There was an odd silence following her as she gathered her arrows. She was lucky, none of them had broken. Bertold was still trying to digest a Tier 1 with a Skill Level of 11. You didn’t get that till you were well into Tier 2, if not later. What else had she not been telling him? What had he failed to ask? He looked over at her sorting the arrows in her quiver.

Cassidy was deliberately taking things slow. She had moved out of order in battle. She didn’t use teamwork. Even a loner like her knew the line she had crossed. She didn’t want to meet Bertold’s eyes.

He noted she was taking longer than usual to restore her weapons, but didn’t want to ask. His mind was all awhirl, working to fit his image of the petulant child he’d grown to dislike with the highly capable young woman before him. He noticed her brown hair had fallen like a shield around her face; masking her eyes from his. It occurred to him this might not have been an accident and he in turn studied his boots. Even all of the dust from past days couldn’t hide the new black shine popping out in patches, indicating how recently he had bought them. This wasn’t supposed to be a long trip. But that wasn’t her fault. He’d decided to examine the territory. He agreed to answer her questions and he allowed for her to join him on the way back—even slowing down to give her an easy pace. Maybe the petulance hadn’t been on her part.

He thought of all those times she’d used that bow, every action her dogs had taken, that Level 11 Skill. You didn’t get there on your own by being an idiot. Had he ever bothered asking her questions? You didn’t survive in those woods by being weak. He never even asked her how long she’d been here. How had she reached Tier 1 without help? Why was he expecting her to have Attributes it took people years to advance? Maybe it was time to broker peace and admit she wasn’t a penny-pinching hermit bent on making his every decision hell. Yeah, he heard how bad that sounded now.

She was rubbing her face before finally retying her pony tail and facing him directly. “I’m sorry.” Her voice was more subdued then he was use to and it caught him off guard; stealing the words from his mouth. She continued. “I know I should have waited for you but I’m just so used to making these decisions on my own and… I guess I’ve grown a little arrogant.” The last part came out as a whisper and she couldn’t meet his eyes. Instead they tracked the dense woods off to the side.

He took a moment to recalibrate his thoughts and remember what she had to be sorry about. That was… bad. A really dangerous mistake. But young warriors often made mistakes. Stupid ones too. He sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. This would be even tougher than he thought but he was the experienced one. He was supposed to lead.

“You made a mistake. It was bad. Very dangerous.” He took a breath to keep control and remember he was trying to be kind. “But you’re new. You’re still learning to fight. You’ve never fought with others before—in fact, how long have you been fighting?”

She looked back at him her mouth a little open. Where was this all coming from? “It’s just over 6 weeks now.” He blinked owlishly.

6 weeks and Skill Level 11? What had she been doing this whole time? He remembered her bear story and shivered. That was not enough time for anyone to face a bear. Forget young warrior, she was a downright baby! He felt a little sick at some of the things he’d said to her. Off course she didn’t know anything.

“But you already know what you did wrong and most don’t even want to admit that.” He thought to himself. He didn’t want to admit that. “If I’d admitted to myself your skill with the bow, I wouldn’t have been so negligent but I’ve been too focused on your Tier 1 status and forgot that you were an—”

“—Initiate?” She cut in with a grin. “and Initiates are weird.”

“Right.” He nodded. “You’re very weird. So, I’m sorry too. Because I haven’t been very forgiving of that either. I just keep on expecting you to be this lame Tier 1 better off at home when in fact…” He looked like he was sucking on something sour. “You’re a very capable young fighter who’s never been to this world. An Initiate.” She was smiling now. The sun reflecting off her green eyes to light up her whole face. He still wanted to smear it with mud for what he was about to say next. “I did agree to answer your questions when you let me examine your property and I haven’t been doing a very good job of that.” He paused but she didn’t have anything to add on. She just kept smiling. He continued. “So, in honor of that agreement and respect for my sanity, I am willing to accept any questions once we set out in the morning until noon. Deal?”

“Deal!” She practically burst forth to shake his hand and for the first time he noticed how soft hers were and frowned. Very few calluses had formed. Her life until now had to have been very kind.

They worked together to drag the wolves from the road while Koda and Sugarbear waited, panting in the heat. Cassidy eyed the sun but it was already past noon.

Over the next three days, the treaty held. He’d set the camping spot; Cassidy would do the cooking and they split the watch. Then, once they were on the road again, Cassidy would bring out her questions. To be fair, they were evenly spaced. It’s not like she was a chatter box, but by noon Bertold would be weary to the bone. Being short on sleep didn’t help any.

It was the fifth day now and Cassidy was silent for most of the morning. It was almost noon when something finally occurred to her.

She broke the silence. “I thought credits wouldn’t allow you to buy your way through a bottleneck.”

“They don’t.” He said tersely, hoping the sun would move a little faster. Maybe he shouldn’t have said noon. Noon was half a day! Maybe he should have just said 10 minutes. Yeah, 10 minutes of questions sounded much better. He wiped the sweat from his brow as he looked up at the sun. Still not noon.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

“Then why was I able to buy my dogs past 5 on Attributes?”

A sigh. “One! VERY, very, very rarely buy attributes. It’s better to build them up on your own. Which makes it’s easier to get through Bottlenecks when you’re used to pushing yourself like that. Two! The Bottlenecks start at 10 and then go on every 10 until you hit 30 then its every 5.”

She paused remembering her windfall of 3,000 credits and gave herself a pat on the back. Good thing she never spent them. “Then why did my Resilience catapult from below 5 to past 10 after we fought that bear?”

Bertold grit his teeth. Be kind, he reminded himself. Be kind. “Because you fought a bear!" Maybe less loud and more nice. "That’s work enough to get you through ANY bottleneck.”

“Oh.”

When Bertold turned around to reply in a softer tone he froze. She turned to see what he was looking at. A group of four in black armor were galloping towards them in the distance. Her bow came up automatically and Eagle Eye let her zoom in close to see their helmets. As she sighted down her bow into the eye openings of their armor, she had a cold realization, she didn’t mind killing. Her morality had made a definite shift toward violence.

“What are you doing?!” Bertold jumped and pulled her bow down, she loosed an arrow into the dirt. It split as it hit the hard ground.

“What do you mean, what am I doing?” She asked, turning back toward him.

“We don’t know if they’re friendly or not!” He was exasperated.

“By the time we find out they could have killed us!” She turned fully to meet his startled eyes.

He began shaking his head in astonishment. “You’re more than a little blood thirsty, aren’t you?”

“If that’ll keep us alive, then yes I am.” She said grimly.

He shook his head and pointed “Look.” They’d come close enough to get a better look at their armor. A crest was embossed on their chests. The black armor encompassed them each as a whole and gleamed under the sunlight. They must be cooking inside there, she thought. Her arrows would’ve been a mercy. Bertold continued, “That’s the mark of the city. You nearly killed city officials! Next time wait a little before you start swinging that thing around.”

“Oh.” Her face had gone a little white. Killing people sounded like a bad idea now. She was such a child. Why did she flip flop like this? Was it an Initiate thing? But first, “How am I supposed to tell when they're enemies? I’m an archer. If I let them get too close, I’m dead.”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. As I told you before, I don’t deal in archery."

She wanted to ask him about the her new found violent streak but her face heated and she couldn’t bear to say the words. He’d already seen her ready to murder. But apparently, that wasn’t strong enough motivation for her to actually ask the question. She was surprised by how calm he was about her mistake. Was killing really that common that her actions only startled him a little? Maybe her new morality matched his. That was a scary thought.

They waited together as the group of what she assumed to be knights approached them, only now the group was at a much friendlier pace.

"Be careful around knights. It's well known their Dueling Skill Set allows them to identify bloodlust or sense how much blood is on a prson's hands.” He paused to look at her. "And I'm not talking about a beasts blood."

"What other Skills do knights have?" Bertold just shook his head. They were both left sweating in the sun as they waited. Her dogs panting heavily. It was too hot today. When the knights were finally a few paces away they stopped and took of their helmets, not a drop of sweat to be seen. How were they not boiling? They dismounted and lined up to face the two travelers.

Cassidy looked them over. The first to dismounted seemed to be the leader as the others came down simultaneously at his signal. He was also the shorter of the four but that didn’t say much when they were all easily six foot. The second one was an intense looking woman. Her skin was flawless and raven hair cut to framed her eyes. They were purple! Was that a thing here? People’s eyes could be purple? Or did it signify something else? Cassidy glanced over the knights' clean faces and spotless armor and she became all too aware of her current state. Muddy pants with a bloody, sweat stained shirt that had been mended in a dozen places. Dirt on her face and in her hair from the last night few nights and a clear scent of unwashed human and dog wafting up into the air.

As her embarrassment grew, she realized she’d missed everything spoken but the last introduction and she wasn’t sure wherein that title was the actual name. With a little bit of dread, she cleared her throat. “I’m afraid I’m a little lost on etiquette. Would you mind telling me what I should call each of you?” Her cheeks were bright red. It managed to draw a smile from each of the knights. The woman moved first, stepping forward.

“I’m Shakira Adal, but you are more than welcome to call me Shakira.” Cassidy nodded, her eyes flying down to her boots. Bertold was watching now in outright fascination. Where had this shy, cowed girl come from? He could hardly reconcile her with the one that faced down a pack of wolves Tiered above her and drove him to near insanity every day.

The other’s stepped forward one by one. “I’m Heber Fremont, please just call me Fremont.” He spoke quickly to get it out of the way.

The next introduced himself much more gently with a smile to mimic Sharika’s. This was lost on Cassidy as she couldn’t tell from the view of here shoes. “I’m Aldaric Edel, call me Edel.”

There was a pause for the last. “Norcross. You can call me Norcross.” He’d been the first to dismount.

She heard where each of the voices were coming from so the introductions weren’t lost on her even if she was too embarrassed to look up from the ground. At least she managed to gather the courage at the very end and glanced up to see Norcross speak. She met his gaze. Eye level. Just like how everyone’s should be. Bertold kept looking back between them, this odd look on his face. She turned to glare at him. “What?” He just shook his head and seemed to be inspecting the woods. “Nothing.”

Bertold then stepped forward and gave their own introductions. He never bothered with last names. She made a note to ask him why that was later.

Norcross took another glance at them before offering, “It looks like we’re not far from the city. It’s about time my troupe slowed down to rest, why don’t you travel with us? It’ll make camping that much safer.”

Bertold was quick to jump on the idea. Getting a half night’s sleep due to sentry duty had left them both ill-tempered and their relationship had enough frictions. Besides the extra sleep, there were now plenty of buffers between Cassidy and him, in case he ever needed a break from those questions he promised her under the best of intentions. Which was, admittedly, always.

With that, Fremont and Norcross mounted back up but Sharika and Edel stayed down to chat with their new companions. They were terribly interested in Cassidy’s dogs. They’d never seen anything like them. The hound dogs they knew never filled out to be quite that massive. Cassidy was still tongue tied though so she left more than a little of the explaining to Bertold. Only jumping in when he sent her a look that clearly read ‘I don’t know.’ Though Cassidy wasn’t sure why he kept rubbing her face in her status as an Initiate by constantly sharing it with the knights. She just focused on keeping her head down and waited for the torture to end.