What they got from the demon’s corpse was morbid and interesting. Its tendrils were strong and incredibly elastic. One of the dismantlers recommended using them as ballistae strings. The claws weren’t just sharp, they kept their edge even after scratching stone. The scales were the real prize, though. Sharp, solid, and light enough to carry, there were enough scales to have an axe or buckler made for everyone who fought, and then some. Nirk, hobbling around from his injuries, had the biggest smile when he held up the cleaved skull he’d decapitated from the demon. He kept saying he was unsure if he should use it as a helmet, a pauldron, a trophy, or bring it as a gift for Molod’s family.

It was when they cut open the demon that many questions were answered. Not all of them, but quite a few. The dismantlers, covered in blood, were talking over one another as they took the demon apart, pointing at specific sections of the creature’s anatomy. Rael tried to follow along, but they couldn’t tell one goopy bit from the other. Finally, the dismantlers cut open whatever worked as the monster’s stomach, finding three partially digested bodies closer to its mouth. Not whole, mostly crushed and torn apart, but they still had jewelry that helped identify them. Greem’s blood-brother and two other hunters, with what was left of a couple pickaxes.

“They probably went looking for the demon, found its cave, and decided farming its resin would be better.” Edith explained at the longhouse. “The operation was doing well, until they realized that it was eating people.” The Shieldmaiden was standing, fists flat against the table. The silver torcs of the accused lay before her on a cloth. “Someone had the bright idea of hiding the emergency flags, probably so they could buy time to farm more resin.”

“Only it backfired when the demon ate them.” Greem said softly, eyes focused on his blood-brother’s torc. “Why was he such a fool?”

Edith held up a shard of resin to the candlelight. Rael, Derrol and Kip watched from behind the Shieldmaiden, the flickering of the flame dancing in the amber material, glittering like a diamond. “It is beautiful. Same color as amber but…” Edith slammed the shard against the table. When she removed her hand, the shard was intact, and the table was indented. “It’s much harder. Could be used as jewelry or as weapon materials.”

Greem was staring at the hole in his table.

“That was an ancient willow table.” He said blankly.

“Hush up.” Edith rolled her eyes. “We’re not taking it with us.”

Greem swiveled his head.

“‘We?’”

“Yes, ‘we.’” The Shieldmaiden nodded. “It’s not safe to leave all of you here. With our recent casualties, we have enough space on our ships to take all of you to the Stone Circle.”

Greem’s expression fell from grim acceptance to one of fear and despair.

“The Norns are going to flay me.”

“As much as your village was a devastating failure,” Greem flinched at Edith’s harsh words, “nobody could have anticipated a demon. Nor could they expect you to not trust your blood-brother.”

“So what do we do now?” Greem sighed, sinking deeper into his chair.

“You walk outside, call a Thing, and tell everyone to gather the essentials and prepare to leave.”

Greem bit his cheek, his gaze lingering on his blood-brother’s distorted torc. “What about—”

“We leave them here.” Edith spoke with finality. She wrapped the torc in a cloth and left it on the table. “Their names will be stricken from the records, and no burial rites will be given. Their greed has condemned the people of this village to this fate; their memory is tainted.”

Greem nodded sadly and stood up to leave, nodding to all of them in turn. He stopped in front of Rael.

“Dragonward, I’ve heard from some of the warriors that you were of great help in slaying the demon. My vill—” He caught himself. “My people owe you a great debt.”

Once he left, Kip collapsed into a chair, still exhausted from the battle.

“Gah, I hate politics.” He wiped sweat from his brow. “All the standing around and not talking…”

“Not talking was hardest for you, eh?” Derrol chuckled.

“Shaddup.” Kip laughed hoarsely.

“Enough lollygagging, you two.” Edith grabbed them both by the shoulders and pushed them towards the door. “Captain Derrol, I expect you to lead the effort in getting our men to pack up. I don’t care if they already opened some barrels of wine, we don’t want to linger long. Captain Kip, I want you to help the villagers. Make sure they only take what they can carry with them, I don’t want some idjit insisting we take his bed. If they want to buy some space on the ships, make sure it’s expensive.” She pointed at Rael. “And you…go take care of Azmond.”

Rael followed the other two outside. There already was a hubbub of activity as the villagers began to dig through their things, looking for valuables and personal trinkets. There were too few people to really call it a swarm, but people didn’t seem to have time for emotions. Stern faces, gaunt bodies, and twitchy gazes spoke of weeks under siege by an unseen enemy. Despite dragging the body to the village, the people were too tired to rejoice. For them, it must have been weeks since the village felt like home.

Azmond was carrying a huge, dog-like skull, following a young girl with blond, curly hair. Slinking behind him from a distance were Jasp and Pequit, heads swiveling between looking at Azmond and each other. Azmond spotted Rael, gasped, and waved his free arm frantically as he balanced the massive skull in the crook of his neck.

“Rael! Rael!” He patted the girl’s back a few times. “Bleffy, that’s Rael. They’re the one I told you about!”

Bleffy’s eyes lit up and she rushed over to Rael. Her eyes practically sparkled when she looked up at Rael.

“You’re Rael?” Bleffy hopped in place excitedly.

“…Yes?”

“Azmond says you’re even better at tag than him! Can you play with us?” The little girl practically vibrated with excitement, an amber-colored stone glistening from her neck. Rael put down the skull and rushed to her side.

“Please, Rael?” He gave his ward the biggest puppy dog eyes he could muster, tearing Rael’s eyes away from the girl’s necklace.

“How about when we get to the Stone Circle. We’ve got to finish up over here.” The shoulders of the two kids slumped. Rael clapped their hands together, getting their attention. “But…if you two can help the others carry their stuff to the ships, I’ll, uh…” Rael looked at their expectant faces. Azmond was easily entertained. Some roughhousing, a bit of tag, and snuggling after a long day of running around kept his spirits high. ‘But I don’t know anything about Bleffy. Probably the same thing I could bribe Tipple with.’

“…Buy you two some sweets when we get there.”

“Yes!” Bleffy fist-pumped and ran over to help more adults move their things. Azmond looked confused but ran after her. A woman resembling Bleffy approached Rael. There were bags under her eyes, and she walked as if the weight of the world was on her shoulders.

“She’ll hold you to that, you know. She likes rogromme, honeyed pear, and apple tarts the most.” Rael nodded, eyes lingering on the woman’s own necklace. The woman noticed, quickly hiding it. “A gift from my husband. Late husband.” She sighed. “I was still hoping he’d come back.”

“He gave you and Bleffy those resin shards as gifts?” Bleffy’s mother nodded.

“It’s rare for an Aspirant’s village to exist for long. Usually, a Jarl somewhere dies, and the Aspirant becomes the Jarl of the village as his old followers compete with the new for positions beneath him. New Jarldoms are seldom born, but when they are, it is because they provide something the other Jarldoms cannot.” The woman held a hand where she’d hidden the resin shard. “Kl—My husband brought us those shards about a month ago. He said this was his promise that Greem would become a Jarl equal to Feldon, Trygyve, or Moryn.” She clenched her jaw as she got misty-eyed, expression downcast.

“And then?” Rael asked.

“People started to go missing. I should have seen the signs. My husband was anxious for a few days before, he too, disappeared. I felt it strange that his hunting group did not go searching for him but dismissed it as caution on their part.” Her knuckles were white. She looked up, tears finally flowing down her reddened cheeks. “That damnable blood-brother of Greem’s knew. He had to know, but he let that creature keep feeding. And now, my husband’s name is gone. My daughter’s future is poisoned, because her father was too ambitious for our own good.”

Rael followed her line of sight, witnessing villagers give Bleffy the cold shoulder as she offered to help them. They only acquiesced when Azmond insisted, and even then, Bleffy shrunk under their glares. Rael’s heart twisted in their chest, recognizing the looks Bleffy was receiving. A young Raela had grown strong, tempered in the blaze of a bitter village. But it was not something Rael would wish on any other child.

Bleffy’s mother sighed, picking up the dog skull and balancing it on top of the wooden chest she dragged behind her. “I knew what I was getting into when I wed him. ‘Velma,’ he told me, ‘I will only return from the raids with the head of prey worthy of you’. True to his word, he came back covered in fresh scars holding this warg skull.”

Rael felt a shiver climb up their spine when they realized what manner of creature the skull belonged to. A monster she’d never seen, but one that occupied the shadows of their nightmares for the duration of their trip on that damnable slave ship. Before another monster took its place.

“Sounds romantic.” Rael said in a tone that spoke volumes to the contrary.

“Wasn’t it?” Velma sighed, oblivious to Rael’s not-so-subtle opinion. “I must be going. Thank you for getting my little marigold into doing something productive, Dragonward.”

“Please, call me Rael.” They held out a hand. Velma looked at it curiously. A small smile crept onto her lips.

“Thank you, Rael.” She grasped Rael’s hand and shook it.

Rael was about to go help Azmond and Bleffy but found Pequit and Jasp still hanging back. ‘Let’s see if I can intentionally bring out Ruen’s abilities.’ Rael walked on the balls of their feet, awkwardly avoiding dead branches and uneven ground. Slowly, they snuck up on the two, foreign muscle memory taking over until they moved as quickly and silently as an owl. Occasionally, their mind and body fell out of sync, but they eventually realized the trick was not focusing too hard on moving. Until they reached right behind Jasp and Pequit, breathing down their necks. The two jumped up and turned around, color fading from their faces.

“Dragonward.” Jasp bowed his head. Pequit looked at him, then at Rael, and mimicked him stiffly.

“Jasp.” Rael stood up straighter. He was sightly hunched and avoiding making eye contact. A twinge of guilt prickled at their conscience. “I…uh…wanted to apologize for earlier.”

“Pardon?” Jasp cocked his head as Pequit gaped.

“I should have trusted you to try your best, even without threatening you. It’s just it was dangerous, and I thought…” Rael stopped, shaking their head. “Never mind. The point is, I overreacted when it came to protecting Azmond. We’ve been through difficult events, and I’ve sort of taken him under my wing…an unknown place with unknown danger brought out the worst in me, and I’m sorry.”

Jasp smiled timidly. “I accept your apology, Dragonward. You were only doing your duty.”

“Thanks for looking over Az, by the way.” Rael nodded. “Did he give you any trouble?”

“Aside from running around and climbing everywhere, none.” Jasp cocked his head in thought and continued. “He did manage to convince that girl to play tag with him, which got the other children together into a big game. Pequit and I had to rush around and prevent them from running into the forest.”

“Those kids have way too much energy.” Pequit huffed. “It’s as if they haven’t been outside in weeks.”

“They probably haven’t.” Rael responded. “The demon has been picking people off about a month ago. Staying inside was safer.”

“So it was a demon.” Pequit gasped. “I’d only heard whispers from those who returned…There hasn’t been a sighting in over a century!” He grabbed Rael by the shoulders and shook them. “You must tell me more.”

Rael shook him off and pushed him back. “You’ll learn everything from Meayetti. She was there, disguised as Captain Kip.”

Pequit winced. “That does explain her absence…did render Kip unconscious and replace him, or…?”

“From what I gather, she replaced him after he went behind the encirclement to recover.” Rael narrowed their eyes. “Does she normally do that? Pull secrets from people by knocking out their friends and pretending to be them?”

“[Presdigitation] is a foundational spell of hers. She tends to use spells derived from it a bit too much, sometimes to our detriment.” He furrowed his bushy eyebrows and snapped his fingers. “Why, a few weeks ago, I was sweet-talking this fascinating trader from Doub, only to find out Meayetti had replaced her for some inane reason! I told her—”

“I get it, she’s a handful.” Rael interrupted. “Is there any way to get her to stop?”

The skald shook his head somberly.

“She’s a stubborn contrarian. Tell her to be quiet, she’ll speak up. Tell her to explain, she’ll shut her mouth. Asking her not to sneak around for secrets is like asking a fish not to swim or a bird not to fly.”

“Great.” Rael sighed, biting their knuckle.

“If I may, Dragonward,” Jasp stepped in. “Maybe you should consider taking away the power she has over you. A swamp panther will pursue its prey until it drops. But if there is no more prey…”

“The panther gives up.” Rael finished quietly. “You’ve given me a lot to think about, thanks. No need to keep looking over Az.” Rael left the two to help Azmond, their thoughts muddled and turbulent.