(Year 997, 16th of Full Inji, 10:22PM)

I wasn't sure, now that I was thinking about it, how I'd managed to make my way through the forest when I ran away from home. I'd made use of [Indulge] to block out the world and just run, letting my instincts guide me, but...

Sitting here now, camped in the forest in the dead of night, I couldn't figure out how I'd gotten anywhere by just running. The forest around us was almost as dark as the sky above them. I'd been thinking, on the walk, that the elves must have been able to see well in the dark if they were going to keep walking through it. That wasn't long before the lead elf had instructed his team to set up camp for the night, though, so I must've been wrong about their night vision.

On the other hand, maybe the elves were just getting tired... both things could be true, for all I knew.

Whatever the reason was, we'd stopped for the night, and the elves had set up their camp. It was an odd camp setup, though - I'd heard stories of elves sleeping in trees, but I'd always thought they were just made-up. After all, why would elves sleep in trees when the ground was perfectly fine? What would be the point?

Here I was, though, up on one of the thickest branches of a particularly large tree, so apparently those stories were true after all.

I was also, unfortunately, tied to the branch I was supposed to be sleeping on. Faen, who had caught and carried me, had been the one to tie me up. While he did, the lead elf had spouted something off about not wanting me to fall out of the tree, but...

Well, honestly, I had been kind of worried that I would fall out of the tree if I moved too much and shook my branch too hard. The branch was thicker than one of my legs, and probably twice as long as I was tall, but that still didn't leave much room for me to catch my balance if I started to fall.

I still thought he just wanted an excuse to tie me up so I couldn't run off, though. Even if trying to "run off" from these high tree-branches would probably just mean a long, painful fall.

Being tied to a large tree branch wasn't the most comfortable thing in the world, sure, but all things considered... this was kind of peaceful. In a weird way, I was actually in less danger than I'd been before the elves had captured me; they seemed serious about bringing me home, so they would probably protect me from anything that tried to get in their way by taking me or hurting me. I didn't really need to do anything, either, and I didn't need to worry about falling, so I could actually just lay back for a while. I could listen to the rustling of the leaves and the occasional chirping of night-time birds, I could look up and try to see the light of the moondance peeking through the leaves, and I could even try to get some sleep.

As for sleep, though, I wasn't sure 'try' was the best word for that situation, or the worst word. I really, really should've been sleeping, all things considered, but...

It was weird to think that it had been a full day since I ran away, in part, because that meant I'd been awake for a full day. It had been the middle of the night, if not later, when I left the village, and now it was nearly the middle of the night again, probably.

And yet, somehow, I wasn't tired.

I was strapped down to a branch so I couldn't get up, and all I could really do was look up at the branches blocking the sky, so I should absolutely have been falling asleep, but... I wasn't. I was just awake. I could probably make myself sleep if I wanted, using [Indulge], since I knew that had worked before, but on the other hand, that might not be the best idea.

I was waiting for someone, after all.

Eventually, with the sound of creaking branches to announce their presence, someone finally did come for me... but not the person I'd been expecting.

The elf woman who'd carried me for the last leg of the trip, the one who'd asked if I wanted to be free, hadn't said much more than that. All she'd said was that if I kept quiet and waited, she would help me.

It wasn't an elf woman who approached me, though, dropping smoothly down from a neighbouring branch with a kind of balance I'd never be able to copy with all the Dexterity in the world. I could tell by the barely-lit shape of his shoulders and chest that the elf visiting me had to be a man, but it wasn't until he asked, "You still awake, little bastard?" that I finally recognized him by voice - Faen, the elf who'd finally caught me when I was still running.

I'd been thinking about what I'd ask the elf woman when she came, but a visit from this guy was throwing me off-guard, and I wasn't sure how to answer. He waited for a moment, crouched over me, but then he moved like he was about to get up, and I didn't want that, so I whispered, "Yeah?"

It was the first thing that came to mind.

That stopped Faen from moving, and after a moment he crouched down lower. "So you are. Good. Makes this easier. Now tell me - how would you like to go free?"

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Now I was absolutely confused. It was one thing for some random lady elf to want to free me, but why was the guy who'd caught me asking about letting me go?

Not wanting that question to go without an answer, I decided that I wasn't going to let this pass without asking questions, and I started with this: "Is that an offer?"

Faen snorted, and then he chuckled - a weirdly pleasant sound, almost musical, considering what it followed and who it came from. "You bet your first finger it is, boy, and it's not an offer you're gonna get from anyone else. Limited-time, too... clock's ticking, so you'd better think fast."

"Aedan." I was surprised by another voice interrupting the conversation, even if - as I reminded myself - it was a voice only I could hear. Shimmer continued, "Something is wrong with this man. He is abnormal, in a way that I almost recognize, and that cannot mean anything good. Be cautious."

That worried me, of course, but it was all the more reason to ask questions. Not wanting Faen's offer to 'run out of time', I cut right to the question that seemed to matter most: "Why help me?"

For a moment, it looked like a patch of Faen's face had started to glow, but then my sight corrected itself - Faen was smiling, thinly, and a sudden shaft of moonlight was catching his teeth. "I don't want to say too much about that, so let's just put it down to... People like you and people like me, we're different but similar, and I think we ought to help each other out. You're gonna be a nice little thorn in the side of some people I don't like overmuch, and when it comes to that sort of thing, I say..." Faen leaned in, whispering this last part more intensely: "The more the merrier."

Seeming to realize that he was getting a bit creepy, Faen pulled back and asked one more time, "So... you in, kid?"

I wasn't even sure how to respond to that. I wanted to say yes, of course I wanted to say yes, but it was hard to say that willingly when what Faen was so clearly... wrong. Not to mean it was incorrect, because I didn't know that for sure, but if he only wanted to let me free to cause problems for someone else -

That was as far as that thought went before Faen perked up, taking my attention. "Well... time's up, I guess." He leaned back in. "Think on it a bit longer... maybe I'll be back later."

With that, he leapt away as quickly and easily as if it were no effort at all, just the way he'd landed, and he was out of sight.

Shimmer chimed in to say, "Something is coming," but that was all the time she had before another elf took Faen's place.

This elf was a woman, I could tell by her moonlit outline, and when she leaned down to whisper to me, I was certain I recognized her voice as the voice of the elf who'd carried me earlier. "Alright, kid. Time to go."

I felt one of her hands press down on me, while the other started fiddling with the ropes around me, setting me free. I had to think then, for a moment - were she and Faen working together? Did they know about each other? That didn't seem right... if they knew about each other, Faen wouldn't have run off when the lady elf approached.

Should I tell her about Faen, then? Just to see what she would say?

I thought about it, but... something told me that was a bad idea. I should wait until I was on the ground, at least, to make sure I could actually get free before possibly getting wrapped up in any complications between them.

It was with that in mind, as the ropes came loose from me, that I asked, "Can you help me down?"

The elf woman nodded. "Holding you over my shoulders again will be the easiest way. Hold onto me, it will be... bumpy."

'Bumpy' wasn't exactly the right word, but it was close enough. I managed not to fall off the branch before the woman picked me up and held me over her shoulders, so that was a good start, but as it turned out, she needed both hands free in order to climb down the tree properly. She needed to be extra careful, too, since she seemed pretty burdened by my weight. Certainly more burdened than Faen seemed, earlier in the day, when he carried me for what must've been hours.

This meant I had to wrap myself awkwardly around her body, as best as I could, and hold tight to avoided bumping or shifting too much, since distracting the elf or throwing her balance off might've caused us both to fall.

It was kind of impressive, honestly, that we both made it down to the ground in one piece. A few branches and a braced fall later, though, we were both down. The elf woman was panting, clearly tired out by carrying me down, but we were both alive and well, so all told, we'd gotten exactly what we wanted.

"Alright, child," began the elf woman, "This is where we part ways. Your village ought to be that way-" She pointed into the forest, seemingly at random, "So if you run in any other direction, you ought to get somewhere safer than this. I'll lead my crew in the wrong direction, and then we'll... I don't know. I'll buy you some time, I hope, and the rest will be up to you."

The elf woman turned to walk away, or maybe jump back up into the trees, but before she could, I felt a need to ask, "...Why did you help me?"

The elven woman was silent for a moment, and then she asked, "You are the son of Omar, yes? Son of the Kingsbane?"

I nodded. "Yeah... I mean, I don't really know what my dad did to get that title, if you're going to ask about that, but... that's me."

The woman shook her head. "No, child, it is simply..." She turned back to me. "It was your father who asked me to help you. The elves of the forest... he is known to us, and among us he has friends. When he heard that a party of elves was hired to pursue you, he came alone to us - to some of us - and asked for our help. He asked... that you be allowed to escape, because bringing you home would put you in deeper danger than the wilderness." She stepped forward, and as the moonlight caught her face, I could see something in her eyes... annoyance? Distrust? "Why is that, child?"

On the one hand, it was reassuring that Dad was still... "looking out for me" might be a stretch, but he was still on my side, in a way. Trying to help me from a distance. I'd worried that he might hate me after what had happened, and for all I knew, maybe he did, but if he was asking the Elves to pass up money for the sake of helping me...

Did that mean I could trust this woman with the truth about why the Bishop wanted me, though?

I didn't get a chance to find my answer to that question, and I didn't get a chance to answer the elf, either. Instead, Shimmer suddenly called out, "Aedan, something is wrong,"

And then I heard a thump.

In the faint moonlight, I could see the elf woman's eyes widen. Her question forgotten, she brushed past me to check something - whatever had made that sound, probably. I turned, trying to follow her with my eyes, and saw what seemed at first to be a large lump, suddenly lying there on the forest floor.

As the elf woman approached, though, knelt down next to it, gasped, and began to turn it over, a shift in the moonlight revealed to me exactly what she was seeing:

The body of one of her fellow elves, fallen down from the branches above, stained with red.