“Now look what you made me do!” Jasper yelled. “It’ll be at least a day before that regrows!”

Jasper lobbed the horn at the guard. It bounced off his helmet with a loud clang. The sound reverberated through the mountain and the guard took a step back, lifting a hand to his head with a wince.

“Huh. I should have just done that in the first place,” Jasper mused.

A dozen guards jogged up from the halted caravan and joined the two standing across from Jasper. A man with a small red plume in his helmet glanced down at the gremlin and frowned.

“Is this what you sounded the horn for?” He asked, distain oozing from his voice.

“Yes Captain. The gremlin says it’s robbing us, sir.”

The captain rolled his eyes. He knelt down in front of Jasper and titled his helm slightly to peer condescendingly at the gremlin.

“You sure about that, buddy? There’s an awful lot of men to rob here. I’m feeling magnanimous today. If you turn around and run back into the mountain, I can pretend this never happened,” he said, his lips turning up in a smirk.

“Go kiss an anthill. Now, do me a favor and scream nice and loud.”

The gremlin flicked his hand and a bolt of crackling purple energy erupted from his fingers. It leapt from one man to another, passing through all the guards before they could even blink. The energy was followed by a series of loud pops as all of the guards’ weapons were replaced by limp fish.

“Vision! The little bastard is a Vision!” The captain screamed.

Tossing his useless fish aside, the captain lunged for Jasper. The gremlin rolled nimbly out of the way and stuck his gray tongue out at the man. He kicked the guard in his backside and cackled as the man fell face first into the snow.

“I appreciate the yelling. It was just what I needed,” Jasper said, waving his hand again. “You can go now.”

There was another series of pops and the guards vanished, replaced by an assortment of mice and rats. Jasper giggled with glee. He stepped over the captain, who was now a gray furred rabbit, and walked up to the edge of the first wagon.

He didn’t have to wait long for a stern looking woman to emerge from behind the train of carts. Two large guards accompanied her. Jasper gave her a moment to take in the situation before he cleared his throat.

“I assume you’re the merchant in charge of this wagon train?”

“You assume correctly. And you are a Vision that has killed my guards,” she replied flatly, looking around at what remained of her guardsmen.

“Didn’t kill them,” Jasper corrected, yawning. “Just turned them into rodents. Except for your captain.”

“And what did you do to him?” She asked.

“Turned him into a rabbit,” Jasper explained. “They aren’t rodents.”

“I see. Is there a reason you have transformed the majority of my guards into a pile of fish, rodents, and a rabbit?”

“The fish are their swords,” Jasper explained. He began cleaning the dirt out from under his nails.

“The question still stands, gremlin.”

“Ah, yes. I believe I was in the process of robbing you.”

The woman and her guards exchanged glances. One of the guards moved his hand to the hilt of his sword. Jasper turned it into a fish.

“Make sure you find that some water. You don’t want your sword to die,” Jasper informed him with a cackle.

The guard sent worried glance at the fish and moved to cup some snow in his spare hand before a sharp glance from the woman stopped him.

“You don’t give us much incentive, Vision. With my guards transformed into tonight’s dinner, I’ve got no chance of getting to Rellen alive. Not to mention I would be destitute and lose all my wagons without any goods to sell.”

“Oh, you’ve misunderstood. I don’t want all of your stuff. I’m much too small to carry that. I just want the shiny bits. Gold, silver, ornately decorated spoons. Sun dried tomatoes if you have them. Give me that and I’ll leave peacefully. I’ll even turn your guards back since I’m feeling…magnanimous,” Jasper said, baring his needle-sharp teeth in a grin.

A strong wind howled through the pass, buffeting everyone with a wall of snow. Jasper tapped his head impatiently.

“Think faster, merchant. Night is closing in, and I don’t think either of us fancy weathering it without a camp.”

The merchant sighed and slapped one of the guards on the back of his helmet.

“I told you we should have hired a Vision for the trip. But you and the good captain were so insistent that there would be no chance of running into a Vision in these mountains,” the merchant said, hitting the guard in the back of his helmet. “This is coming out of your pay, you hear me?”

She turned to Jasper with a defeated look and shrugged her shoulders. “I’ve got no choice. You may have the gold in exchange for returning my guards to normal and leaving the rest of us alone.”

“Wonderful! I’d shake your hand, but I don’t want to get any weird human germs,” Jasper said. He cleared his throat and glanced behind the merchant. “Our trade deal is completed, my exceedingly tall friend. You can come out now.”

Ethan stepped out from behind the wagons. Two large backpacks were slung over his left shoulder and a young woman over his right. He strode right past the merchant and up to Jasper, only pausing to drop one of the packs in the gremlin’s arms.

“We’ll be taking a hostage, just to make sure you don’t try to follow us,” Ethan warned before giving them all an easygoing grin.

“Don’t worry too much, she’ll be dropped off in Rellen safe and sound. Gremlin’s honor.” Jasper added.

One of the guards opened his mouth to argue, but the merchant silenced him with a glare.

“How much could they possibly have gotten this quickly? Keep your trap shut,” she hissed. She looked back at Jasper. “And do you think you can just kidnap one of the people traveling with us?”

Jasper bared his razor-sharp teeth and purple energy crackled across his body like a glowing snake. The merchant held the gremlin’s glare for a moment. Then her shoulders fell, and she let out a defeated sigh.

“How much is a gremlin’s honor worth?”

“Not very much,” Jasper admitted.

“I figured,” she said, rubbing the bridge of her nose. “You better return that girl unharmed, Vision. I’ll make you pay if you don’t, even if I have to hunt you down myself.”

The gremlin tilted his head to the side. “You really mean that. Interesting. Nonetheless, she’ll be fine. Just don’t try following us.”