“Throughout the realms there are temples and ruins containing scriptures carved in stone bearing ancient languages, each depicting the abandonment of the gods as they left the realm of people, seeking new pastures.”

Looking out into the depths of town from the porch from which I spent my night, unsure of they would even ask for my help, watching as the lights flicker on and off throughout the windows, as eyes watch me from afar from the comfort of their homes each observing my behaviour, sceptical of me, doubting my offer to help is genuine.

Scribbling away in my journal adding in my new entries of all the things I’ve learned and discovered these past couple of days about the north, the creatures I had seen, a hand drawn map of the region in the area from what I had seen.

Wearing it down steadily with each additional page I fill in, until my journal is complete and there’s nothing left to explore in this realm, although I’ve never thought about what comes after once all the pages are complete.

“Do you really intend to sit out here all night?” My eyes drew away from my drawing to see Damian stood in the doorway holding two mugs each producing a vast amount of steam from the top.

“There’s something relaxing about sleeping under the stars at night” Staring off into the dark sky filled with little glints spread all throughout. “plus I thought I’d make it easy for everyone to keep an eye on me.”

“What are you doing anyway?” Damian asks, inquiring about what I do to pass the time when I'm on my own.

Handing over my journal to let him have a look through, his face in awe as he flicked through the pages one by one. “You drew all these?”

“Ye,it takes a lot of attempts till I'm satisfied with it though.” My face turns red with embarrassment at his words, it’s the first time I've shown that journal and its contents to anyone else other than myself. As I sat opposite watching him continue to flick through the pages as I just observed him sipping my coffee, as if he were a child just given a new story book.

“What’s a Dreclya?” he asked turning the journal around to show me the page, pointing to the picture I drew of the creature.

“Nasty creatures… They burrow underground at high speeds; the skin on their back acts as their armour, tough to penetrate all the way down its snake-like body. Its tail splitting off into two bearing enough force to strike any man down in one blow, limited visibility though.” His face filled with both fascination and dread at the sound of such a beast as he takes a gulp at the thought of encountering such a beast, speechless with nothing to say just a look of disbelief “Don’t worry though, they only live in the deserts in the south.”

“Does everything in this journal sound like a dangerous beast?”

“It’s not all about creatures, there's other languages, the alphabet's ancient scriptures and symbols, from churches and temples.” I explain flicking through the pages whilst he holds it back to the first page, where it all started.

“You’ve done so much”

“About twenty years ago, when I filled in that first page… seems like so long ago now” A smirk emerged across my face with a little chuckling as I reminisced briefly in my head about all my adventures and how far I’ve come since then.

From setting out at the age of twenty five or so, in order to find something important to me as if a part of myself was missing, constantly making notes and recording everything I’ve ever seen, from the mapping of new lands, every new species of creature I find, ancient texts and foreign languages.

If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

“Say, when did the first child go missing?” I ask knowing completely that it’ll put a damper on both our minds but still, even if they don’t want my help yet, I would still like to be able to gather as much information as I can.

“Thought you weren’t going to help, till he put his pride aside? What game are you playing?” Damian asked with a raised eyebrow unsure of my methods, unable to gain a read.

“I’ll be straight with you, I always intended on helping, but I need the people of this town to trust me and be quick about it… now I don’t have time to get to know everyone and tell them all about myself. So I had to take a roundabout way which isn’t ideal but there's a time crunch that makes it seem like I'm the only one that can help so they’ll divulge everything I ask without hesitation or arguing back.”

“That is a horrible plan!!” Damian retorts back immediately.

“I Know. I Know” I repeat aloud visibly asserting my discontent with having to do things this way. “But three kids have gone missing, right now their my only concern”

“About four days ago the first went missing, the second was two days ago, that's why I was out around the lake seeing if I could find any signs that could have pointed us in the right direction.” He carried on to explain. “Each child was soundly in bed with their parents in the next room over, then they would be gone without a trace and a blizzard would then follow the next day.”

The Blizzard would follow the next day. Those words bothered me the most, an unease spreading throughout my entire body. Why would the blizzard come after the abduction and not during?

Trying to rack every corner of my brain, for possibilities, it was obvious that something was taking them but for what purpose, my frustration consuming coming up with more questions by the minute to which none of them had answers, slicking my hair back, a habit I seemed to have picked up in my travels as my hair grew out each time I had unresolved thought plaguing my mind as it was my attempt to try and push the thoughts to the back of my mind.

A distant crunching of snow being ground beneath a boot getting ever closer with each passing step as me and Damian cease our conversation directing our gaze towards a familiar face making his way towards us, wrapped in a fleece jacket and a black scarf, pausing at the foot of the porch, looking off to the side refusing to look at me. Displaying a scowl across his face in his displeasure.

It was the man from before that felt the need to punch me in the face, rubbing my thumb just below my lip remembering the subtle pain from my burst lip.

“You gonna hit me again?” I ask, holding a straight face waiting to see what his response will be.

“Only if you deserve it” He mutters under his breath, steam emanating from his mouth with each exhale.

“Seriously!” Damian scoffs at the disbelief in what he’s hearing.

“But… We do need your help, if you'll still offer it.” muttering his words, finally swallowing his pride and asking for my help. “Only for the children's sake.”

“Of course!” I agree with him nodding my head subtly in a mocking tone.

“Ok, but you have to provide anything I ask for” offering my hand out to him to cement our new treaty.

“That goes for you too.” offering a side glance towards Damian making sure he’s aware that he’s also to be a part of this deal amongst the three of us.

“Ok, the name’s Warrick, since you didn’t ask” he reluctantly declares planting his hand firmly in my own offering his allegiance to help me find the children “ what’s the first step?” Trying to gain an insight into what’s going on in my head.

“Tomorrow I want to see the rooms of the children that were taken, can the pair of you arrange it?”

“Should be easy enough” Damian declares, offering a subtle glance towards Warrick. “For now we should get some sleep”.

As Warrick turns his back to retire for the night, still looking as if he was questioning my ability as to whether I could help or not. “One last thing… I’ll say what I think, whether that upsets people or not, my only concern is finding those children.” Offering a fair warning, to both Damian and Warrick.

Turning my back as Warren heads home to retire for the night, me and Damian proceed to do the same knowing full well that tomorrow is going to be a long day.