As two killers circled one another in a swamp, Jarl Feldon, Shieldmaiden Edith, and Azmond sat quietly in the captain quarters high above the remains of the Bergin ship. Feldon had entrusted Derrol to lead the recovery efforts as he ruminated some newfound information. His eyes trailed over the map Edith had nabbed from the Bergin ship before it went down. Edith, blasé as ever, leaned against the wall as she watched her husband pour over the map. Azmond was more obvious in his curiosity. He sat cross legged on the table, noting every movement of Jarl Feldon’s fingers trailing paths across the map, memorizing every city that held his attention.

It was the first time either Azmond or Feldon had ever seen a map so detailed. Every road, every settlement, every stable wind current was shown. Had Feldon been like most Faulk, he would have scoffed at using such a thing. A ‘true’ Faulk relied on the stars, the winds, the prickle in their bones to know where they were. True enough, the map was nearly blank on the western side. It was only marked with a vague outline of the coast and a stern warning.

‘Beware: Faulk and Fae infest these swamps.’

How could any mapmaker hope to do more than warn the reader? The lands were steeped in a fog that hid the ground from view and the winds were wilder than the land below. The map was utterly useless for any Faulk navigator. Feldon didn’t care about such things. In every confrontation, from trade to war, information was king.

He told Azmond as much when he first unrolled the map on the table. The child absorbed information like a sponge, quickly becoming proficient in reading maps. He leaned closer to Feldon and pointed at the settlement the jarl kept focusing his gaze onto. It was at the river mouth connecting the Eventide Sea to the ocean.

“What’s that?”

“That…is a problem.” Feldon shuffled in place nervously. “I am not too good at reading Bergin names. I believe it’s called ‘Beaufort’?”

“Pronounced ‘Bo-fuhrr.’” Edith rolled the ‘r’. “An old Venra name meaning ‘handsome fort.’”

“Thank you, Edith. That may have confirmed my suspicions.” The jarl traced his fingers to several wind currents that passed through or close to the settlement. “I know that the area around the Eventide Sea is at a higher altitude than the rest of the peninsula. And there are many regular wind currents that lead there. Yet there are few roads leading to it. Not to mention the river current would be too strong to sail against.”

“You think it’s important.” Edith hummed in thought as she leaned over Feldon’s shoulder. Some of her hair hung loosely enough to tickle Feldon’s nose. Edith’s mischievous smile made it clear to Azmond this was intentional. He wondered again why adults did stuff like this to each other.

“I know it’s important.” Jarl Feldon brushed away the hair and his rare grin. “I’m wondering just how important. How fortified. Whether it’s just an airship resupply, or something more. Like a prison.”

“Looking for Jarl Trygyve?” The shieldmaiden sat on the table, which creaked under her weight. Feldon nodded; a frown still aimed squarely at Beaufort.

“Why?” Azmond cocked his head. “I thought you wanted to be High Jarl?”

“Ha!” Edith snorted and tried to mess with Azmond’s hair as Rael did. Azmond dodged the surprised woman’s hand and continued to stare at the pair curiously. “Well, Feldon here has a problem. He’s a very good Jarl. He’d be a great High Jarl. But…”

“I don’t want to. I have enough on my plate.” Feldon grunted as he paced in place.

“But you’re—”

“Because having Erikar as High Jarl would be the worst thing to happen to the Faulkie.” Feldon interrupted Azmond. “And saving Trygyve would spear two fish at once. One more candidate against Erikar, and some merit to make me a more viable candidate.” The Jarl groaned and stretched, his back popping in several places. “We’re getting ahead of ourselves. We need to verify Beaufort’s status. Hopefully we’ve captured some prisoners. Bak made us some potions of candidness before we left, we might as well use them.”

“I’ll go check on Rael and the others on the ground. Last I saw they were cleaning up. Giving last rites, punching legionnaires in the face…the usual post-battle rituals.” Edith got up, the table groaning in relief. “Who knows, maybe we captured some of those wargs. I hear they’re killer on the battlefield.”

“Can I come?” Azmond leaped off the table and landed by Edith’s side.

“Only if you promise to let me teach you some sparring tricks.” The Shieldmaiden put her hands on her hips and stared down at the Child of Dragons.

“…Do I have to?” Azmond pursed his lips.

“If you want go to dangerous places, you must become dangerous yourself.” Edith crossed her arms and stared down at the boy. He looked away and nodded reluctantly.

The Shieldmaiden nodded and led him outside. She brought him to the edge of the drakkar, the wreckage below hidden by layers of thick fog. Azmond could barely make out the general shape of the crash from the soft orange light of burning wood. Edith squinted through the mist and scowled.

“What?” Azmond tugged on Edith’s gambeson.

“Some of those idiots need help. Can’t even deal with some overgrown hounds.” She eyed Azmond carefully.

“Is Rael okay?” Azmond got on his tiptoes to try and get a better look over the side of the ship.

“They’re dealing.” Edith patted Rael’s back a few times. “We’re going down to help.”

“In the basket?” Azmond asked. He didn’t think they could get the line and basket ready quick enough to help.

Edith chortled and picked him up from under his arms. “Nope.”

And she threw him overboard.

<><><>

Rael burst to the surface, gasping a lungful of air. They pulled themselves to the beach, dragging a furry corpse behind them. Rael collapsed over the corpse, too tired to care about the smell.

‘There has to be a better way of killing these things.’ Rael thought as they flipped over and groaned. The battle could have been a fierce one. But Rael had been tired, injured, and too damned sick of the fighting. Rather than waste energy on several spells to try and make an opening to attack the warg’s neck, the Dragonward decided that they would use the environment to their advantage.

They exhausted their magic to cast [Hydro-kinesis] and turn deep water into dry(ish) land. A crater of water opened for Rael to escape into. When they ran down, the warg followed, the sight of fleeing prey too much a temptation for the man-eater. How unfortunate for it. When Rael released the spell, the wall of water slammed into the unprepared beast and the slightly more prepared youth.

The rushing water pushed the beast down, down, down. It snarled mutely in the murky waters until the madness in its eyes was steadily replaced by fear. The warg no longer tried to bite at Rael as they swirled around each other in rushing water. Instead, it paddled desperately towards the surface. But the very things that made it such a fearsome creature had spelled its doom. Its own dense muscles, thick fur, and heavy collar dragged it into the depths.

Rael could have left it there. But when they burst to the surface, Rael was still in a daze. In their mind, hazy with exhaustion, they remembered Azmond having fun playing with a warg skull. It seemed only natural that they bring it up. That’s how they found themselves sprawled across the warg’s body, retching up swamp water. Rael pulled themselves up, their mind clearing enough for the rage to take hold.

It was supposed to be a smooth mission. It hadn’t even been thirty minutes since they boarded the ship, and now ruin and corpses lay around them for nearly a kilometer. Rael snarled and set their sights of the warg.

They kicked the warg’s corpse in the ribs and stomped on its neck, screaming angrily at the dead creature. It was as if all the emotions they’d bottled up poured out of them in a flurry of blows. Rael howled obscenities incoherently at the corpse, at first cursing John and the Bergin, then Faulk, Wollow, their family, and even the Dragons themselves. Rael’s vision, blurry with saltwater, soon cleared enough for them to see the creature.

The terrifying monster’s all-too-human eyes lacked the madness that had been present in life. In fact, it was serene in death. Calm and tragic like an ancient ruin. Its wet fur clung to its emaciated frame, its open jaws reveal cracked and blackened teeth in the soft light of the foggy clearing. Scars curled around its wrists in a repeating pattern; scars Rael was too familiar with.

Chains.

Azmond found Rael resting on the waterlogged corpse. They sat with their head in their arms, jaw clenched shut.

“Rael?”

Azmond was good at recognizing Rael’s smiles. There was the dazzling one that got people to stop and stare. It usually meant Rael was about to punch somebody. There was the one that they kept just for him, whenever he said something they found funny, or clever, or curious. Azmond liked that one.

Then there was the one Rael hated showing. It only ever appeared for only a few moments, whenever someone asked them about their past or their family. It was a small smile that made them look their age, warm and full of happy memories, but also held a type of deep sadness. One that was rooted in their very soul. It never lasted for more than a second, quickly disappearing beneath an unfeeling mask. This time, it stayed.

“Hey Az.” Rael waved him over. “I’m pretty sure the battle’s over.”

Azmond nodded and sat quietly by Rael.

“Are you okay?”

“Just tired.” Rael winced when Azmond poked them in their arm. “And my arm is hurt.”

Azmond wanted to ask more about Rael’s condition. But they tended to clam up if people prodded. So, he kept quiet and leaned against Rael, basking in their heat.

“I got a warg for you.” Rael said. “I saw you having fun with a warg skull with Bleffy, so I thought: ‘why not?’”

“Don’t need one.” He grabbed Rael’s hand and put it on his head.

“How’d you get down here, anyways?” Rael caressed his horns gently.

“Edith brought me down.” Azmond hummed. “It was fun.”

“Okay, but how—”

“There you are!”

Edith walked through the underbrush, followed by a dozen Faulk with wounds of varying severity. Behind them, hands bound by rope, were half a dozen legionnaire prisoners. When the Faulk saw Rael and Azmond perched atop the warg’s body, some of them let out whistles of admiration. Only Edith looked unimpressed.

“You look like shit.” The Shieldmaiden chuckled.

“Language.” Rael winced as they used their injured arm to cup Azmond’s ears. The adrenaline had long faded away, the pain in their arm and thigh flaring up again.

“Demsy drank the last vial of our healing potions. Will you need help to climb back up to the ship?” The woman smiled evilly, goading Rael to say no.

“I have been choked, stabbed, and then nearly mauled, crushed, and drowned.” Rael huffed and stood up straight, limping towards the two-meter woman. They leaned against her shoulder and groaned. “I’m too tired to care how I get back on the ship.”

“Clearly not too tired to talk.” Edith quipped, picking up the youth with arm and resting them on her shoulder. She waved up at the ship and a rope ladder swung down from the fog. Once Edith had climbed far enough for nobody to hear, she whispered. “I saw you. You were clever. We’ll make a fine warrior of you yet.”

Once all the surviving Faulk, prisoners, and loot got on board, a triage was quickly assembled. The more severely injured would be brought inside the captain’s room and placed in sturdy hammocks to rest. The prisoners were bound, gagged, and lumped into hammocks of their own.

The moderately wounded sat on their benches and bragged to one another about how their scars would look the best. The medics had slapped some poultices on Rael’s arm. ‘Garlic paste, ginger, murkweed, and tuber jelly.’ Rael recognized the smell emanating from the bandages. It would help them heal their torn muscles and fractured bones, though not as quickly as a specialist’s spells would.

The healthy raiders went down to divvy up the loot and collect the locks of the fallen, under the watchful eyes of the captains. They brought swords, spears, and strips of metal torn from any of the armor they could find. A particularly inquisitive woman even found a heavy iron chest filled with silver hidden in what remained of the officer’s quarters on the Bergin ship. A hefty bounty of silver and scrap. Her friend congratulated her with a bottle of wine he found, and soon the crew cracked open a barrel of spirits.

It was sound reasoning: they’d just brought up a load of weight and it was time to drink it away. Azmond sat on Rael’s lap as the party got started, his guardian’s fingers distractedly braiding and unbraiding his hair. The two watched as the drinking horns were raised eight times. One round for every Faulk lost.

With every round, they would tell stories of the ones who died. Brave Mikkel’s first swamp boar hunt, when he accidentally took an irate hog for a ride. Fimla’s numerous attempts at wooing Brumvei, who now found herself a widow. Cualahan’s history of wrestling and how he once lost a match to help his friend get lucky. And so on.