Telmik was now a small speck in the horizon. Lit up brightly by the morning sun rays.

We were about to round a large set of hills, which would have blocked the city from sight anyway… but…

“You can always go back you know,” Vim offered again. This would be the fifth time he’s said something like it since we had left this morning.

I huffed at him, but I wasn’t really that angry. I knew he was just…

Vim did seem to hope I’d change my mind… but I also knew he genuinely wanted me to do what I wanted. He also seemed to worry that I was making a mistake, and didn’t really realize it.

It was possible but…

As much as staying in that city for the rest of my life, building a home… making friends with everyone…

I still felt this was the better use of my life.

Just being someone who does odd jobs… cleaning a church, or updating maps, didn’t sit with me. I wasn’t sure if I could do anything more, but I wanted to see if I could.

“That city will be there forever. I can always go back,” I said to Vim and myself.

“Forever,” Vim scoffed at the word, and I knew he didn’t believe it would be.

We were walking a large stone road. One that was… a little empty, strangely.

“Where is everyone?” I asked.

“Sleeping off their hangovers,” Vim said.

“Oh… because of the festival. I had figured the roads would be busier since it was now over,” I said.

“They will be. By midday this road will be packed,” Vim said.

I carried my little backpack, but it was a little lighter than I was used to. I had left some of the stuff I had acquired on the way here. Vim had me put them in one of the small drawers near the front entrance of the house we had stayed at. He had said Jelti would put them in a secured storage for me, to return to when I wanted them. The little white book had been a part of the stash.

Honestly I hadn’t really wanted to part with the letters or the painting that Vim had saved from the fires… but… I knew it was for the best. Such things could easily get lost or ruined while on the road. To weather, or accidents.

“It is a little chilly this morning,” I said as I noticed the glistening dew on the grass we walked past. Most of it was frosted and frozen.

“Hm. Cold?” Vim asked, suddenly looking at me.

“No… I just notice it,” I said.

He studied me for a moment, and I realized he was worried I was ill-prepared. He was probably worried my attire wasn’t good enough.

I patted my hips. “I’m fine! I have two layers now; do I look cold to you?” I asked, worried he’d buy me more. I was worried I’d get hot and stuffy as it was!

“We are headed to the mountains. High mountains and marshlands. Places that get cold. We need to dress the part,” Vim said.

I nodded, it was the only reason I had been willing to let him dress me so heavily. Usually I’d never wear such thick leather and furs.

“Plus winter isn’t over just yet. It’s about to be though,” he said.

“Not for another few months Vim,” I said.

“Months,” he said the word in a way that told me he saw it the same way he had the earlier statement about time.

To him months and forever were equal in their value.

It made me wonder how much of his personality was warped by his inability to notice the change of the immediate time. He probably didn’t notice days as they went by, but seasons. My grandmother had been that way. I had left for a year and returned, and she hadn’t even realized I had gone.

Though that might have just been her age and condition…

“And all you did was add a thick cloak… aren’t you going to be the one standing out?” I asked him.

The man glanced down at his new cloak. It was a dark gray, and had white fur on the inside lining. Some kind of sheep. It stunk a little, honestly. But it was heavy, so heavy that it looked like it’d make him too hot even during a storm.

“I never stand out,” Vim said plainly.

“You are a little average looking,” I agreed.

“I am,” he nodded, seemingly pleased to hear me say so.

Smiling at the man who seemed happy to have been insulted, I wondered if such a perspective was sourced from the way some of our members treated him.

Though I suppose so far Henrietta had been the only one actually trying to flirt with him… Kaley had done so, but odds were she had just been teasing.

“I can tell you’re thinking something rude, you know,” Vim said with a smirk.

“It wasn’t that rude,” I said honestly.

“Sure it wasn’t.”

Off in the distance a pair of silhouettes appeared. They were hard to see, thanks to the morning sun being right in front of us… but it looked like a pair of horses.

We walked in silence for a moment as I tried to envision the map of the society I had seen. By that map it’d only take a few days for us to reach our next destination on foot… but if we had horses…

“Why don’t we ride horses?” I asked Vim.

“We do sometimes,” he said.

“Why not now?”

“Because you need to start remembering the paths. If you get there too quickly, it will fade from memory,” Vim said.

I slowed my pace for a moment, but Vim didn’t. He seemed to ignore me as he studied something to our left, near some trees. I didn’t see anything there, however.

Picking my pace back up I returned to walking by Vim’s side. “I see. So it’s on purpose,” I said.

“Everything I do has a purpose. Even when I don’t know what it is,” Vim said in his light tone.

“That’s a very… male thing to say,” I teased him.

“Well I am one,” he said.

“You are.”

Vim glanced at me and did so with an odd raise of an eyebrow. He looked as if he was expecting me to make some kind of joke, but I wouldn’t.

After all it was the truth. Sometimes he did speak a little… well, arrogantly. But maybe out of anyone, he earned that smugness.

He was the strongest, after all. Plus he didn’t abuse his strength; at least not in any detrimental way so far I had seen.

If anyone needed proof to his trustworthiness… one only needed to look at how our members acted around him.

They feared me. A stranger. A woman. Because I was a predator. Yet in terms of danger, I couldn’t come close to Vim. He wasn’t just stronger than me… he knew how to use that strength.

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Yet not a single one of them feared him. Not a single one of them shied away from him.

“What will I do about the places I can’t go into? Like Tor’s village,” I asked him.

Vim looked back at that cluster of trees again. “You stay out of them until you earn the right to enter.”

“And uh… how would I go about earning that right?” I asked.

“By proving yourself,” he said simply.

Great. That meant he knew, or at least had an idea, but wouldn’t outright tell me. Maybe it was just something that took time to earn.

The sounds of birds began to fill the air as we neared more trees. Was a forest nearby?

“Along this route there might be a few places that you’ll be denied entry. Just… accept it,” Vim said as he finally looked away from the cluster of trees he had been focused on. We were leaving them behind, and I still couldn’t see anything special about them. Some birds maybe, but nothing else.

“What did you see in those trees?” I asked.

“The two men,” Vim said.

“Two men?” I glanced back and tried to find them. I could see nearly through the cluster completely from here. They weren’t that big of trees, and there wasn’t much foliage… I didn’t see anyone.

“They’re in the trees. On the branches. They have bows. They’re hunting, but I’m not sure what they’re hunting,” Vim said.

“Oh…?” I studied the top of the trees a little, and finally found one of them. He looked like he had intentionally moved some of the branches to hide him better from our sight. I could just make out the bundles of arrows that he had laid down on a part of the branch he sat on.

“They’re really too far from the road to be hunting humans. But they might be hunting those who hunt them. Who knows,” Vim said with a sigh.

“I see…” I hadn’t realized he meant hunting in that sense. But it was true… other than small birds and small animals, like bunnies and mice; I hadn’t seen any large game around here.

“Whoever they are, they’re taking a big risk. If any of the local knights or militia notices them they’ll probably be thrown in prison,” Vim said.

“Oh!” I looked forward, and sure enough could see the gleam on the horses approaching us. “Those are knights huh,” I said.

“They are.”

I kind of wanted to stick around a little, to see if they would notice them. To see what would happen. But I knew Vim wouldn’t like that idea.

“Speaking of knights… do you think Melody and the rest ever got back safely?” I asked.

“They did,” Vim said.

I paused a moment. His tone when he had answered…

“I didn’t tell you?” Vim looked at me as he too stopped walking.

“Tell me what?” I asked and hurried to go back next to him.

“Melody and her daughter had made a donation, thanking the saint of protection. One of our members heard their confession,” Vim said.

“One of our members did?” I asked, and I had to calm myself down after I realized how loudly I had spoken.

Vim nodded slowly as he studied me, as if weary of me now thanks to my outburst. “A priest. Randle. He works beneath the chronicler. He took their confession and donation. Randle thought they took what happened as a blessing, a miracle. In reality they probably just got so terrified that they resorted to their faith as a crutch,” Vim said.

I closed my eyes and took a small breath.

Thank goodness.

Returning to walking, I felt a new spring in my step. How I wish I had heard this information earlier!

“I told you they’d be fine,” Vim said after a moment.

“You did… but I wasn’t just worrying over their safe arrival to town, Vim,” I said.

For a few moments I slowed down again, since Vim had done so first.

“Oh,” Vim realized what I actually meant.

“Oh,” I realized what I had just said as well.

There was an awkward silence, and then Vim gave me a smirk. “I see. You thought I’d hunt them down? Really?” he asked.

“Why wouldn’t I?” I asked a little too quickly.

“Because it means you doubt my ability to stand by my decisions. I left them alive, why would I not have just killed them then if I was going to hunt them down later?” he asked with a smile.

That smile was the only reason I wasn’t ashamed at myself. “Because you put the Society over everything! I was worried about it! It was why I waited until now to ask… I mean…” I coughed, a little embarrassed.

“You waited until we left to make sure I’d not remember them and go searching for them. I see. You know it’s been a while since someone has tried to manipulate me so brazenly,” Vim said with a nod as if in complete understanding.

“Manip… No! I just… didn’t want you to kill them or…” I hesitated. The horses were getting a little close. Too close to talk about this stuff.

“Well that is my fault. I heard of their confession only a day after we arrived. I… thought I had told you. Maybe I got distracted, I apologize,” Vim said gently.

“Hmghmh,” I made an odd noise, since I wasn’t able to voice my emotions at the moment.

Vim chuckled, and his strange amusement over my fumbling over this conversation just made my own mind whirl even more wildly. What did I say to this? What could I say?

It was true… I had worried Vim would have killed them; if he had found out they had reported us. Our names, especially. But… at the same time I honestly hadn’t thought he would. It had just been a worry. A fear. A stupid one, but one nonetheless.

“Sorry,” I grumbled.

“Apology accepted. As long as you accept mine for failing to tell you until now.”

I nodded. “Mhm.”

“You didn’t lose sleep over it did you? Is that why you tossed and turned those first few nights?” he asked.

“Well…” I didn’t answer, and not just because the three horsemen were now within range to hear us.

Two of them wore armor. One of them had armor even on his horse. It sounded… exhausted as it slowly trotted on by.

“Good day,” Vim greeted the two men and the woman as they passed.

“Fair travels!” the woman smiled at us, and I waved at her in thanks.

They weren’t trotting very quickly, but the distance between us grew quickly. And not just because I had picked up my pace so I could return to the conversation with Vim quicker.

“If you must know some of the coins in that bag you carry are from their donation. Not all of it, but a good portion,” Vim said with a point to my backpack.

“Huh?”

He nodded. “It’s only fair. You’re the one who had the most… uh… distress? From the event. So you earned it,” he said.

“Wait… the coins the chronicler gave me?” I asked. I could feel the weight of that bag. It was the heaviest thing I’d carried in a long while.

Vim nodded. “It’s not a tenth, but it’s close. They probably donated about a fifth of their profits. I do believe your gospel says eleven? Not very religious of them, no indeed,” Vim tsked with his tongue as he smiled.

“Oh shush…” I couldn’t help but laugh at him.

“I also found out the name of their business. They have a shop in the marketplace. No, you can’t meet them. I’d have taken you there otherwise,” Vim said.

“What was it?” I asked.

“The Singing Deliveries. Probably a play on her name,” Vim said.

“That’s… cute…” I took a small breath as I tried to imagine the building. The shop, where Melody and her daughters all worked.

“I’d warn you against going there again… but by the time we return to the Cathedral they’ll probably all be too old to work, or…” Vim stopped talking, and I didn’t even need to glare at him to make him do so.

“Thank you Vim, for telling me,” I said, ignoring his last comment.

“Hm.”

“Really, thank you,” I reached out and grabbed his hand. He seemed to hesitate, as he came to a stop and stared at me.

I squeezed his hand with both of mine. I held it firmly, and closed my eyes as I bowed my head to him.

“Thank you,” I said.

Vim said nothing, but I heard his unease. I felt it, in my hands.

He was uncomfortable, but… but…

I couldn’t help it.

I had no other way to display such emotion, after all. I didn’t know how else to thank him.

He had no idea how much I had worried about it. He had no clue to how much I had expected the opposite to have happened. After all, it would have been… not only easy for him to have killed them, but accepted. No one in the Society would have found it odd, or wrong. For he would have done so for us. To protect us.

Even I, for as much as it would have broken my heart… could have done nothing but accept it. If he had sought out and killed Melody and her daughters… I would have had to of simply accepted it. It would have simply been a fact of life I would have had to live with.

Yet he hadn’t. He had given them a chance. An opportunity.

It meant no matter how little he thought of humans, or their lives, he still respected them. Still saw them as people, and things with worth.

After a moment I released his hand, and Vim let it fall to his side. He had an odd look on his face, but it at least wasn’t one of anger or disgust. If anything it kind of looked…

“Let’s go, Renn. We have a long day ahead,” Vim said as he turned and returned to walking.

Nodding, I followed him closely.

I knew this had been the right choice. He had proven it once again.

Walking side by side with Vim, the Societies Protector… I was more than happy with my decision to join him.

This journey was going to be a long one, and most likely arduous… but with him… With Vim I felt confident that I could not only survive it, but enjoy it.

And that single fact made me have hope for the future.

And that was precious. Precious enough to devote my whole self to it.

I wanted to cherish it. To protect it…

So I needed to learn how. And he was the best to learn from. Even if he didn’t realize it.

Which was why I chose him, and none of the other locations.

To learn from him.

To walk beside him.

To thank him, for ending up the man I had hoped he’d be.