“Fourteen men?” Nowak watched the family of refugees in front of him. They still looked terrified, but after some gentle prodding from Asle they’d managed to keep them from bolting entirely, mostly for the promise of food. They were halfway to starving just yesterday after all.

“That’s a squad.” Summers pointed out.

The family had mentioned that at least one soldier they’d encountered was a foreigner, what they had failed to say was that he was an American. Or at least, they’d heard English. From the few words the family remembered, there was no doubt they were dealing with someone from their world.

“Asle tell them they’re safe with us.” Nowak turned to Summers. “What’s a good angle on this?”

Summers looked to Asle. “Tell them to keep all this to themselves, we don’t want rumors spreading about us. If they have a problem with it, we’ll leave them to fend for themselves.”

Nowak held up a hand to stop Asle. “That’s kind of harsh, isn’t it?”

“Not like I’m planning on following through. But last thing we need is to take sides.” Summers gestured to the wagon. “Besides, we’re just merchants, remember? If they think that’s true, what do you suppose they’re going to tell people?”

“… They might assume we were the ones selling those people guns. If we weren’t outright spies, anyway.” Nowak concluded.

“Right.”

Nowak thought. “And what if they call your bluff?”

“I doubt the other traders would be able to do much to us. If they were going to warn anyone, it’d be in the city. And if that’s a target for whoever these people are… we won’t be there for long.”

“What about resupply?”

“I think we can use Synel as an intermediary, assuming we get the chance.”

Asle took Nowak’s silence as permission to continue. The two children showed no response as she spoke. Though Summers could tell the entire family was still on edge.

The father, a man by the name of Eirik nodded solemnly. He bowed as he spoke.

“He swore an oath to not speak of it. That’s good. It’s...” Asle struggled to think of the word. “It’s an honor thing.”

“…Good…” Summers nodded. “We done here, sarge?”

Nowak seemed to consider the family, then Asle.

“Yeah. Asle, thank them for me. They can go.”

“I mean, this is good news, right? We might have found a quick way home.” Cortez leaned against a tree.

They’d decided with the news that they weren’t alone in this part of the world, they needed to figure out their new direction.

Bang!

“Could be, or we could be walking into something way over our paygrade.” Summers responded. “I mean, these guys wiped out an entire village of mud farmers, that doesn’t sound like something the army would be interested in. Especially if their power base is in Nevada.”

Bang!

Summers turned to see Asle, she knelt down on one knee and fired at another bottle as he watched. It shattered instantly. As far as target practice was concerned, she was going three for three.

“Asle, take five would ya?”

Asle nodded before handing Summers the gun. She’d gotten a lot better with it, a lot faster than Summers would have expected. Even Nowak looked impressed by her progress. Of course, given what he’d seen of elf culture, everyone knew how to fight in one form or another. She’d probably gleaned at least a few tricks from watching them all these weeks.

“They spoke English.” Nowak pointed out.

“Some of them spoke English.” Summers corrected. “For all we know the guys with guns were deserters. Or helping whatever this “gray army” is.”

“You learn anything else about them from your girl?” Cortez asked.

“Foreign nation, had a lot of fights with uh, Asle what are these folk called?”

“Nordli Stam.” Asle responded promptly. “Um, Northern tribes.”

“Right. So, they fight a lot with these Northmen. But mostly their places are on the coast, far as I can tell all the way down to northern California.”

“Then we’re going to be running into them eventually.” Logan ventured.

“That’s right.”

Nowak considered all that before he spoke. “My suggestion is we head to the city, get some intel on who these people are, then decide where we go from there. I’d like to contact whoever it is that’s out there, but I want to make sure we’re playing this safe.”

“And we’re sure we trust that family not to talk?” Cortez asked.

“No but given our reputation in the caravan right now I don’t think it matters. Worst case, we give them some food and leave them behind.”

Summer glanced at Asle who was listening intently. He remembered how happy she seemed when she met those kids.

“I’ll set up the targets, thirty meters this time, all right?”

Asle nodded in confirmation.

Summers would have to see how things played out.

The favor was busy work, Asle knew that. But still...

“I found another one, I think.” Erne called over. She held a small mushroom that looked to be the right size and shape.

“Looks right to me.” Asle nodded in satisfaction.

The group as a whole had been tasked to find various herbs and mushrooms for the caravan’s dinner, while their parents helped with the cooking.

Synel didn’t need help. She was trying to get on Asle’s good side by giving the siblings a reason to talk to her.

“What about this?” Beorn tossed a bug the size of her arm into the basket. Erne shrieked, Asle yelped, then chucked the basket, mushrooms and all into the distance. It landed on the ground with a heavy plop.

Beorn showed no reaction to their response, but she could tell he was laughing. She did her best to hide a smile.

Despite her best efforts, Synel’s plan was working.

“I think we should end for today.” Summers said in perfect Nos, Asle still corrected him any time he tried to call it Elvish. “If that’s all right with you.”

By the way Synel’s eyes lit up, he figured he’d gotten the pronunciation right.

“As you wish.” Synel responded.

She looked tired. They’d been hauling ass down the road ever since the refugees had mentioned an army behind them. The last thing the caravan wanted was to deal with soldiers, and with a group as large as theirs a small party could easily catch up if they weren’t careful. But she still hadn’t missed a single one of Summers lessons.

Synel spoke to Asle, the two talking back and forth. The cadence was so fast that Summers couldn’t quite grasp the meaning, so he waited for the girl to translate. Something that was happening less and less these days.

Asle for her part had really stepped up her game in these lessons. Summers was by no means a clever man. In fact, he was a dumbass grunt through and through, with maybe a little more common sense than average. But between the private tutoring and Asle’s explanations afterwards, the language lessons were really starting to show results.

“She’s… she wants to be alone with you… So… Goodbye.” Asle nodded before turning to leave.

Summers blinked a few times as he watched her push the flap to Synel’s private tent closed.

It took a moment before he realized what was happening. And he was pretty certain if leaving your barely fluent friend alone with a beautiful woman could be called betrayal, this would qualify. Synel had moved towards a chest at the back of the tent.

Summers immediately went into full on panic mode.

“It’s getting late, I shouldn’t keep you up.”

Synel placed a glass full of brownish liquid in front of him. It smelled vaguely fruity.

Oh, thank god it was liquor.

She gave Summers a vaguely hurt look, cupping the glass in front of her in both hands.

“It’s crass to drink alone, I’d hoped you could keep my company for a few more minutes.”

Synel was a lithe woman, and a smart one. Probably smarter than him as a given. If this was her big play at him, he had no doubt she’d feign offense at any excuse he’d use to get out.

And so, Summers had no choice but to raise his glass in response.

"I'd love to."

Synel was smarter, but there was something that Summers figured she didn’t account for. That was the fact he had about sixty pounds on her. So the solution seemed obvious.

He’d drink her under the table.

Summers awoke in a daze several hours later. He looked down to see his pants weren’t were he’d left them. Neither was his shirt, or his boxers.

He was completely naked, covered in furs, and lying beside an equally bare Synel.

Her hand was laid against his head, gently stroking his ears.

His very human ears.

Summers had seriously fucked up.