“Do you sleep with that thing?” asked the blond guest irritably. He scrubbed at his face with one hand, clearing the corners of his eyes of gritty sand.

He was fully dressed now, in a fresh white linen shirt, brown homespun trousers, and a green cap adorned with an absurdly long pheasant tail feather. His brown leather boots were dusty, but unscuffed.

He was taller than she’d expected, but gangly, all elbows and knees and chin. His hair fairly glowed when it caught the sun.

“Oh. It’s you.” Cara stepped out of guard, allowing the hem of her chemise to relax around her legs and give her a semblance of modesty. “What do you want, Pasty Ass? This is my room, if you didn’t know. Breakfast will be downstairs.”

The blond guest’s face twisted into a scowl. “I know very well where breakfast is, thank you, my lady Obvious! I’m here to talk to you.”

Cara’s eyes narrowed. She spun on her heel and reached for her sword’s sheath, thrown haphazardly on her cot. “Talk, then.”

“It’s rude to turn your back on someone when they’re trying to have a conversation with you.”

She slid the blade home, praying she’d keep it there instead of lopping the interloper’s head off.

Cara faced the guest once more and crossed her arms over her chest. “And I’ve not yet broken my fast, so I apologize if I’ve been rude, m’lord Manners, so would you please get on with it?”

The guest opened his mouth to say something before thinking better of it—a gesture Cara approved of. Maybe he would just go away and leave her in peace so they could both forget about the weird happenings of the night before.

He sunk down to one knee and bent his head in a penitent gesture, one hand on his chest.

Then again, maybe not.

“Please, fair maiden, accept my sincerest thanks for your actions last night,” he began, “for I would have perished at the blade of a brigand were it not for your valiant attempts to safeguard my soul. Truly, your arm was blessed by the gods, above and below, and I am grateful to have been witness and beneficiary of your deeds.”

He coupled his flowery speech with wild gestures, all with his head still bowed. Cara stared at the top of his hat, the feather bobbing in the breeze from the open window, and wondered if he had rehearsed this before entering her rooms.

He peeped up from his stance and frowned when he saw Cara’s stoic reaction. He resumed his abject posture and continued with his litany, though slightly faster than before.

“And so, I find myself in the most humbling position to beg a boon of you once more, as I cannot continue my journey without having your sure right hand at my side.”

He stopped talking and placed his hand back over his heart, as if to demonstrate the sincerity of his request. Cara blinked and said the first thing that came to mind.

“Did you write that all out before you came up here? Because you delivered that better than any bard I’ve ever seen.”

The guest’s head popped up, earlier irritation seemingly forgotten as he basked in the warmth of her praise. “Really? Really and for true? Because I—wait a moment.” He eyed her suspiciously. “You didn’t answer my request.”

“You made one?”

“I did! You’re not going to make me say it all again, will you?” He took a deep breath. “‘Please, fair maiden—’”

“No! No, don’t say it all again, for the love of all those gods you mentioned. Get up, you’re wrinkling your nice trousers.” Cara grabbed him by an arm and hauled him to his feet. He squeaked.

“Now, what did you want? And please, be quick about it. I was serious about needing food.”

“Fine, have it your way.” The guest tugged his arm out of Cara’s grasp and cleared his throat. “Miss Maid Whose Name I Don’t Know, would you please serve as my protector on the way to the capital?”

Her mouth fell open as her heart leaped and her stomach dropped.

“What?”

“Oh, come on! Those were perfectly plain words, drat it. Last night’s…” The guest searched for a word. “…altercation made it very clear to me that I’m in need of a bodyguard. And, well, since you know about what I’m about and you came charging into my room to save the day, it seems I’m meant to ask you.”

He smiled suddenly, white teeth nearly as sparkling as his hair. “You have to admit, it’s fate that brought us together.”

“No.”

“No about fate? I admit, that might’ve been a little too flowery for the occasion. My second best night shirt was utterly ruined, after all. But I think that—”

“No, I can’t be your protector.” Cara stepped away, reaching for the clean skirt and bodice that hung from a peg by the door.

She kept her mind carefully blank, while logical words spilled off her tongue. Her fingers trembled only slightly. “I’m not a Hero. I’m just…”

The brown skirt was in her hands now, the fabric weighing against her fingers, wrapping around her wrists like manacles. “I’m the barmaid, and you’re a guest.”

“But—”

“Whatever happened last night was… was a mistake.” She’d been a fool to think she could be a Hero, could take on work like this. Her gut screamed with hunger—whether for ambition or in starvation, she wasn’t sure.

The skirt began to shake. “I couldn’t protect you all the way to Cadens! That’s through the marshes! No one’s cleaned out the nests in months. Gods only know what’s hatched and roaming around down there. And that thief!”

She whirled, flinging the skirt to the ground at the feet of the stunned guest. “There’s a professional thief on your trail after whatever’s in that box of yours. Do you think I could save you from that? I’m nothing! Nothing!”

She began to laugh, an edge of hysteria creeping in to tease her frayed nerves. Tears collected at the edges of her eyes, making the guest’s figure swim and dance in her vision.

“I’m a failed Apprentice, didn’t you know? I had a Master once, but he sacked me—and rightly, too, because I nearly got the both of us killed! Over nothing! Nothing at all! All I’ve got is an old sword and three exercises and a hodgepodge of information crammed between my ears that nobody ever needs or wants to hear! The best I can do is scratch a man in a fight because I don’t have the guts to finish, even when it’s important, and kill feral chickens in the night to leave at the blacksmith’s doorstep, rot his eyes!”

Cara gulped for air, chest heaving, fingers clutching invisible weapons in the air as if she could shoot her demons. She stared at the ceiling, refusing to let her tears spill over.

The room was silent, save for her rasping. Cara tried to count her breaths, hold the air in for a moment before she released it, but it was like a wall had ruptured in herself. She was unable to hold anything back.

Footsteps thudded across the floor. His weight’s distributed all wrong, Cara thought in the part of her mind that normally only showed itself in battle fever. He’d be heard a mile coming, with that walk.

A hand rested on her shoulder. She tried to shrug it away, but it resisted, squeezing slightly.

“So that was you, then?” the guest asked lightly. “With the cockatrices this morning? I heard the milkmaids gossiping about it under the window this morning while I was dressing.”

Cara gave up fighting her tears and lowered her head to look at him, swiping at her eyes with the back of one sleeve. “Yeah.”

“So you killed an entire flock of cockatrice, at night, by yourself, and then came charging into my room to save me, yes?” The guest raised one eyebrow, daring her to contradict him.

Cara tried. “Well, you really want to hunt cockatrice after the sun sets, anyway, because it makes it harder for them to lock you in their stare, and—”

“And you still came up to save me after you were done whacking poison tails off killer feral chickens,” the guest interrupted. “That’s not the work of a nobody. That’s the work of a somebody.”

Cara chuckled despite herself. “You make that line up yourself?”

The guest had the grace to look a little sheepish. “No. It’s from Gods’ Grace on the Mountain.” He shrugged. “It sounded good there.”

“It did.” Cara leaned over and picked up her skirt. “Okay, yes, I might’ve done those things, but I really am just a barmaid. I… I might’ve been a Hero, once, but I couldn’t make it. I’ve got Jeffrey now, and the inn, and my work here.”

“You enjoy getting propositioned?” The guest sniffed. “I took you for better stuff than that.”

Cara bristled. “Absolutely not!”

“Then come with me.” The guest leaned forward and grabbed her hand. She tried to tug it away, feeling her calloused palms scrape against his smooth skin, but he didn’t let her go. “I said it before, but let me say it again, plainly—I need your help. I can’t do this alone. And I think…”

He laughed a little. “Say what you will, but I truly believe the gods arranged our meeting. Would you work against them?”

“I… I don’t…” Cara stopped suddenly. The guest’s sudden movement had freed his amulet from beneath his shirt. She could see two horns, spiked and spread like fingers reaching to the sun, atop a masculine figure.

Her blood ran cold.

“Which god is that?” she asked, knowing the answer.

“This?” The guest looked at his chest and plucked at the amulet’s chain. “Cern. The abbot gave it to me before, for protection and luck on the road.”

Patron of hunters and Heroes and warriors. Guide in deepest woods and darkest shadow. My secret god, the one I pray to when no one’s around to hear me.

“You stop only when Cern himself tells you to stop.”

And so it was, with her former Master’s voice slurring and spitting in her ears, that she accepted her first official quest as a Hero.