I didn’t kneel but did offer the handle of the Ashwood Blade, gripping it carefully by the blade, meeting the faerie king’s gaze the whole time as I awaited his verdict on the alliance. He need not respond to take the sword, for I had offered it as a gift, but the implication was clear.

Tension lingered in that moment. My arm aloft, both parties wary and all too aware of the other’s wariness, all bespoke a turning point, for better or worse.

The faerie king accepted the sword, grasping its handle and holding it peaceably at his side.

‘The faerie kingdom accepts your offer,’ he said. The two cloaked faeries behind him were wide-eyed and with mouths agape. The king continued, ‘We shall form an alliance for mutual protection for as long as it is of benefit to both of us. This man,’ he indicated Baron Urzo, ‘Will be our liaison.’

I nodded, hiding my excitement. ‘Agreed. We will sort out the details of our eastern border patrols in the coming weeks. I would also like to propose a conversation on our laws. Presently it is legal in Ebonreach for a man to kill a faerie, and in the Dreadwood Forest for a faerie to kill a man who has damaged the forest. It seems to me that the former should be recognised as murder, and the latter too harsh a punishment to be just. I am sure a more suitable arrangement can be devised in the interests of preserving the peace between our two realms.’

The faerie king nodded gently. ‘Changes must be made to accommodate the alliance. We will speak of it no more this day. There are celebrations to be had. The Ashwood Blade is once more in faerie hands. Would you join us, Countess Saemara?’

I almost nodded, but Urzo was surreptitiously shaking his head, and I remembered my missing brother. I couldn’t enjoy myself while he was missing in this dangerous place.

‘I am most grateful for your invitation, faerie king, but unfortunately I am pressed upon by matters of state. Please accept my best wishes for your celebration.’

‘As you wish, Countess Saemara,’ the faerie king said, before turning his back on us and melting back into the trees with the rest of his kin. Only Urzo remained, and he immediately approached me.

‘It was well that you did not accept,’ he said. ‘Faerie celebrations would be most confronting to a human.’

‘Thank you for the warning,’ I replied, feeling suddenly exhausted. ‘But I declined in order to search for my brother, who has disappeared from our camp.’

‘I do not think it was the faeries, my lady,’ Urzo replied.

‘Nor I. The faerie king seemed most grateful for the return of the Ashwood Blade. Yet there are many other dangers in these woods.’

‘Surely you do not mean to search for him in the dark,’ a new voice, Alum’s, contributed. He joined us as the soldiers returned to their tents and sentry duties. ‘A single torch catching on a tree and the entire alliance is undone.’

I couldn’t help but agree with Alum, especially taking into account the other fates that could befall a wanderer in the Dreadwood Forest at night. Further investigation revealed that Timoth was last seen well before nightfall, not long after we’d initially made camp. He’d set the sentry rotations, assembled his tent, and then disappeared almost immediately.

There was nothing else to do but wait until dawn, and sleep was the best way to fill that time, though it was hard to come by. Even when the sun rose, we searched the camp and found no tracks - not even where the faerie royal party had stood mere hours earlier. There were no clues as to Timoth’s location whatsoever.

‘What do you want to do?’ Alum asked. I summoned Urzo and Tadruk to the conversation and told them of my plan.

‘It took us half a day to reach this location. Therefore, if we wish to return before dusk, we have half a day in which to search for my brother. I suggest we separate the men into four parties, with one of us at the head of each. We’ll search the four points of the compass and return here by noon.’

The others agreed, though Alum was not pleased to see me leading a search party in the absence of anyone of higher station than sergeant. I sympathised moreso with Urzo, who was not a military man, but I trusted his experience in the forest more than any other so I did not doubt my decision.

The tents were disassembled and the horses’ saddlebags stuffed. Four soldiers remained behind to guard them and mark our rendez-vous point, tasked with maintaining a fire so that the search parties could be guided by the smoke trail that rose above the forest canopy.

My party travelled north, off the track and deeper into the thickest part of the forest. I took Wargwa with me, though I dared not ride him on account of the dense foliage. I’d come back black and blue if I tried to travel off-track eight feet off the ground for six hours. The five soldiers accompanying me were not thrilled by my decision, but propriety kept them in line.

We travelled for an hour with no result, crossing less ground than I’d hoped. I ordered one of the men to climb a tree and look for any terrain features in the vicinity, and he came back reporting a clearing a few hundred feet further north. We set off in that direction. It was only too easy for me to recall Timoth’s prior experience in a Dreadwood Forest clearing with the blue-haired nymph I’d slain. Surely there was no way he’d fallen afoul of the same creatures once more?

As we emerged in the clearing, there was again a small lake, this time nestled in the crater created by a massive boulder that obfuscated the far side of the lake from view. I took the party towards the lake, intending to circumnavigate it, but there were ripples across the surface of the water and I halted the party.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

An immense crab emerged from the water, snipping two glowing red claws the size of crocodile jaws in anticipation. The entire thing was about ten feet wide, though it stood only three or four feet from the ground. It was a mix of white, brown, and pale blue, especially on the underside and near its limbs. Two comically tiny eyes on stalks watched my men form a small wall with their shields, their spears protruding between the gaps.

‘Let’s back away,’ I suggested, hoping not to anger the monster, but it was too late. Even as I took the first step backwards, the crab scuttled forward with surprising speed and slammed into the shield wall.

The soldiers uniformly fell over, and one on the edge was picked up in one of the crab’s claws. His screams as he was crushed and nearly bisected were horrifying. The other soldiers attempted to spear the crab, but their weapons bounced off its thick exoskeleton.

Suddenly Wargwa leapt upon the crab, standing upon its back and pounding it repeatedly with his fists. The exoskeleton began to buckle and the crab relinquished its grip on the soldier, trying ineffectually to raise its claws high enough to snap at Wargwa. His eyes were still blue, and I could tell the difference even in his violent actions: they were careful and considered, like those of a surgeon as opposed to an axe-murderer.

The crab scuttled from side to side in a panic before its exoskeleton finally snapped with an ear-splitting crack. Wargwa calmly reached into the breach and pulled out a fistful of crab guts, stilling the beast instantly. He walked away from the monster back to his original position, where he awaited my next command as silently as always.

It was a horrifying sight, but I was encouraged by the fact that Wargwa could perform acts of violence while retaining his blue-eyes. Perhaps if the crab had landed a blow he might have succumbed to his berserker rage, but at the very least his mental state wasn’t as fragile as we’d once feared.

The soldiers moved to check on their fallen comrade, but he was well and truly dead. As they began to strip his body of useful items and hoist it on their shoulders to return it to Trackford, I heard a woman’s voice.

‘You have slain the guardian of the lake,’ it said, accompanied by harp music. ‘Come, take us as your reward.’

The men immediately dropped the corpse and began to look about for the voice. Two nymphs appeared from behind the boulder, still a few dozen feet away beyond the lake. One had green hair and the other blue, and as before, they both stood completely naked, though one had a tattoo-like pattern of ivy running down her body. They were both quite tall, about six feet accentuated by their slim build and perfect posture.

I immediately remembered what had happened years ago when I’d run into nymphs with Timoth and Gentleman Wargwa. I’d only been able to break the trance by causing one of the nymphs to screech inhumanly from a stab wound. Armed with that knowledge, I drew my dagger and approached the nymphs ahead of my soldiers, making sure Wargwa was at my side.

‘Release the men from your spell,’ I commanded them.

‘Jealousy does not become a Countess,’ the blue-haired nymph replied, not even deigning to turn her gaze to me, instead examining the soldiers. ‘The men clearly prefer us, and why shouldn’t they?’

‘They are not of their own minds. If you do not release them, I will slay you as I once slew your kin.’

‘Saemara, it’s okay,’ Timoth said. As I’d closed on the nymphs he revealed himself behind the boulder. His clothes were filthy, presumably from a night spent in the dirt, and the blue necklace he’d found in Vizonia hung openly from his neck. ‘They mean the men no harm.’

‘I see you have failed to learn the lesson from our last encounter with nymphs.’

‘I am not bewitched, if that is your meaning.’ He spread his arms wide to indicate harmlessness, and even spun on the spot as if to demonstrate his independent free will.

I stopped, confused. It was still possible that he was bewitched, but he acted nothing like during his prior enchantment, or like the other men in the vicinity. As if to prove his point, the blue-haired nymph ran a pointed fingernail seductively down his chest, but Timoth grasped the tattooed wrist and moved it gently aside.

‘Then have the nymphs release the men, and return with us to Trackford,’ I demanded.

Timoth shook his head.

‘I can’t do that, Saemara’ he said. ‘I have a purpose here. I must remain.’

‘What purpose could you possibly derive from these detestable vixens?!’

‘He prefers our ministrations to those of human women, and who could blame him?’ the green-haired nymph said. Beside her, the blue-haired nymph pouted at her prior rejection. ‘Human women treat men as a chore, like washing clothes or cooking supper. In the forest, men are supper.’

‘Timoth, surely you cannot be swayed by words of such dubious intent. I beg you, return with me to Trackford.’

Timoth again shook his head. The men had reached the nymphs, and now sat by the lakeside, allowing the two strange women to caress their shoulders and remove their helmets.

‘I’m sorry, Saemara. You must trust me on this. The men shall remain with me, and I must remain here. Wargwa will protect you on the return journey.’

‘I’m afraid I cannot accept such an outcome,’ I said, raising my dagger anew. ‘I will gut these scandalous harlots like fish and we shall return as one.’

Timoth drew his sword, earning a slack jaw on my part. He’d raised a weapon to his Countess, to his sister no less!

‘If you do not sheathe your sword then your life shall be forfeit,’ I tried to reason with him.

‘I cannot sheathe my sword, so my life must be forfeit. Therefore, no purpose is served by your remonstrations as I am equally served by death in the Forest as by death on the gallows.’

‘Nevertheless, the gallows are the prescribed punishment,’ I replied. ‘I will return with the rest of the party and attempt a rescue, that you may hang where justice can seen to be administered. In any case, a trial would precede the hanging, and your innocence may yet be proved!’

‘Returning to this lake would be an exercise in futility, as I would long since have departed. Once more, I implore you to return to Trackford without me, and above all, to trust me.’

I considered sending Wargwa to attack them, or attempting to shadow them in the forest while Wargwa remained as a beacon to the rest of my party, but both plans were plainly foolhardy and risked injury not only to myself but also to my brother. Regardless of my words, I had no present intention of executing Timoth. If his betrayal were purely the indulgence of selfish lust, then my intentions would change. But he’d asked me to trust him, and he deserved that much at least.

Finding myself bereft of choice, I bade Wargwa follow and returned to the main track.