Primus rounded on Olivia as soon as they had finished off the monsters, which seemed to have only been a temporary irritation to him.

‘Why didn’t you tell me about your vision?’ he asked her. He seemed to have recovered from his initial shock at Olivia’s words. ‘Why didn’t you tell me you had seen the location of the Clarent Sword?’

‘I didn’t want to put you in danger, Grandfather,’ she replied, tucking an errant strand of blonde hair behind one ear. The battle with the monsters barely seemed to have phased her. Horatio was beginning to see how she had got this far by herself. ‘Qind knows you’ve been through enough in your life as it is, what with losing my Dad and Mum, and I knew that this journey would be very dangerous. I also knew that if I’d told you where I was going you wouldn’t have let me go!’

‘You better bloody bet I wouldn’t have!’ Primus yelled, red in the face.

Sensing a family argument brewing, Horatio thought he had better step in.

‘Look, both of you,’ he said, holding up his hands in what he hoped was a calming gesture and literally stepping in between the two of them, ‘whatever’s happened is in the past; what’s important is that you have found your granddaughter now, Primus.’

‘Yeah,’ spoke up Egea, ‘that means we get paid, right?’

Horatio ignored her. ‘As I was saying, let’s focus on what there is to be grateful for. The two of you have been reunited.’

‘Yes,’ said Ceres, ‘that is something to thank Qind for.’

‘What we should be discussing is what to do next,’ Horatio said.

‘No discussion is needed about what to do next!’ said Primus. ‘What happens next is that we escort Olivia home, I pay all of you, and we forget that any of this sorry affair happened!’

Olivia’s mouth gaped open. She looked at Primus as if he had just told her that he had arranged for her to be married to an orc. ‘What?!’ she said when she’d recovered herself a little. ‘Grandfather, you can’t be serious! Don’t you see what this means? If the location of the Clarent Sword has been revealed to me–and my visions have never been wrong before–then that means the Demon Lord is coming to Gard! If that’s happening, then we have to retrieve the Clarent Sword to stop him! It’s our duty to Gard! Qind knows, I might even be the hero who is destined to defeat Brax!’

Olivia paused her outburst. She had been speaking very animatedly and passionately, her voice raised and shrill, but now she went suddenly quiet and still. This abrupt shifting seemed to be a habit of hers.

The girl looked around at the assembled party yet again, eyes scanning them one by one. Finally her gaze rested on Horatio.

‘Or maybe the destined hero is one of you,’ she said quietly.

A tingle ran up Horatio’s spine.

‘Nonsense,’ said Primus, the slightest tremolo in his voice. ‘This is nonsense, Olivia. You will come home with me immediately. This ridiculous escapade must end now. I won’t have it. I won’t have it…’ He did not speak these words angrily, as he might have, but softly, as if his mind was somewhere else. He sounded as though he was trying to convince himself of what he said, and failing.

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Olivia fixed him with her stare. ‘Grandfather, you know what I say is true. I have seen the Clarent Sword, and that means we must complete this journey to find it. Brax is rising. I did not tell the Braxians who captured me where the sword was, but they were chasing me for a number of days before they managed to catch me, so they know which direction I was travelling in. And I don’t know why they began chasing me and captured me. I deliberately travelled alone so as not to attract attention to myself, and I thought I was travelling in secret. I don’t know how they found me or how they knew I was seeking the Clarent Sword. They may have seers too. They may know where the Clarent Sword is too, or that my destiny is somehow entangled with it. If they do, we must finish this quest. If the Sword were to fall into the hands of the Braxians, there would be no hope left for Gard. We must retrieve it. And look.’ She held out her hand to indicate the other party members. ‘In coming to find me, you have gathered together a collection of warrior heroes–whether on purpose or inadvertently, I don’t know. What better a group with which to seek out the Clarent Sword?’

She finished her speech.

Primus was silent for a long time, looking down at the ground.

‘All I wanted,’ he said at length, quietly, still looking down, ‘was to find you and bring you home safe. I did not want to continue journeying with you into danger. I wanted to keep you safe from harm.’ He looked up at Olivia. ‘But I see now that there is indeed a destiny at work here that is bigger than me, although I do not understand it. I do not like not being able to understand things, but I cannot deny this. You were always special, Olivia, like your parents. I will come with you to find the Clarent Sword, and do whatever is to be done with it.’

Olivia smiled at him. ‘I know you will, Grandfather, because I have foreseen it.’ She addressed the rest of them again: ‘Will you all come with us?’

One by one, the party gave their answers.

Egea was the first to reply. ‘Will you pay me?’

‘This is a quest to save the whole of Gard!’ Primus said irately. ‘You should not need payment!’

‘Sure, but will you pay me?’

‘...I suppose I will continue to credit your account for as long as you remain in my service.’

‘Then I’m on board.’ Egea smiled, shutting her eyes.

‘Of course I will come too,’ said Ceres. ‘And I do not need any payment beyond food and company. The fate of the whole of Gard is at stake. Qind is at work here; I am sure of it.’

‘I will come too,’ said Wyvera. ‘My augmentation skills seem to be of use to the group. I do not need further payment either–I am just glad of the protection of travelling with all of you.’

‘Ouzo also is coming,’ said the Wolf Clan druggist. ‘If master will have him. It would be an honour to serve as the apothecary for such a great quest.’

‘Well, I don’t know about all this ‘great quest’ stuff,’ said Silvia, ‘but I could use the protection from safety in numbers too. It’s not like I’m just going to go off by myself now at night in the middle of the Fardan plains, is it? It’s not really much of a choice.’

‘I will come,’ said Helen. ‘I am the greatest hunter in the whole of Gard, this is a great hunt, and although we found the girl, the hunt is not over!’

Last of all, Olivia looked once more to Horatio.

‘I am coming too,’ he said. ‘That goes without saying. Where are we headed? What do we do next?’

‘Well, the thing we do next is fight off the group of monsters that are just about to attack us from behind that hill over there.’

How does she do that? thought Horatio as the monsters roved over the hill towards them.

Battle 2