Kunin met Tobei and his returning crew at the edge of Silvax Forest like he’d known exactly when and where they’d be.

Tobei—slumped in his saddle, exhausted and stressed and painfully sober—gave his Wolf a relieved smile and reached to scratch those silver ears. Kunin trotted right past him for the nearest wagon.

“Ku,” Tobei growled a warning.

Kunin was having a hard time aiming at the still-moving wagon.

“Kunin Luista!”

The Wolf, normally so graceful, nearly stumbled over his own paws ducking away from the wagon, head down. Tobei hadn’t used Kunin’s full name in that tone since their army days, and even then it was rare. He hated doing it and he would make it up to the Wolf later with a full grooming session, but they didn’t have time for this shit right now.

“Tell Kadie we’re coming, Ku. Lenna’s sick. Bad.”

Head still bowed, Kunin gave an understanding snort, swiped an apologetic tongue over Tobei’s hand, and darted off, back into the monstrous trees of Silvax Forest.

Tobei’s head was pounding, and the weight of the very empty flask at his hip was trying hard to pull him off the saddle of the big buckskin beneath him, Gerald. Every step Gerald took made Tobei’s bones rattle, and yet he urged the horse on faster through the forest, toward the jug of whiskey waiting for him beneath his bed.

Something pale flashed in the corner of Tobei’s eye, but when he looked around there was only trunks and leaves and grass, as always. Mother Dark—it was worse than he’d thought. He was hallucinating again.

He needed a fucking drink.

He squeezed Gerald’s sides with his knees, and the horse picked up the pace.

Kadie met them at the edge of camp, a wrinkle of concern between her brows and a med bag slung across her shoulder. Before Tobei could even dismount, she asked, “Where is she?”

“The first wagon,” he said just as it was coming into view down the trail, and she jogged toward it.

He should go too, he knew. Fill Kadie in, answer any questions, offer any help. But—Tobei looked up into the canopy, in the direction of his house. Even the thought of untacking Gerald before melting his mind a bit sent a lightning strike down his spine.

How did Daivad do all this leader shit all the time?

As if summoned by the thought, Daivad arrived with … a patchwork monster about the size of a dog, its jaws clamped on Daivad’s boot, still on Daivad’s foot, growling joyously as it got dragged along with each step. Tobei didn’t even have the energy to ask.

The most he could muster was a bright smile for Daivad as he slapped one of those oversized shoulders merrily. “Do me a favor, brother? Oversee this group while I fetch a drink, yeah? Be back before you can miss me!”

“Not much of a challenge,” Daivad grunted, trying to shake the monster off his leg.

“Great.” Tobei stuck the reins at Daivad and simply dropped them when Daivad was too occupied fighting for his boot to extend a hand.

But before he got two steps Daivad said, “Ay.”

“What were those words again?” Tobei asked, his grin stiff. “Not much of a challenge?”

“Lenna was better. What happened?”

“I’ll fill your questions when I’ve had a swig or two—Ah!” He gestured toward the figures appearing from the undergrowth, carrying baskets full of nuts and berries and who knew what else; the Duxon group back from foraging, led by the tiny Edgar. “Excellent timing! All these hands to help unload. Back in a twinkle.” Tobei started toward the nearest lift again but—

“Ay.”

“Mother—the one time I don’t want your attention, I can’t get rid of it. What?”

Daivad gave him those icy, narrowed eyes. Every second that Daivad stood there, choosing his words and ignoring the monster that was throwing its full weight into yanking his foot out from under him, was agony. Finally Daivad said, “You curse-sick too?”

Tobei told himself this was Daivad’s backwards way of showing concern, and he might have been touched, or else offended at how backwards it was, if he weren’t a heartbeat from snapping.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

Through his brilliant teeth, Tobei said, “Yep.”

Tobei had at least three very brief conversations on his way up to his house, and two seconds after he’d had them he couldn’t remember what they’d been about or even who they’d been with. His mind was only whiskey whiskey whiskey.

Finally, he swept aside the curtain of vines over his front door and finally let his steps slow with relief. With the promise of peace just a few feet away. In his bedroom, Tobei collapsed onto the floor, leaning back against his bed frame and reaching under it without looking. The weight of the jug was delicious in his hand. That slight tremble of his fingers stilled as he popped off the cork and lifted the jug to his nose.

One deep whiff and he felt his shoulders melting down, the chattering in his head fading to the background just a tad. He sighed, head swimming before he’d even had his first sip.

~*~*~

A few minutes later, Tobei was back on the forest floor, once again his grinning, fabulous, slightly-drunk self. Now buzzed, he could think straight again, and he remembered that he didn’t have anything to feel guilty about. The train job had been a complete success. None killed, their identities hidden, they’d gotten every bit of the resources they’d expected, and Lenna losing her shit was not only not Tobei’s fault, it was a blessing because now he remembered that he hated Lenna.

He was feeling excellent.

Good enough, even, that the sound of Kadie’s slightly raised voice, her sharp tone only stirred up a small amount of anxiety in Tobei’s whiskey-warm belly. Her hair was orange today, and it lended heat to the words she was throwing Daivad’s way. Their leader was busying himself unloading the wagons (piling crate upon crate into his arms like he thought if he stacked them high enough Kadie wouldn’t be able to see him) and calling directions to the other camp members who were helping to take the horses and haul off crates of their own. The clearing was full of the foragers who all stood around wanting to help but not knowing exactly what to do. They were also trying to avoid one edge of the clearing, where Maxea stood resolutely ignoring the beast that was wiggling and rolling on its back right in front of her, trying to get her attention.

If Daivad hoped any of this would deter Kadie, that she might hold off the scolding while this audience was around, he was wrong.

“How long has Lenna been with us, Daivad?” Kadie stalked after the stack of crates with legs that was Daivad. “How much has she done for this camp? For you?”

Edgar, looking tiny with his one small crate next to Daivad and his four large ones, shuffled in the same direction as the arguing pair, shooting Tobei a worried glance like he wasn’t sure if he should hang back to give the conflict its privacy. Tobei, buzzing, took the initiative to welcome the little old man into their sweet shit with a smirk and an after you gesture.

They followed as the crates growled on their way to the nearest lift, “I tried, Kade.”

“Sweet shit!”

“Daivad!” Pait yelled as she rushed toward them, her face flushed and her breathing heavy and, Tobei was surprised to see, the one-eyed monster on her shoulder.

Tobei had yet to meet the one-eyed monster, Julius, but he had heard many a story. It chimed in, “Huge Man!”

“Mother fucking Light,” Daivad snarled. “What now?”

Tobei could smell the fear on her. Pait opened her mouth, but the words seemed to die just behind her pale lips. She glanced at Julius on her shoulder, hesitant. Then back at the forest behind her.

Half-hearted, she said, “We saw … something.”

“Excellent.” Daivad started forward again. “She said there was nothing she could do, Kadie. She said Lenna has to break the curse herself.”

“And you didn’t think to ask how?”

“Lenna’s cursed?” Pait trailed after them.

Daivad’s response was only to clomp onto the lift and stubbornly attempt to kick at the lever instead of asking someone to throw it for him. Tobei, kind as ever, flipped the lever despite the fact that it nearly got him kicked.

“You didn’t think to ask,” Kadie pressed, following them onto the lift, “what kind of curse it was? What rune language?”

The lift jerked under their combined weight and the tower of Daivad-crates wobbled precariously. Tobei steadied the boxes, and though neither Kadie nor Daivad acknowledged this, Edgar gave him a big blue-eyed smile. Tobei liked Edgar.

“It had to be the language of monsters,” Daivad said.

“Did she say that?”

“That’s what she spoke when she cursed her.”

“So you’re not sure?”

“Xo?” Edgar piped up. “Is this the ‘little monster girl’ Dolly was talking about?”

Kadie glanced at Edgar. “Do you know any Xo?”

“It’s what I taught,” Edgar said, “decades ago. It’s what earned me this mark.” He held out his forearm to display the letters DUX inked into his wrinkled skin, looking as bold and dark as if they’d been put there last week. He continued, “I can’t say what the years have done to my knowledge of it, but I may be able to help.”

Once the lift had finally creaked to a stop in the branches, Kadie grabbed the crate out of Edgar’s hands, stuffed it into Tobei’s, and said to Edgar, “You come with me.”

Daivad clomped off, and Kadie and Edgar disappeared back down the lift, leaving Tobei and Pait (and Julius) standing at the terminal.

“What’s the story with the nightbeasts?” Tobei asked, nodding at Julius.

“Good boy, Julius!”

“We went to Broken Earth, met the weird monster girl in a graveyard, and then Daivad came out with Kitten.”

“Kitten?”

“The half-scaley one.”

There was a pause.

Tobei said, “And he called me curse-sick.”

“What?”

“Nothing.” Tobei shifted the crate in his arms and started forward. “Name what you saw in the forest.”