Baldir scrutinized the flier for all of a moment before he gave Leoric a dirty look.

“You just want to try riding a boar,” he accused, which Leoric turned his head to look demure.

“I resent your accusation!” he said sternly.

“Okay, so I’m going to go off to the tavern here, and I’m NOT going to do what I do best. Scritch, you want to come?” Baldir asked. Scritch looked up to him with a canted head.

“I’m gonna go steal their stuff,” Scritch said proudly before Leoric stopped her.

“You’re going to get caught. Sit this one out because we’re too close to your last spree,” Leoric said sternly.

“Aww…” Scritch said, wilting.

Baldir waved his hand dismissively and set off with his empty canteen. Blast stuck her head out from the back of the wagon and tilted her head.

“I tried to eat more of the awful meat and I am displeased with it,” She announced before spitting out a burnt piece of bread.

Leoric looked down at it on the ground.

“Well, hunting is slim here,” Leoric mused.

“There’s rats, pigeons, and cats,” Scritch said as she gazed around the cityscape.

“None of those are tasty,” Leoric pleaded.

“I want a cat,” Blast said sternly.

“You don’t want a city cat,” Leoric said placatingly.

“I do too!”

“She really does,” Scritch said.

“But city cats are full of fleas, disease, everything gross,” Leoric said, eyeing their surroundings and hoping that he didn’t have to pry the dragon from the mouth of a cat.

“That is true,” Blast said as she thought about it.

“How about a chicken?” Leoric offered.

“One of the big ones that screams in the morning, yes,” Blast said, nodding.

“Cock,” Scritch announced proudly.

Leoric spit.

“Cockerel,” he corrected.

Blast looked to Leoric with squinting eyes.

“But… that’s a boy chicken,” Scritch said wilting.

“COCKEREL,” Leoric stressed again.

“That means it meant something dirty,” Blast said with a sigh.

“Awww,” Scritch said as she wilted even more.

Leoric dug in his coinpurse and pulled out a few copper before glancing around at the wagons surrounding them. A neighboring cart a few rows over had cages of chickens intended for market. Leoric was able to buy one fairly easily and sent them back to the cart to enjoy as he sat outside and listened to the sickening crunches and sizzling bites.

Leoric held his head in his hands and sighed before preparing for bed for the night.

Come morning Baldir snuck back to the wagon, teetering on stumbling feet with a red nose. He was covered in what appeared to be bite marks and bruises.

Leoric woke with a start and squinted to Baldir as he climbed into the wagon and into his bunk.

Scritch and Blast were curled up together in a small pile. Scritch didn’t have a bunk but rather had a small cave she’d fashioned beneath Leoric’s bunk. She liked the secluded darkness. Baldir looked to Leoric’s bunk from his side and saw the dimness from beneath his side.

Two sets of red eyes gleamed back at him from beneath it.

“Scritch? Blast?” Baldir asked as he situated himself in his bed. He felt something wet and reached around in his blankets. He pulled out what appeared to be a chicken head that had been chewed on.

“I saved it for you,” Scritch said. All he could see of her were two red slitted eyes. One of them obscured by shadow for a moment as she licked it.

“Oh… thank ye?” Baldir said as he held up the head.

“Welcome,” She said proudly. He could see the squint of her eyes, telling him that she was grinning.

“Yes, not don’t be rude and eat your gift,” Blast said with menace in her voice.

“Uh….” Baldir asked and Leoric translated. His face went a little green.

“Oh, but I’m so full. I ate so much,” Baldir said, holding out the chewed-on chicken head.

Blast gave a warning growl.

“You may want to just…you know,” Leoric said, pantomiming fake eating the head.

“SOD IT!” Baldir said before stuffing the bird head into his beard and pretending to chew on it.

“Hehehe, gross,” Scritch said before retreating back in her den to go back to sleep. Blast retreated too.

“She did something gross to it, didn’t she?” Baldir said with a sigh.

“Leoric shrugged and stretched to wake for the morning.

“Let’s just head out to the eastern woods and see if we can grab some of those boars this evening,” Leoric said before grumbling and grousing on his way to the reigns.

He made a few stops along the way and handed Scritch a bundle of bolts for her arbalest.

-

The trip to the Eastern woods was relatively quick as far as things went. The streets of the morning were clear and free and no other adventurers were in the midst. Scritch came scrambling out of her hiding hole with blast, watching the green earth around them expectantly.

“I hate it,” Blast said as she squinted around.

Scritch carefully crawled out of the wagon and looked to the forests surrounding them. It was different from their mountain homelands, that was for certain, and much more different than the cities full of clueless people.

“Scritch, do you have any idea how that ride skill works?” Scritch asked. Baldir was snoring gently inside the wagon.

Scritch scrambled back into the wagon to view the skill once more.

[ULTIMATE MOUNT] 2/100

By approaching a wild beast and fastening a rope or lead around its neck, you may chance dominance and try to ride the beast. Your likelihood of being able to ride a beast is a factor of skill and luck.

Scritch read it to him.

“Okay, so I get some rope and find a boar,” Leoric said before rummaging through the wagon’s storage and his own belongings to find a length of rope to fashion into a lasso.

Scritch ran about, following Leoric.

“Okay, get your Arbalest,” he said as Baldir’s snoring trickled free.

“That might just end up calling the boars for us,” Leoric said with a harumph.