08 – WOLF-KIN

As escorting hero of the caravan, Mateus was given a seat right next to the head merchant on the first wagon, ready to spot any incoming threats. The whole caravan moved along with a nice, sedate pace through the empty dirt road by the forest, and there wasn’t a soul anywhere all around.

The silence was almost deafening, save for the mechanical noise of the wheels turning, and of many feet stomping the ground. Of course, Mateus could hear much more than this, but the forest itself felt empty and devoid of any kind of life beyond the trees and the plants that grew short and crooked. It felt wrong, like the life had been sucked out of this part of forest.

As time passed, the forest gradually regained a sense of rightness. The shriveled trees became straighter and greener, the ground more fertile, and the smells richer. A few animals could be heard, birds singing their songs among the branches of the trees.

“Finally. That place was giving me the shivers.” Turmion said, and looked at Mateus next to him.

“It was the Weapon, wasn’t it?”

“Hah, you tell me, hero! It wasn’t me who went all the way there to slay it!”

Mateus looked pensive. “It did more damage than I thought.” He said, looking around and then down.

“You what, you lived all your life shut inside the capital’s walls?” Turmion asked jokingly.

“Yeah…”

The merchant gave him a condescending look. “You must have lived quite the boring life, then. Is that why you decided to be a hero?”

“My father helped me. I’ve always dreamt of becoming one, and one day he just…” He stopped there, his eyes losing their luster for a moment.

“I see,” the merchant replied. He distractedly caressed the bundle of cloth with his right hand.

“What’s that?”

Turmion retracted the hand, a quick and practiced motion. “This? It’s nothing. It’s nothing.”

Mateus looked away. The trees were passing by, one after the other, and he hoped to get lost in such a sight. Melancholic memories came back, revisited and changed ever since he became machine. The knowledge that something changed, that fated day, all those years ago. The beginning of their fortunes, and yet the downfall of his father’s happiness.

“It’s the last memory of my wife.” Turmion said.

Mateus got pulled back into real time. “Uh?”

“The cloth. It belonged to my wife. It’s the only thing I have left of her, now.” He looked sad. He felt the texture of the cloth with his hands, and then put it back next to him, on the opposite side of where Mateus was sitting. He shuffled his body almost in a defensive move, trying to put himself between the hero and his most prized possession.

“I’m sorry for your loss.” Mateus’ eyes reflected that sentiment, he himself feeling the weight of a loss he didn’t even experience. How truly tragic must the merchant’s story have been. To lose everything he cared for.

Turmion studied his face, and his features saddened for a little moment. Then, he restored his expression, back to the usual merchant face he always wore.

“But, no need to dwell onto that. We’re here now, look.” He pointed ahead. “Our first stop.”

The road ended into a gate, large and imposing. Its gargantuan features were somewhat diminished, however, by the state it was in. It was crumbling, the stone loose and riddled with vines and green overgrowth. All around, a ring of wooden posts made a makeshift palisade, like an unsteady fence trying to protect the village, but unable to even face a gust of wind.

Seeing the gate and the fence close to each other, the village gave the impression of being what it was. A remnant of an age past, where those few who were still here clung to whatever was left.

While Turmion looked at it with a complacent look, Mateus looked with starry eyes. He had never been here, all his previous travels only bringing him to battlefields or hunting expedition, all in preparation for the one final battle they had to fight. This time, he was exploring the world, like he dreamt of doing when he became a hero.

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Turmion instead knew that this village would not bring him much profit. Still, he decided to stop here so that his crew could rest the night, and so that he could see how the people at the edge of the reclaimed lands were faring. The situation looked dire, but he already knew that beforehand.

The caravan was stopped at the gate for a brief moment. The guards standing there were all clad in shoddy armor, leather and metal plates juxtaposed the best they could. The most interesting feature, however, was the nature of the guards and the other inhabitants of the village.

Even though the kingdom welcomed all Sentients, in truth the capital was mostly populated by humans. Mateus had grown up there, and had barely seen any other race other than humans. He caught himself staring at the furry ears and tails of the guards, and averted his eyes. Nevertheless, his round pupils stared at the slitted ones of those people with interest and fascination, mouth open agape.

Turmion motioned everyone to move along, and the caravan entered the village.

“Wait here.” He said, after they reached the central square. “I need to fill in some paperwork.”

Mateus jumped down from his seat, and stretched his limbs. Turmion observed him, and noticed a startled look and then a realization dawn on the hero’s face as he looked at his own arms. He shook his head. He had an important thing to do here, the only reason he even stopped in this village in the first place.

One of his people approached him.

“Paperwork, sir? It’s not usual procedure, is everything alright?”

Turmion blinked. “Of course it is. Just need to use the comms magic tower real quick. Gotta let my wife know I’m coming home.” The underling nodded, and left.

Mateus saw the merchant approach one of the wolf-kin who had come out of the main building to assist them. They exchanged pleasantries, then Turmion produced a couple coins and a crystal, and was led inside the large stone house.

After the paperwork was done, the caravan prepared to set up their stalls and sell their goods. Mateus had been given the day off, since the wolf-kin guards offered to guard the merchant personally to ensure that everything would go smoothly. With nothing better to do, the former hero just wandered around the village.

It was small and cramped. Beside the one stone building by the square, everything else was made of wood and hay; small rooms cramped on top of each other, trying to fit inside a second much smaller ring of defenses all around. Between the two rings, the fields were being plowed by the hands of many people.

Mateus found this all hard to watch. It wasn’t the simple, bucolic lifestyle he expected of the countryside. Even on a sunny, mildly warm winter day like this, he could see that this was no easy life. He could see the struggles, the suffering and the sacrifices everyone had to make. He almost wished to help them, and maybe in the future he would. He was a hero after all, he only needed to restore his status by proving he was not dead.

They spent the night in the village. They were given the best-built houses, the warmest and most comfortable beds, and most of the short supply of commodities that the village could afford. Mateus almost felt sad for not needing any of those, given how much effort the wolf-kin people put into making their guests feels at ease.

He laid down on his bed. Even if he didn’t need to sleep anymore, he felt that he could rest for a bit, think about his situation. The faint whispers from the nearby rooms all died down within minutes, the merchants exhausted and in dire need of a good rest.

The wind wasn’t strong, and yet it howled when it passed through the small cracks and holes between the wooden planks. The bed was hard, and a few straws poked out and scratched Mateus’ back, to the point where he had to turn off tactile sensations from that area.

He felt cold. He felt alone. The wind whispered to him.

He closed his eyes.

Ahead of him, a sphere in the darkness. Little bright lights, like candles in the dark, shone where the sphere was black. Then he was in the middle of it all. Deafening sounds. Rushing people, monsters of metal speeding away, dangerous and imposing, loud and dangerous. He saw himself get swept along by this whirlwind of monsters and metal, inside this maze of angles and straight lines. Lights everywhere. Noises. Smoke.

He woke up.

He looked at his arms in confusion, and morphed and shifted them. He made scales appear on his skin, then he changed its color to red, then blue and green, then back to normal. He transformed an arm into a log, made of real wood, then into a beam of iron, then back into an arm.

He was still a machine. He was still here.

By the time when the first light of the sun bathed the village in gold, he was already pacing around the small paved square. The bricks were large and irregular, and he was counting them as he stepped on each of them.

Eventually, Turmion and the others woke up, and they were ready to depart. Mateus’ mind still tried to make sense of what it saw, and failed. He felt he somewhat knew those things, and yet he didn’t. He could ask Computer, but didn’t want to.

“We have a problem.” Turmion said.

Mateus looked startled for a moment, and cursed at himself for always giving the impression of being distracted. What a guard he was.

“What is it?” He asked.

“They told me that a large tree fell in the middle of the road, a couple hundred meters out. There’s no other way around.”

“So, we need to wait? I can help, speed up the cleaning process.”

“You would? It’s not really a job for a hero, you know?”

Mateus straightened his back. “There’s no such thing as a job for a hero. There’s helping, and not helping. And I choose to help.”