That night, they slept under the stars. Booker prepared and applied a compress of simple ingredients to Kuei-Lan’s leg, nothing that bore any toxicity whatsoever, promising her that after the pain increased for a few days she’d be ready to heal completely. Hua snored gently under her sister’s arm, and Fen played his instrument as he sat watching the fire die down to a pit of cinders.

Quest: Local Flavor

Goal: Create 5 (1/5) different medicines from plants and ingredients local to the Lower Mantis Valley.

Reward: Apprentice Page.

Booker lay on the grass, feeling at ease in a way he rarely had within the Sect. There were no scheming enemies here: the wilds itself might be a danger, but it held little malice, only the blind self-interest of beasts. And if that was true, perhaps he could finally slow down the pace of his life and enjoy a little relaxed living…

Ha. Why do I feel that’s only a dream?

But still… A dream was what he needed, now.

And sleep came easily.

— — —

The next morning they set out. Fen and Booker walked near the front, with Hua darting in and out of view ahead as she searched for herbs. Xan offered his shoulder as support to the limping Kuei-Lan and they all made their way towards her village, under the sun-drenched pine and in the growing cold that frosted the branches with thin sheens of ice melting rapidly in the light of day.

As they went, Fen tried to teach Booker the beast-luring trick. They would pause, Fen would point towards a bird in the branches, and Booker would try to whistle it down.

Often nothing happened. More rarely, he would push himself too hard and the frustration in his effort would scare the bird up into the sky. But slowly – very slowly – he began to understand. The trick was to focus totally on the simplest details, like he had with his talisman. As long as he held an image in mind and let his ‘intent’ totally exist within that image, forgetting the world around him and the feeling of the mask weighing down his face, his own spiritual presence faded to nothing.

While his appearance didn’t change, his spirit did. And these simple animals were just attuned enough to the spiritual world to sense this crude illusion, like a blind man feeling the sun on his face.

They had walked for most of the day by the time he managed to lure the first little sparrow into his hands. The sun was beginning to descend towards the mountains, and Fen and Booker were sitting on a gnarled ridge of tree roots, when Fen pointed out the small bird hiding in the tree above.

Booker sighed and closed his eyes.

He had tried a dozen mental images – waving fields of grain, drifting clouds, the blue sky and the clear flow of a river – but this time he picked something from Earth: the sight of dozens of crows sitting along a bending telephone wire, their croaking songs filling the clear blue dome of the sky.

As he whistled, he let himself be transported. Remember what it had felt like to ride in the back seat of his father’s car in summer, the faux-leather seats sticking to the skin on the back of his neck by drops of sweat. The conditioner struggling and rattling to make a thin breath of cool air.

It was a moment he remembered warmly, every detail still clear in his mind.

And he felt the bird land in his cupped palm. The sensation of its wings brushing his fingers, its small claws landing on his palm, startled him out of the past.

He opened his eyes to see the sparrow looking up at him, and glanced over to see Fen smiling.

“There you go. Forget everything you don’t need, and it’s easy.” Fen explained.

Booker smiled, and threw the bird back up into the sky, where it took off in a flutter of wings.

— — —

When they stopped to camp for the day, Booker and Hua set out to find more medicines while the others prepared the fire and a meal of wild chicken Fen had caught. The two of them walked into the woods under a darkening sky, Booker happily prodding at stones and fallen wood with his walking stick, trying to unearth centipedes with pain-numbing properties. When he caught one, he’d glance around to make sure Hua wasn’t watching, then let Snips fly from his bag and slice the target in half in a scything sweep of purple light.

The spirit beasts were all in jars within his bag, safe and fed, but he couldn’t let them out while anyone was watching: they would identify him as surely as the brand on his face.

“Soon we’ll be out on our own, and you can hunt all you want.” He promised Snips as the mantis returned to him, holding a dangling centipede corpse in his scythe-claws. But Zhu-Zhu’s nose was already beginning to surface from the dirt in his jar, sniffing about for tasty treasures, and Booker was obliged to stuff all three of them back down before the ornery mole started causing trouble.

“Hua!” He called, looking about and not seeing the girl.

No response came from the dark woods.

“Hua!” Booker called again.

And this time he heard a distant cry – not words, but the shapeless sound of terror and distress.

His heart froze, but his body did not. Booker was running full-tilt before he’d even had time to think. He shot over tangles of tree-root, sending rabbits and other small animals fleeing from his footsteps as he forced his way through the undergrowth, branches and thorns ripping at his skin.

But he skidded to a halt when he saw the spiderwebs in the trees ahead.

They were huge, each strand of silk so thin it was invisible, but the collection of them catching the light in rainbow streaks and shimmers that extended between the trees. There were gaps in the webs, just large enough for someone of Hua’s size to creep through.

And ahead…

He saw the girl struggling, her body entangled. Spiders the size of human fists were climbing slowly towards her down the anchors of sticky thread that held her in place.

“Hold on! Hua, close your eyes and count to ten! I’ll have you out of there before you finish counting!” Lifting his walking stick, Booker swung down hard on the webs.

It was as he feared – they were far tougher than mere spiderweb should be. His stick snagged, barely tearing halfway before it back stuck, and he had to wrench with all his strength to rip it free again.

“One!” Hua called out, her voice shrill with terror.

“Snips!” The mantis erupted back out of his bag, circling once around Booker’s head in a luminous ring-trail. “Go! Cut her free, and keep those things away!” No time for stealth now – let’s hope she keeps her eyes shut. Snips didn’t need telling twice. His wings buzzed, and he shot forward in a purple-blue streak of luminous energy that slashed through the webs. He was like a comet, too fast to follow with the naked eyes – strands of webbing and spiders split apart in his wake, the miserable creatures exploding into two halves that fell apart in a spray of yellow gore.

Booker raised his stick again and swept the remnants of the web out of his way, charging forward down the cleared path. As he did – “Froggy! Come out and defend the rear! Burn these webs and make sure nothing cuts off our escape!”

With a mighty croak, Froggy launched himself out of his jar and dropped down, his back flaring with flames. He spat out little bursts of fire, setting the webs ablaze. Booker was hoping the fire would stop the spiders from following them – or better yet, scare them off entirely.

But he had no time for the flames to spread.

“Two!” Hua called.

Booker shot forward, sweeping left and right with the staff as stray spiderwebs brushed and caught against his face. In moments he was at Hua’s side. Snips seemed to be everywhere at once, streaking left and right to slash spiders out of the trees as they scuttled along the branches. One flash of his razor-sharp claws, and they fell to the ground missing all their legs along one side.

“Three!”

Booker lifted up his boot and stomped them into paste, pounding his heel against the ground to crush out as many as possible. But there seemed to be no end to them. And worse, they didn’t need to reach him – they could spit their webs.

Snips was having to weave more and more erratically as sticky threads of webbing shot through the air, trying to snare him. Booker paused for a moment to kill off the ones on the ground, and when he turned, his back was trailing dozens of anchoring lines that pulled at his robes. The broken threads hung across his shoulders like a net, getting tangled as he moved his arms.

“Four!”

He struck down the lines anchoring her and pulled her free, Snips cutting the thickest anchors and disappearing among the trees, only visible as flashes of light between the branches – bodies rained down wherever he went.

“I’m here, I’m here.” He said, grabbing her shoulder and pulling her towards the burning archway Froggie had left in the webs. Something huge and dark was coming through the trees, long legs descending down the branches. A web brushed his face, but he swiped it away and continued pulling Hua forward until they were free from the webs and past the burning gate.

‘F-five!” She gasped out.

“It’s okay, Hua. It’s okay.” He promised, dropping to one knee and brushing the webs from her crying face. “Snips, Froggie! Come back!”

Two streaks – one purple-white, one orange-gold – shot out of the trees and returned to his bag.

“Six!” The girl yelled out.

“Hua, it’s okay.” He repeated. There was a pain in Booker’s right hand, growing from his wrist. He glanced down, fearing a bite that would spread poison through his system, but there were no punctures and no blood. No swelling either…

Just pain.

It was growing, too.

“Seven! Heee-elp!” Hua bellowed.

“I’m here, I’m here…” He tried again to calm her, but now the child was bawling and the pain in his wrist was shooting up his arm.

What’s happening..? Why does everything feel like a nightmare?

Hua’s eyes opened, and he found himself staring into the misty-gray tone of her pupils. They were slitted like a cat, and wide with fear. “Move! You need to move! It’s right in front of you!”

Booker swung his head about, looking left and right, but he didn’t see any danger. Only felt the pain in his wrist…

What if…

What if I’m the bird in the hand.

He closed his eyes, and brought to mind the image of Zheng Bai. In a single moment he brought forth the wave of killing intent from within his chest, sharpening it, focusing it, pushing against his own mind.

The illusion broke like cobwebs.

He was still in the spider’s grove. There were threads all over him, burying him in a dense net of shimmering silk. He could feel it now. In his haste before, he’d missed the subtle vibrations of intent within. Now that they covered him, he had nearly been buried in the illusion. At that very moment, a half-dozen blue-white spiders were creeping down the webs towards him.

Zhu-Zhu was hanging from Booker’s wrist by his teeth, blood welling from the bite. The mole had sunk his teeth in to try and wake Booker…

Because a massive mother spider – the size of a large dog – was descending from the branches towards Hua, who was tugging desperately at Booker’s arm.

Goddamnit!

He wrenched hard at his constrains, but the sticky threads refused to break. “Snips!” Nobody answered. He twisted his head, and saw Snips caught in his own web. The stray strands catching against his wings must have slowly lulled him into sleep, and now the smaller spiders were creeping towards him as he hung helplessly.

“Hua! Close your eyes, keep counting!”

For a moment she stood paralyzed, gazing up at the descending legs of the mother spider. Then the girl clenched her eyes shut hard and shouted, fists squeezed together, “Eight!”

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Can’t risk setting myself and Snips on fire, so… Dialyze!

A swirling disk of water erupted from his left hand, dissolving the chemical structures of the webs holding him. He dragged it up and down, ripping his arm free with each motion until the remaining threads could no longer hold, and he brought the blade of crystal water sweeping around to slash himself free in a semicircle of raindrops. As he tore out of the last of the restrains, he grabbed Snips and shoved the unconscious beast back into his jar – rushing forward he scooped up Hua as well, holding her to his chest.

But the spider had reached the ground, and stood in his way. Its mandibles clicked and its dark eyes glinted.

“Nine!”

Nothing else for it…

Forward!

He lunged for the spider, bringing out his free hand and summoning another Dialyzing swirl of water from his palm. As the spider leapt forward to meet him, Booker twisted aside at the last moment to scramble out of the way, his Sect-made slippers skidding against the forest floor for a moment before his momentum evened out and he dodged around the spider, bringing the water-blade sweeping up and around to carve through its mandible and forward leg. The motion was anything but graceful, but he followed up by swinging his foot up and kicking it over, a single scything blow to send it rolling over onto its back.

And he was out – sprinting through the fiery retreat Froggie had carved out for them, embers falling from the branches above stinging against his face.

“Ten!”

He threw himself backwards to the ground, crushing the hand-sized spider he could feel crawling up his back. Frantically he swept another one off the girl’s shoulders, checking that she was unharmed. She was. Teary, red-faced, but not bitten.

“Hua, be brave for a moment longer. And stay behind me…” He put her aside and rolled onto his feet, grabbing a burning branch from the edge of the trees Froggie had set alight.

The mother spider was still following them. He could see it flinch at the edge of the billowing flames, see its hesitance to approach, but it was still coming after them.

And I don’t know if I can risk another Dialyze or Furnace without passing out…

Hefting the branch, he swung it through the air in a trail of embers. The spider lurched back, then resumed crawling forward. Booker stepped back slowly, keeping the fiery branch between him and the beast, continuing to swing left and right in slow, steady sweeps as they faced off…

Conditioning it.

Making it expect nothing when his arm lifted up to swing…

Until…

“Froggie!”

The frog shot from the burning brush with a mantle of flames around him, slamming into the spider’s side like a living fireball. It screamed in panic, half-turning – but in the same moment, Booker lunged and swung his branch down, smashing into its eyes with the flaming end. The force of the blow bent its legs inwards, and it nearly fell down again, but then the spider recovered and pushed forward off the ground, leaping for Booker’s throat with its poison jaws.

Booker backpedaled, bringing the the branch between them and jabbing forward, using the fire as a spear to prod it away and open space as Froggie recovered, shot off, and circled it from the other side.

“Again!”

Froggie slammed into its back legs, unbalancing it, and Booker swung the branch low along the ground to uppercut into its head. This time, the spider was flipped completely onto its back. It’s seven legs thrashed in the air, their awful little hairs and black chitin skeleton scraping against him as Booker dropped onto its exposed underbelly, throwing the flaming branch aside to draw his knife.

That knife was gripped in both hands as it rose up, and Booker shouted aloud as he slammed it down into the space between legs. The next time it rose into the air, it was soaked with yellow gore. Again and again he stabbed down until he was coated with the slick, foul-smelling yellow blood up to his elbows, and the beast had finally stopped twitching.

— — —

When they returned to the others, Kuei-Lan immediately swept Hua into a giant hug, brushing the dirt and spiderwebs from the girl’s face as Hua collapsed completely into bawling. When Xan and Fen heard, however, they had different concerns.

“Brother, that was a Dream-Spinner Spider! They’re no mere beast. Please tell me you took the entrails! Their web gland is beyond valuable!” Xan exclaimed.

“Xan…” Fen shook his head. “Rain, it’s good you even survived.”

“No, Xan is right…” Booker grinned, and pulled a jar of glowing blue entrails from his bag. “These really are valuable.”

Dream-Spinning Spider Entrails

Intact // Dull-Quality

Luminous intestines and glands belonging to a dangerous breed of spider that entraps with illusions. The guts contain this creature’s ability to understand the world, allowing it to gain enlightenment from the creatures it snares, binds, and slowly liquifies.

Soul Strengthening 10% (+)

Toxicity and Potency 10% (-)

Paralyzing Poison 20% (-)

Beast Cultivation 5% (+)

“Ha-HA!” Xan swept him into an enormous hug. “Brother, those go for a small fortune! Even the instructors would drool over the chance to refine their soul!”

“Admittedly,” Fen said reluctantly, “They are quite valuable. But if that had been any kind of cultivating beast that tried for raw strength instead of clever illusions, think of the outcome.”

Xan harrumphed. “Our brother has killed a cultivating beast and all you can say is ‘what if he’d died’? I’m no less concerned than you, but don’t forget to celebrate the victory we have, instead of bemoaning a loss that never happened?”

“Ahhh, brothers, you both have your ways of taking care.” Booker intervened. “I think one of you had better come with us on these herb-picking expeditions, Fen is right about that. But as it happened, I survived this time, and when we get back to the Sect, I can make pills for us all out of the entrails.”

“All of us? Come on now, you did all the work.” Xan protested, and for once Fen nodded along.

“Brothers, if you kill a cultivating beast yourself, would you think of keeping it all for yourself because I’m a cripple? Let’s not worry too much about who did what. Out here in the wilderness, it’s better to share everything out as evenly as we can.”

“Elders, one moment.” Kuei-Lan said, “Hua wasn’t in that grove for no reason. She shouldn’t have been there at all, but, she saw something precious and made a very unwise decision.”

“I’m sorry…” Hua sniffled, clinging to her leg.

Kuei-Lan held out a blue flower, the size of a hand with its ruffled azure petals and dark, pitted center, which was plump with small seeds.

Night Blue Peony

Intact // Dull-Quality

A flower known for its power over life and death. Powerful when eaten raw, it was one of the first cultivation medicines discovered by the people of the valley.

Cultivation Boost 10% (-)

Toxicity 25% (-)

Necrotizing Poison 10% (-)

Major Healing 10% (Wood)

“Ahhh, this is a treasure.” Booker said, reaching for his purse. “Here, I’ll gladly pay you for it…”

“You saved my sister’s life. You fed and sheltered us. Let me have some dignity here, elder.” Kuei-Lan insisted, finally abandoning her awkward attempts to imitate highborn manners. “Please. Take it or I’ll cry.”

Booker grimaced, but Xan stepped forward and closed his hand over the flower. “Sister, you’re too kind. This treasure is more than worth the trouble our brother went through. But, since we’re treating your leg, we’ll call it payment for his medicines as well.”

She smiled, although it was clear her leg hurt and she was afraid for Hua and the day had been too long already, struggling to keep pace with them through the forest.

As they walked away, Xan leaned in and whispered, “Remember, these little folk have never had any silver of their own to be generous with. If you show them too much kindness, you’re stepping on their face.”

Booker nodded, but felt resentment. In his mind people deserved the help they got and shouldn’t have been so ashamed of needing it.

Raindrops had started to fall. Heavy, fat raindrops, splattering against the dirt. The day was already cold and as the storm billowed in, the little warmth in the air vanished. The rain struck the branches and struck their faces, heavy impacts that stung the heat from their skin.

Xan and Booker worked together to drag a tree’s branches down and tie them to stakes driven in the ground, forming a canopy of pine needles that did a little to keep the ice-cold water from reaching them. But the storm only grew.

As freezing water sieved through the branches above, they huddled around a fire that was constantly sputtering and spitting with each raindrops that landed among the coals. There was no sleeping that night – the ground was a soft churn of mud, and only Hua was able to sleep under such conditions.

Booker leaned over to Fen and whispered, “When she’s awake, look at little Hua’s eyes.”

Fen raised an eyebrow quizzically.

“When I fought that spider… I was almost immediately pulled into an illusion, but she wasn’t fooled at all. I think she might have some spiritual talents…”

Fen considered for a moment, then nodded. “I’ll take a look.”

A falling spear of lightning lit up the distant mountains. Moments later, the thunder reached them in a slow rumbling expansion across the sky.

Slowly, despite the cold and the rain, they settled themselves against the muddy bed of pine needles and slipped into sleep around the coals of the fire.

— — —

The next day they traveled further towards the village of the medicine-pickers, but the pouring rain last night had left a problem in their path.

The bridge over the river had completely collapsed. The rope supports had snapped and the wooden slats had been carried away by the flood. What was left was a broad stream of green water flowing swiftly over a bed of flat stones. The tug of the river sent anything that fell into it – branches and leaves – spinning past, frothing up into white water where it tangled around a stone too big to move.

And from that white water froth, shapes emerged. They moved like leaping fish, and resembled koi the size of cats, but they were made totally from turbulent white water. They flickered through the river with powerful movements of their tails, and exploded up in giant leaps that carried them across the sky in arcs of crystal water droplets.

“White-Water Dragonfish.” Fen confirmed. “Minor elementals that are born from flowing stormwaters. They’ll happily drown anyone who steps foot in the river now.”

Kuei-Lan looked pained. No doubt she knew the trouble the locals had gone through to build the bridge in the first place.

“Well, it’s too far across to leap.” Xan sighed. “But I imagine those dragonfish die if they’re torn apart, no?” His big fists curled.

Fen flicked his sleeve, and long metal needles slid out into the spaces between his knuckles. “Indeed. They’re quite mortal. Short-lived, too, if we had time to wait for them to die off naturally.”

“Wait!” Kuei-Lan interrupted. “Elders, I finally have some wisdom to offer. There’s another path.”

The three of them glanced at her as she explained. “Before the bridge, we had a path of standing stones. They’re a little tricky to navigate, but– with you three disciples we shouldn’t have any difficulty.”

“Lead the way,” Fen suggested, “better that than fighting our way through.”

Altogether, they followed as Kuei-Lan limped downstream through the pine forests. Soon they stood at another thin point in the river’s flow, where huge stones had been rolled into the path of the water to form a segmented bridge, each stone just far enough apart to leap over.

But there were white-water dragonfish playing here too, and their joyful leaping carried them higher than the stones. All it would take was one slamming into you, and you’d be thrown into the swift-flowing water.

“Right.” Xan said. “I’ll carry our guide.”

“I think that’s for the best.” Booker said. “Fen is swift and deadly, so he should go first and clear out any elementals that trouble us. I’m the weakest, so I’ll go in the middle where it’s safe and carry Hua. Xan, you can carry Kuei-Lan in one arm and and fight with the other, so you should bring up the rear.”

They all nodded. Xan pulled Kuei-Lan over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, which the girl was clearly not happy with – but it was better this than trying to cross on her injured leg, so she stayed silent. Booker kneeled down by Hua and offered her his arms.

“You’ll be safe.” He promised.

She nodded, face pinched in a comical expression of determination, resolved not to let any fear show through. Climbing into his arms, she buried her face against his shoulder.

Fen smiled to them, and said, “Brothers, you carry precious cargo. Don’t slip.” Then he darted out to the first stone with a graceful leap, his slippers barely touching the moss-covered rock before he jumped again, almost seeming to float as he danced between the landing points.

Moving so fast Booker could barely call out in time, a white-water dragonfish shot forward and exploded up out of the river. It flew towards Fen – but Fen merely turned, and a steel needle flicked from his fingers to pierce through the fish’s center, shattering it into a spray of clear water.

Two more erupted behind him, flipping themselves out of the water by bending their liquid bodies and kicking up from the river’s surface. Fen’s head snapped to the opposite direction, his hand extended, and two more needles burst through their center of mass, destroying them.

“Hurry!” He called. “I’ll support you!”

Booker jumped. The first leap was the most heart-stopping, launching himself off solid ground. His shoes hit the slippery surface of the stone and his toes bent as he grounded himself, pushing off quickly before that grip could slip away and send him plummeting. The stones didn’t offer enough footing to actually stop – the only way was to keep moving forward, and count on your momentum to keep you steady.

In five long strides, balancing and jumping and balancing again, he had covered half the river.

That was when he heard the splash behind him, and turned just in time to see the flying fish exploded, splattering his face with water as Fen’s steel needle pierced through it.

“Don’t hesitate!” Fen called, already on the shore and turned back to cover his comrades. “Move quickly!”

Already feeling his shoes beginning to slip, Booker launched himself forward again. Two more steel missiles whirred past his ears but he didn’t turn back to see.

Behind him, he could hear Xan grunting as he leapt across the steps. The river was a steady roar, piling up swiftly in whitewater crests against the stone. Booker’s eyes were fixed on the far shore. Five stones remained. Then four.

Three.

Two.

And then he felt – not an impact, but a premonition of one. Maybe it was simply the air being pushed by the oncoming blow, or maybe it truly was some hint of spiritual sense, maybe he saw the shift in Fen’s eyes, but –

He knew he was a split second away from doom.

Booker flung Hua towards Fen. An instant after the girl left his arms, an elemental slammed into him with the force of a sledgehammer, making his ribs creak and pushing all the air from his lungs. Air he desperately needed, as the blow launched him sideways off the stone and the blue winter sky spun overhead for a moment – before he hit the freezing cold water, and sank beneath in a trail of bubbles.

He tumbled aimlessly for a moment, trying to recover enough to even remember which way was up. The rapid current pulled him along, bouncing him against the flat stones of the riverbed. Something cut across his back. The mask was full of water, heavy on his face.

Can’t die here.

Booker shoved his way towards the sun on the surface of the water, and broke above the stream. But the water pulled him down again, snatching him away from the air before he could take more than half a gasp – he almost inhaled water as he was pulled under with his mouth still open.

He spat it out as he reached the surface again, fighting to keep his head above water for long enough to breathe. In a moment he was under again – drowning could happen all at once, but more often, it happened by degrees. You fought for air and maybe drew a few breaths, but again and again you would be dragged under, getting weaker each time, swallowing water by accident, being ground down by the water’s relentless current.

In the moments where his head was above water, he could hear Fen and Xan and Hua all shouting.

Ahead, a broken branch hung across the river. He reached out and caught the water-logged, slimy surface of the bark with his fingers, digging his nails in and hauling his chest up out of the water.

For a moment he hung there, his lungs heaving in and out and coughing up spews of water. His hair stuck to his face. Everything was cold and there was a darkness at the edge of his vision.

“LOOK OUT!”

He turned – and saw the white-water carp diving towards him. This time, there was no energy left to even breathe in before it hit him, folding him double and snapping the branch as he went tumbling deeper into the water.