The smell of spices and fresh pine filled Bonto's home, which made sense as it surrounded the upper trunk of a massive tree. The climb up into the trees had been exciting, and Thad was still walking around, examining the home's structural supports. Teki, the younger Laka-uni tribesman, returned and was now pouring spiced cider into mugs for everyone in the cozy tree-house.

While Thad marveled at the home's engineering, Bonto made polite conversation with the highlanders. With only a slight hesitation, Uzca had told the Elder of his god-given quest to find his lost mother and brother.

"I wish there was a way I could help you find your brother, as you have helped me recover mine, but I know nothing of Telestria or the people who live there."

Uzca accepted a mug of cider with a node to Teki and took a sip. "That's good!"

"Thank you," Bonto said. "It's an old family recipe. It takes apples from a special tree that only grows here in our forest. Not many outsiders have partaken of it."

They sat around a circular table large enough for all seven people, and Thad finally rejoined them as the conversation continued.

"Now tell me," Bonto leaned forward over his own mug. He had hung his mask next to the door when they came in, and his face was earnest. "How did you manage to heal my brother? Did you really call upon the gods?"

"Bezben, do you want to tell them what happened? It was Vandrias who answered the call after all," Uzca said.

Bezben stopped fussing with his fingernails and looked up.

"Hmm? Ah, yeah. Well, there's not much to tell, really. After Thad said we should ask our gods, I just kneeled down and prayed. I asked Vandrias to heal him. Next thing I knew, me and Uzca were kneeling in a temple, and Vandrais appeared before us."

"What did he look like?" Thad interjected.

"Big. Half again as tall as me and half again as wide as Uzca. He had plate armor and blue orbs for eyes, streaked with red."

"You still have many gods in the mountains?" Bonto asked. "What god is this Vandrias?"

"We do," Uzca said. "Vandrias is the Warrior God. We only have perhaps a dozen temples to various gods near our home village, but the peaks are home to many more."

"And they are all active? All the gods still live?"

"I...don't actually know. No one in the peaks has ever mentioned the gods dying—that I can remember, at least. The gifting—where we're granted power by our gods—only happens every ten years, and not all gods are chosen by young hopefuls. Vandrias is one of the most popular with the young men looking for gifts, as Bezben can attest. My own god, Rethkam, God of the Forge, has one or two come for gifts every cycle, but several have had none in recent memory."

"Interesting. Here in our sacred forest, it is said that our gods died with all the others in the lowlands. This would have been part of the cataclysm that fell on the valley in the far north."

"Old Livia," Thad said. "I've seen the valley, and the destruction there, even at four hundred years old, is astounding."

Bonto nodded. "We have tales of the gods waging a great battle there and sacrificing themselves to protect the world. They say the Living God was born from the remnant power."

"I lived among the priests of the Living God for a few years doing magical research. I didn't directly engage in their religion, but from what I gathered, they and the Living God himself claim that he ascended into godhood around a century after the fall of Old Livia."

"Ascended?" Uzca asked. "He was a mortal once?"

"That's the claim. Coming from the god himself, I would say its an interesting one. I does beg many questions on its own, of course. Is he really the same as the other gods? Could we replace the lost gods? If gods ascend or fall, are they really gods? The list goes on and on. They like to debate many of them in public forums in his city."

There was a moment of silence while the highlanders digested the claim, and Bonto sipped his cider.

"Anyway," Bezben said, remembering he had been in the middle of the story. "Vandrias brought us both before him and asked what I wanted. I asked him to heal your brother, and in return, he asked that I bear a burden for him. Only then would he heal the taint. I agreed, and you saw the rest. I could feel the power in my hand, and I just reached out and touched him."

"What was the burden?" Thad asked. Uzca was curious, too. He had seen Bezben acting more fidgety than usual, but nothing alarming.

Bezben held up his right hand. His palm had a black brand that looked like it was seared into his skin. Uzca had never seen anything like it.

"So far, it just itches. I'm not sure what it's going to do. Vandrias said it would be challenging at times, but he thought I could handle it."

Thad stood and walked around the table.

"Do you mind?" he asked Bezben.

Bezben shook his head, and Thad took his hand, examining the brand closely.

"I've seen something similar. There are special runes that can be imbued into objects. It's an offshoot of enchanting. I've never seen one on a living person before, though...not even on an animal."

"What do they do?"

"Almost anything. I've never actually studied them, so I don't know how to decipher the runes. You'll probably have to wait and see."

"I hope your burden is not too great. We will always be thankful that you took it to save my brother. Ah! Speaking of thankfulness," Bonto waved at Teki, and the boy brought him a pouch. He tipped it over onto the table, and three gold coins spilled out.

"These are special tokens, one for each of you. If you show this to any Laka-uni, they will provide you with any assistance they can and allow you safe passage and usage of our sacred forest. It is not nearly enough to repay the good thing you have done for me, but it is the best I can offer you. With these, you are considered to be the greatest of allies to my people."

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Bezben examined the coin, and Uzca tucked his own away. "Thank you, Bonto. In the mountains, we are a free people, and we don't have many neighbors who covet our resources, so I have no token for you. Know that you and your people will always be welcome in the peaks."

Uzca wasn't a village leader or Elder, but his people never turned away strangers and always acted with hospitality.

"A generous offer, and after I have done nothing for you! This speaks well of your people!"

"Actually, I think a night in a regular bed will be payment enough."

Bezben grumbled his agreement, rubbing his back, and Thad chuckled, nodding.

"Well then! It is late, and your caravan will no doubt be departing early. Come! I will show you to some rooms."

Dawn's pale light came far sooner than Uzca wanted, shining through the window above his not-quite-large-enough bed. The rooms had been simple and small but comfortable enough compared to sleeping on the ground. The smell of breakfast drifting in through his open door was enough to make him forgive the sun for waking him. He joined Bonto and Thad at the table in the main room.

"Bezben isn't up yet?"

"Haven't seen him yet, but Bonto says we have some time. He could probably use the rest."

"Help yourself to the food, Uzca. We can pack up something for your cousin if he sleeps too long," Bonto said. "I have people watching the caravan; they are about an hour away from leaving. Do they do a headcount?"

"Not that I saw."

"Good, then you may take your time!"

The food, while filling, wasn't exactly what Uzca would call delicious. Everything kind of just tasted like pine needles, and he wondered what exactly Bonto put into that porridge.

Bezben stumbled out of his room about a half hour later. His hand, it seemed, had gotten worse.

"It was just like this when I woke up."

The skin had started peeling on his palm, and angry red welts surrounded the brand. It looked like he had fallen in a fire.

"Itches like crazy, too."

"You should stop by the infirmary. The healers should have a poultice for your hand, and we can see if my brother is awake."

"Good idea," Thad said. "He might be well enough for another healing spell."

They finished eating, and Bonto said they had just enough time to visit the infirmary before they had to head back to the road.

Bonto's brother looked much healthier than he had the previous night, though his wound was still far more extensive than Uzca expected was survivable. This was alleviated by Thad, who cast a new healing spell. This one looked like rings of light that pulled the wound shut, sealing it and making the man look like he would actually recover.

"The healing spell I used yesterday was aimed at internal injuries and helped a little with basic infection. This one is specifically for closing wounds. If my guess is right, your brother should wake up sometime today, maybe tomorrow due to the extra healing spell."

"Again, I owe you a debt, Thad," Bonto said. "Come, Bezben, allow my healers to take a look at your hand."

Thad waited next to Uzca and Bonto's brother while Bezben went with the Elder to get some kind of salve.

"I've never seen a wound gaping open like that," Uzca said. "Anything close to that severe would be deadly in the mountains, even with someone with a healing gift on hand."

"You're not wrong. In a way, this man was fortunate. As you say, anything else causing that wound would have been deadly, but it was caused by ghouls from the Livian Valley."

"You mentioned those yesterday. What are they?"

Thad thought about the question for a moment. "They're hard to describe unless you've seen one, but essentially, they're monsters that look vaguely like humans. They're all over the ruins of the valley, but they're hard to study since they're so aggressive. They carry a divine curse, the one this poor man was infected with, and spread it with their claws and bites. Vicious creatures."

"So why didn't the wound kill him?"

"Ah, yes. The curse is a nasty one. Only healable by divine magic. Basically, it transforms the victim. In another day or two, Bonto's brother would have been another ghoul."

Uzca took a step back. "Wait, are you saying all of those ghouls were once people?"

Thad shrugged. "That's one theory. The most morbid of that line of theory is that the majority of the ghouls there are the people who died during the valley's destruction four hundred years ago. Only, in that instance, they wouldn't have actually died. I'm not sure what's worse, being destroyed along with your entire home in some kind of cataclysm or being transformed into an unaging, horrific monster."

"I think it's pretty obvious what's worse."

"Hmm. You may be right there. In any case, that's only one theory and one I don't put a lot of stock in. If you ever go to the valley, you can't help but notice that it was completely ravaged by something. My mentor, a professor at the Mage's Academy in Telestria, has studied the Livian Valley extensively. He and his colleagues believe that a magical explosion destroyed much of the valley, mostly likely instantly killing everyone who lived in Old Livia."

"And what of the death of the gods? Bonto says that it was a clash between gods that destroyed the valley."

"That one is mostly just folklore. There's no evidence of divine battle, and we have some very good historical records from many religious orders of the time. There's no mention of any conflict of the gods anywhere around that time, but there is mention of the gods disappearing sometime within the decade or two following the cataclysm."

"So the event at the valley didn't kill the gods?"

Thad lifted his palms up and down as though weighing ideas against one another. "That's one of the great mysteries. We don't know. We know both of those things happened at roughly, historically speaking, the same time. It's easy to draw that inference, but we don't have any evidence."

"Then there's the fact that our gods are still alive."

Thad nodded eagerly. "Yes! It's amazing. I'm not sure how many people actually know about your gods. Sure, there are stories about god touched and god tainted and all that, but I think many of those actually stem from rumors about the ghouls of the Livian Valley. If anything is god tainted, it's the monsters with the divine curse, not people blessed by actual living old gods."

"I can wholeheartedly agree with that. I don't want myself, Bezben, or any of my people treated badly just because of rumors and prejudice founded on made-up stories."

"Yes! I just wish there was a way to prove it to people. These kinds of tales have been around for generations. Unless you or Bezben become some kind of folk hero, well known around the empire, it will be hard for you to change sentiment just by doing good things like you have done here. Besides, I don't know how often you can count on your gods intervening on your behalf."

Uzca nodded. Being some kind of hero was exactly the kind of thing he always looked down on the other children for aspiring to. He didn't hate the idea. He just didn't look at it as something that was possible for him to attain.

"It would be nice to change things, but that's not my quest. I need to find my mother and brother. If I can find them, and maybe reunite them with my father...I think that would be enough heroing for me."

"I'm sure we'll find them. Even if they're not in Telestria, we should be able to track them down from there."

"I hope so."

Bonto and Bezben returned then, with Bezben cradling his heavily bandaged right hand. The healers had fashioned a makeshift sling.

"All that for a bad rash?" Uzca asked him.

"They said it would be best if I didn't reflexively use my right hand to grab stuff, so they put it in the sling."

"Not a bad idea. I guess you won't be putting in any spear practice for a while."

"I can probably make it work!"

"Ha, it's your hand, Bez."

Bezben grumbled and scowled at his hand.

"They said to change the bandage after a full day. If the blisters and welts have gone down, he doesn't need another, but he'll need the skin covered if they're still there. They gave him some salve to put on it when the first bandage comes off. If it's not healing within three days, get in touch with a healer."

Uzca looked at Thad, who had traveled the road many times.

"Will we be somewhere with a healer in three days' time?"

"Hmm. I don't think so. I would guess it's two days to the Meglemen swamp and another two days to Brightwater. They have healers there, of course."

"Four days then? I guess we'll take our chances."

"Yeah, we could stay here to make sure he heals, but then we'll be out a Caravan ride, and we're a few days out of the worst stretch of road. We might end up at the base camp before the swamp and have to wait a week for another caravan to travel with."

"I guess we risk it, then. Are you alright with that, Bez?"

"I'll be fine, cousin. You..." he sighed. "You may need to carry my spear."

Uzca laughed and clapped Bezben on the shoulder.

"Truly this is a terrible burden."