his search, the others would be either drunk or have returned to the wagons.

  The other tavern was almost at the opposite end of the village, close enough to the gate he could see the path cutting into the forest. It didn’t have a placard announcing what it was. He’d sensed the people, the water and corruption essence that made out most alcohols. This was reserved for the people of this part of the village and no one else.

  The crowd filling half the tables barely took notice as he entered, and it wasn’t until he reached the counter that the room fell silent. The barman was lean and eyed Tibs warily.

  He took a copper and placed it on the bar. “I’m with the caravan. I’ll take one of your ales.” The information didn’t reassure the man, but he filled a tankard and handed it over before taking the copper.

  Tibs sat at the furthest table. It wasn’t covered with shadows, due to the many windows and sun still high, but gave him a sense of aloneness that he increased with an etching of Air that lowered the conversations to a soft hum.

  He wished he understood Jeremy’s interest in him. Tibs wasn’t some hero of songs, or even its villain, like some bards sang. There was nothing that much out of the ordinary about him, except, maybe, his willingness to help out. Jeremy wasn’t alone in doing what he could to avoid that aspect of their duties.

  And on the whole, Tibs didn’t mind the young man and his questions; he appreciated curiosity. But at times, it felt like the questions were asked because it was what should be done, and not because Jeremy wanted to learn. It made him tiring to be around.

  He paid for a second ale and forced himself to savor it.

  Ale was as unique as the village that made them. Some libraries had books after books of ales, the places they were from, and their flavors. Tibs wouldn’t be surprised if there was a scholar out in the world who could say where an ale came from after just a sip.

  He wasn’t that person. Ale could be more, and less, bitter from one place to the other. Sometimes he could tell there was something fruity, or spicy, or meaty, but he couldn’t keep track of what he’d tasted where. And it wasn’t what he was doing.

  Savoring this ale meant he didn’t have to return to the caravan just yet. That he had more time to himself. More quiet.

  The woman who rushed in had a frantic expression and spoke with gesticulation towards the way she’d come. He undid the etching so he could hear her words.

  “—in the forest!”

  The unease at what she’d said was palpable. Worried looks were exchanged and some seem to refuse to acknowledge she was there.

  “What’s wrong?” he called.

  She hurried to his table. “My man went to get wood for the oven. He wasn’t back when I went to bed, but it’s happened before. But he wasn’t there when I woke, and no one’s seen him.”

  “He went too deep,” a woman whispered, then hurried to look away as Tibs glanced in her direction, hoping for more information.

  “He wouldn’t!”

  “Please sit.” He motioned to the barman.

  When he delivered the ale, he seemed as wary of her as much as of Tibs. As if she’d been tainted by whatever had happened to her man. He handed her the tankard, and she drank half of it in quick gulps.

  “Why wouldn’t he go too deep?”

  She lowered the tankard and her voice. “He knows that’s dangerous.” She glanced left and right. “That it’s where it is.”

  “Where what is?”

  She hesitated.

  “The monster,” a man said, then spat.

  Tibs looked at the others and the near uniform fear on their face.

  Monsters, the way bards sang about them, were rare. In all his years of traveling, Tibs had only encountered one, and it had taken over years of piecing together overheard conversation and research before he’d been confident enough to go looking.

  It had been nothing like in the songs. Lean and short. Its skin had been mostly scales with patches of fur. Four clawed fingers on each hand, with a finger broken off. There was no blood, not red flesh or bone. If he hadn’t sensed the uniform life essence in it, the sight of the exposes mass, the color of sun-bleached bones, would have told him this was a dungeon made creature.

  It attacked on sight, and had been stronger than it looked. More ferocious than he’d expected. But he’d defeated it. It hadn’t crumbled into nothingness, as those within Sto did, and hadn’t left loot behind.

  He hadn’t known what to do with it, and when it wouldn’t burn, he’d used raw Purity to return its essences to where they should go. Be that the dungeon that made it, or the elements themselves.

  But it wasn’t just dungeon made creatures, or those out of bard’s songs that were dangerous. The animals of the forest could be as monstrous as any creature to those who weren’t equipped to deal with them.

  “What can you tell me about this monster?”

  She shook her head, so he looked around.

  “No one’s seen it,” an older man said.

  “Then how do you know there’s something, and that her man didn’t just lose his way?”

  “Its taken others,” someone he couldn’t find whispered, but the fear was real. “Ten years or so, since it started taking them. Took years before people learned not to go far anymore. Stay by the road, we warn them, but some don’t listen.”

  Enough had moved as she spoke that the woman was visible. Ancient looking, hands trembling around her tankard.

  “Do you know what direction your man went?”

  “Aren’t you listening, boy?” the ancient woman said, looking at him fearfully.

  “But it’s just been a night and part of the day. He might just be lost.”

  “He’s dead.” She spat. “I’m sorry, Korela, but you know that’s what happens when they go in and don’t come back. It got him.”

  “All I need is a direction.” Tibs said. “I’ll go look. If this monster gets me, then it isn’t one of you who died.”

  “I’d never send anyone there,” a man snapped. “Not even someone I want to see dead. It’s too horrible.”

  “Someone saw it? What does it look like?” With a description, he might be able to work out which animal it was. There were some scary ones out there. His first bear had left him certain he was fighting a dungeon creature, in spite of it bleeding when he cut it. The only reason Tibs had survived the fight was his abundant use of Purity. Wolves, too, could be monstrous. Dogs that went wild and vicious.

  Anything people weren’t used to was easy to interpret as a monster.

  “It’s long,” someone said, “like the serpents of the sea.”

  “No, it’s short and stocky,” a woman countered. “Like a rock that’s been given legs and arms and fangs.”

  “It’s covered in fur the brown of dirt,” another said. “It prowls low, ready to pounce on anyone who gets too close.”

  What such varied description told him was that no one had seen it. He studied the woman seated before him while arguments over who had the correct description erupted.

  “How do I go too deep?” he asked her. She shook her head vehemently. Maybe the talk had her scared to send him in, even with the hope of rescuing her man. “I grew up hunting,” he told her. “Whatever’s there, I’ll deal with it and…” did he really want to promise something he couldn’t guarantee? “Whatever happened to him, I’ll bring your man back to you.” He could promise to bring the body back, at least.

  She swallowed. “When you leave the gate, the road turns Zenith. A hundred paces you go off the road toward the sunset. The closest person to have been taken was five hundred paces in.

  He placed a hand on hers. “I will find him.”

  He rose and left the tavern.

  The lone guard at the gate remained leaning against the wall as Tibs passed by. He suspected that if the man had recognized him as a resident, he’d have asked after him, but if a stranger wanted to go lose himself? He wasn’t going to care.

  Five hundred paces could take a long time to cross, and not actually be that distance. If those taken weren’t found, how did anyone know how deep they’d been? Or that they’d been taken.

  Getting lost among trees was easy.

  It had happened to him when fleeing the guild. Each time had been harrowing. He’d never felt in danger. He didn’t know enough, and the runs were still fresh in his mind as the most danger the world had to offer. And he hadn’t encountered anything, back then, to contradict that, but there had been times, without being able to sense people as far as he pushed his sense, when he’d wondered if they would ever end.

  He walked, sensing. Animals ahead of him, the people in the village, and the caravan. He kept his distance from the larger animals as he searched for a person’s essence. He wasn’t here to fight, just to find a, hopefully, lost man.

  Bottom Rung is available on KU:

  here

  Stepping Wild, on Ream Stories where the story is multiple chapters ahead even at the lowest tier, and the support helps ensure I can work with a minimum of real-life interruption.

  Thank you for reading this chapter.

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