For someone who was desperate to leave I was awfully unprepared to actually go.

When Jethro and I returned from our little trip to Rotveil, with our tale of disaster and the diary to back us up, Agnes listened patiently to us. She wrung every last detail out of us, even things I didn’t realise I’d noticed at the time. Then she spent at least 10 minutes just looking thoughtfully into the fire, before grabbing the diary and going to her tent to ‘consult her crystal ball’.

It was only after she’d swept into her huge tent and let the curtains swing shut behind her that I realised that I had no idea if she meant that she was going to look into the future or if she was going to discuss it with every Witch in the Black Woods via C-mail.

When she finally swept back out of her tent I was not expecting her to tell me that I had to leave.

“What?” I said.

“You heard me. Give Aldo back his tent. Pack your stuff. Jethro, you as well. Pack up your tent. You two are going to Uln to give this,” she waved the Rotveil diary, “to the Town Council. Once they’ve seen it and made a copy you’re taking the original to Moonstone.”

“What’s the hurry?” I said, “Rotveil was abandoned for thirteen months before we found it.”

Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.

“Which means that the Fever has been abroad in the Black Forest for the last thirteen months, at least. It’s probably already in the cities but they need to know how long it’s been around. And they need to know about the hungry people from the diary,” said Agnes. She was definitely keeping something from us but her need for urgency seemed genuine to me.

“Hungry people?” I said. “Are we talking about zombies or something?”

“No. I swear that you won’t have to deal with walking corpses on your journey but I can’t explain it right now. We don’t have time. You still don’t know enough. This is all tied up with the stuff that you need to learn for yourself.”

“Then explain it to Jethro,” I said.

Jethro backed away from us, hands up. “I have neither the career, the levels or the skills to deal with whatever this is,” he said.

“Petra, you can learn all about it, if you still want to, in Moonstone,” said Agnes.

“Fine,” I said. "Now or in the morning?”

Agnes looked questioningly at Jethro.

Jethro thought about it for a second or two then, “If we pack up right now we should be able to get to Uln before dark. Or at least close enough that the lights will guide us in.”

“Lights?” I said. “Does this Uln place have some actual nightlife?”

“Well it’s not Moonstone but at least it doesn’t shut down at dusk like a lot of the villages,” Jethro said.

I felt both a lot more eager to get to Uln and a lot more apprehensive about how I would cope when I got there. It sounded like it was more similar to the life I was used to but it also sounded like my inexperience would be a lot more noticeable. Would I instantly stand out as an Outlander?

There was only one way to find out.