The rush of wind from above made treetops bend and blew Yara’s hair in her face. She looked up what caused it. Closely above her head flew a massive, grey dragon down from the foothills above and into the Yilgran bay. It roared as it descended. Immediately Yara looked the other way to see where it had come from, and sure enough plumes of smoke rose above the treeline from not too far away. She turned Helena around and bent forward in the saddle as she commanded her horse to gallop. The smouldering and blasted remains of wooden houses stood limply amidst the ash and ruin. Whatever was left of the buildings looked like it was going to topple over. A small group of people searched the ruins of the houses that had stopped burning, and at the town’s edge a little girl stood waiting next to who Yara presumed to be her grandmother. Yara thought for a second, these people spoke a language she knew barely anything off. She reminded herself of who she travelled with. The succubus ghost she'd befriended was a local of sorts.

  'Julie, are you here?' she asked.

  ‘where else would I be?’ Yara heard Julie say from behind her. She turned around. Their eyes met for a split second.

  ‘You speak Yilgran, right?’ she asked, looking down. Julie nodded, ‘could you talk to them?’ Yara pointed to the old woman and the little girl, ‘I don’t think they’d understand me.’

  ‘Sure, I could try,’ said Julie as she got down from the horse and walked to where Yara directed her. Yara herself also got out of the saddle and immediately began to ask any of the people searching the rubble. Unfortunately they couldn’t tell her anything she didn’t already know: a dragon attacked and burnt down most of the village. It wasn’t like she expected anything too enlightening, she knew all too well that these people had just tried to run for their lives without looking up. Empty handed she wanted to return to her horse and just follow where she saw the dragon go. Julie called to her and she looked up.

  ‘They know something!’ she said, ‘come here I’ll tell you.’

  The elderly lady seemed delighted at speaking with Julie earlier, though her expression soured when she saw Yara. She covered nearly head to toe in her armour, and it appeared the elder shared the opinion of the masses when it came to female knights.

  ‘What’d they say?’

  ‘The girl remembers looking up when the dragon attacked, apparently it had six spikes on the end of its tail?’

  ‘Not the most unusual thing, did she see anything else?’

  ‘I’m afraid not,’ Julie shook her head, ‘but the elderly lady here told me she saw some of what happened, she says it attacked using that tail, and that it had to land to breathe fire.’

  ‘Well that’s at least somewhat helpful,’ said Yara, she wanted to thank the elderly lady but realised she didn’t know the Yilgran for it.

  ‘Thank you?’ she said with a questioning tone to her voice. Julie snickered and translated it for her.

  ‘Merci,’ she said. The elderly lady smiled and the girl she stood next to only nodded. Yara had already turned around and walked back to Helena with Julie right behind her.

  ‘So where are we off to now?’

  ‘Where do you think?’ Yara asked as she put one of her feet in a stirrup and pulled herself up.

  ‘After that dragon?

  The huntress nodded, ‘after that dragon.’

* * *

  The next few days were spent on horseback as Yara tracked the dragon as best she could. A flying creature wasn’t exactly easy to follow everywhere, they left little in the way of tracks which made it hard to find exactly what way it went. Fortunately she made do. An attack here, a snapped treetop there, it was enough to form a path of approximately how the dragon had travelled.

  One such attack had been a caravan of traders from the mainland. On their way to a harbour to return home and after a long journey they’d been forced to deal with the dragon. According to them it was covered head to toe in grey scales, with a spider-like pattern of black ones decorating its back. Its tail had supposedly moved as if the dragon had extra control over it, almost like another limb. One of the traders said that its head was narrow and lined with long, smooth fangs, while another contradicted them with an entirely different description. After the confusing information given Yara had to continue onward. She'd started to build a picture of how it looked.

  As she travelled further a rustling came from the bushes by the roadside. It was hardly going to be the beast that Yara was chasing, after all a dragon wouldn’t fit in the roadside brush. Initially she chose to ignore it, but when it continued she could swear she heard the sound of scuttling by the roadside. She swore she could hear the chittering of insectoid jaws. If Yara had ignored it for a second longer she wouldn’t have seen what was coming.

  From out of the brush a creature lunged at her and Yara screamed in surprise as she was tackled out of the saddle, nearly dislocating one of her ankles in the process when her foot got stuck in a stirrup. Helena panicked and dashed off after Yara hit the ground. The thing pinned her to the ground. Its body was almost like that of a woman, but emaciated, with chitinous skin stretched directly over bone. One large blade each jut forth from both its short forearms, its hind limbs were long and digitigrade. The creature’s humanoid head split open three ways and it shrieked loudly as saliva dripped down directly onto Yara’s face. She looked at it with disgust as she struggled under the creature.

  Yara waited until it raised up one of its arms before raising her legs and kicking the creature off. She'd taken off her plate and gambeson for travel comfort, meaning she was only wearing the clothes she'd normally have under them. Yara dashed to Helena to grab her sword but as soon as she grabbed the weapon by the hilt she felt the creature rush at her again.

  Yara shouted when she was once more pushed to the ground, on her stomach this time, with the creature crawling over her with deadly curiosity. Now it was different however, as in her right hand she held Skycleave. Her sword gave her security. The moment Yara tried to roll over onto her back in order to gain more control she felt a deep and sharp pain in her back, and as she turned she could see what caused it. The creature had stabbed her, and Yara’s sudden movement had caused it to tear through her skin from the back right of her ribcage until eventually the blade disconnected just under her left breast. She screamed through gritted teeth and the creature lifted its claw up out of surprise. Blood poured from the wound and stained her green shirt black. The wound wasn't deep, but saints be damned if it didn't hurt. Now in a position where she could do something about the monster she thrusted Skycleave up and through the centre of its torso. Blood started to pour from the wound and the creature let out a deafening screech. It darted away and Yara scrambled to get up. She was losing too much blood. Calmly she walked over to her saddlebags, where she found her medical supplies. Bandages. It wasn't a surprise they were there, but she was definitely glad to see them. Immediately she started cleaning the wound and covering it up. She needed to get to a healer. Fast.

* * *

  Yara rode through the night to find the nearest village and healer, though she wasn’t sure they’d even have one. Getting even a little help from anyone would be perfect for her right now. She turned at a junction and rode slightly up a hill until she arrived in a small township. It was early morning. The sun had only just risen and Yara didn’t expect anyone to be awake, but she saw people out and about. A woman who was filling a bucket of water at the well looked at her. Yara grinned weakly before she felt one of her feet slip out of its stirrup. She'd made it, but for how long? Her hands let go of Helena's reins, and not a few seconds later she fell. The next thing she felt was her face smacking hard into the ground, then, nothing.

  Several hours later she woke and rushed to sit up straight, sweat on her forehead and new bandages covering her injury. Whoever had patched her up had also left her unmentionables uncovered for the most part, though a new, clean shirt lay folded on the end table. The wound still stung, but at least it'd stopped bleeding. A healer had gotten a look at her, there was no other way she could've recovered like this otherwise. Her cheek, the one with her scar, felt sore, bruised even. She wanted to sit at the edge of her bed and maybe even stand, but before she could a man entered the room. Yara, still pretty much topless, covered herself with her arms.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said the man, he raised his hands, ‘I’m not here to do anything other than talk about your injury.’

  ‘Could you turn around or something?’ she asked carefully. She didn’t know this man, she had no idea what he really wanted.

  ‘Unfortunately for you I need to look at the wound, which means you can’t put on a shirt.’

  ‘You could’ve at least covered me up with a bandage or something like that.’

  ‘I made an effort not to touch you in the chest area during the healing process, which wasn't easy because of where the wound ends,’ he said, ‘I figured I shouldn’t try to overstep any boundaries of a woman I don’t know.’

  ‘That’s… thoughtful of you.’

  ‘Not hard to be thoughtful when the person I’m treating isn’t my type,’ he said as he pulled up a chair, ‘feel free to keep yourself covered with your hands if that makes you more comfortable.’

  Yara did exactly that as the man carefully removed the bandages, ‘who are you, if it’s not too much to ask?’

  ‘Me?’ said the man, completely focused, ‘my name is Olivier, I'm the local healer.’

  ‘Mine’s-.’

  ‘Yara? I’m aware, the brunette woman you brought with you told me.’

  ‘Brunette?’ Yara had a puzzled look on her face, ‘oh you meant Julie.’

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  ‘Yes, her,’ said Olivier, he looked at the other scars on Yara’s body, ‘is she your…?’

  ‘Friend,’ answered Yara immediately, ‘I’m not- not that there’s anything wrong with-.’

  ‘I get what you mean,’ he cut her off as he made certain signs with his hands. Yara looked down and from what she could see the open cut had been replaced by a red mark that followed the exact path of how the monster had sliced her.

  ‘It’s going to leave a scar, and a nasty one at that.’

  ‘I’m used to those at this point.’

  Olivier snorted.

  ‘I can tell, some of them nastier than others,’ he said, ‘You wouldn’t mind if I looked at some of them, would you?’

  Yara shook her head and Olivier began to inspect her scars.

  ‘Which one is the oldest?’

  ‘The one on my face,’ she answered honestly and he started to look at it closely, making Yara feel slightly awkward in the process.

  ‘From a sword, narrow tip, a clean cut too,’ he said, ‘who gave you this.’

  ‘I’d rather not talk about it.’

  ‘Suit yourself.’

  This continued on for a while until eventually Olivier stopped and stood up.

  ‘Feel free to walk around the village, feed your horse, et cetera, and come visit me a few times a day,’ he said, ‘oh, and the only thing you can’t do is leave, I need you to stay here for at least two days.’

  ‘Why? Didn’t you already heal me?’

  ‘I’m not perfect, the healed skin is still very tender and your body needs time to catch up to the work I’ve done,’ answered Olivier, ‘another thing you can’t do: too much exercise, you might tear it open again.’

  ‘Thanks, Olivier,’ said Yara as she put on the shirt that’d been put on the end table for her.

  ‘Don’t worry too much, and get some rest too, you probably need it.’

* * *

  As if truer words had never been spoken she fell fast asleep and didn’t wake for the better part of a day. The first thing she did when she got up was feed Helena, who’d been left outside all of the previous day. She’d nibbled at some of the dandelions and grass that’d managed to sprout up around Olivier’s home and clinic, but she did appreciate the bag of feed she was given.

  Next Yara searched her saddlebags, which had been brought inside while she slept. For the next hour or so she would look through her Encyclopaedia of Dracology. Some of the pages had started to fray from how frequently Yara had turned them. Every time she’d get close to the inside of the back cover she’d stop turning the pages and just close the book, or at least that’s what she started doing after Arran died. The blank page at the end of the book had both their signatures on it. Yara didn’t want to look at them because she knew they’d stare right back at her.

  After reading for a good bit of time she stood up and knocked on the door that led into Olivier’s own house.

  ‘Come in,’ he said, his voice muffled by the door. Yara opened it and walked through.

  ‘How’s today been?’ asked Olivier. He sat on the opposite end of the room in a big, comfortable looking chair that stood next to a dead fireplace. He was writing in a little journal, his attention focused on it completely.

  ‘Today was fine,’ Yara answered his question, ‘I didn’t really do all that much.’

  ‘Good, good, that means you’re letting your body heal.’

  ‘Any previous healer I visited never asked me to wait with them,’ she said as she wanted to sit down on another, equally big and comfortable looking chair, 'at least, not for a surface wound.'

  ‘Don’t,’ he said sternly, ‘take one of the other ones instead,’ Olivier referred to the seat, he pointed at the dinner table chairs.

  ‘Oh, my bad,’ Yara picked out one of those to move over and sit down on.

  ‘As I’ve told you before, I’m not exactly the best at this,’ Olivier answered her question, ‘whoever took care of you before is miles ahead of me, don’t expect the same level of care from any healer you come across.’

  Silence fell upon the room and Yara watched Olivier’s short quill dart around the paper as he wrote and the sound it made as it moved around filled the room.

  ‘What are you writing?’ asked Yara, genuinely interested.

  ‘Something private, do you mind?’ Olivier replied, he realised midway through his sentence that he might’ve sounded rude to someone who was genuinely interested, ‘sorry,’ he said, ‘not used to people actually being interested,’ he shifted in his chair and quickly turned the book to Yara before turning it back, ‘they’re letters.’

  ‘To who?’

  ‘My partner.’

  Yara cocked her head as she focused on the book, ‘why write her letters?’

  ‘“Her”?’ Olivier scoffed, he saw that Yara was about to apologise, ‘don’t worry you wouldn’t be the first.’

  ‘Oh, why do you write him letters?’ she corrected herself.

  ‘He’s a trader, which makes him hard to reach,’ he explained, ‘instead of mailing them we write each other letters in a journal, and when he comes home we trade them to see what the other wrote.’

  ‘That’s… actually kind of sweet,’ said Yara.

  ‘How about you?’ asked Olivier, refusing to let another silence take hold, ‘do you do anything “sweet” for a loved one?’

  ‘Oh, no I don’t have anyone.’

  ‘Really? I find that hard to believe,’ Olivier tried to look Yara in the eye but she avoided looking back, ‘we all have parents, don’t we?’

  ‘Not anymore.’

  Realising he struck a raw nerve Olivier quickly tried to shift the focus of what he’d said.

  ‘How about a lover, or someone you’re interested in?’

  Yara shifted uncomfortably in her seat, she thought of Laras, ‘there is one person,’ she admitted, ‘he doesn't want to talk to me anymore.’

  ‘Why would that be.’

  ‘He- he's not,’ Yara was thinking of how she should put it, 'according to him it wouldn't be proper.'

  Olivier sat up straight, closed his journal, and put it on the small table in front of him. He looked directly at Yara, 'it wouldn't be "proper"?' he asked with an eyebrow raised, 'is he a lord or something?'

  'No uhh...' Yara deliberated whether she should acknowledge Arran's family, the one she was adopted into, 'I'd be the one with the status. He's too scared he'd sully my honour or something. And now that I ran away without him he's probably mad at me too.'

  Olivier looked perhaps a little endeared. He sighed like a parent would, ‘do you want my opinion on this?’

  ‘I don’t think it could hurt,’ she lied through her teeth. It probably could.

  ‘Well firstly, he's an idiot. If you two care about each other enough you can get past that easily.’

  Yara scoffed, 'wish he'd believe that-.'

  'Secondly,' Olivier said, unappreciative of being interrupted, 'secondly, he's probably worried sick about you if he feels the same way about you. Maybe he's even out looking for you.'

  ‘Well, I don’t think he is,’ she said in a reserved tone, ‘but… I hope you’re right.’

  ‘I hope I am too,’ he said, ‘now go rest some more, it’s late anyway.’

  Yara obliged by standing up, bidding Olivier good night, and leaving the room for her own.

* * *

  A door creaked and woke Yara early in the day. Olivier walked in carrying a sealed letter. She managed to read her name on the envelope. Her eyes had only barely adjusted to the light which now streamed into her room, but she recognised that handwriting. She could read her name in that handwriting in almost any context.

  ‘A courier came by with the town’s mail, he had a letter for you.’

  ‘And there's no seal right? nothing that looks like my order's emblem?' Yara asked. Olivier turned the sealed letter around. No seal on the other side, no emblem either.

  ‘As you can see, no there’s not,’ he said as he handed her the letter. She opened the envelope and took out the paper hidden inside.

  ‘It’s an invitation,’ she said after she finished reading.

  ‘Who from?’

  ‘Nobody in particular,’ Yara quickly dismissed his question. Olivier grinned.

  ‘Where’re you being invited to?’

  ‘Misery? Miser? I don’t know how to pronounce it.’

  ‘Miseré, it’s a coastal town in the bay.’

  Yara got up from her bed and began packing her stuff immediately.

  ‘Hold on where do you think you’re going?’

  ‘To Miseré.’

  ‘You need more time to heal,’ said Olivier critically, ‘Your skin could tear open if you exert yourself too much.’

  ‘I was invited, I can’t exactly decline.’

  ‘Well you said it was nobody important, right? Why bother?’ he asked, his face twisting into a shit-eating grin when he saw Yara had gotten all flustered.

  ‘I’m going.’

  ‘Fine, I’ll be coming with you then.’

  ‘You better have your own horse.’

  ‘No, but that saddle of yours looks big enough for two people,’ he followed her outside as she prepared her horse next.

  ‘As long as you don’t touch me, fine.’

  ‘perfectly fine by me.’