As the sweat built upon his brow in the jungle heat, Tarn had to admit there was something pure and satisfying about hammering a nail into wood. It was not a surprise he had done little carpentry work in his life, going from the orphanage seemingly straight into a life of adventure and danger. But now he looked at the activity and found himself enjoying it.

Enjoying it, and wondering what else he had missed. Was there more to life than battles and discovery? Diving into tombs and dungeons, going up against mages and monsters, with his next day never guaranteed?

He had never imagined that he could want more than he had. Yet there was something here in this simple house he was building amongst the orc ruins of Ak Thanon, a voice inside the activity that spoke to him. One wooden board going on after another, each just simple planks on their own, eventually forming themselves into a shelter that could house and protect against the coming winter.

Wiping his forehead, he took a step back and admired his work, pushing his tools into his belt.

Standing beside him, Lash loudly crunched an orcish turnip as he surveyed the small dwelling Tarn had spent the past two days constructing. Next to the gremlin, Isca was focusing her goggles on the house as if looking for structural flaws. Urthin was organizing the tools on the nearby workbench in neat and tidy rows, while Bog tended a cooking fire and a pot of turnip stew.

The Progenitors had done tremendous damage in the short time they had been within Ak-Thanon, leaving hundreds of orcs without shelter for the coming cold season. Yet even past the chill of the coming air, there was a darker wind that blew through him as he considered the plight of the orcs.

In many ways Tarn and Bog had taken more from their hosts than the invading Progenitors had, but despite losing their cultural memories the orcs had kept all of their building skills. The majority of repairs and construction were being done by the orcs themselves, but Tarn needed do his part.

Building homes wouldn’t be enough to fill the hole that had grown inside him since he and Bog had made their choice, he was sure of that. But it was something. Maybe it kept the doubt from growing, or maybe he was just avoiding the problem. Either way, until the Axe Dungeon was reopened he didn’t have much else to work on. And the work of building did *feel* good. It was tactical, it was real. A tool in his hand and a simple problem to solve.

“Nice house, Boss,” Lash said through munches of his vegetable.

“Thank you, Lash!” Tarn said proudly. This was his third construction and he had to admit, for someone with no experience in carpentry or home design, he was getting better.

“Needs roof, though,” the gremlin added. “No roof yet. Rain come in.”

“I know it needs a roof.” Tarn scowled down at his tiny friend with a sigh. “Obviously. Obviously, it needs roof. I’m going to work on that next and—”

“It seems to be leaning a bit to the left as well,” Isca added, angling her body in a similar fashion to the structure’s pronounced tilt. “More than a bit actually.”

Grunting, Tarn turned to the smiling group.

“Any more comments from the construction experts?”

“Your nail placement is uneven.” Urthin did not look up from his task, but continued to reorder the tools in what he considered the optimal organization. “There are three crossbeams on the rear section that are unlikely to take the load of your planned roof, should be it be constructed.”

Tarn grit his teeth, somehow smiling and grimacing at the same time. Laughing loud enough that her voice echoed throughout the jungle, Bog paused stiriing her cooking pot and called over.

“Don’t listen to them Tarny! It’s a beautiful house!”

He met her smile and his friends teasing with a chuckle. It wasn’t a beautiful house, but it was something.

Something. That word had been bouncing endlessly through Tarn’s mind in the three months since the door to the Axe Dungeon had slammed shut, slicing the Progenitor General in two and sealing the orcs away in protection.

All of his time had been spent in search for a magical something. Something to do that felt useful, something to pass the time, something to get him from one sunrise to the next. Each day bringing him one day closer to the Axe opening once again. Back to where decisions made sense, and he felt useful.

That wait was supposed to end tonight, with the rise of the full moon over the dense jungles of Ak-Thanon.

“You sure this is going to work?” He asked Lash as he looked off to the east, where the rising tower of the Axe stood hundreds of feet above the ceiling of vegetation. “Opening the door to the Axe I mean.”

“Not sure about anything.” Lash laughed his casual giggle, as if everything they had planned didn’t depend on what happened in a few hours. “But sure as Lash can be. Orc magic man agrees. Three full moons needed to power the key, third one is tonight.”

“I know.” Tarn said with a weary sigh, slotting his hammer back at his belt. “I don’t doubt you, Lash. It’s just been… a long wait.”

“Yes.” Isca’s voice cracked almost imperceptible. “A long wait indeed.”

He looked over at her, seeing in her eyes a mixture of hope and worry. Over the past three months Tarn had watched her journey through various emotions as she waited to regain a route to her people. Since leaving the Sword months ago with Tarn and his team, she had no real way of knowing what state her world would be in.

She and Tarn had spent many damp nights under the stars of the jungle, discussing each and every possibility her mind conjured up. Tarn reassured, he listened, he held her as her heart swung wildly between fears and doubts. In the end, Isca had seemed to settle on a belief that her people were still there, back on Kitharia, still fighting against the Progenitors.

And yet as the fateful day grew closer, her darkness was beginning to emerge again. Hiding underneath that forced optimism Tarn detected a fear that he could sense like an undertow. Despite all of his gentle attempts, she wouldn’t speak of it except to say she had ‘a lot on her mind’.

It was understandable, and ultimately he had let the matter drop. She would tell him when she was ready, forcing her to talk wasn’t going to solve anything.

“Yes!” Bog said, banging one fist into her other hand. “Not much time now. Finally.”

The big orc looked over her shoulder to where the other orcs had constructed more than a dozen makeshift shelters as well as a schoolhouse, replacing a portion of whatever village might have been standing there before the invasion.

It was all built to be lived in for the winter, then moved out in the spring. When the ants returned and drove the orcs towards the sea, as they did every year. The Progenitors might be gone, but many of the orc’s old problems still remained. Now even more difficult without the cultural memory of how to deal with them.

“You’re wondering about my decision, Tarny? Everyone?” The question was on all their minds, even if Bog was the one asking it. Fresh out of prison, he and Bog might have had this conversation in private. Now standing among her friends, it seemed to Bog this was still private.

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They hadn’t talked about it much, but as the days grew shorter and the air colder, they all knew the moment was coming. They would return into the Axe and try to complete what they had started, bring an end to the Progenitors’ ability to threaten their world or any other, as well as return Isca to her home.

“We figured you’d tell us when you were ready Bog,” Tarn said, his chest feeling a bit tight. He hadn’t allowed himself to think much about this, it was too far out of his control and too hard to keep his own feelings out of things. To stay or go had to be Bog’s decision alone.

Urthin and Lash had been adamant that their job was not done, and had never wavered in their desire to go into the Axe and back to Isca’s world. But they were not in the same position as Bog. She was faced with leaving a people she both belonged to but never really knew, and one she had helped Tarn damage. That damage may have been done in the name of a greater good, but he knew it still weighed heavy on her heart. Just as it did his.

“The orcs are doing well,” Urthin said, pointing over at the growing village. Anyone else might be offering moral support, but Tarn knew better. For Urthin, this was just stating the factual. “Considering all that has happened. Their spirits seem to be high as they prepare for the coming winter season.”

“Thanks to the elders,” Bog nodded. “It was a gift that Narsol saved them, and that Steward Ramad brought them here. They know enough to give these people back some of … what I took from them.”

“What we took from them, Bog.” Tarn reached out, giving her shoulder a squeeze. “It was a choice, and we both said we’d make it again if we had to.”

It had been a moment lasting only a few seconds, a window of time for their decision that was between one heartbeat and the next. In that tower, with the Progenitor’s forces closing on their position and shelling striking the land around them, it had seemed the only option.

They could free the orcs by erasing their cultural memories, or they could let them die. Either allow them to stay unwilling slaves of the Progenitors, or killed by the psychic backlash of their mental control being suddenly broken.

There hadn’t seemed to be another option. Yet the one they had been left with still weighed them both down, ate at them like insects.

Had there been another choice? Would a hero have found another option? Tarn had been called that back in the Realm following his defeat of Lurim. He hadn’t felt like a hero then and he sure as hell didn’t feel like one now.

“Bog can’t stay here,” Lash said plainly, as if the matter had no debate. “Team needs to do this, finish this. And team is not team without Bog.”

The gremlin was right, at least on paper. No matter what his feelings about Bog’s emotional needs, from a tactical state the loss of her in combat would be devastating. He didn’t want to think about navigating the Axe and beyond without her muscle and fury, but if they had to – they would.

“It’s not that simple, Lash.” Tarn shook his head. He understood the feeling of responsibility she felt, remembering Ramad’s pleas for him to stay and help in the Realm. He wouldn’t put her in that position. “Bog has to do what she feels is best, and she still has time to think.”

“No.” Bog stood and faced them. Her face was filled with emotions, but the conflict that had been in her eyes for weeks was gone. It had been replaced with a stubborn resolve Tarn knew would be unbreakable.

“I don’t need to think about it any longer, Tarny. I’ve had three months to do just that, to do… too much thinking, really. I guess I just needed to wait until today to say it out loud.”

Tarn felt his chest grow tight. This was it, she was staying here. It made sense, he understood what her reasons would be. He knew how he felt was selfish. This wasn’t about him, or even what the team needed. She was his friend, and he needed to show her that.

“Bog.” He smiled at her, remembering back when they first met and he had nearly gotten them both killed. “I understand. We all do. We support you-“

“-I’m going with you.”

Normally the sound of Urthin’s gasp would have gotten his full attention, but Tarn was too busy being shocked himself.

“You – you are?”

“Yeah.” She grinned back at him, while Lash scrambled up her in a blur, throwing his small arms around her neck and giving the orc a tight hug. “Thank you, Lash. I know … I feel the same way. I couldn’t leave you all. I couldn’t leave this job undone.”

Still laughing, she gently lowered the gremlin back to the ground.

“If I stayed, it would have been for me,” she continued. “For my guilt, my pain. I cannot hide that pain from our enemies, Tarny. They have to see it – they have earned it!”

“I – I am glad that you are coming, Bog.” Isca voice shook as she spoke. “I would be afraid to do this without you. But as someone who left her home behind, are you sure this is what you want?”

“We’re taking you back home, wings.” Bog stepped forward, slapping the smaller Isca on the shoulder and sending her wobbling forward a few steps. “What I’ve done – what we’ve done, Tarn – I can’t change it. I could stay here, but I’d just another hand swinging a hammer. In the dungeon, I can swing an axe. I can make sure the sacrifice the orcs made… *my* people’s pain… that it wasn’t for nothing!”

“Sound reasoning.” Urthin nodded. “It will be tactically advantageous to have you with us.”

“You see?” Bog roared with laughter at this. “Smiley’s practically gushing, the big softy. Now I know I’m making the right decision!”

Tarn felt the relief wash over him, as he went over and gave the big orc a hug. Her arms embraced him, and he could feel the strength of their connection as she released him. Bonded by more than friendship now, they were joined by a decision neither of them had found a way to fully accept.

But they were still together, and she would still be standing beside him when all of this came to whatever ending they were racing toward. They all would. Knowing that made all of the somethings he had been searching for easier.

They were his last connections to the Realm. Aryo and Jental had joined Ramad on the last ship headed across the sea, both eager to support the new Steward in his bid to reshape their home in a better direction than the one Lurim had steered it in. He could still feel the warmth of the kid’s smile and see the renewed strength in Jental’s eyes. They had been changed by their time with the team, and it was for the better.

Lash was right. Without Bog, that team would have felt diminished and changed. It was a weight off his mind to know she would be swinging her axe, cooking her terrible food, and singing her off-key songs. The boastful orc was a constant in his life, one that had seen little other stability.

Yet even in that moment of relief, there were other concerns. Both Urthin and Isca had been dark and conflicted as their final night in Ak-Thanon had drawn closer, each seeming more tightly wound by the day. Ironically, only Lash seemed relaxed about their journey, and he was the one Tarn thought should be the most concerned about facing the Progenitors again.

If the little gremlin should be going at all.

“We’ve got a lot happening tonight.” Isca said, stretching her arms and giving her wings a quick vibration. “I think… I should go get some extra sleep.”

She was lying, and to Tarn it wasn’t even that subtle. He could only imagine the thousands of fears he could see building up behind her eyes.

“I want you to know….” She looked back at the assembled group. “Whatever happens, the fact that you all are willing to try and get me home… I appreciate the weight of that commitment.”

Tarn stepped closer, trying to hold her doubts in his eyes. Read her intentions.

“I made a promise to you, Isca. We all did. You’ve risked your life for us and our homes. It’s time for us to do that for you. We’re your team, after all.”

The words were intended to be reassuring, but they didn’t seem to affect her that way.

“But what if…” She looked down at her feet, a sigh caught in her chest. “I mean – there might not be anything to-“

“Hey.” He gave her a loving wink. “No ‘what if’s’, remember? We’re going to get there together, and we’ll deal with whatever we find there the same way. Together.”

He watched the sea change taking place in her expression. Optimism was a choice, and it was one she had to remake every day. In a moment the doubts in her eyes ran to the shadows again, replaced by stern determination.

“You’re right.” She nodded. “He’s there – my father. I know it, he’s stubborn as a gale. And My people would never lie down to these monsters. When we get there – we will push these things out, just as we did here.”

It won’t be as easy, the pragmatic part of his mind told him. They had indeed managed to force the Progenitors out of Ak-Thanon, but time had been their ally. Fighting the orcs and a hostile environment, the invaders barely had a few months to make a foothold.

Kitharia had been occupied for more than a year. Furthermore, the Progenitors had been hampered here by Ak-Thanon’s toxic environment. There was no indication that any such hazard had slowed them on Isca’s world.

But it was try or die. Tarn could see no value in returning to the Realm and simply waiting for the Progenitors to come back.

“Go get the rest you need,” he said, giving her a nod and a smile. “There’s not likely to be better beds in the dungeon.”

As he watched her head off toward their small camp. Tarn’s eyes fell upon Lash, now scampering towards the jungle path, headed for the Axe dungeon and his researched ritual. The Progenitors would never stop coming, they would try one route after another until they succeeded. They seemed driven to their goal with something beyond a need for conquest or power. It seemed primal.

The mystery hung over Tarn’s thoughts. The group began to scatter wandering off to whatever tasks they chose to fill the last few hours with. Tarn picked up a fresh board and began to swing his hammer again, but the joining of wood to wood no longer felt satisfying.

Each pound of his tool was another question he had no answer for, another something that was undefined. Could they save Isca’s people, and what would she feel when she got there? What darkness was hiding in Urthin, and would Bog regret her decision.

Looming over it all was the giant mystery of a two-foot-tall gremlin, even now chasing birds in the jungle without a shred of fear or doubt in his heart.

This was all about Lash, and Tarn still had no idea why.