---RYNE---

Woodrow slumped against the wooden doorframe and breathed out heavily. His eyes were shut tight. I let him compose himself as he slid down to the porch, burying his face in his arms.

Woodrow’s cloak muffled his voice. "I think the purpose was that if I charmed them to drain them, then that person would be in that state for who knows how long." He looked up at me with watery green eyes. “How did you know what to do?”

I went by his side, leaning against the door. “I think Gaelmar showed me how. He always shows me how to do it. It always feels like a tingling warmth or buzzing in my lungs.”

Some of the villagers were looking at us from their place near the communal fire. Woodrow looked back at them, but his eyes were seeing something else.

“The poor villagers at Fairstep monastery,” he said, voice quaking. “Do you think they have recovered?” When I did not respond, Woodrow added, “If part of undoing my charm was to let the afflicted remember who their true love is, I hope that the victims of Fairstep had many people in their hearts.”

Woodrow arranged himself on the floor, sitting cross-legged. He looked at his long fingers. “It is so deadly to wield this power, Ryne. It is like constantly holding a huge sharp butcher’s knife as a skilled swordsman. If I’m not careful and when I am at my weakest state, I don’t know who I could be charming next.” He looked directly at me. “I used to love this power once. The possibilities of charming almost anyone.” He shifted his gaze, looking behind me, then looking back at the villagers still walking around the fire. “It took me a while before I realized that I was yearning for something. More than food. That yearning will ruin me. I have half a mind to abandon you and hide myself in the dark forest if not for the fact that I am safest from the world if I was with you and Wilbur. You will make sure to control me.”

I did not like how he had phrased it, but I understood what he meant. I let a moment pass, then I patted his shoulder, like a cat. “That’s right. We will watch out for each other.”

Woodrow smirked. “We haven’t done that in so many years. Looking out for each other. I must have been such a pain in the arse.”

I chuckled. “Yes. Frequently.”

“At first, we protected each other out of duty and necessity. Now… well, I’d like to think this is more. It certainly feels grander.”

The fire roared. We turned our attention back to it. Every so often, faces would look in this direction, waiting eagerly for the strongest members of their village. They brought out crops from their storage shed. The children helped the women pluck feathers out of a goose. They were preparing for supper. Though looking closely at the meat, it looked like a celebration.

“One of the better villages we’ve seen, eh? Very tight-knit,” Woodrow commented.

I just realized. I did not feel the miasma floating around here. I was not sure why that was until I saw how the villagers moved. I squinted and observed how they interacted. There was a trail of warmth here, I felt it hovering and entangling in the air. The villagers of Kent lived for each other. They helped each other survive. Woodrow had told me earlier how Agate put everyone’s skills to good use. I thought about it. Could it be that simple? That believing in community managed to prevent, or at least, postpone the effects of miasma?

The door behind us opened. The villagers snapped to attention as Agate stepped out into the warm fire. Then behind her, the looming figure of Harlan, twice her size. His skin was almost back to its normal brown color. Woodrow and I both withdrew to the shadows behind the door. A collective quiet, then applause, the sounds of good cheer, and the pounding of wooden poles on the dirt.

Harlan waved at them all and grinned. Agate led him down from the porch to the eager crowd. All of the villagers save for the scouts on the towers left the communal fire, abandoning their meal preparations. Agate spoke over them once the noise stopped.

“You all have trusted my father to lead you before his death. I know how scared all of you were when mighty Kent could no longer wield his war axe. Especially now in these darker times.” The villagers, men, women, and children listened to her, not daring to make noise. “I have tried to be strong for you by proving my worth. But I realize now how foolish that was.” Slowly, she looked at Harlan and all the villagers who looked like her finest warriors. I realized that they were the ones resting inside the elder’s house. “We need to depend on each other, now more than ever, if we intend to survive. We know that we each have our strengths and weaknesses. We need to find people that fill in those weaknesses as we hone them.”

Agate stood tall and raised Harlan’s arm. Harlan looked ready, steadily looking at the crowd as Agate shouted the last of her speech. “And so, I have asked strong Harlan here to help me in leading this village, if you will have him. I know that two elders are too much for this small village and that it goes against tradition, but I assure you that we will split the responsibility fairly amongst us and to those that we deem trustworthy. We will make sure to protect you as best we can if you follow us.” She scanned every face there was in front of her before speaking again. “What say you, villagers of Kent?”

They responded as one, cheering louder than before. The ones closest to Harlan and Agate rushed towards them, sweeping beside them, and clapping their backs as they pulled them deeper, the crowd folding over them. They cheered their names, parading them as if they were newlyweds. The children swarmed their legs and giggled as Harlan playfully grabbed them. The women and men congratulated Agate. I heard an old man say that her father would be proud. She smiled a true smile.

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They were already close to the communal fire when Agate said loudly, “Halt! I forgot my manners from all this excitement.” She looked back at us and raised a hand. “We’re having yet another feast, monks! Dine with us!”

Kind faces walked us to rejoin Harlan and Agate near the communal fire, but we insisted on helping prepare the meal. Woodrow went to the pigs while some children handed me a small wicker basket and directed me to the small plot of land where turnips and parsnips were growing.

I walked down the path until I saw a small fenced fertile land that the dark forest provided them. The crops looked healthy enough, but curiously, I placed my finger on the soil. I felt nothing. It seemed that I was too far away from Rothfield to feel Gaelmar’s connection with the land. I shrugged and harvested the ready crops.

Before I brought this to the women, I observed the heart of the festivities; the communal fire. It roared mightier tonight, I imagined, than other past nights. I watched the faces of glee, of laughter, as Woodrow made faces when his hands reached into the open chest of the pig. Harlan held the hands of one elderly woman, listening to her as she patted his face. Older girls were braiding one another’s hair, and a mixture of young girls and boys were playing with blunted wooden sticks. I caught Woodrow looking up at them and smirking.

“Thank you for healing that big oaf,” Agate said from behind me. I startled as she chuckled. “You are easily spooked for someone who just traveled through vines and seen the condition of my brethren.”

She smiled and kept her distance. I had a feeling that she was testing my reflexes, seeing how things worked around here. Her next question confirmed it.

“Woodrow mentioned that there were fighters amongst your brotherhood?”

I chose my words carefully. “Woodrow is one of our better fighters, yes. Though there is one that is mightier than him.” Agate arched a brow. I continued, “Harlan reminds me of him, actually. My big brother. A gentle giant.”

“How fortunate that you have a tank amongst your members and how unfortunate that you have lost him temporarily.”

“A tank?” I asked.

“Someone who can take a lot of beating on a battlefield. Someone who has a lot of strength.”

“He was likely more to raise houses, raise cattle and sheep than be on the battlefield,” I said. “And he was likely more to be diplomatic than end a conflict with brute force. I miss him terribly.”

Agate considered. “A gentle giant, indeed.” Her eyes fell onto the crops I was holding. She looked back at the small plot of land behind me. “We have been blessed for years, thank the Saints.”

Her face was appreciative but uncertain. I should warn her. She seemed to be the type of person who values honesty, as suspicious as she is. And she is no stranger to the mystery of the dark woods. “Elder Agate, there is a blight going around in some parts of the realm. We know this because we have seen it.

“That’s what I’m afraid of.” She bit her lips and looked down. She looked pained. “We have three new additions to the village. Three babes are born following one another. I was thinking of bartering or trading with another village, but with the recent attacks in the form of giant wolves and bandits, I couldn’t send my scouts. My father traded with another village once, but we are not sure if that village still stands. It was years ago.”

Now. I felt a fluttering of warmth in my chest. The words came out of my mouth before I had a chance to organize them. “I would like to invite you back to Rothfield Monastery. The corruption of the crops… it does not stay in our grounds.”

Agate blinked. She pouted, though it looked like a forced placating gesture. “What makes your monastery so special?”

“Would you believe Saint Gaelmar himself cares for the land?”

Her face was careful, but her eyes moved with the thoughts churning behind them. The vines revealed Woodrow to her. The vines revealed me to her. She knew that the dark forest had some connection to us. Her eyes flew to Woodrow, observing once again how odd it was for his features and behavior to be a monk; all smiles and lithe movements and a perfect presence for merrymaking. She then considered me.

“Lift your hood and look at me,” Agate said.

I blinked at her and slowly let my hair free. I looked up for her to scrutinize. She scanned my features, her face firm. But for once I did not fear being judged or mocked. Once she was done, she combed my hair back and arranged my sleeves.

“I shall present you to the village this way, so there is no mystery to our future host. When the time comes, that is. We may very well simply trade with you while we remain rooted here.” Agate shrugged.

“Is it all right?”

“We are not so easily spooked. Besides, you are with me and it is a festive night.”

She encouraged me with a nod and we walked side by side to the communal fire. So close was I to her that I was stepping on her shadow. I traded a look with Woodrow, his glee momentarily gone. He wiped the mess from his hands on the apron they gave him and walked towards us, eyes flying towards any villager who looked frightened.

“He does not have the sickness,” Agate called out to the men. “He was born into the world with these scars. A fighter in the womb!”

A few villagers made soft pleasant noises. Woodrow’s red hair brightened as he came close to the communal fire.

Agate led me to the center. The villagers surrounded me, stopping their preparations to gawk at my face. I let them, though my fingers shook and my knees threatened to give out. “This brother monk had offered us a place in their grounds if we find ourselves hungry. We have always feared that our supplies may not last, but here our new friends offered us hope. Tonight, we not only celebrate Harlan and me, but with Brother Woodrow and Brother Ryne of Rothfield! If not for them, some of us would be buried in the ground.” She looked at Harlan with steady eyes. “If not for them, I would not have the strength to carry on.”

There was joyful noise, and suddenly they were all moving as one again, back to their stations. Only Woodrow and I remained on the fire with Harlan and Agate. Then he was dragged by the arm back to the messy wooden long table with buckets for collecting blood and scraps of meat while someone took the basket of crops from me and rolled them to another round wooden table. The children took turns cutting them. I thought I felt a flicker of warmth course through me as I let the crops go. I also thought that I saw them glow before they were sliced. Hope, Agate said.

I felt it suddenly in this village as the great fire roared. I also felt the love they had for each other. Brotherhood, camaraderie, mutual respect… influenced by Woodrow, yes, I felt his influence here as well. Not his powers, but his natural charm. Hands helped each other up, hands that passed crops and meat. Hands passing cups and bowls of ale. Hands wiping away smudges from little children’s faces.

They brought out a big brass cooking pot from the elder’s house, not unlike the one we had back at Rothfield, but larger, requiring five villagers to place it over the communal fire. They added water to it, then the scraps of meat, then the diced crops. They even had a small treasure of their own; a small barrel of salt that Agate stole from the bandit camp! They added a pinch of it and the villagers smiled warmly looking at the glow of the fire.