It’s dark again, I see a friend of mine, a friend from class.

“Oh, it’s him, he’s alive!” I think out loud, but then he comes up to me and says “No”.

We walk down the path to school, he has sad eyes, red eyes. No that’s not him, it’s… the girl with the eye patch, she has the same eyes, is she going to jump? She stands on a ledge, alone, she can’t stand the loneliness, I can’t let her do it! “Co@@ b@ck” my voice cracks, I can’t talk, I can’t utter a word. She falls, I can see the ground coming closer through her eyes. It’s getting closer and-

Bang

I banged my head on the bottom of the top bed. Uhhh, it smarts…

“Fren, is that you?” I woke Grey above me.

“Yeah, bad dream, sorry if I woke you.”

“It’s alright, it’s morning already.” Oh, that’s true, the sunlight beams enter through the crack in the window and land right on Klem’s face, he somehow powers through and sleeps soundly.

“Grey,Let’s go and exercise again?”

“That training thing? I think I’m still sore from the last time.”

“Come on, you gotta do it everyday, it’s the only way to get stronger.”... silence…

“Fine, let’s go.” I knew that would get him to do it. It’s a fine day outside, the dew on the grass is a bit annoying but it feels better than going in full boots.

I oughta go soft on him, let’s do 20 squats, some pushups, situps and… he doesn’t look like he can take any more, and we barely finished one set. “Come on Grey, you can do this! A little more!” I thought I’ll be going easy but it ended up being more than he could take… well, at least it will make him more hungry for breakfast. Speaking of which, I think I saw the innkeeper going by with a basket that had some vegetables in it. “Alright, let’s go have breakfast. No need to tire yourself too much.”

Eggs and bread, and some bell peppers on the side. It’s not fancy, but it’s good, and Klem woke up early enough to join us.

“This is great!” Klem chows it down as if he hadn’t eaten for a week, I think I saw a faint smile from the innkeeper after his complement. “So… what are we going to do next?”

Next… I want to go to the archer’s house, she might be there, and even if not we might learn something. “What are you going to do next, Klem?”

“Me? What do you mean? Are you guys not going to Mandoza?” He looks at me and Grey with a confused look.

“Yeah, I thought we were.” Grey joins Klem and stares at me confused too, “Oh, is this about your archer crush?”

“The one that guard said has red eyes yesterday? Fren you should not mess with that.”

“You guys are being paranoid, what could her eyes do to me? Besides, she helped us and we need to thank her.” They both give me an odd look “And it’s not a crush.”

“Well… whatever we are, you and I need to get to Mandoza, did you forget what Allous told us?”

“I remember her telling you to accompany me-”

“She’s probably a demon or something, Fren.”

“And are you not a priest?”

“...”

“Excuse me, what about me?” Oh, I forgot about Klem… He doesn’t need to stay with us.

“You can go back.” I reach for my purse.

“Go back? Even if I wanted that wouldn’t-” before he finishes the sentence I take out a bunch of silver coins.

“Here, you can buy a horse, we can continue on foot, it shouldn’t be too far. I think we can do it in under a week.”

They are both silenced, Klem looks at my hand full of silver coins, and Grey looks me straight in the face. The innkeeper behind the pots and pens also peeks at the coins but goes back to whatever he does behind there.

“Fren, I think… this is a bad idea, what if we end up fighting a demon, and not the fun ‘grant you three wishes’ kind?”

“I understand that, but she needs our help.”

He sighs, then smiles, then whispers “You’re an idiot.” thanks… I guess. “Do you know where she is?”

“The innkeeper told me where she used to live, we can go there right now.”

Grey stands and points at the innkeeper behind the pots. “You did this!” The innkeeper hides his face.

“Umm… I didn’t finish eating.” That’s right, Grey and I finished eating already but someone here really likes the inn food. I leave the money on the table.

“Let’s go!”

“Aren’t you taking your sword?”

“Nahh, she doesn’t live there anymore anyway.”

East toward the town hall, then pass it north and keep going, there should be a house with wind chimes. I didn’t really realize what he meant but it has a bunch of wind chimes, of all sorts. It looks abandoned though.

“As a priest we can’t break in or steal anything.”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

“It’s empty though, and judging by the dust I can see from the windows it must have been empty for a long time.”

“I don’t know if that- hey, don’t just ignore me, at least knock first.”

I enter through, it’s a small house, the birch wood still holds, but it was neglected for… I’m no construction worker, I can only tell it’s a long time. “This is where she lived? How long ago, though?” I ask aloud to myself.

“I don’t know, demons can live for hunderds of years.”

“There are two beds here.”

“There would be a thousand more if you would give one to every maggot.” Grey laughs at his own joke. Eww, the bed is filled with worms. I think I just saw a rat running at the corner. There’s a hole in the corner that hogs probably use, or other small creatures.

“This place must have been abandoned a long time ago, maybe the neighbors will know something.” I think we should ask the neighbors, the ‘current residents’ are too disgusting to interact with.

“I’ll tell them the joke about the maggots.” Grey rushes over outside. I follow him but behind me comes a voice.

“Who are you?” It’s her! I turn and she stands right in front of me, she has a serious face, one that makes me feel she’s angry, or upset with me for some reason. Maybe I should have knocked anyway… “What do you want from me?”

“I just wanted to say thanks… for earlier, with the bandits.” she looks away. Is she… blushing? No but her expression softened, it may even have been a small curl of the lips for a split second before she returned to the frown default.

“Whatever, are you guys demon hunters? Did you come for me?”

“Are you really a demon?” When I ask her that she looks me in the eyes with the same eyes I remembered.

“I’m not a demon!”

“Fren, are you coming?” Grey is calling me from the outside.

“Stay away from me, and don’t hurt the people around here. You better just leave before you cause trouble.” She says that and turns around.

“Wait, where are you?”

“Stay away!” she says before walking away, oh that’s how she entered, there was a back door.

“Fren, are you here? Fren! What are you staring at? I’ll let you tell the maggots joke if you want to, just come.”

The neighbors didn’t know anything, they moved in after the previous residents were killed by bandits. The Damians again, they really are a plague to this village. Is this why she helped us with the bandits earlier? Does she protect the village… but the guard said she used to be with them. This is a bit much, I want to think about this more after we go back to the inn but even before we enter we can hear noises.

“This is not enough, stupid. Three pebbles? For the entire week?” We enter and we see three nasty looking men with red scarves, Damians. The innkeeper and Shaila are being blackmailed for money, this is probably why they needed the money, we did help them but I guess the Damians are a greedy bunch.

“Who are these? You actually have customers?” One of the three thugs turns around to me and Grey. An ugly face that’s too synonymous with rude barbarians, and he sprays while talking in a way that makes me wish he had worn his scarf over his mouth. “How about you hand over your money too?”

“Sure I’ll cover what the innkeeper can’t pay.” I almost reach for my purse but I’m interrupted by their laugh.

“I don’t think he understands what you asked of him, hahahah.” His friend laughs with him and turns to me. “Linden’s pay is his, you pay all your money and scram!”

“You pay up too, we said five.” The third thug is trying to pull money out of the inn keeper in the meantime.

“Please, we need to live off something, we won’t be able to feed ourselves.” the inn keeper is begging, his wife behind him scared senseless and doesn’t know what to do, her eyes meet ours. She’s asking for help, I remember she said they hurt him last time, she must be afraid it’ll happen again.

“What if you had to only feed one? Will that make it easier?” The thug takes out a knife from his pocket… is he going to? I need to-

Bam

Grey punched one of the bandit’s in front of us! Straight in the face too. What a shock. He acted before I could react.

“Ow ow, ahhh.” He shakes his fist. “Leave them alone!” He quickly switches to a facade of a hero. The bandit holds his face with his hand, blood dripping between his fingers, a broken nose? I hope so. Either way it took the attention of all three, the innkeeper and his wife are safe for now.

One of the other bandits takes a step forward to us. “You guys feeling brave? Hu-” this time I interrupt him. I remember how it felt the first time I used the axe, I feel the same thing from the armor, the… fangs adornments in particular. The power flows from them to me, to my chest and back and to my hand and clenched fingers. It’s fast too, or maybe everything else is slow for a moment. Either way it knocks the bandit down, more than knocking him down, launching him to the floor. I think I broke a floorboard. The bandit is no doubt knocked out.

“You bastar-” the one still standing almost acts without thinking but then backs down.

“The priest hit me? You’re done, I don’t care who you-” His buddy who began thinking clearly stops him.

“Hey, I think this guy is for real. Let’s go”

“What? Damian will kill us if we let a loser like this scare us.”

“This guy might kill us too, let’s get out of here.” I just began noticing, my face is super serious, I can’t tell if I’m scary but the bandits sure think so.

They both drag the one knocked out by his feet and exit, passing me and Grey on their way out. “You’ll hear from us, this means war.” says the one with the broken nose. I’d like to see them try.

The innkeeper and his wife get up. “Bobby, Bob are you alright, they didn’t hurt you did they?”

“No, I’m fine, Shaila. They didn’t hurt me.” Bob, I never asked his name come to think of it. “Thank you, both of you! I don’t know if they’ll come back but for now we’re safe.”

“Grey actually punched him first, that was amazing Grey!” Grey looks at me, still shaking his hand.

“Yeah, you know, gave ‘em the ol’ ‘what for’, no big deal.” He makes a boxing gesture like a tough guy would. I bet he wants to pray for healing but is afraid of looking like a wimp right now.

“If you want to stay again you’re welcome. I’m sorry for the price we gave you last time-” Shaila apologizes.

“That’s alright, we just like helping people, right Fren?” Grey smirks, and hides his swollen hand behind his back.

“Yeah, that’s right.” I smile back

“Oh, yeah, the girl, did you find her?”

“No, but we found maggot in her beds, not the best for cuddles but I guess to each his own.” Grey makes a different joke, I thought he’ll shoot for the one with the amount of beds, probably decided to freshen it up after the cold reaction from the neighbors. He’ll probably think of a new one after neither Bob nor Shaila had even a chuckle.

I think maybe I should tell him I met her but… She looked angry and asked us to leave her alone. But I don’t think she actually wants to be alone… It’s so difficult to decide, I don’t want to leave her alone but I might not have a choice.

“You must stay for dinner, our treat… although we’re paying with your money.” Shaila awkwardly makes herself feel worse about the surcharge again.

“We actually need to go, right? We looked for her and we didn’t find her. Any more is just looking for trouble.” Grey hints me it’s time to go.

“Yeah, I guess we need to pack our things and go.” I can’t help but feel like I’m abandoning her. I know she needs someone, but I don’t know if I can help her.

The sword, the shield, the rations, I remember how to forage and hunt but Grey packs a bunch of food, and it can’t be meat because that will spoil too quickly. I’ll teach him what Rodrick taught me. We need to go to the stable at the edge of town, looking for another carriage to take us, but we’ll probably just need to walk by foot. That’s fine, it’s on our way anyway, and if Grey can ride a hor-

“Umm… Fren… we have a visitor.” Grey wakes me up from daydreaming.

There are no people on this side road to the stable. Only me, Grey and the red eyed archer.