Weary was the band of travellers when at last on the following day they trudged into the old goblin camp. It remained partially intact, only lacking the basic gear that Chance had taken on his first visit. There were even a couple of partially erected tents remaining, enough for a few of the men at least if they could be repaired.

“It is not much for now,” Chance told them as he looked it all over, “But we can work on it.”

“We started out not much better than this,” Daf replied. Chance could see the man studying it consideringly. “Just a rough camp in the middle of nowhere, it was. We built it up from there.”

“We had supplies back then,” another of the bandits spoke up, a bald-headed man that Chance hadn’t learned the name of yet but had kept an eye on due to his surly disposition and tendency to complain during the trek. If any were to be the source of problems, Chance had decided it was to be him.

“I have friends here,” Chance said, “And access to supplies. They will be available. Enough to get you settled in. I will go and speak with them now, to arrange it all. Daf, Ryvan, I want you to come with me too. I will need someone to liaise between you lot when we aren’t around.”

Chance let the former bandits have a poke around the camp, to see what was available, to drop off their gear. He spoke with his friends while they were doing that. “Shags, Snarl, you keep an eye on this lot. I’ll take Yrip with me while I speak with the kobolds.”

“Best of luck,” Snarl grinned. “You are going to need it.”

“Yeah, probably,” Chance agreed. “Are you going to be okay here with this lot?”

“I’ll get them to tidy up,” Snarl replied. “Let's see if we can’t get this place at least partially liveable.”

“And you thought I was the one needing luck,” Chance shook his head.

Snarl cackled at that.

‘Keep an eye on baldy,” Chance went on. “If there is to be trouble, it will be from him.”

I’ve been watching him, Shags reported. Closely.

Chance nodded. He wasn’t surprised that Shags had already picked up on it as well. “See you soon, then.”

Taking the two men and Yrip with him, Chance headed off, back towards the stream and the bridge. He didn’t want to let them know quite yet about the shortcut through the hills and over the stream to Azval Stalvaq, though undoubtedly they would discover it themselves at some point. The longer that the two groups remained apart, the better it was he felt, at least until they got used to the idea.

“Those were apple trees up there,” Daf noted as they walked away. “A good number of them.”

Chance was impressed that he could tell that, given the early stages of rebirth that they were in. “They were once dead, but I managed to restore them. There will be apples again at some point but not right away.”

“Apples means cider,” Daf went on.

“Among other things,” Chance pointed out, pushing on down the path.

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“True, but cider is the most important one,” Daf said.

Coming back to the bridge, Chance led them across it, turning to the north, to follow the main path again.

“Those ruins,” Ryvan asked as they walked along the path between the stream and the marsh, looking toward the old tower and tumbled-down walls on the island in the middle of the marsh.

“Best to stay away from them,” Chance warned him. “There is a troll that lives there, and he won’t be best pleased if people start to poke around his home.”

“A troll?” The kid’s eyes went wide. “Are they as big as the tales say?”

“‘I’ve no idea how big the tales make them out to be,” Chance replied, “But he was big enough that the dragon didn’t want to mess with him.”

Daf and Ryvan both came to a sudden stop. “The dragon?” Daf asked. “We saw it on occasions flying around, but never knew where it came from. It is here?”

Chance halted, turning to face the men. “Not any more,” he explained. “It was killed.”

“It had been a while since we last saw it,” Daf mused. “We had wondered where it had gotten to.”

“Did you do it?” Ryvan asked, still wide-eyed. “Kill it I mean?”

Chance laughed as he shook his head. “No, it happened before my time here.”

“And the treasure?” Daf put in.

“Funny, everyone keeps asking about that. There was nothing here when I arrived so it must have been taken away already.”

“That is a pity.”

Chance nodded in agreement. “Yeah, not going to lie and say that it wouldn’t have been useful, but that is all water under the bridge. We will have to make do without it.”

They began to walk again and soon were leaving the marsh behind, heading into the forest as the path swung around towards Azval Stalvaq, a place thicker and wilder and darker than the parts they had been in before.

“This place is old,” Daf noted, looking around at the trees towering up around them, “And it doesn’t much welcome strangers.”

“Really?” Chance asked. “I hadn’t noticed that. It has seemed peaceful to me,”

“You're a druid,” Daf pointed out. “It will see you different to others. I can feel it, almost as if it watching us, judging us.”

“I am sure that you are imagining it,” Chance told the man. “You are going to have to get used to the place living here. The forest will be your home.”

“As long as it gets used to us as well,” Daf remarked.

“I am sure it will, and it will also provide for you as well. Besides the apple trees you saw, there are also other fruit trees, berries and nuts, wild vegetables and herbs, game to hunt and even fish.”

“It could be worse, I suppose,” Ryvan noted.

“There is no bread or cheese,” Chance pointed out, “And only water to drink. I had been travelling to Yereshalaz to try and fix that, only to find that matters there were not exactly as good for trading as I had hoped. But we have started working to fix that.”

They fell into silence once more as they walked, Daf and Ryvan casting furtive glances around them at the forest that loomed up around them. It was a reaction that Chance found odd. None of the others he had met had experienced a reaction to the forest like the two men had, and it made him wonder just what exactly it was about. There had been one part of the deep forest, on the way to the gnoll’s camp, where he had felt the watchfulness of the forest upon him, but not with the kind of hostility as Daf had explained it.

It did feel strange to consider the forest as somehow being aware, almost alive, but given what he had experienced so far since arriving, he wasn’t going to discount the possibility. It was something he was going to have to look into, as he didn’t want the place to show hostility towards the men, in case it caused unnecessary complications.

Could he communicate with it somehow? Perhaps Shags would know; he knew far too much for a simple wolf.

The path ahead broke out from under the trees, and the cave of Azval Stalvaq appeared before them, the small camp and the gardens they had established in front of it. A number of kobolds could be seen among the camp and the gardens.

Daf raised an eyebrow when he saw them. “Your friends are kobolds?” he asked.

Chance nodded. “Yes, they are,” he stated pointedly so that there could be no misunderstanding. “They were here before you, and this is a place of refuge for them as much as it is for you. And they are going to be the ones that will help you survive.”