“I got you some books,” Herald told me out of nowhere.

It was a hot day and we’d been dozing off, me up a dense, leafy tree where I could hide in case someone came, her sitting against its trunk.

“Hmm, what?” I said, not wholly with her, and not sure that I’d heard her correctly.

“I got you some books.”

I’d heard her right the first time. I snaked my head down to look at her. “That’s lovely, but… I can’t read.”

“That is why I got them! I thought I could maybe… teach you?”

I grinned. Both because of how thoughtful that was, and because she was adorable when she was all shy and uncertain. It was one of my all-teeth grins, and she didn’t even flinch.

“I’d love that,” I told her.

She sat up excitedly. “Do you want to see them?”

“Yeah, sure!”

I jumped down as she crawled into the tent, coming out with two books bound in leather. I hadn’t seen any books here, and it was strange, seeing something so familiar.

She held up the larger of the two. “This one is about, well… monsters.”

“Like dragons?” I asked, lifting an eyebrow at her.

“Like dragons,” she confirmed with a slight blush. “And also wyverns, hydras, advanced animals and gremlins and goblins and many other creatures. It has a lot of pictures, see?”

She opened the book and flipped the pages slowly. It looked like paper, rather than the coarser papyrus-like material she had used for her notes, and there were indeed a lot of pictures. Nicely drawn, too, if not exactly realistic. More Roman mosaic than Da Vinci, so to speak, but detailed and nicely coloured.

“See, it has a whole section on dragons, different types and what is known about them. But,” she said, putting the bestiary away, “we should start with this.”

The second book was smaller, but when she opened it the text was far larger, the pictures simpler and more colourful and, well… cute. It was clearly a book for children, the first pages divided into sections with one or two letters and one picture. ‘A is for Apple, B is for Banana,’ et cetera.

I was not above using a book for preschoolers if it helped me learn the local system of writing.

“All the languages spoken in the Sareyan League… That’s the league of cities Karakan belongs to. All the languages here use the same system of writing, so if you learn any other languages you should be able to read those, too.”

“Oh, I know all human languages, I think,” I told her offhand while looking at the pictures. "At least the living ones." Herald stopped turning the pages, and when she hadn’t spoken for a while I looked at her. “What?”

She was looking at me flatly, her mouth slightly open. “I do not believe you, sometimes.”

“I mean, I am not sure. But I think that I do.”

Her eyes widened a fraction. It took me a second to realise that she’d spoken, and I’d answered, in a completely different language, one full of hard consonants and short, clipped syllables.

Herald shook her head slowly. “And yet you cannot read,” she said, going back to the local language that I was used to.

I wish I could say that I picked it up easily, but no. It was quite different from the good old Latin alphabet. Every ‘letter’ was a syllable, and you tied them together which changed how they looked a little, and the pronunciation changed with what came next and whether or not you put little dots next to it and if the dots were above or below or right or left and… it was complicated. By the time we decided that we’d had enough for one day I was proud to have gotten the general idea, and that was plenty. Then we flipped through the bestiary for a while, and I finally truly learned the difference between a wyvern and a dragon.

I understood what Herald meant about them being hard to mistake for one another. Where a dragon was proud, majestic, and had four limbs besides its wings, a wyvern was basically a glorified, long necked iguana with batlike wings where its forelegs should be. I was almost insulted that someone might mistake me for one, but Herald pointed out that if someone saw me high in the air, all they saw was a flying lizard. Wyverns weren’t native to Mallin, but with them being orders of magnitude less rare than dragons… well, Occam’s razor was a thing anywhere you went.

“So…” I dragged the word out as Herald put the books away. “I’m guessing that, since you’ve got all this money now, maybe you want to take it easy for a while?”

“Oh gods, no! Now that you are back I cannot wait to go and actually do something worthwhile, again!”

“Well, in that case, any idea when you guys will be able to go out again? I was hoping you’d come check out the first gate that I found. It’s probably too late for the miners, but–”

“If there are valkin there, we should bring the Wolves,” Herald said, interrupting me. “Garal has been asking about you a lot. Their commander still wants to see you, so we could probably arrange something. I am sure that they would love to show up the Cranes.”

That was good to hear. I’d wondered if they’d written me off when I disappeared on them. “Oh, great!” I said. “That’s much better than my idea. Though I figured the payout would be better with just the five of us.”

“We will not get paid if we cannot do the job,” Herald stated with a small shrug. “Or if we die.”

“Yeah, fair enough. So I should talk to the commander, right?”

“I think that you should. But, they would not go out completely uninformed. Rallon likes to prepare if possible, and he does not risk his people needlessly. If I let the Wolves know that you would like to meet with Rallon, do you think that you could find something to show them? Some information about what is up there? That would go a long way to convincing him, and showing how valuable you could be.”

“Probably. I could check the place out on my own, I suppose. But I’d rather have you along.”

Herald smiled, just the tiniest bit. “I appreciate that. But I would hold you back. You can get there faster on your own, and I doubt that anyone can match you for stealth in those tunnels. I would not be surprised if you could get there, do some basic scouting, and return in the time that it would take me to get back to the mine.”

I wanted to argue, but I wasn’t going to insult her by pretending that she wasn’t right. For all her good qualities she wouldn’t be able to keep up with me, and we would save days if I went on my own while she approached the mercenaries.

I looked up at the sky. The sun wasn’t all that close to the mountains yet, but if Herald wanted to get back to the city by nightfall…

“Does that mean that we should get you packed?” I asked, a little ball of disappointment settling in my gut.

“I suppose it does.” She didn’t look any happier about it. “Will you walk me to the fields?”

“Of course.”

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I couldn’t help her much other than scattering the camouflage, but Herald’s little camp away from the camp was orderly, and packing didn’t take her long. When she had everything put together, the tent and bedroll strapped under her pack, she turned to me with a leather contraption in her hands.

“Before we go, this is a gift.” She turned the thing so I could see it better. It was clearly a bag, with several long straps on it. “The books are inside, and the fire steel. I think your money bag would fit as well, if you want.” She looked at me, adorably nervous. “What do you think?”

“What do I think?” I answered, all my delighted surprise on full display. “What do you think? I love it! How do I put it on?”

Herald burst into action, my acceptance of the gift triggering some pent up excitement. “It’s made so you should be able to put it on and take it off yourself. You put this over your head, see, and then your arms go through here and here, so the bag goes on your chest. Then you tighten this–” She pulled on a strap, “–and to take it off you release it like this, see? No fiddling required. And the bag closes with these, and locks with this, so it should be safe for flying. I… tested it, rigorously. It never opened once.”

I wasn’t sure what Herald meant by testing the secureness of the bag, so I imagined her flinging it around, spinning in circles and playing aeroplane with it. A small giggle escaped me.

“It’s great!” I said to cover the very undragonlike sounds. “So I open like this…” I fumbled a bit, but got it open. I took the money bag off my neck to put it in, and paused.

“How much did this all cost?” I was suddenly a little worried. Those books had been full of pictures, and it wasn't like they had printing presses. At least I didn’t think so. Even with advancements that let someone draw quickly and accurately, either of these books must represent several days of work at minimum.

“Do not worry about it,” she said, waving it off with the eternal answer of everyone who has spent too much money on a present. “It is all a gift, the bag and the books. From all of us, as thanks for helping us.”

“But you gave me a cut of the reward!”

“Yes. But without you I would not have gotten the others out. Even if I had found the gate, which I would not have known was there, I had no way to get it open. I told the others that I had some things I wanted to get you and they all insisted on pitching in. Even Mak,” she added pointedly.

“But–” I started, then stopped myself. “You know what? Thank you. Really. And tell the others I said 'Thanks', too."

Walking back was nice. The bag took a little getting used to, and Herald helped me adjust the straps so that it would sit a little better while walking.

"So what did the bagmaker say?" I asked. We were walking the way we usually did, Herald on the side of the road and me among the trees, hiding whenever we met anyone.

Herald grinned. "I told her that it was for a large dog. She suggested it should hang on the sides, instead, so I had to make something up about the poor thing having sensitive skin. I do not think that she believed me, but she was happy enough to take my money when I insisted."

"If she does custom leather work she probably gets strange requests all the time," I said with a laugh. "If people here are anything like back home."

Herald's face silently scrunched up in thought for a while before she spoke. "I'm not sure what you mean by that."

"I'll tell you some time. Just, maybe don't ask Makanna about it."

"Why not?"

"Trust me on this. If she knows what I'm talking about she won't be happy. She probably thinks that I'm corrupting you as it is."

"Well, that is… now I am not sure that I want to know."

I just laughed.

The rest of the long walk we just talked. There had been no news of fighting in the south, which was a big relief to Herald. No new letters, though. She spent a lot of time telling me more about her and her family's friends in the city, and about how Tamor seemed determined to make up for his weeks away by spending every moment he could enjoying their company. He'd been in a constant flurry of outings, dinners, friendly meetings and parties ever since they got back to the city, and eventually even Valmik had had enough of him, accompanying Herald into the forest for a few days of peace and quiet.

About an hour in I realised that Herald had switched to that other, new language, and she gave me a bright smile when I asked her about it.

"It is the language of my mother and father. I rarely get to speak it. Mak and Tam do not like to use it, and remember little. And traders from those parts are few and far between. It is just nice to hold a normal, friendly conversation. And it sounds good, coming from you."

"Thank you! What parts are those?"

Herald hesitated before answering. "Tekeretek. An unpleasant place, from all I have heard, and a rival of the League. We do not speak of our origin openly."

Tekeretek. It meant the City of Rains, in their own language. I was curious, but there was an edge of sadness to Herald’s voice that stopped me from pushing. She'd tell me more if and when she wanted to.

The dark moment passed quickly as we moved on to happier topics, which drifted into her beginning to help me think in feet and yards and miles. It came pretty naturally out of us talking about how far ahead things were, and her, again, having no idea what a metre or kilometre was. By the time we separated at the edge of the forest I was starting to get a decent hang of it!

Ready to go, Herald gave me a quick hug, then stepped back and looked at me seriously. “Draka,” she said. “Please be careful. This bounty is going to draw out a lot of people who want to try their luck, and I have heard people talking about it. They will be watching the sky.”

“I will. I promise.”

And with that she was gone, with a plan to meet again at the lake two nights later, with or without the mercenaries.

I watched her go, equal parts happy and concerned. She had waited for six days to meet me. Two of those days she had been alone in the forest. I would never have asked for that kind of patience from anyone, but she'd simply done it.

I hoped that she knew what she was talking about, about our friendship. She sure seemed to have given it real thought. I just couldn't shake the feeling that the dragon knew more than me.

Maybe it was time for a long overdue talk with myself, but it could wait a little. I mean, I tried, but not very hard. I had other things to focus on. It was time to return to the hoard, and while I knew that I couldn’t carry my money in there through the crevice, I had a cunning plan.

I had acquired a stick.

When I got back to the cave I took off my bag and carefully placed it on a high, flat rock near the back of the entrance. I fumbled a little with the straps that held it closed, but I could do it, which felt awesome. Once I had my pouch full of coins out I closed the bag again, took the pouch and my stick, and headed down.

The crevice was too narrow. Or rather, I had grown too wide to fit through. But dragon or no, I was still mentally human, at least partially, and humans use tools. So, I took my stick – a nicely straight young tree that I’d had Herald chop and strip for me – and carefully threw it into the crevice.

The first attempt didn’t go well. I cursed myself out as it hit something and clattered to the ground almost out of reach, then got down, reached in with one arm, and stretched as far as I could. I could barely get one fingertip on it and was about to give up and go get another stick to retrieve my first stick, when I remembered that I had claws. Once I hooked a claw into the stick, getting it back was easy. The next throw went better, getting it almost all the way to the other side.

The next step was a little trickier and caused me a lot more anxiety, but I had to get my silver to the hoard somehow. So, with a knot in my stomach and my heart in my throat, I gave the money pouch a few practice swings and then tossed it.

It landed on the back half of the stick. Success!

After that it was a simple matter of shadowing in, carefully pulling the stick to myself, with the pouch coming along, and that was it. It worked!

My triumph didn’t last long. I looked at the bag in my hands. It wasn’t big, and it had been a hassle getting it in. Anything bigger may well be impossible. And the ledge was narrow; if my pile of treasures got much bigger it would start spilling over the edge into that damned pit. Hiding my hoard here had made perfect sense when I understood less of what was going on, but now… I was going to have to move it. I wasn’t sure where to or how, but I was.

I didn’t want to leave my cave. It was home, and it was near impossible to get to if you couldn’t fly. But, with some luck, I wouldn’t have to. This was not, after all, the end of the cave system. It went deeper. Lots deeper. The only reason I’d even had my climbing gear when I came in here was that not much further in than where I found the crevice, there was a sharp drop before the system continued. I hadn’t bothered with it since waking up, since it was too steep for me to climb reliably and too narrow to fly, but with my shadow form it should be doable.

I didn’t even have a day job, and I still somehow kept filling my days with things that needed doing. But this was a little fun, a little exciting. I’d come here, ‘on that fateful night,’ as a dramatic person might call it, because it had been months since I’d been down there. With my shadow form and my shadowsight, I’d be able to really get around down there, really see the whole place in all its glory!

Yeah, this was going to be fun. When I got around to it.

I happily tossed the pouch on my pile and prepared to leave.

“A fourth minor threshold has been reached,” came the dragon’s voice in my ear. I jumped! There was a decent amount of silver in that pouch, but I hadn’t expected anything again so soon, on top of her silence lately. It was kind of nice to hear her little mantra again, even if she did sound a little bitter and sulky.

“How will you increase your power? Strength, to overwhelm your enemies? Greater Fortitude, to weather all but the mightiest blows? Physical greatness, to increase the power of your body in all ways, at a cost? Charisma, to beguile the weak-minded with your words and presence? Cunning, to plot and see through the schemes of others? Choose!”

I’d actually been giving some thought to what I’d like to improve, though I never expected to get the chance so soon. I went with Strength. Charisma was a new, tempting option, but for now I needed to be able to fight better. The Greater Fortitude sounded like it might make me basically invulnerable, but I figured that was no use if someone tried to take me alive, and I did not want that to happen. Besides, dragging around goats had been annoying, and I wanted to be able to carry stuff.

The dragon didn’t acknowledge my choice beyond a general feeling of satisfaction. She approved, like I'd thought she would, even if she didn't say so.

I felt the changes wash over me, and my body was left feeling lighter. I took a few steps along the narrow ledge, and my walk felt steadier. I couldn’t really try anything else, but that didn’t matter. It was time to head to the gate.