Joe rose with the dawn, feeling confined by the normally welcoming Fort Coral for the first time. His encounter with Sir Naeqen had left Joe feeling tense and grouchy. To limber up and shake his black mood, he decided to take a morning run, the first one in a long while. The storm had broken the heatwave, and it was a nice, cool morning for the first time in weeks.
He and Earcellwen had formed a tradition of morning runs before the scalding summer began, making the exercise too uncomfortable to bear. Since they both had speed-boosting traits, their jogs often ended with insane sprinting races. On open ground, RC was quicker than he was, but if there were obstacles of any sort, Joe could bound over them faster than the elven archer.
Of course, the hounds loved these runs. Naenaeon occasionally joined them, too. Now that Joe could speak to the great white elk, he was even more awed by the noble beast. The wise stag could outpace everyone except for the fleetest of Joe’s hounds. Joe had not yet found the upper limit on Ranu’s speed; at times, the ghost hound almost appeared to jump through space to stay in the lead.
On the off chance that the elf had the same idea, Joe jogged to the plaza outside the Guildhouse where they typically met up. As he and the pups approached the square, they spotted the familiar sight of the green garbed Wildbow stretching by the central fountain. Feeling his face break into a grin, Joe realized he had not seen this friend for way too long.
Bayu dashed forward to greet one of her favorite people with a bedlam of happy yelps. Thankfully, RC quickly quieted the happy girl before she woke the neighborhood. The elf was one of the few people who was able to get Bayu to control her crazy barking fits.
“How do you say it,” Earcellwen stated, looking back up at Joe, “‘Great minds think as one.’”
“Close enough. I was really hoping you would be here,” Joe admitted as he joined her in stretching out his legs and back. “I had an encounter with one of your folk yesterday, and a good run together is the perfect cure. If I ran alone, I’d likely stew over it the whole time, just making myself more annoyed.”
“Tell me about it as we go,” she said, rolling her shoulders. “I’ve been waiting here for ten minutes. You’re late,” she chided with a small smile.
“OK, but remind Bay to keep it down. I don’t need any more trouble, and she listens to you better than she does me.”
“That tis she be a sage and regal lass,” the elf said in the tongue of beasts. Joe’s [Beast Speech] was less words and more ideas and feelings projected and received. The elf actually spoke, using melodious tones that translated into archaic-sounding words that Joe could now understand thanks to his druidic skill.
The pups loved hearing her address them. They held their heads up high and puffed out their coats, even the stoic Maru. The trio of spirit-hounds formed around them, running like honor guards beside the pair of mortal joggers.
Joe related the tale as they ran to the South Gate. Earcellwen was as surprised as Cricket had been by Sir Naeqen’s attitude toward Joe. She reiterated that the knight was not known to be a hothead; as a matter of fact, it was just the opposite. He had a reputation for being level-headed. She seemed to know the man well, even though she made it sound like they had not spoken directly with each other before.
When the runners reached the fork, Joe turned them away from the road to Mount Serabuk. He had had enough of knights and was happy not to have to pass the cottage where Corra Loigen resided. The old man doted on RC, but Joe was still too sore about the adjunct to want to deal with Corra’s gruffness toward him this morning.
The east path took the pair through the farmlands that fed the city. Unlike on Earth, where monsters did not regularly roam the land, the farms here were clustered like wagon wheels. These were known as steads. The hub was made of a central well, and the farm buildings belonging to typically three to five families: homes, barns, henhouses, stables, pens, and other assorted outbuildings. Arrayed around these structures were the crop and grazing fields. Stone walls or streams separated the far ends of the fields from the outer edge of a neighboring stead.
At the first cluster, Northwind Stead, Joe and Earcellwen checked in with the farmers to see if they had any troubles that needed to be reported or problems the guild could help with. This was part of being a guilder, and it was both satisfying and appreciated.
Joe sat on the edge of the well and healed various injuries that were not life-threatening enough to need a visit to a city healer but more challenging than the local herbwife could manage. There were more than usual that morning since Joe had not made this trip for a while. His only charge was breakfast. This stead had someone who baked the best buttermilk biscuits he had ever eaten.
While Joe worked, RC jotted down some monster sightings, the worst being Tusked Tarz. The vicious old manticore had killed a farmhand a few days ago and flown off with the body. The chimera had been a problem for years, but it was a wily creature, one that had eluded hunting teams time and time again.
The monster had a particular hatred for Joe, having been badly injured and thwarted by the druidic healer in the spring. Joe was much stronger now, but even so, Tarz was not an enemy he was sure he could defeat yet. So far, he had survived his encounters with the manticore thanks to the arrival of superior numbers and a lucky escape in the middle of a hurricane.
Even knowing Tarz was around, he and RC should have been safe that morning. The beast was a nocturnal hunter.
They were a few minutes out of Northwind, heading to Meadow Stead, when RC huffed loudly and blurted out. “Are you really not going to ask me to come with you?”
The annoyance and hurt in her voice totally threw Joe. He stopped cold in the middle of the country lane and turned to her. “But, everyone said you were busy this summer. I didn’t want to make you have to say no.”
She planted her hands on her hips and looked up at him, directly meeting his eyes. Uncomfortably, Joe glanced away to see his traitorous hounds arrayed around the elf. ‘You guys are supposed to be on my side,’ he thought.
Out loud, he added, “I’m sorry. I want you to come. I really do, but I didn’t know what you had going on.”
Earcellwen sighed and dropped her gaze, shaking her head. Looking back at him, she raised an eyebrow and flipped her hands in his direction so they ended palms up. In a flash, Joe realized what he had missed. She had turned everyone else down recently because she had been waiting for him to ask her to join the team.
“Oh, for crying out loud. I’m so sorry. I definitely want you to come. I just thought …,” Joe stammered. “Wait. You could have said something.”
“I thought for sure you would ask. I even bet Kenda five gold that you would. There’s a bet I just lost.”
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“Consolation. You won the bet about me asking about my guild furlough papers. So, you’re actually up five gold. Wait,” Joe bawked, cocking his head. “How often do you three make bets about me missing something?”
“Sometimes daily,” she laughed.
Joe gaped at her before pinching the bridge of his nose. “That’s just wrong,” he grumbled, even though he could easily see them doing it.
“Well, let’s get this out of the way first,” RC added as she pulled a pouch out of her dimensional locket and tossed it to Joe. Catching the bag with a clink, Joe felt several of the one-inch coinbars within the soft leather purse. He opened the drawstring to be met with the giddying sight of dragongeld. When his mental defenses dismissed the tantalization of the enthralling metal, Joe counted thirty geldbars—three thousand gold. “My buy-in,” the archer declared.
“That’s perfect. This covers the … Wait! Was Tez in on this bet, ‘cause if he was, I’m gonna …”
“Nope. That one was just Kenda and I. Tez only bets on the rules stuff you miss.”
“Then welcome aboard Crewwoman Rhuival.”
“Okay, but there is a caveat that, if you had asked me normally, would have come up. I’d like to go see my family as part of this trip. Once we break the curse, we can sail on to the city of Wildroost and dock the ship. From there, we’d take the road from Wildroost to Hart Holt, my home.”
“I would finally get to meet your father. Of course, we can. That makes this trip even better,” Joe beamed, clapping her on the shoulder.
“You will. I know he’ll like you. ‘The deeds of an unpretentious soul are diamonds among glass,’ he’d say. He’ll get a chuckle about your disdain for pomp and ceremony.” Joe missed her dad-quotes. It had been too long since they hung out.
“Now I’m really looking forward to meeting him,” Joe asserted. “In that case, we should get moving and finish the loop. With your share, nothing is stopping us from setting sail as soon as we get provisioned.”
Joe glanced over at RC, who was smiling happily. The moment she turned to scritch Bayu, Joe shouted, “Race you to Meadow Stead,” He dashed off at full speed before she was ready. On the level roadway, she had the advantage. Cheating was his only shot.
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By the time they were leaving the Stone Brook Stead, the last community on the Eastern Farm Loop, he and RC had compiled a pretty good list of tasks they would need to get done before they could set sail. Joe would reschedule his meeting with Margen. They should also get together with Puq for a gear check to see if the guild had any must-have items for a sea voyage.
RC also suggested that Joe pick up some study materials from the booksellers or see if the guild library could make copies for him. If Joe’s prophetic mark was causing issues, he should learn everything he could about it and the other marks as well. The Mark of Death was most active during the encounter with Sougath when his mark was actively contending with the Night Skinner’s Mark of the Moon. Knowing the nature of all the signs would benefit him should he ever find himself facing another mark-bearer.
Lastly, they needed to meet their captain and see the ship. That would determine how much they could bring with them and what provisions were needed. If the captain was unfamiliar with their destination, sea maps would be a good thing to buy. Joe considered purchasing a map of Hornwood for himself even if they didn’t need one.
With the list finished as they neared the city, it was time to race again. This mad dash for the city gates turned out to be one of their closest races ever.
Earcellwen, of course, did not share her [Trailbreaker] spell, which tripled her speed. Likewise, Joe did not share [Efferous Endurance]. His only advantage was her speed boost ate up copious amounts of stamina if used to its fullest.
They had worked out their own rules for these contests. Potions were cheating, so was transforming into an animal shape for Joe. RC was not allowed to ride Naenaeon. Shoving and grabbing were permitted only with hands, no [Glorious Gauntlets]. They each had movement-enhancing gear, Joe’s pants and her boots, so either they both wore them or neither did. Joe could use [Spirit of the Pack], but since he couldn’t exclude RC from the aura’s effect, it only helped him when they were not running near each other.
The hounds were allowed to run, but they were not permitted to help either runner. And it was not a given they would automatically be on Joe’s side. They were equally as fond of the elven archer as they were of the man bound to their axe.
If the pair began sprinting in sight of the gate, she’d definitely beat him. This time, though, the Wildbow gave Joe a chance. She started the race on the little bridge just outside Stone Brook Stead, a good two miles from Fort Coral. She couldn’t run flat out the whole way, or she’d run out of stamina long before she made it to the finish line. Having to ration her speed allowed Joe to stay a little ahead of her. Even so, he knew she had the equivalent of a nitrous oxide boost if she had enough stamina left for the last hundred yards.
These races were one time Joe allowed the wildness a great deal of free rein. The feral spirit loved physical competition, and this was a safe way to let it loose. Joe could feel his body sprouting hair and bending bone and muscle, allowing him to run on four limbs as effortlessly as he did on two. He pushed to stay as far ahead of the ranger as possible, hoping to get enough lead to use [Spirit of the Pack] for the extra movement, but RC stayed just inside close range.
They pounded down the lane at a breakneck speed. The guards were alarmed only for a second, but even though it had been a while, this competition was well known to them. The last time Joe checked, the odds were five to one against him since he had to stop using [Beast Shape]. The wildness wanted to throw on the werewolf hide, but Joe was not sure anyone was ready for that yet.
Trying to think of any advantage, Joe recalled that he had one new spell since his last race.
Without warning, a hunk of ice appeared in the elf’s path.
“HEY!” RC shouted.
Before she could zoom ahead, Joe rapid-cast ice everywhere. Block after block after block appeared across the road. This arctic spell burned stamina instead of mana, the resource he was already heavily drawing on, but [Efferous Endurance] was now a Rare-tiered spell with over sixty ranks. It produced such massive amounts of energy Joe should never run dry. Bounding over the frozen chunks, he added planes of slick frost across the road, his claws and [Steadfast] providing him plenty of traction.
“CHEATING!” she howled with laughter in her voice.
“Nah ah,” Joe shouted back.
The gate was right there.
Driving forward, he spread more ice around the ground and glanced to his side, looking for his adversary. RC was running full tilt but she had angled way off the road to avoid his [Icy Obstacles]. The rougher terrain was challenging for her at that speed, and the distance was further.
Joe had a chance. Only throwing ice on her side of the road, he sprinted as fast as his body would carry him.
Launching himself at the finish line, a green streak blurred by his side. It was a photo-finish, if this world had such a thing.
They used the horse rail to halt themselves, and Joe hit them both with [Effereous Endurance], the movement they stopped. Turning to the guards, panting heavily, they looked for a ruling on the winner, only to find a heated debate between the cluster of the guards on duty—an even split.
Joe wasn’t 100% sure, but his guess was that RC had just edged him out—again. Honestly, though, it would depend on where the finish line was. Joe reached the outer edge of the gate first, but he was pretty sure she beat him into the city. As they had never had a race this close before, this was unknown territory.
Still, he was happy to give it to her; it would make up for his flubbed invitation to join the voyage.
The wildness was not nearly so charitable. It grumbled and groused inside Joe as they waved goodbye to the guards and headed into the city to tackle their new list of duties.