The river – or rather, Duu’s improving waterbending – carried Yaosen and his companions to a place where the ground grew steeper, the different branches of the river more fragmented, and the flow of water far more turbulent as it tumbled down the incline.

The salmonsturgeon seemed to have no problem leaping the rapids and small waterfalls, but the canoe, with all its heavy passengers, had no chance to ascend them.

They had made the decision to disembark and portage the canoe while they tried to find a trail up beyond the rapids, where they could resume their journey by boat.

Yaosen tried to find a dignified posture to rest, after setting the canoe down in the tight boulder-strewn clearing but he ended up slumping against a moss covered rock as soon as they had wedged the canoe into place.

“How far did we make it?” Yaosen asked.

Torun, also knuckling a knot in his back, said, “Probably about halfway. That backtrack cost us.”

“I’m sorry, ok?” Duu cut in, “I said I’ve never traveled this section of waterwiggle before.”

“I wasn’t blaming you, Duu, just stating facts.”

“As long as we stay ahead of any Earthbreaker scouts,” said Yaosen.

“Earthbreaker scouts would probably have no trouble with this,” said Torun, gesturing to rocky terrain and the stunted pines that nonetheless clung to every surface, walling them in at every step, “Probably topple all the trees and turn it into a nice steady staircase…”

Duu shot Torun a pout.

“...not that I’d condone something like that,” finished Torun hurriedly.

Yaosen and Torun had carried the canoe on their heads up the steep, uncertain footing all morning. Duu was too small to bear the weight, and she had earned the rest besides, being their most effective paddler.

On flat ground maybe Grunt could have taken a turn while one of the adults rested, but in the tight, sloping tracks beside the rapids, it was all the three-legged wolfboar could do to keep his balance.

Yoasen had caught Torun casting pained, guilt-ridden looks at the struggling wolfboar when the Meteor Knight thought no one was looking, as he was doing now.

“It couldn’t have gone any other way,” said Yaosen.

“Hm?” Torun looked up at the monk, as if just noticing him there.

Yaosen gestured to Grunt, as the wolfboar collapsed in an exhausted heap in their tiny, temporary camp. “His pack would have killed and eaten us, if we didn’t kill them first. In the wild, barbaric code of the wolfboar, he was honorbound to fight, and you found the only way for us all to make it out alive.”

Torun sighed and once again that meteorite mask slipped for but a moment, “Oh I don’t know. I keep thinking maybe there was another move, another way to win the fight and stop the wolfboar pack without hurting him.”

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“You took the only move available to us. Besides, he’s adapted well. You wouldn’t even know he was injured back in our old settlement. It's just this terrain that’s giving him a hard time. You’ll see. He’ll be back to his old self when we get to the people in the north.

“Hmph.” Torun was unconvinced, but if he were intent on punishing himself, there was nothing Yaosen could say to dissuade him. The Light Temple monk just hoped he had said enough for the knight to start forgiving himself for injuring Grunt. Back then, the wolfboar had been their enemy, a wild animal intent on killing them. Yaosen himself would likely have fought to save his own life without a thought for his enemy until after the fight was over. It had been a testament to Torun’s own code that he had put himself in so much additional danger to save his foe’s life.

“Here,” Duu handed a small folded-up leaf to Yaosen and then one to Torun.

Yaosen unfolded it to reveal a white powder inside, “What’s this?”

“For aches and pains,” said Duu, “Fever too if you have one. But it should make some of the soreness go away.”

“Is this what you gave us when we were healing in your hollow?” asked Torun, always interested in the non-bending arts, like herbal healing.

“No, grandfather said you can’t take knuckleroot when you’re bleeding.”

Torun nodded, and tipped the leaf packet into his mouth, swallowing the powder in one gulp.

Yaosen attempted the same but gagged, doing his best not to cough up the dry, bitter powder in the attempt to swallow it down.

He looked over to Torun, whose face might as well have been forged from meteorite ore. He could tell Torun was struggling to master himself because he didn’t move a single muscle for a time.

Yaosen then looked to Duu, who looked horrified, “You’re supposed to mix it in water!”

Yaosen took a long pull from his waterskin and that did indeed make it go down much easier.

He passed it to Torun, but the Meteor Knight wouldn’t even move to take it. Finally, with a herculean gulp, Torun returned to normal and continued with his camp tasks, “Not bad, Duu. Not bad.”

Even Grunt looked at Torun with skepticism.

Then Grunt lifted his head, testing the air with his snout and stiffening.

The tangle of forest bent and parted, and the massive one-horned bearmoose lumbered into their camp.

Yaosen’s heart pounded with sudden fear. The beast was like a wall of scarred fur and muscle, towering over even Grunt. It had taken all Yaosen’s firebending prowess to dodge the bearmoose in the remnants of their last settlement. Now, in these close quarters, if the bearmoose attacked they would have no chance of survival. It would rip through all four of them in a single heartbeat.

Something instinctual had every one of them frozen in fear. Yaosen looked to the knight out of the corner of his eye, and the barest of head-shakes told the monk that Torun was thinking the same thing.

Their only chance at making it out of this was to let the bear take what it wanted and hopefully move on. The only problem was, the bear didn’t take anything. It simply wedged itself into the clearing with the rest of them, back half still lost in the thick pine-fronds, and slumped to the ground.

In moments, its head rested on its forepaws, snoring.

It felt like an eternity before anyone moved, so terrified were they all of disturbing the bearmoose.

Eventually, Torun gestured for Duu to slip away. She did so, without a sound, and for the first time Yaosen realized how effortlessly the little treebender moved through the rough, wooded terrain. Yaosen watched as she left. He almost immediately lost sight of her, by virtue of her mossy attire.

There was a silent argument, but Yaosen eventually convinced Torun to take Grunt and lead him off.

Yoasen was left alone to watch the sleeping bearmoose. If it should wake now, while the rest of the group tried to escape, he would do his best to distract and delay it. He suspected he would not last very long.

After Yaosen could no longer hear the old knight and his hobbling wolfboar moving through the trees, Yaosen crept toward the canoe and began dragging it up the hill by himself. It was foolish to risk his own life to retain the canoe, but the choice was to risk the bearmoose now, or risk the Earthbreakers catching up with them later.

Yaosen figured even a bearmoose was better than Lu Gun.