I skinned the studded hippo Tyler’s lurvine killed in the middle of the base camp. The thing was a metric ton at least, and it had spikes on its back that raked the ground and tiles as we dragged it in, upping the psychological damage for those in camp.

It only got more intense when I pulled out my machete and cut its head off in one swing, a very necessary step before skinning animals, and then used Separation and levisphere to drain the blood in a gyrating sphere.

Tyler thought it was “dope,” Felio thought it was “fantastic,” and Lithco was probably roiling as he watched from the skies above us, but it didn’t matter. Brexton had spent a solid five minutes eye fucking my soul core from the tree branch he was sitting on the night before, and while he hadn’t looked sense, I had a feeling that Hadrian and the families already had 25 factoids about it.

I needed an excuse for how I knew soulmancy techniques, and the basic need to eat food daily was one of them. So I launched that blood sphere into the forest like a fastball and butchered the beast like a pro before publicly cleansing the meat and throwing both rib racks over a fire in the center of the plaza.

Not five minutes later, the scent and pop of sizzling meat spread through the base camp, capturing the attention of bone-tired elites who had been cooking meat for eight hours without luck.

“The fuck’s up with that?” someone said.

“Witchcraft?” another said, using the word “caragona,” a name rooted in the name of an evil sorcerer from a fairy tale, as Felio quickly pointed out.

“Dunno. Go ask her.”

“Nah, you ask her.”

Then Brexton whistled from behind the cookfire he was sitting at.

Everyone looked at him.

“Hundred hawks if you wanna know,” Brexton said. “Otherwise, you pansy asses have to talk to the chick. Not like she handed out free ingredients all day, or anything.”

I turned and saw a whole stack of untouched items I had traded, from clothing to cookware to multi-tools that I had stacked up and left on the edge of the Mouth. Then, I turned to Brexton with a complex expression, wondering if I should let him profit off these people’s hesitations. Then I remembered who he was, flipped him off, and said, “Fifty hawks." Just for spite. Suddenly, I found myself with over a thousand hawks, a unit of measurement I didn’t understand, and offered it to Tyler.

“Is this enough for rent?” I asked.

He popped the coin sack in his hand a few times, listening to the clack as if to confirm that it wasn’t chocolate coins, and then looked up with the most insane expression I’ve ever seen and said, “Of course not. Get more.”

“You son of a bitch,” I said, slapping his arm. Then I said, “Line up if you paid,” and then I gave each person variations of, “It’s soul cooking. I kept attracting beasts with my eighteen-hour cookoffs, so I bit the bullet and bought a skill.” People asked me what grade of request I used. I told them, “Thousand hawks or fuck off,” expecting that they wouldn’t, but lo and behold, I landed myself another ten thousand hawks as I lied and said it was a gold request.

Tyler looked like Daffy Duck, prepared to dive headfirst into a haystack of gold when I handed it to him and said, “For Mom and Dad.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said, but I knew full damn well that he'd take a fifth at least.

I was about to call him out, but a woman offered me a bottle of something; Aiden rushed up crazily and checked it for GHB and confirmed it was just brandy, and the next thing I knew, I was half a bottle down, buzzing hard, screaming, “Soul cookin’s on me tonight!”

Muted cheers rippled through the campsite, and soon, people were lined up with plates as I served medium rare ribs seasoned with herbs to them on my machete. Once they tasted the meat, I got countless offers to buy it by the pound. I said I would consider it as I joined random campfires with Tyler and Aiden, helping both the shy guys network with powerful people. Before long, we knew enough powerful people to get away with murder.

It was a fun night, and like all good nights with drinking, it eventually got bad. Everyone kept feeding me alcohol, and my body cleansed it so fast I thought I was invincible. And it was that invincibility that led me to flip Kal the bird at his petty little campsite, then pumped my arms as people cheered.

I imagined he was pissed.

I’ll never know because I was piss-drunk and losing control, half a step away from telling Hadrian that he was a blind eight, but his regal doucheatry tanked his rating a high-estimate three. But I didn’t, and that was a good thing. Not an hour later, I stumbled into the woods and shedded my guts like a molting snake before stumbling back. Aiden forced my backpack off so he could set up my tent, and I waited on the ground while they set it up. Then, at some point, Tyler threw me onto my cot as I groaned and asked for Kline, asking, “Where’s Kline… come here, Kline…” as I fought back against the spins.

“Kline’s gone, sis,” Tyler said somewhere on a distant horizon.

“Oh, yeah…” The spins won, and I drifted to sleep.

I publicly proclaimed the next morning that I would never drink again.

The sunlight felt like razor blades, and my head went through waves of pain that seemed to subside mere moments before exploding again.

“You look lovely,” Felio giggled.

“I feel lovely,” I said, clutching my stomach.

“Take this.” She offered me a purple elixir.

“Is it alcohol?” I asked.

“No.”

“Is it water?”

“No.”

“Perfect.” I didn’t ask for more. I just chugged it and choked and nearly puked, but mere minutes later, the pain ended, and my world eased up as the harvesters making morning tea laughed.

“Survives Areswood but can’t handle a few drinks,” was the talk of the camp. I just sneered as I hugged my knees at Felio’s fire, drinking the tea she gave me. It tasted like peaches.

“So?” she asked. “What’s on your agenda?”

“Hmmm… I don’t know. I’ve been thinking about that. I can see pretty far, but people are stretching out really far. So… here’s what I was thinking. I’m going to sell ingredients and elixirs—for information. Turn these harvesters into a sniveling pack of sketchy snitches.” I paused. “On other families, obviously.”

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

“Did I hear a business proposal?” Brexton yelled across the plaza.

“Are you stalking me?” I yelled back.

Brexton laughed. “No offense, Mira, but while you’re certainly worth stalking, it’s not stalking if it’s your job.” He took a drink out of his flask and then stood and stretched. “And when it’s your job, you hear all sorts of whispers about people doing this or that, lighting fires—breaking rules.” He started walking toward me. “And if you were to, say, make a deal with your friendly neighborhood grimwhisper, I suppose every returner with a budget would steer clear of breaking your rules—and every idiot would end up on a list.”

He stopped before me, hands stuffed into the classy jacket he was wearing. The lapels were popped.

“Now wouldn’t they?” he mused.

I gave him a once over to make sure that I wasn’t missing something, then locked eyes with him. “How about this? I’ll make a deal with you… for the right price… for a multi-year, highly lucrative contract—if you release my friend.”

He chuckled with a wide, closed grin. “While I’m honored by your deal, I’m more than satisfied by the fifty million he made me last week.”

My eyes widened.

“You’re gonna have to do a whole lot better to free that man—and it’s not happening any time soon. It’s nothing personal—just business. In the mean~time, why don’t we discuss—”

“I’m going to kick your teeth in if you say one more word,” I warned. “Not today. I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt and guessing you’re freakishly strong.”

“Thank you,” he said quickly.

“But next harvest, the harvest after, five harvests from now when we have a deal… I’m going to kick you fucking teeth in if you don’t leave me alone.”

He smiled amusedly, swiveled on his toes, and walked away, whistling this haunting tune that seared itself in my mind.

“God… what’d I give to insult people like that,” Tyler said, spitting into a cup after brushing his teeth. Just seeing it made me realize that I should teach him Purify and get it over with.

“Don’t get used to it,” I said. “It’s stupid.” Just like that, I embraced my inner pack-a-day smoker aunt and spewed some hypocritical shit to start the day.

Then, I rummaged through the stuff I got yesterday, found a white tarp, plastered it up on my tent, took a smoldering stick from the fire, blew it out, and then used it as a pen to write the following:

“Rule 1: No squatting. Leave the forest once the Harvest ends.

Rule 2: No sadism.

Rule 3: No needless massacres of beasts unless there's a valid reason—otherwise, it’s sadism.

Rule 4: No fire spells. If you can’t fight in a forest without killing your friends in a forest fire—just… die.

Rule 5: No thieving.

Rule 6: No plotting to kill people.

Rule 7: No killing people unless it’s self-defense.

Rule 8: Out of space. No do shit I no like. “

The letters got progressively smaller the more I wrote until I was scratching the last rule, like fine print on the bottom line. Then I looked up and gave a small speech that sounded as follows:

“I like this forest—so don’t be an asshole to it! If you’re don't, and you give me verified information on people who are, I’m liable to give you one of these here rare herbs I picked with Felio yesterday. Spread the word. If you tell someone and they tell me, I’ll give you a finders fee. If you don’t, that’s fine. But if you’re friends with any of the people who are guilty, or I catch you intimidating people into silence, you’re out. It’s a lifelong ban. So help me or suffer permanent problems. That’s all.”

I paused.

“Oh, and if you give me an innocent name, I'll put you on a different list.”

I sat down and pulled out the herbs I got the day before, and the area buzzed to life with snitches snitching all over each other. It got messy, so I fished out a field notebook one of the middle families had traded me and started taking a long list of names. Everything said seemed pretty valid, but there were a few that Brexton casually outed as liars, and those fuckers got on the ground and prostrated like sycophantic swine.

I glared at Brexton, who shrugged as if to say, Everyone hates me—but everyone uses me.

I ignored him and continued my trading for the night, eating leftovers leisurely until people returned to camp and I informed the bad ones of lifelong bans and the mild offenders of their first and only strike. Then I sat around by the fire, refusing to look at alcohol as people swapped stories.

Throughout it all, Kal just glared at me, no doubt thinking sinister thoughts—unaware that his life was ticking down.

Once most people had fallen asleep, but some were still awake, I took Sina on a ride into the forest. Kyro didn't show, but Kline did. I petted him and loved him and whispered my praise. Then I read him a list of names of rule breakers before returning back to camp and falling asleep.

Then the next morning came, and the same things happened, with the exception that Aiden disappeared with four lurvines and a tent and returned with two beasts that almost sparked a riot before he explained that he was a beast tamer who needed to collect beasts as tributes.

The fourth day wasn’t much different for me, but it brought new developments. Aiden showed up with four more beasts, and I heard a group of elites in base camp recalling a grimly fascinating story.

"I'm telling you, Dast. No one saw or heard anything. Not even Tarma."

"That's why we scan."

"We did scan. It just... appeared suddenly. Then everything collapsed. We barely got Ricker out of there."

"Damn... Dalker's gonna be furious. What'd you say it looked like?"

"A cat. I just saw a glimpse of its aura, but I'm pretty sure it was a cat."

The woman interrogating the man turned to Brexton. "You know anything about this?"

My heart raced, preparing to be outted, but Brexton just smiled and said, "I know about cats. This cat? No. Good luck with your story, though. I'm sure Dalker will be pleased."

After the exchange, Brexton winked at me, and I turned away in disgust. I hated that prick.

The fifth came, and there were only seven out of ten beasts under Aiden’s control and it started to make me nervous. But regardless of his tribute, I had already paid mine—and I had something else to do. So, I chose that night to act.

I positioned myself with the Dante family to chat with Tyler’s guard, hugging up on Kal, close enough for Brexton and perhaps Kal to hear as I talked about my plans for the following day.

“Hey, I’m heading out early tomorrow,” I said quietly. “I want you to keep Tyler in the camp.”

“Why?” Hackle asked.

“Because I’m going after a rare herb, but it’s cuttin’ through the herd.”

“How do you know?”

“‘Cause it’s on the way to the river and that place was packed when I was there. I’m sure you could handle a third ev, but I’m not risking my brother’s life on it.”

Hackle furrowed his brow and looked at me, and found my face serious. “And you can?” he asked.

“Of course not. I run. But I’m rolling with a pack of third evs and have enough umph to maim one. There’s a big difference.”

He thought about it. “You do understand that Kalas is a Grand Alcian, right?”

“Grand Alchy… what?”

“Grand Alcian. He’s one of the greats. If both of us are there, Tyler’s safe.”

“Not if other families intervene,” I whispered. “And you know this…. I have enemies.”

He nodded reflectively. “That you do.”

“So keep him here. Promise?”

“It’s up to Kalas.”

“Keep him here,” I said colder.

“It’s up to Kalas,” he said harder. But he added, “But I’ll try,” softer.

“Good enough.”

Throughout the whole exchange, Kal’s eyes were burning a hole in my back. Twenty minutes later, he spoke to Brexton and handed the cocky asshole a bag of coins.

The pieces were in play. Now, it was just a matter of setting the trap.