They all backtracked slightly, before settling where the path widened out, sitting in a circle.

The paper in Shrike's hands had turned to glittering ash as they walked, but he still had the lost expression on his face.

"Is it really that big a thing?" Ollie asked, "I was offered some weird shit that nobody should take. The Keyed apprentice class was the best of it."

"She could have changed the world," Shrike whispered, staring at his palms. "The city would have set her up in an office somewhere in the Chapter House, and every library and scholar in the world would have come here to have their documents translated."

He hit his lip, the dungeon-light shining off the top of his head.

"It would have saved the city, no doubt about it."

Jump-touch frowned at that.

"But I would only have been reading things?"

He looked up at, and then through her. "Yes, but you would have been reading things lost for generations, for hundreds of years, in some cases. Maybe thousands!"

A hundred years wasn't all that long, some of the kobolds were much older than that. She wasn't all that impressed. Weren't there other people out there who could read, anyway?

"I like reading," she said slowly. "But not that much. It's nice of course, but to be stuck here forever, just reading old people's diaries?"

"You could have…" he trailed off, as the others looked at him. "No. I'm wrong. They would have taken you to the Capital and presented you to the king. They would have built a library just for you. Resper would have gotten recognition, but it would have been too good, for you to be allowed to stay here."

She scrunched up her nose, "I'm glad I didn't take it then! I want to travel and talk to people, not sit in a room all day and read old letters. And I really don't want to go to the capital, wherever that is!"

It sounded horrifying! She was glad she'd taken [Cultural Scholar] instead.

She sucked on her teeth, "but I wouldn't mind reading a little, later. I could learn the languages, I just didn't want to have all them all magically put into my head. One is bad enough! What if every time I listened to birds, I could hear all the things the birds were saying, or, or-"

She couldn't think of anything. All she knew was that it would be loud all the time, words everywhere, and people expecting things of her at every waking moment.

"There would be words in my head all the time, ones that aren't just mine. Words don't understand, but that the thing in my head does. It would be awful."

She hunched her knees up, resting her chin on them. "It's bad enough the Stone made me learn this one, but it said it couldn't undo it once it was done, and that it had needed to do it so it could give me a job at all."

She pressed her forehead into her knees, blocking out the constant light. "It's stupid and it makes me feel sick all the time."

Somebody laid a hand on her shoulder, and she felt herself flinch away. The hand withdrew.

She wanted to be alone. Not here, surrounded by humans. She wanted to be up on the Mountain, surrounded by kobolds who would give her space, with whom she could just speak, without magic having to get in the way all the time.

"You can disable the boon, you said," Eim said quietly from somewhere beside her. "If you want to turn it off and never turn it back on, that's okay. We can teach you while we walk. Plus if your Class description is right, you should pick up Resper fast enough."

"We can teach you King's Tongue too." This time the voice was Ollie's, "well, those two can, I'm shit at it."

She mumbled something into her knees, but even to her it was just sound. Eim's presence beside her was like a furnace, and she could feel the heat of him even though he wasn't touching her.

"I want to go home," she found herself saying. It wasn't really what she wanted right now, she mostly wanted to be alone, but it was close enough to the truth.

"Come on," Ollie spoke. "Cheer up, I think having that class would have suuucked."

"Ollie," from Shrike.

"Nah, kid's right. Being stuck in a dusty old room reading dusty old scrolls all day and never talking to nobody. I'd have constant dust-fever. I'd keep sneezing all the words off the pages!"

"Would it allow you to speak the language of love?" Eim mused, and there was a long silence from the group, followed by an "ouch!" from Eim, presumably as Shrike whacked him with the cane. His presence moved away from her, and she kept her face pressed into her knees for another moment, before finally uncurling herself.

"I want to talk to the ink-worm."

Ahead of her Shrike was being held up with one shoulder by Ollie, and he was attempting to beat Eim with his cane. Yaris was watching, arms crossed but saying nothing, but Jump-touch thought her face looked amused.

I like these people.

For humans anyway. They were fun and she was so, so glad she'd found friends in the city, but she did wish she could be alone sometimes, when the noise of them became overwhelming.

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"Maybe we can try it," Ollie offered, lowering a laughing Shrike back to the ground. "It can't follow us into the jungle, right? The plants would chop it to pieces."

"The ink dissolves away the copper," Shrike was still brandishing his cane at Eim, who had run away down the narrow path, laughing. "So it'll have no trouble running through the jungle. But if we set up a get-away, maybe we could slow it enough."

He sighed. "Don't take this an endorsement. I think it's going to eat you."

Yaris nodded, arms still crossed as Eim returned.

"We could ask it to clear a path for us to where we need to go? If I can talk to it?" She was hopeful, but the others seemed sceptical.

"This is a terrible idea," Yaris said, "you're going to get killed. The guild is going to fine us, and, worse than that, you're going to get killed."

"I'm small and good at running, if it doesn't want to talk, then I can hide!"

She grunted, her stance not changing as she sat on the ground, back straight and arms across her chest. Her green eyes were boring into Jump-touch, and her brown hair was untied today, falling around her shoulders.

"If we could kill it," Eim said slowly, "then it's bound to leave behind something good. Something really good. It's a true monster, so the body won't stick around, but the First always drop something."

The others looked at him. But I don't want to kill it, I want to talk to it!

"We, hmm," Yaris glanced around at the copper-consumed vegetation. "Maybe."

****

It was a full day later by the time the trap was set and done. The group had even stopped to sleep and eat in the middle of it, and it was now somewhere around mid-day, as Jump-touch and Yaris set out.

Shrike had promised to bring a clock next time, which was something humans used to tell time. She wasn't sure how it would work without the sun overhead, but he had promised to show her.

It'll come back, she told herself, as the two of them made their way back to the clearing, it's made of magic, it can't really die.

She had gotten somewhat upset last time, and the others had had to console her with the promises that the worm was a monster, and therefore couldn't truly die.

But what if it could? What if the snake that came back every time wasn't the same snake that died? Each time reborn anew. Humans never spoke to it, how would they know? What if it remembered dying each time, and that was why 'dungeon monsters' were crazy things? A thousand years of deaths, that would be enough to drive anyone to the Peak.

"Okay, remember, when this doesn't work-" Yaris briefed her, again, "- then you have to run. Straight to us, alright? We've marked the path so it's easy for you to follow, and we'll all be waiting for you over here.

Jump-touch nodded, her stomach twisting around her breakfast. I can do this.

The pessimism of the others was starting to get to her, and it was becoming harder and harder to convince herself that this would work. But it would work, she was sure of it.

Somewhat.

She had spent the morning practising her Other, although she was a bit unsure if anyone outside of her village actually spoke it. Traders did sometimes, but they were traders, so they didn't count. They knew all sorts of languages, and Other was quite a simple one to learn.

"Okay," she said to herself, bouncing up and down a little, ready to run if needed. "I'll just say hi, what can go wrong."

"You're sure?"

"I'm sure."

"Alright then." Yaris patted her on the shoulder, and then backed up along the path. "Shout, so we know you're coming, alright?"

With that, Yaris turned and headed back to the others.

****

The Ink-worm was still in the clearing, curled up like nothing more than a big pile of dirty rope. Beside it, a pool of bubbling greenery was growing, opportunistic vines twisting through the bristles of its tail.

There was no copper on the floor here at all now, only bright, vibrant green. Grass was growing almost up to her knees, and the contrast stopped her short for a moment. It hadn't looked like this last night.

She had gotten so used to the dead orange of the dungeon, that to see somewhere alive within it was a shock. Even the orchard was dead, compared to this small clearing.

Hidden in the bushes, she took a deep breath. This was it, depending on how well she did here, the Ink-worm would either die, or it would make a new friend.

You've got this, Jump-touch. Just say hello.

Licking her lips again, she started with a low whistle over her teeth. It was the sort of greeting you might use on a sleeping friend, shrill enough to cut through sleep, but not loud or high enough to shock. A warning noise, a greeting.

The Ink-worm opened one lazy eye, staring around the clearing with vague interest, but not raising its head.

"I'm just a bird," she whistled, from where she was hiding in the bushes, getting a bit more complicated with it now. "Only a little bird, coming to say hello."

It wasn't what she'd intended to say, on the walk here, but plans change and you can't mourn them forever.

The Ink-worm tilted its head, first from one side, then to the other, a slow, sinuous movement, as it uncurled itself from its sleeping position. Raising itself up to get a better look around.

No, Jump-touch, you're a negotiator. You talk to people! You can do this!

It hadn't responded like she would have expected of a kobold, but it was still possible that it understood her, but that it couldn't speak Given Tongue.

She tried to read its movements. It didn't look aggressive or angry right now. Sleepy yes, curious, yes, but not blood-thirsty.

As she watched the movement, whistling another bird-greeting, something in the back of her brain was moving, like a muscle she hadn't used in a long time. A leg gone to sleep.

She could try Other, or Screech, but what if the switch upset it? She stuck to Given Tongue.

"Can you show me your tail, Big Snake?" she said carefully, making sure to enunciate. She didn't think it was a snake, but you had to be polite, and she was limited without eye contact and body language.

In the clearing, the Ink-worm wavered, eyes losing the veneer of sleep, now bright and alert, staring around the clearing. The movements becoming faster and more jerky.

She might have to move to a different spot in a moment, but it didn't seem very good at pinpointing her through sound. Any kobold would have been on her by now.

As she watched the movements, she examined it. Its body was a pale white, like a bone left to bleach in the winter sun for many, many years. Its eyes were gold, flecked with spots like the Opal Stone still sitting in her Heart. It wasn't much taller than Yaris when sitting like this, its tail coiled into a seat, but it would be more than twice as long if it stretched out.

The little hat on its head was a crest, she could see it now. A red spike, like a rooster might have, but sharp and angled backwards like a scythe. Wide at the front and narrowing the further back it went. It was the only piece of red on its whole body.

Speaking of the body, the wrap around it appeared to be made of crumbling paper, and every now and again a piece would break off, breaking down into glittering ash before it hit the floor.

Jump-touch found herself staring at it, forgetting to speak. Somebody had made this, she was sure now. They had made it out of magic.

They had summoned it, and then abandoned it here alone.

It was sad, that was sad. That was the saddest thing!

As it turned, trying to work out where she was, she saw there was a single, opalescent jewel studded into the centre of its forehead. It seemed to pulse with magic, and it was a moment before she could draw her eyes away.

Greed, whispered something in her ear, and she agreed with it. Don't get drawn in by gems, they will be your downfall.

The Ink-worm reared back on its coils as she watched, and then, very slowly, lifted its tail into the air.