The next morning Seth retrieved one of Isolde's cages with Owen and met the others in the courtyard by the school gate. The sun was already well up, and had started warming the cold air. A black carriage with a grey-cloaked raven embossed on the side waited for them. Two shadowy horses were hitched to the carriage, and two guards, one with a sword and bow, the other an axe, waited beside the carriage.

The presence of the two guards scandalized Duvessa. "How dare Nana send me babysitters! I can take care of my own business! You two go home. I am not a toddler!"

The woman with the axe smiled at Duvessa. "Of course not, my lady. Your grandmother gave us strict instructions not to interfere with your affairs. Mostly. She also instructed us that you are not allowed near certain areas of Laureli, you are not allowed to talk to certain people, and we will be arranging all travel and accommodations."

Duvessa gasped. "Nana! This is sabotage! I hereby reject my grandmother's meddling. We will walk!"

Owen dropped the cage to the ground beside the carriage with a thunk. "Then who gets to carry these things? Once they've got critters in them, they're gonna be heavy."

Seth put his own cage down more gently. "I don't care if they're empty. I'm not carrying them."

At first Duvessa gazed hopefully at Owen, but he wouldn't look at her. After a moment Duvessa huffed at the cages, and then stared with narrowed eyes at the shadow horses. "I know! We–"

"No you won't," the woman with the axe interrupted. "The horses will return to your grandmother once they've been unhitched. She said you might try that."

"Ugh! This is so unfair," Duvessa complained. "Favors with strings are not favors."

"It's fine," Blaise said. "At least we don't have to walk there, and we can spend more time catching beasts." She shot a meaningful glance at the soldiers. "We can discuss the changes in our plans later."

"Is Booth coming? He's not here yet," Seth said as he scanned the tower courtyard by the front gate. "We still have one more cage to fetch."

"If he's not here when we're done, he can chase us on foot," Blaise said. She peered into the boot of the carriage.

Seth snorted. "If he doesn't help hunt, he doesn't get paid."

"Is that fair?" Owen asked. "He needs it the most, doesn't he? I mean, I can use it too, to fix the sword, but I thought he needed it right away."

"Of course that's fair," Blaise said, dropping her backpack beside the carriage. "I'll go get the last cage. You get these loaded." She lowered her voice so the guards couldn't hear. "We won't have to do as much hunting if he doesn't show, and we can focus on what I want to do instead."

Getting the cages fitted properly into the boot of the carriage with catchpoles and everyone's luggage took some finagling. Seth and Owen rearranged everything several times with suggestions from Blaise and Duvessa, and jeers from Reginald the Second. Reginald the First perched calmly above the driver's seat and watched Mau assessingly.

Owen had just jumped down when Booth wandered in from the front gate.

"Hey. Right on time," Booth said as Owen shut the boot hatch. "Nice."

Blaise simultaneously looked disappointed he showed up and like she was thinking of drowning him.

"It's fine, let's get going," Seth said and ushered everyone into the carriage. He picked up Mau and plopped her inside, too.

The carriage rolled out as soon as Booth shut the door behind him and took his seat. The three boys were on one bench seat, and the two girls on the other.

"How long do you figure it'll take with this carriage, Duvessa? Summons should be quicker than regular horses, right?" Seth asked.

"Hmm. I'm not sure," Duvessa said as she scooted over closer to the window. "Summons don't get tired like animals do, but where it takes energy for an animal to run, it takes mana for a summons. I don't know how much Nana is giving us."

"A regular carriage would get to Laureli by early afternoon," Blaise said. "That should give us plenty of time there, even if they," she jerked her head at the guards at the front, "get weird about where we can go in the village."

They whispered plans and watched the city roll by. Mau hopped up in Seth's lap to better watch out the window. The gentle swaying of the carriage put Seth to sleep in no time.

He was woken by a sudden falling sensation.

"I got you, you're fine," Owen said, positioning Seth on his feet.

Seth blinked rapidly and tried to figure out what happened. The carriage was stopped and he'd apparently fallen out the open door.

"Sorry, man, but you wouldn't wake up. I figured you would if we moved you," Owen said. Once Seth was steady, Owen let go.

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

"I told you to just slap him a bit. He'd wake up," Booth said, and headed to the back of the carriage.

"Rude," Duvessa said. "You should get more sleep at night, Seth. You're younger than us, and I don't think you're getting enough."

"I'm alright. I'm just a heavy sleeper. Sorry for dozing off like that." That was embarrassing. He'd always been a heavy sleeper, but this was becoming a problem. Eager to change the subject he gazed around. "Where are we? This isn't Laureli."

The carriage had pulled over beside the road in a broad meadow. They were approaching the foothills and the slopes were shallower and the valleys broader. The forest had turned golden in fall colors as fewer of the trees here were evergreens.

"He's a genius," Booth said as he pulled the catchpoles out of the carriage boot.

"Quit being an ass," Blaise said. "He's not getting anything out of doing this favor for you." To Seth she said, "It's only been about two hours. I'd guess we're a little over halfway there."

"This is the closest the road comes to two old entrances," the woman with the axe told them. She'd turned around in her seat to address them. "That way is the first and closest one, but older. The second one is that way. You can follow a stream down to it." She picked up her axe and gestured at the forest. "I will remind you that we are outside of the regular patrol routes. While that makes it more likely you'll find the little beasts you're looking for, you may also find some of the bigger beasts that hunt them. Watch yourselves. Send your familiar if you need help, otherwise we are to leave you to it."

"I'm ready!" Duvessa exclaimed happily as she tossed her bow on her shoulder. "Let's go!"

"Be back a couple of hours before sundown. The summons can see in the dark, but we can't," the woman called after them as they crossed the meadow and headed into the autumn woods.

They came to the stream they'd been told about. It was more a dry stream bed with puddles than an active stream.

"Time to plan!" Duvessa announced. She turned to follow the stream bed. "Are we walking from here to Laureli, going to Thurstan's house and asking to be guests, or hunting beasts like we said we would?"

"Hunting beasts," Booth said. He shook his head like he found the question ridiculous. "We can look around in Laureli when we get there."

"What will going to Thurstan's house do?" Owen asked.

"We can search it if we're there," Duvessa said.

"No we can't," Seth said. He trailed after Duvessa and Blaise and stepped carefully around tree roots. "He is not going to let us in, and if he did, he isn't going to let us wander around in his house by ourselves. And if he did, we aren't going to find anything that way. It would be hidden or guarded."

"Ugh. I liked the idea," Duvessa said, and absently whacked a bush with her bow as she walked. "Laureli is still an option then."

"I like the idea of having more time in town to look around, but we can look tonight," Blaise said. She stopped and turned, looking around at the forest.

"Yeah, we're here," Seth said, stopping with her. "Let's do the thing we're here for and not get distracted. I think we should get closer to where she said the sealed entrance was before we start searching for beasts. Owen, you're the most familiar with navigating the woods, why don't you take the lead?"

Everyone fell in behind Owen. Reginald the Second was sent to scout ahead, and Mau draped herself across Seth's shoulders. When they thought they were in the vicinity of the old Below entrance, they used the same tactic they'd used when they found the goats. Seth used the wind to find medium small animals, and Duvessa sent summons to identify the type of animal and exact location. They deliberately avoided larger animals.

Over the course of the next few hours, they found very little that interested them. All of the animals they'd found had been normal forest animals.

After the sixth time being disappointed by a normal fox, Seth started casting Detect Mana periodically also. Eventually Mau jumped down and took the lead.

Owen didn't even question it and let the cat lead them.

Mau led them to an outcropping overlooking a small meadow. Mau lifted her head and sniffed the air, her whiskers twitching in the breeze. She made the sign for 'Quiet'.

Seth relayed Mau's command and then cast Detect Mana, whispering the incant. Sure enough, there was more mana here, but it was only a small increase. Seth thought Mau's sensitivity improved if she could lead them here.

Duvessa opened her mouth but Booth wrapped his hand over it before she could speak.

"Shh," he hissed. "There's stuff down there. Quietly, take a look."

"Look," Owen whispered. He had crept up to the edge and looked down. "The meadow is perfectly round. I'd say this is the other sealed entrance we've been looking for."

"I thought it was supposed to be a cave?" Blaise said, also whispering.

Owen shrugged. "This ain't natural, whatever it is."

"What are those, Owen?" Booth asked quietly. "I can't see them well enough in the grass."

Seth watched the meadow, looking for what Booth had seen. He guessed the yellow grass was about knee height, and some type of animals were moving around in it, but they were too short to see.

"No more weasels, no more weasels," Blaise muttered.

Finally Seth spotted one. "They're not weasels, they're rabbits. There's a whole warren down there," he whispered happily, "so there should be at least a couple of magic ones."

"So, not dangerous," Duvessa said quietly. She sounded disappointed. "This should be easy."

"Really? How do we catch them without them all running away?" Booth said, also quietly. "And how do we catch the magic ones and not regular rabbits? We don't have much time left either. We're supposed to head back soon."

"We don't have to hurry," Duvessa said. "They will wait for us."

"But the longer we're here, the less time we have to look around in Laureli," Blaise said.

"I ain't running after rabbits with a catch pole," Owen said.

"I could shoot one and then we heal it," Duvessa suggested.

Owen shook his head. "They'll hear the arrow coming and dodge it. Even normal rabbits are quick that way. Unless you think you can hit them while they're running from this distance?"

Duvessa gaged the distance, but both Booth and Blaise shook their heads. Seth also knew Duvessa didn't have the skill for that.

"Can we lure them?" Owen asked.

"I was thinking about that," Seth said. He was crouching at the edge of the outcropping and looking down at the edges of the circular meadow. "We can lure them, but then when we go to catch them, they would run away. The lure isn't a trap. And if we set a trap, we might just catch normal rabbits."

"So what do we do then?" Booth asked. "Running into the middle of them and grabbing them like we did the weasels isn't going to work this time."

"Owen, where do you think the rabbits are likely to go if they get scared?" Seth asked.

"They probably got holes in the meadow. There's also some dense brush on that side, so maybe there, too." Owen examined the woods. "Yeah, they're not going to go west, the forest is too clear. They'll go underground, or northeast."

"Okay. I have an idea. Here's what I think we should do," Seth said.