The moon was barely over the horizon, and the stars had just begun to shine, but the monsters were already out in force. A gray shape whipped around high in the sky, but I didn’t have the time to wait for it to dive.

A shambler was attacking a horse, which had reared onto its hind legs to give the monster a solid hoofing. But it wasn’t the horse I had heard scream. Esmelda was on the ground beside it, but already scrambling to her feet. She tried to get her horse under control, but it was panicking, and it bolted, leaving her alone with the mob.

The horse's kick had knocked the zombie down, but it was undeterred. It lurched toward Esmelda, and I burst into a sprint. They say not to run with scissors, and this advice applies also to swords. I could only assume there was a technique involved, and I would be sure to ask Gastard about it the next time I saw him, but I immediately slashed myself in the face.

I’d taken maybe five steps, and my arms had swung automatically as I accelerated. The blade's edge touched my cheek, and it felt like a paper cut, only I knew that it was deeper than that. On instinct, I threw my arms behind me and kept going like I thought I was a character in Naruto. Is this why ninjas ran like that? My face was bleeding, but that didn’t matter.

Esmelda had produced a knife, and taken a step back from the incoming shambler. I reached them a second later, and swung my sword around at the back of its neck, twisting my whole body into the blow. The blade whooshed over its head as the zombie ducked, a lucky stumble. It wasn’t paying attention to me. So I gave my best approximation of the high-guard stance Gastard had taught me and broke it with an overhead strike.

The iron blade didn’t have as much of an impact behind it as the stone would have, but it was much sharper. The back of its skull opened like a melon, and it went to the ground.

“Get inside!” I shouted at Esmelda.

“Will,” her eyes were wide, and her breath was coming fast. She still held the dagger like she was expecting to be attacked, looking around us for more mobs. “My horse–”

“It’ll be fine as long as it keeps running. We can’t stay out here.” As if to emphasize my words, a phantom chose that moment to come screaming at my back. I spun, not bothering to try to use proper form, and sliced through the air just ahead of its arrival. It rammed into my chest, and I tripped, landing on my butt and looking up at the manta-like creature floating above me.

I raised my sword, and the spine on the end of its tail jabbed into my wrist. The pain caused my hand to spasm, releasing the sword. The spine had gone all the way through, a barbed edge sticking out from the back of my forearm, so when it jerked its tail back, it jerked my arm with it, and I cried out.

Esmelda stepped forward smoothly and brought her knife down to sever the phantom’s tail. The cut was clean, and the monster fled back into the sky. I ignored the blazing agony in my wrist, and picked up my sword with my other hand. There was a clear path back to the shelter, but I knew it wouldn’t be open for long. Another zombie was moving in.

“Run,” I said, and we rushed into the short entrance hall together. I punched the button to close the gate, and it looked like we were safe.

“I’m so sorry,” Esmelda said. Her hair was a mess, and she pulled it back out of her face after sheathing her knife. “Your hand, what are we going to do?”

“I’ll be fine,” I said, “I just need to eat something.”

“What? How is that going to help? And your face, did the phantom do that?”

“No, I uh, slapped myself with the sword when I was running before.”

The spine was keeping my wrist from bleeding much, but I could feel the warmth and wetness of blood pouring down from my cheek to my neck. Esmelda’s brows furrowed briefly in confusion.

“Oh,” she said. “Is that why you had your arms out like that?”

“It’s a work in progress,” I said, taking a few steps to the end of the entrance hall and glancing around my shelter to make sure no monsters had slipped inside. It looked clear. “What are you doing here? You know what happens around me when the sun goes down.”

“I thought I would make it in time.” She looked away. “I wanted to warn you. Men from Henterfell arrived in Erihseht today, they spoke to my father.”

“That sucks,” I took the stairs down into the basement, and headed for the basket of bread I’d left sitting beside my furnace. Esmelda followed me. “What did they say?”

“They will come for you in the morning,” she said. “They are Lord Godwod’s vassals. Knights in his service. And their leader questioned my father about the mark on your hand. They know you speak Kevinian.”

“Bad luck,” I said. “But I’ll figure something out.” I set down my sword and grabbed a loaf of bread. I was about to bite into it, but hesitated as I glanced down at the barb sticking out of my arm.

What would happen if I healed with it still inside me? This wasn’t an opportune moment to experiment to see whether my body would automatically reject a foreign object. A couple of inches of the tail hung limply from the entry point. I dropped the bread back in the grass basket and wrapped my hand around the barb. Its side points pressed into my palm, but I took a deep breath, squeezed it, and jerked it out.

Pulling the tail through my wrist was not a pleasant sensation, and blood gushed from the wound the moment it was no longer blocked.

“Will!” Esmelda produced a cloth from a pocket in her riding dress and pressed it around my wrist.

“It’s fine,” I said and started shoving bread into my mouth, chewing and swallowing as fast as I could.

“What are you doing?” Esmelda demanded, her voice strained, her grip on my bleeding wrist tightening.

“Just…give it a minute,” I said between mouthfuls. By the time I was finished with the first roll, the pain had diminished, overridden by tingling and itching. I started on the second.

“This is insane,” Esmelda said. Blood had suffused the cloth, and was dripping through her fingers. “You need to hold this so I can tie a tourniquet.”

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“You’re good,” I said, “keep doing what you’re doing. Eating heals me.”

“It…” her face was pale, “What?”

“Eating,” the second loaf was harder to swallow. “Actually, could you grab me some water? There's a stack of bowls by the box.” I nodded to the chest beside my worktable. As I kept all my resources in my backpack, it wasn’t really necessary for storage, so I’d taken to using it as a water basin. I didn’t keep it very full, because it was a hassle to fill and empty, but water was something I’d felt like I should have access to in my shelter on general principles.

She didn’t move, both her hands still squeezing my wrist, so I continued to shove bread down my increasingly dry throat. Would carrots have been easier to swallow? Maybe, but they took longer to chew, and anyway, I didn’t like carrots very much.

After finishing the second loaf, I put my hand over hers, and gently unwrapped her fingers from my wrist. I pulled off the cloth to reveal that the wound, though not completely healed, was no longer bleeding. It was obvious that I’d been stabbed, but it was scabbed over.

Her eyes got so big they were threatening to take over her whole face. “Is this another of your miracles?”

I took a step toward the basin, and my feet almost gave out from under me. Esmelda automatically placed herself under my arm to steady me. It was a nice feeling.

“I guess,” I said. “Any food I make or grow restores my health when I eat it. Is that not something the other heroes did?”

She shook her head. “Lord Umber could heal with a touch. I never heard of him doing it with bread.”

We went to the chest, and I drank. Bowls weren't ideal for drinking, but it got the job done. They generated in sets of four, so I had plenty. Magical healing or not, I had lost a lot of blood, and it was making me woozy. I closed the lid of the chest and sat down on it.

“Could you bring me the rest of the bread,” I said. “I’m still not feeling great.”

Esmelda did as I asked, and watched me wolf down the remaining loaves. Though I wasn’t particularly hungry, my stomach felt bottomless, and I kept eating until it was all gone.

Esmelda wiped at my face with the bloody cloth. It was better than nothing.

“The cut,” she said, “it’s gone.”

I lifted my arm and saw that the wound on my wrist was gone as well. The area where I’d been stabbed was still pink, a fresh scar, and I wondered if that would go away too if I kept eating.

“See,” I said. “No worries.”

She didn’t seem to know what to say to this.

“What’s your dad going to think of you spending the night here?” I asked.

She shook her head. “I didn’t think that far ahead. The knights left to find rooms at the inn, and I told my father I wanted to be alone. He didn’t see me go.”

“Where’s Gastard?”

“I haven’t seen him in days. I would have asked him to warn you, but he often leaves Erihseht to hunt, and brings back pelts to sell in the market.”

I’d wondered how he supported himself, it wasn’t as if guarding the mayor and his daughter in a peaceful, out-of-the-way village was a full-time job. For someone who had nearly been eaten by a zombie, Esmelda was remarkably together. She had been distraught over my injury, but now that I was healed, she seemed almost relaxed.

“Will you help me translate when the men come tomorrow?”

She nodded, her expression resolute. “I will.” She looked around, fully taking in the interior of my shelter for the first time.

“What are all these fences for?”

“To discourage mob spawns, and trap them if they do.” I glanced over at the firepit, which was still burning strong. “We should be safe though, as long as there’s light.”

Her gaze settled on the log box taking up one corner of the basement. “What is that?”

“My sleeping coffin,” I said.

“You sleep in that?”

“It may not be spacious,” I said, “but it’s cozier than it looks.”

Esmelda looked like she was about to respond, but she quirked her head to one side, then looked at the wall that I had built to seal Bill’s cell.

“Do you hear that?” She asked.

“Hear what?” The stone muffled Bill’s laughter to the point where I didn’t notice it anymore. But he wasn’t laughing. We both listened in silence for a moment and then I walked over to the wall and placed my ear against the stone.

“What is it?” She asked.

Even this close, I could barely make it out, a faint tapping from the other side. How good was Esmelda’s hearing?

“I’ve got a monster in here,” I said. “One of the shamblers. It changed. Got smarter, so I trapped it.”

Her lips turned down. “What is it doing?”

“I don’t know.” Had Bill managed to break off part of the fence? Even if he was using a stick to tap the stone, it wasn’t as if he could ever get through that way. He would have a better chance of digging himself out through the dirt. Now that I thought about it, I needed to excavate the entire area around the cell and fill it all in with stone to be safe. I could do most of that tonight, but my thoughts were interrupted by a much louder sound from above.

I heard a grunt, deep-throated and menacing. It was a noise an animal would make, a bear or an ox. It was followed by a thump, and splintering wood. I rushed up to the entrance.

The outer gate was gone, and I found myself meeting the gaze of a new monster. It was a lot bigger than a shambler, with broad muscular shoulders, and disproportionately thick arms. Basically a gorilla. But unlike a gorilla, it was hairless, with leathery gray skin and a head like a hound. Its eyes were small and dark, and it hooted like an ape when it saw me.

The monster was too big to fit inside the hall, but it smashed one oversized fist against the wall and dislodged a log. It was strong enough to break the seal of a crafted structure. My mind jumped to the figurine. A troll. What had Gastard called it?

Koloss.

“Esmelda,” I called, “get in the box.”

“What?” She hadn’t followed me up the stairs, but I could hear the quaver in her voice. I ran down and grabbed my backpack.

“The sleeping coffin. Get inside. Big monster.”

She looked skeptically at the vessel in question, and I pulled out a stone medallion and split it into tokens on top of the coffin, then split the tokens into coins. I could hear the troll punching out more sections of the hall as I did.

“Do you know what a koloss is?” I asked, and the color drained from her face.

“A terrible beast,” she said. “Stronger than ten men, with a hide thick enough to turn a sword.”

“Good to know.” I started placing stone blocks around the coffin. “There’s one of those up there. Please get in the box.”

There was another grunt from above, and after a fearful glance at me, Esmelda crawled inside the opening of the coffin. I was dropping stones as fast as I could, building up around the sides before covering the top.

“What are you going to do?” Her voice sounded very small coming from the coffin.

I considered my options. Leather armor wouldn’t help me much. The koloss hadn’t looked like it had claws, but it would probably cave in my chest with one punch. As soon as I placed the last stone, leaving only the opening unenforced, it reached the inner gate.

I looked up in time to see its hand wrap around one of the lateral posts and pull, snapping it like a twig. Was I supposed to fight this thing? No, thank you.

“Make room,” I said.

“What?”

I grabbed my sword, just in case, and got on my hands and knees to crawl backward into the coffin. Esmelda pressed herself against the sides of the makeshift safe room, and there was barely enough room for both of us to squeeze inside.

The troll tore its way into my shelter a second later, and I placed a final pair of stone blocks, sealing us in darkness.