The sun meandered away from its peak and the midday shadows slowly stretched into the afternoon. Iris looked over the vast fields of corn and wheat as she limped down the final stretch of the mountain path. She had given her teleport power a rest since the pocket watch incident, letting the intensity of what happened slowly settle in her mind. She dwelled on what-ifs and could-haves, but deftly dodged thoughts about whether or not she had almost died today. It was her first day questing, her first day as a real adventurer, and she refused to entertain the idea that she had almost died over a pocket watch.

Her eyes turned towards a cottage in the distance. There were several cottages, homes and barns scattered throughout the valley farmland, but only one of them had an elaborate, haphazardly constructed wooden tower jutting up over the fields. A multitude of chimneys each billowed different colors of smoke, and several broken down carts and carriages littered the yard around it. Iris stood up straight, trying not to wince from the pain that splintered and pulsed through most of her body.

As the trail's descent finally met the valley floor, it continued straight along the side of the mountain. A field of tall wheat grew to her left and obscured her view as it boxed in the narrow path against the sheer cliff face to her right. She teleported a few times to cover distance, and soon the field of wheat gave way to a field of corn and she veered off the trail between the rows of stalks.

Annoyingly, the angles of the rows seemed to change direction wildly and unpredictably, rather than being planted in straight rows along the entire length of the field like most farmers did in the valley. Her teleport power was of little use here, as she couldn't see more than a few feet through the corn in any direction. She kept herself oriented with the glimpses of chimney smoke she could catch in the sky.

After several rapid changes in the rows of corn, Iris looked up and realized she could no longer see the smoke. She saw the wind rustling the tops of the corn stalks and cursed it. An idea occurred to her, followed by a pang of anxiety and a flashing memory of the pocket watch incident, but she ignored those and focused on the idea. Her neck craned up towards the sky, she disappeared from the corn field and appeared twelve feet in the air above. Her limbs flailed awkwardly as she screamed and yelled an involuntary "oh shit!" that got lost in the fields of corn.

She whipped her head around until she caught a glimpse of the cottage, then looked down and teleported back to the ground before she began falling too fast. She landed with a thud and stumbled forward, but kept her balance. She kept trudging forward in the direction of the cottage, cutting a straight line through the mismatched angles of the corn rows. She repeated this process two more times before finally escaping the corn. She took a deep breath as she passed through the last wall of corn, pushing through them like breaking out of a cage. Her head hit something metal and her vision went black.

Iris groaned as she awoke, feeling grass in her fingers and the sun beating down on her. Her eyes cracked open to see an aging man wearing colorful, mismatched clothes and a tattered long coat with multiple square patches of similarly mismatched colors. On his head was a raggedy grey hat with a wide brim and a misshapen cone that tapered to a floppy tip, also with a few colorful patches and some messy stitching. He was standing over her with a short-handled shovel in one hand.

"You cheated," the man accused.

"What?" Iris tried to respond, but it came out more like groaning mumble.

The man pointed his shovel at the cornfield, "you're supposed to follow the lines. The misdirection doesn't work if you don't follow the lines."

Iris craned her neck from where she lay to look back at the cornfield, then back at the man, "that's on purpose?" she croaked.

"Of course it's on purpose! Did you think I planted them all willy-nilly for nothing?"

Iris chose not to answer, instead propping herself up on her elbows -- which hurt tremendously, "look, I've had a long day."

"I can tell, you look like shit!" the man exclaimed, "and what was with that jumping? You got frog legs or something?" he reached down and poked Iris's leg with the tip of his shovel, "nah, look like human legs to me. Shame."

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"I'm an adventurer," she groaned, rolling her shoulder.

The man erupted into cackling laughter, stumbling back and grasping his chest.

"Hey!" Iris shouted, standing to her feet in anger quicker than she probably should have, "it's true! I have powers!"

The man contained his laughter enough to speak, but erupted again before he did.

"Do you want help with your scarecrows or not?" Iris demanded.

The man sharply pulled himself together and spoke in a deadly serious tone, "what do you know about the scarecrows?"

"Just what it says on the note," she replied, suddenly weary of his demeanor.

"Ah," the man said before a long pause, "girl, I've seen chickens more adventurer than you, but I suppose you'll do. Come along."

Before Iris could express her anger, the man turned and briskly walked towards the cottage, leaving her to limp after him.

"I'll introduce you to Gertrude first, she'll be delighted to meet someone else with powers."

That caught Iris' attention. She had never, in her entire life, known anyone else in the valley to have powers. She had also never heard of anyone named Gertrude.

"Wait," Iris barely croaked out as she limped after him as fast as she could, but the man didn't slow.

Eventually she caught up to him around the back of the cottage, where a fence enclosed a small yard surrounding a chicken coup. As she reached the fence, he proudly pointed to a spot near the center of the yard with his shovel, "adventurer, meet Gertrude. Gertrude, this one's here for the scarecrows, don't eat her."

Iris looked where the man was pointing and saw nothing. Seeing the look on her face, the man looked where he was pointing as well, then frowned.

He slammed his shovel on the fence post, making a rather pitiful banging sound as the wood dulled the impact of the metal, "dammit Gertrude! We have a guest!"

A strangely human sounding "bawk" came from the empty spot where the farmer had pointed. Iris could have sworn it sounded apologetic. Then, a hen appeared. She was larger than any hen Iris had ever seen, easily the size of a large dog, with striking red-brown feathers and a blackened beak and eyes. She cocked her head at Iris, then looked back at the farmer and squawked in a way that sounded demanding.

"Was really looking forward to eatin' this one," the farmer said with resignation, "then she went and got tangled up in one of them reality quilt strings and got herself all fancy. Can't kill and eat a fancy chicken, you know?"

"Threads," Iris absent-mindedly corrected him as she stared at Gertrude, "they're called Threads, of the Fabric of Reality."

The farmer arched an eyebrow at her, "you been to college, girl?"

"It's Iris, and no. I, uh," she hesitated, "I read a lot of these adventure magazines--"

The farmer erupted into laughter again, "so that's where you got this idea in your head! Alright, well, let's see what you got, adventurer."

The man turned and started walking away, leaving Iris still staring at the chicken, confused. Just as Iris was about to figure out what questions she even needed to ask, the farmer called back over his shoulder.

"Fair warning," he shouted, "she ain't ate yet today and she usually does the opposite of what I tell her."

The chicken growled, and then disappeared. Iris's eyes went wide, struggling to process the absurdity of a growling chicken, let alone an invisible one. She took a few steps back, then turned and quickly teleported to catch up to the farmer. She tripped slightly in the hurry as she reappeared, but kept her balance.

"Oh!" The farmer exclaimed as she appeared beside him, "there you are, frog legs."

"I don't have frog legs--" she started.

"Doesn't matter, don't care. You see that bad boy right there?" The farmer pointed his shovel at a scarecrow posted in the middle of the yard, "he keeps moving."

"What?" Iris asked.

"I said, he keeps moving," the man sounded annoyed, "every day I move him back to the field, and every day he's right back here in the yard."

Iris glanced around and noticed patches of dirt where small holes had been recently dug throughout the yard. The scarecrow looked firmly planted in the ground with healthy grass surrounding the post.

"You know what," Iris said, "I think I need to see the herbalist. My head isn't right today."

The man stuck out a hand in front of her, not bothering to look over at her. He was offering her a flask, which she stared at blankly.

"It's a potion, kid," he said, giving her an annoyed look, "you'll need it for what comes next."

"No, really," Iris said, backing away, "I-I think I'm gonna sit this one out. I'm not sure I'm thinking properly right now."

"Well, you're certainly not thinking like an adventurer," the man said, taking back his flask, popping the cork with his thumb and taking a swig, "do me a favor and put the note back on the board for me. Maybe a real adventurer will come along to help."

"I just got my powers yesterday!" Iris exclaimed, stammering into an angry rant, "I almost fell to my death today for a pocket watch! My whole body's sore. You're offering me a strange flask and talking about moving scarecrows! A-and the chicken! What the fuck? You hit me with a shovel like five minutes ago!"

"Twenty."

"What?" her outrage was interrupted by confusion.

"You were out for a while, I started to worry."

"I'm leaving," Iris turned and stomped off towards the main road. As she left, she heard the farmer mumbling to himself, and possibly to the scarecrow.