"Uncle Gu?"

"No."

"Can I–"

"No."

"You didn't even hear what I wanted to ask."

"Okay. Ask."

"Uncle Gu, could we ride your boat into the sea?"

"No."

Milo grumbled and continued tending to the garden. This was the tenth time this week that they'd had the same conversation. The details varied slightly with each iteration, but the end result was always the same.

"Why are you so against the idea?" Milo asked while pulling weeds.

"Make sure to get the roots," Gu reminded.

"..." Milo elected not to reply.

Gu sighed, "I'm old. We need a crew. You have no Gift."

"..."

"Do you understand why that matters?" Gu asked.

"Yes."

Milo thought back to his life up until this point – to all the hatred and disgust that he'd received for lacking a Gift. Deviant. Monster. Forsaken. Rejected by the gods. Abandoned by convention. Loved by none. Reviled by all. Such was the fate of the “Prince without Gift”, banished and exiled from home. He was infamous – somebody that no one could accept.

"But…" Gu broke the silence.

"But?"

"But if you finish three tasks, I'll arrange it."

Milo looked at him with distrust, "What are the tasks?"

"In two days, go to the forest in the north. I'll tell you the first task there. Now work."

The two of them cleared the garden of autumn harvest and prepared the land for winter.

Two days later.

Milo packed a bag with all the supplies that he thought would be useful for an adventure in the woods, then headed out. He spotted Gu waiting at the edge of the northern forest. Milo waved.

Although he couldn't hear it from this far away, he could almost see the grumpy uncle's usual grunt of acknowledgment. Milo stood in front of Gu and waited to hear what the task would be.

"Prepared?" Gu asked.

"En," Milo nodded.

"The task is to retrieve an item – a fungus, 'death's deceit.' Looks identical to death's ear but has no smell. Grows anywhere off the ground. Mostly on tree bark. Slightly different shade of white to death's ear," Gu explained.

"If it's so similar to death's ear, isn't this task a little too dangerous?"

"No.”

“But what about the poison?”

“Just don't get poisoned."

"Huh?" Milo blurted, "How could it be as simple as that?"

"If you listened, it's simple."

"...I'll do my best,” Milo sighed.

"Boy, do you think the sea is safe?" Gu fixed the child with a sharp gaze.

Milo flinched, "I didn't think anything of it. Since you’d be in the lead, I wasn't worried."

"On the open waters, the only person you can trust is yourself. Surviving the sea is a dozen times more dangerous than land. If you can't even do this much, then forget it."

Milo clenched his fists with determination, "I'll gather the death's deceit and return."

Gu nodded, "Good. Remember what I said. Now go."

"En," Milo took the lessons to heart and ventured into the depths of the northern forest.

Bits of hazy light pierced through the dense canopy of trees above, illuminating the lively scene of the woods below. The calls of insects, birds, and small animals cascaded from every direction. Dragonflies hovered in the air, flitting left and right. Sparrows hopped around pecking at the earth before scattering in formation. A nearby bush rustled. A squirrel darted out and leapt onto a tree. It landed in a silly pose with all four paws splayed wide across the trunk. The squirrel paused, looked side to side, then suddenly bounded up the tree and out of sight. A lone boy walked through the forest in search of death’s deceit.

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

Milo always felt more relaxed surrounded by nature. Surviving by the rules that governed monsters and beasts was much simpler than the ones that bound men. Monsters would either eat you, or not. Be your friend, or not. They would never lock you away, keep you out of sight, and force you to learn the rules of a game that you would never be allowed to play. No. Monsters were simple. They might be violent, but seldom were they cruel. If you met the right one at the right time, you might even find that they had the capacity for great kindness.

‘Well, I suppose humans also have the capacity for great kindness.’

Milo thought about the villagers who fed him and sheltered him when he was starving and alone. Although they didn’t have the means to provide him this care, they did so anyway because he was worse off than they were.

He thought about the grumpy uncle who took him in and mentored him, and who – even now – was following in secret from a great distance to make sure that the boy didn’t get himself killed. Milo smiled.

But humans also had the capacity for great cruelty – far worse than any monster that he had ever known. Milo thought about the palace life and the games that were not games. The pity that was not pity. The kindness that was not kindness. The love that was not love.

The wind blew and silenced the forest around him.

Milo thought about the gentry who had the means to provide and care for many, yet refused to because “the many” were worse off than them. There was little benefit in helping the commoners beneath them. It wasn’t as if the ground provided any support to the ones climbing floating ladders in the sky.

The forest was eerily quiet.

Milo sniffed and discovered the reason.

Death’s ear. He smelt it before he saw it.

The lethal fungus was sticking out from the trunk of a tree in the distance – an irregular bony circle, about the size of a silver coin. By all accounts, this ivory outgrowth should have fit the description of death’s deceit: it was pale, calcified, shaped like a skull’s ear hole, and growing against something above the ground. Unlike its sibling, death’s ear would never be found attached to a tree like this; it always grew on the ground, and it always grew in isolation. That didn’t mean that it couldn’t have been moved, though. The smell was unmistakable.

Very carefully, Milo gathered a few large leaves from the branches of a different tree and used them to protect himself from contact. Hands covered, he gathered a few twigs and fashioned them into a makeshift box on the ground. He found four more twigs – each about the same length – and used them to grab hold of the fungus. Secured with two sticks on top and two on the bottom, he gingerly pulled the death’s ear off of the tree.

Once it came loose, he put the fungus into the little wooden platform that he had built, then stuck the four sticks vertically into the ground so that their poisoned tips were buried. Milo stabbed the leaves that he was using onto the sticks and then finally let out a sigh of relief. He patted his hands off and wiped the sweat off of his forehead before venturing deeper into the woods. After walking a good distance away from the death’s ear, the playful chatter of the forest returned in full force.

'I don't think these tasks are going to be simple,' Milo thought to himself.

The boy walked north, heading deeper and deeper into the heart of the forest. He was starting to realize the problem with this task – he had no clues as to where the death's deceit might be hidden. On top of that, it was small and had no obvious smell to mark it. On top of that, chances were that Gu moved it away from its natural place of growth, as evidenced by the death's ear earlier. Thus, Milo decided that instead of wandering around in hopes of stumbling into good fortune, he would simply keep north until he reached the end of the forest. He pulled out a cloth sack from his bag and started filling it with the edible plants he found along the way.

'Just in case it takes a while,' he thought to himself.

The forest was teeming with beautiful sights. Although his journey was mostly aimless, it wasn't without meaning. Milo discovered giant trees whose trunks were thrice as wide as he was tall. Birds whose tails reflected the lands beneath them as they streaked through the sky. A sparkling creek full of little sprites who shot bubbles at the animals that came to drink.

Milo laughed and went to the creek to fill his waterskin. A playful blue fey shot a spritz of water at him but he was already prepared. The boy opened his mouth and caught the droplets. The sprite giggled and launched more streams of water. Milo drank some and got hit by some others.

They had been playing around for some time when suddenly the water spirit was struck by inspiration. Milo saw her gather up three balls of water and merge them into a single massive blob over a foot wide – even bigger than the sprite that was carrying it. Her tiny arms trembled under the weight of mischief, and several kilograms of water.

Milo put up his hands in surrender, "Okay, enough enough. I give up!"

The spirit giggled and tossed the giant orb to him.

Milo ran to the side and dived out of the way. The water splashed right behind him and soaked through the earth.

The boy got up, dusted himself off, and laughed, "Nice try, little spirit.”

The fey stuck out her blue tongue at Milo and shot him in the forehead with a dewdrop.

He wiped the water off and waved at his new friend, "Alright little spirit, It was fun playing with you but I should probably get going now. Bye bye! I’ll see you again soon."

The boy started to walk away back into the forest but noticed the water spirit frantically waving both hands left and right.

“I’m sorry, but I can’t stay any longer. I really do have to go,” Milo said with a voice full of reluctance and turned to leave again.

The sprite shook her head and urgently pointed at Milo, and in the direction he was walking.

Milo thought for a moment, but he couldn’t understand the message no matter how hard he tried.

“I really don’t know what you’re trying to say, but I promise that I’ll come back to visit when I’m done with my adventure here,” the boy replied, then waited to see if the sprite had more to say.

She stomped her foot on the creek, frustrated, and pointed aggressively at Milo again.

Milo shook his head, not grasping the water spirit’s meaning at all. He walked back into the forest and called out to the creek behind him, “Take care, okay? I'll come back lat—”

Suddenly Milo was dragged into the air. He found himself dangling upside down, suspended high in the air from a snare tied tight around his ankle. The boy’s view rapidly shifted between creek and forest as the trap spun him around in circles. Eventually, the rotation slowed and Milo caught a glimpse of the fey standing upside down on the upside down creek. She had one hand on her hip as she looked at Milo and shook her head. The water spirit stuck her tongue out at him again, then sank up into the creek and disappeared.

‘Oh, so that’s what it was.’