I’d do Leon’s favor while Kishar looked for a way to get to the town the slavers had mentioned, then we’d gather up Casper and see if we couldn’t muster up some money. I think that part was my job as well. I was initially wary of Kishar going off on his own. What if he got kidnapped? We didn’t know anything about this town or the people in it. I couldn’t stop thinking about the ship and the witch and their kindness and what they had done to us. But, Kishar kicked up a fuss about how he had been living on his own here longer than I had, he also said that if Casper could go off on her own then he should be able to as well. I felt the headache returning.

  Kishar left shortly after we finished our mini-planning session. On the way out, I didn’t miss the way he very blatantly ‘stumbled’ head first into the guy in the apron, hand reaching into his pocket. I bolted upright, reaching for my dagger in case something happened. Thankfully, the man just set him right and patted him on the back, sending him on his way. I caught Kishar’s eye and made a ‘what the hell man’ gesture. He shrugged helplessly and skulked out of the room.

  As I waited for Leon and Vakari, I idly wandered over to the stage, grabbing that green embroidered vest someone had left. I don’t know why I did it, but nobody stopped me. Besides, folded up it fit perfectly into the pocket of my flowy pants. Like it was meant to be there.

  They left me waiting for at least another hour. ‘Meet me’ usually meant ‘I’m going to be there already, you can find me there’ not ‘I’ll show up when I feel like it.’ By the fifty minute mark, I began to worry how Kishar got all that food, and if he had paid or not. Maybe Leon had. Apron Guy didn’t seem too worried. He should’ve been considering the python wiggling around in there but he didn’t need to know about that yet. By an hour I was trying to play twenty questions with Raphael just for something to do. He told me he was going to do horrible things to my mother and I gave up, finally staring at the ceiling and counting the wooden slats. My thoughts turned paranoid from minute seventy onward. I needed to do more, to do better. If I couldn’t learn the laws, to weave, fight, or survive then I wasn’t just putting my life or ability to get home in danger, I was also putting Kishar and Casper at risk. Raphael I didn’t care about so much, but they mattered. I needed to be doing more if not for me then for them. That was usually where my mind went in the absence of something to do.

  “What, what are you doing here?” I nearly shot out of my own skin. Leon was sitting in Kishar’s seat, cutting incredibly thin slices off of the arrayed vegetables to slide under her mask. When my heart stilled and my ears stopped ringing, I felt more than a little annoyed.

  “You told me to come!”

  “I, I meant after you had rested. You took quite the beating! I can’t conceive of why you would actually come directly over.” I wanted to crack my hand against her stupid mask.

  “You said to! And I wanted to check on Kishar!” She whispered something I couldn’t hear, jamming another piece of tomato beneath her mask. I realised she hadn’t been eating the food on the table at all, she was pulling it from the pocket of her winter coat. I shuddered.

  “Well, well no matter. It’s time to cash in that favor.” She stood and began moving towards the door.

  “Hold on.” I said firmly, causing her to turn, wide eye-holes fixed directly on mine. “What am I doing?”

  I had to harvest honey. That was it. Apparently the work would take more than just the two of them to handle, so they figured an extra pair of hands would be just what they needed. Bird-Guffin was right. Leon, I learned, was an alchemist. When I didn’t react with the level of shock expected, she repeated herself loudly. I had committed a bigger social faux pas than I realised.

  According to Raphael, alchemists were one of the rarest and most sought after professions in the world. Only topped by enchanters. And I had stumbled across one in a relatively unknown podunck town on the furthest outskirts of Luden. I wanted to ask if she was a good alchemist, but that felt like a bad idea considering I would soon be relying on her for his safety in the presence of bees. I wondered if bees in Vintreth and bees on Earth were the same. Raphael was my translator, he was supposed to associate words with the closest Earth synonym (unless one didn’t exist in my mind) but it didn’t necessarily mean they were exact matches. She coughed and I realised I had once again not reacted appropriately. I gave the proper awe and congratulations that seemed to be a part of every world’s customs and she practically preened under the praise. I had my doubts, though. What would such an important figure be here and incapable of getting honey on her own. Then again, apparently a world famous bard named Charles-something was coming to visit. Maybe this town was just the type to attract those sorts of fame. For what felt like the dozenth time, I rested my hand over the rough twine grip of the shoddy dagger in my pocket. I would need to buy an actual weapon soon and I cursed the fact I couldn’t grab one off of the slavers before we were washed away. But at the end of the day, even if I could take her, the big rock guy would probably whoop me into next year. I couldn’t help the simmering press of frustration building. I wanted to be better and I wanted to be better now.

  Leon led me through narrow alleys and markets upon markets of fish. I diverted my eyes with a shudder, remembering my first morning in Vintreth. I also began to realize Kiridan was more market than town. Dried fish hung from limp strings over wooden shelves of poultry or vegetables. Below that lay even more fish, these arrayed in bins packed tight with salt. The scent brought a tear to my eye. Pale canvas tents with open fronts protected the mongers from wind, but I noticed not all of them were full of fish. Closer to the coast were stands of miscellaneous gems and broken armour. It looked like loot. More often than not, the stands were empty. Scattered people would barter over fish, they’d rest beneath canvas canopies to shield from the heat and wind but never spare so much as a glance for the glimmering stands of loot. Each with one merchant standing sentinel.

  People distractedly parted before Leon with the leisure of habit. They moved with the same dismissive step people give to a stray cat. Leon, for her part, was just as ignorant of them. She moved at a clip bordering on sprinting, expecting people to move for her. I wasn’t so lucky. A woman leather chaps leaned to let Leon pass, but closed back in as I slammed directly into her. Most of the trip involved repeats of that event. Leon would slide past like a wraith and I’d take the hit for it.

  We walked until the homes turned to scattered huts and the only grass left was in rough tufts. I doubled to catch my breath more than once, Leon never missing a step. I kept feeling a phantom of wetness across my chest, thinking I must’ve bled through my bandages, only to see them clean time and time again. I hated just how right Leon was. We hadn’t moved too far all things considered yet I was barely keeping pace.

  I had still yet to see any trees. In fact, the water was growing deep and brackish as we followed the coast, grainy sand kicking up beneath my talons. My feet began sinking beneath the surface once again when Leon pulled to a stop. I realised she had led us to an estuary. It felt like a different world. As the day progressed, it grew hotter; the air thick with insects. Mosquitos nipped at my bare chest, trying to bite through the bandages while beetles surrounded us with their music. All around, broad roots arched out of still water. They wound into the rough, shrublike-leaves governing them. The trees were broad, squat things. They sat in narrow lines framing us, with wavy peat moss beneath. Something snapped around my calf, sharp and painful. I immediately kicked out, stumbling and thrashing my leg out violently as I jerked my head to look. A cat-sized crab had latched on, its claw like an iron vice. Without pause, Leon reached under her coat and threw a small glass vial at it. Upon making contact, the vial popped and sizzled, beginning to corrode the creature’s blotchy shell. It instantly released me and skittered beneath the muddy shores. I very carefully stepped around the pile of charred, baked mud still dissolving under the liquid. Crab-watch was added to my list of things to do. Vakari had already arrived, the cool grey of his body contrasting against the warm swamp. He quite frankly stood out like a sore thumb. Leaning heavily against a tangle of roots, he was in the process of striking a C-shaped piece of metal against flint. A low rumble was rising from deep within his chest as his thick, clumsy fingers repeatedly missed. To his left lay a pair of long, horizontal clay pots. They were chipped white, with an opening on one side and a rough square-ish shape. To his right; a pile of rope. It was bee time.

  I realised very quickly my role in the whole ordeal. Vakari was too big to do much of anything. Except, nobody would say as much. I climbed the roots to set up the rope ladder because he was busy sparking tinder. I ended up using the double-loop flint striker because he very suddenly needed to double check their clay pot to make sure it was a good environment for the bees. I had no idea what Leon was up to. She just sat against a fallen log and watched, head on a swivel. Her body stayed entirely still as she tracked us back and forth, like a chicken. I took it in stride that she was doing something important.

  The idea was that we’d smoke the bees into the cylindrical pot, and harvest the honey. Apparently we needed to get the queen bee, and the rest would follow. I tried not to notice how little the two of them seemed to know what they were doing. The way Leon spoke, it sounded more like something she had read in a book rather than a regular practice. We’d tie up the rope ladder, smoke the bees a few times to calm them, and then remove the queen and place her in the clay pot with some branches and leaves inside. I scrambled up the tree roots relatively easily, tying quick slip knots to secure the rope where I was instructed. That was when I caught my first view of the hive. It was like an open wound, having eaten through the skin of the tree. Brown fuzz coated every wall, packed in so tight they formed a solid mass to plug the front. I had no idea how I hadn’t heard the low buzz until getting so close. I felt a little sick, staring at the writhing, twisting hive. I wanted to hide from it, for some reason. But as I turned, Vakari was already handing up the ‘torch.’ It was a long thing, with a skinny body and wide rim. Whatever was packed inside of it smelled horrendous, though Leon and Vakari refused to tell me what it was. It smelled even worse while burning, the smoke a pale white. I carefully stepped off of the ladder and latched onto a nearby root. Vakari climbed up his side and held the pot at the ready.

  “So I just… Hold it in front of them?” I asked, gesturing to the torch.

  “...Yes?” Vakari rumbled, as if he didn’t know himself. As he spoke, he had no lips to form letters, though I noticed something organic flexing inside of his mouth. It could’ve been a tongue, or even a secondary mouth. I could feel the heat radiating off his body in waves. It was difficult to get passed. His face was inlaid with a single red gem and a slash of a mouth. That was it. No nose, no eyes, no ears. He did seem to be breathing, his mouth always slightly cracked open, but it was as if someone had taken cheesewire down the front plane of his head and left only a straight line of dark stone. The joints and creases of his body were all made of trapped lava. I wondered how it all stayed there. It was mesmerising to watch, swirling and pulsing, moving down pathways like thick veins. Inside some were smaller, darker solids. They looked like chips of obsidian. His chest was bare, the bottom of his sternum separated from his broad stomach by a river of lava, lined in the same red gemstones as his head. His thick arms led to two massive hands. There were four fingers on each hand, with one thumb and three longer stubs. He wore loose brown pants similar to my own, from what I had seen they were the style of the area, tied off with twine rather than a belt. I had a plethora of questions about all of it, but Raphael had beat that urge out ages ago. He would have a fit if I tried asking ‘how are you not collapsing over your own weight?’ Or even just ‘how are you seeing right now?’ I settled on:

  “What do I do if they attack me?” It was a serious concern. I had never been swarmed by bees and filling their home full of smoke seemed the easiest way to check off that item from the bucket list.

  Vakari’s mouth opened slightly larger than usual before he said, “How would I know?” I couldn’t tell if he was fucking with me or not. It really felt like he was fucking with me. But I still had one last question before this whole thing kicked off.

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  “Why didn’t I see any honey in town? You know, with all these bees around I’d expect other people had the same idea as you.” I heard Raphael chortle from somewhere around my spine. He seemed to strike a fine balance between trying to keep us alive and hating me. The scales were tilting pretty heavily lately. Vakari, for his part, made a kind of huffing sound. But paused before saying anything. He turned down to look at Leon for comment.

  “Because! Because it’s illegal, dear boy!” She chirped, seeming to break out of whatever haze she’d been in. “Honey, jelled krasvu, and some algaes are regulated materials in Luden due to their alchemical use. What rock must you have been raised under, to not know that! Not just anyone is supposed to have this stuff. But it’s for science. You hear, you hear? Science! They cannot take all the bees from us. They cannot stop the people from innovation. They can do nothing to us here.” She was shaking slightly, it was… Weird.

  I was increasingly positive that Leon was in no way a real alchemist, and more than that she seemed antithetical to real alchemists out there. I didn’t want to break the law, but I was in too deep at this point. I wondered if that was the point of not letting me know any details about the quest initially. I had most likely broken a few rules already, I had probably done worse than collect honey in fact. When I woke in the body of another person, with his life all laid out in his pockets. That felt worse. It felt violating. Every cut, scrape, and bruise was another crime against him. I hardly saw how this could be worse. I still wondered what his name might’ve been. Where he was from. But besides that, they saved my life. Despite any ulterior motives involved in doing so. With a breath out, I put thoughts of whoever I had been before away in their box for later, and lifted the torch. It was only in turning back that I noticed the way Vakari relaxed when he noticed I didn’t care. With how easily they had told me about their illegal scheme, my perspective quickly shifted. From the start, this had been a comply or die sort of task. My life wasn’t saved, it was given a temporary extension unless I behaved. Whatever we were doing, it was very illegal and I didn’t want to know what would’ve happened if I tried to run from it. I especially didn't want to see what Vakari could do to all my little bones and fleshy humanoid guts. I resolved to be a little nicer to the guy going forward.

  It turns out bees ain’t shit. Despite my initial trepidation upon seeing the gnarled, layered hive, they ended up being massively docile. Especially after a few rounds of that pale, stinking smoke. Their roiling bodies all pressed against the sides of the opening, letting me see deeper into the hive. I held my cardigan up to my nose as I leaned in for a better look. The trunks of the trees were thin and pale, yet the bees had managed to make a massive hole within. It was longer than it was wide, but it still felt bigger on the inside than it should’ve been, especially accounting for all the insects. They were migrating away from the source of smoke, huddling in the back of their home. I was looking for one with a different shape. Maybe a little larger than the rest? I honestly didn’t know too much about bees or their queens. But there was one with a little bit more spunk than the others near the back and I figured that’d be a good enough start. She was fatter than the rest, with auburn brown fuzz. She was moving around more than any of the others, like the smoke wasn’t getting to her. Queens were fearless right? That had to be her. I turned to Vakari, who was still waiting with the pot. Still as a statue. Giving him the torch, I used my new free hand to reach in. The bees did squirm a bit at that, folding in on each other in discomfort. A big scary hand when they had expected fire was clearly throwing them off. I very delicately pinched her between my fingers, she was so small and squishy I became immediately worried I’d pop her like a balloon. As my hand drew back, I noticed some kind of movement out of the corner of my eye. Something in the shadowed hollow of bark the bees had made so deep within the tree. I figured it must’ve been some lower, expanded part of the hive.

  Placing the queen within the artificial hive, the bees followed over the course of a few hours. Not all of them were out, but Leon was planning on leaving the clay pots out for a few days so they’d naturally migrate in after their queen. Next, I had to cut out the frames of thick honeycomb and put them into a separate container for honey. I brushed off the excess bees with my sleeve, placing the comb into its container after Vakari had brought it up. Leon was suddenly very interested in the process. She dug the cap off of a comb with her finger and swirled it. Testing the honey. She was practically giddy at the sight of it. I figured it would only be another few hours before I could call the favor cashed and get ready to skip town.

  Hold your breathRaphael snapped. Instead I opened my mouth to ask why, just before the thing within the tree wrapped itself around my outstretched arm.

  It was wet and angular, letting out a series of quiet pops as it enclosed itself around my hand.

  “Vakari!” I very calmly screamed in fear. My voice naturally slid up to its old register, before I had adjusted it to lower in my chest. I didn’t vocalize to the point this new body seemed to speak from. “Vakari! Vakari tree monster!” It cracked a few times, but Vakari immediately shoved the torch into the pot and gently tossed them both to the ground, reaching for me. My head had breached the opening, though my shoulders caught against the hollow wood. I felt Vakari’s arms wrap my torso, leaning back against whatever creature was pulling me in. It felt like a branding iron snapping tight around my stomach. I ground my teeth against a scream, whatever salve Leon had used on my injuries began to rip apart and separate skin. The thing around my arm crackled higher and higher to secure its grip. Vakari’s feet struggled to keep hold on the ladder, his body at an awkward angle to keep his arms around me and keep himself from slipping. The creature loosened itself slightly, giving Vakari a bit of slack to begin yanking me out. I threw myself back, using my other hand to claw at whatever was trying to take me. It was slimy, with thornlike protrusions covering every inch of space and ripping into my fingertips while I tried to pull. With our combined effort, my head began slowly emerging from the hive.

  The moment my feathered ears slid out, nearly entirely free save for my arm, the creature pulled with more force than I thought possible. Something shifted in my socket as I gasped, going limp with the shock of radiating pain. My body shot forward, shoulders snapping the thin edges of the hive like paper. Vakari clearly hadn’t expected it either, he’d loosened his pull somewhat to keep from falling backwards, and was paying for it. He caught me once again around the leg, but I felt it was clear to everyone I was going through the tree one way or another.

  “Hand, hand him this!” Called up Leon, I heard Vakari growl ‘wait’ before something bounced off of my back, Vakari snatching it surprisingly quick before he jammed it into my pocket and let go entirely. I felt like I should’ve been allowed more input in that decision. Though, it was most likely the only solution that kept my arm from being ripped off. I could’ve sworn he said something suspiciously akin to ‘sorry’ but the increasingly agitated bees swirling all around made it difficult to tell. They ricocheted against the sides of my skull, filled the dips and valleys of my ears. But never once did they sting. I finally caught onto Raphael’s advice and held my breath. The thing pulled me like a fish on its hook. I could feel the biting, dead heart of the tree thumping against my body as I was fully submerged within. Down the short trunk, between the tangle of roots, through the brackish mud, and beyond. Water filled my nose, though I sealed my lips tight against it. Swampy algae clung to my skin during my short trip through the lake, it seeped through the bandages and trapped itself against my ribs. My eyes screwed shut, shying from the torrent of dirty, salt filled water.

  I finally crashed against the hard ground, my sore wings taking the brunt of the impact. That seemed to be all they were good for. The thing around my arm retracted. It tore my cardigan sleeve with it but thankfully not the skin underneath. I immediately looked around, Raphael silently filling the chamber with foreboding yellow light. It threw everything into sharp relief. The pointed roots sticking from muddy walls like reaching hands and the piles of stark bones. The shining rock beneath me with the polish of age and slimy ceiling dripping with old muck. The smell made my eyes blur with tears. Some kind of rot had been settling here for a very long time and I felt a creeping worry that I would join the pile. I scrambled on wobbling legs towards the wall behind me and finally pulled my dagger.

  “Raphael.” I spat, “Any updates or are we not on speaking terms again? I’m kind of freaking out here.” I couldn’t see whatever had dragged me in anywhere. After the grasping arm had pulled away I was left in deafening silence save for the slow drip of viscous swamp water. It served as my only reply. He got like this sometimes, to the point I was beginning to suspect it was more than just ignoring. Not like he wouldn't talk. More like he couldn’t. Then again, he also seemed set on nothing so much as my slow horrible demise. It felt like he’d be getting his wish soon enough. I looked towards the hole I’d fallen down through. Barely a pinprick of light leaked through to me. If only I had some sort of natural flying implement. For the thousandth time I cursed Silva, and whatever she had done to my wings to make them so entirely useless.

  Slowly, I rose to my feet. My talons made a small tak tak tak across the shining floor as I stalked forward, keeping to the walls. I tried not to think about the piles of refuse all around me or the pervasive stink. Nothing moved. I couldn’t see to the other side of the chamber, which was where I suspected the creature to be. Instead I pulled my cardigan off and wrapped it around the glowing gem in my neck. Then, I pressed myself deep into the muddy walls and tried to look as small as possible. The room went black as Raphael’s light was suffocated. If Vakari and Leon walked off, then Kishar would come for me. If something happened to Kishar, then Casper would track my scent. I just needed to survive long enough for them to get here.

  It didn’t take long for branching, exploratory arms to reach up the sides of the cavern. I couldn’t see them, but I could hear the quiet pop of their joints. Like a room full of Party Snappers. The mud slopped down in chunks as their thorns dragged the walls, and I immediately stepped from my spot against the wall. I could feel the rivulets of blood dripping down my chin from sharpened fangs biting into my lower lip. It’d be mutilated by the time I got out if this if the poprocks monster kept being so damn creepy. We kept up like that for awhile, every time I heard an arm getting close, I’d step away. The ground was spiked with dozens of tiny hills. I had to grasp with my talons before placing my foot down each time, making a small scraping noise. And with each grab, the arms would draw closer. If nothing else, it could certainly hear me.

  There were three possibilities I could see so far; the monster couldn’t see in the dark despite living in a cave, the monster could see in the dark because of living in a cave and was just playing with me, the monster couldn’t see in general and used its arms as feelers. I really didn’t want to find out, but I also didn’t want to keep stumbling around like a chicken with its head cut off. If it could see, I reasoned, then it would’ve been able to keep track of me while I hid against the wall. So it should know where I was considering I had barely moved from my original spot. But it didn’t. Unless it was performing some kind of eating ritual that I was too Earth-brained to get. Carefully, I bent to grab a nearby femur, tossing it to the dead center of the chamber. I heard the arms all immediately shhhh through the air towards the bone. In an instant it was loudly cracked in twain by the middle arm, the other two wrapping it in a pointed cocoon. They yanked it out of sight, it was only the sound of crunching that let me in on what must’ve happened. My hands were shaking as I unraveled the blue cloth around my neck, letting the smallest breath of light slip through. The arms returned to their mindless prodding. I could see them now, moving in straight lines. They didn’t seem able to curve, only snap sharply towards a new direction. Their spiked bodies began arching outwards into the center of the room. I needed a plan. I redonned my cardigan and checked my pocket for what Leon had thrown at me. A large vial of bright green liquid in a porous glass container. Acid, just like what Leon had used against the crab. It wasn’t much, but I remembered what it had done. If I could find a suitably squishy spot it could be game changing.

  The walls began to move, sliding back around me. I heard the blood in my ears. Suddenly, I was back in that tunnel in the ruins and the world was collapsing around me. I remembered the taste of soil on my tongue, the panic as I wrapped myself around Kishar and tried helplessly to keep the room from killing us. But that wasn’t quite right. The walls weren’t moving, the ground was. I was already pressing my body against the wall, grabbing at exposed roots and pulling my body up. This I could handle. I let out a breath, both arms and feet buried into the thick muck. The feelers pulled underground, supporting what I had previously thought was particularly shiny rock and now realised was thick chitin. The higher I crawled the wall, the more of the full picture I saw. What I had assumed were hills were instead ridges along its broad exoskeleton. The body was segmented into two, with a large front and a deep valley separating it from a smaller back. A row of squirming spine-like protrusions split from either side near the far end of the chamber, and two shining black gems hid beneath hills of hardened carapace. I assumed those were the eyes, they didn’t seem to be good for much. My mind was whirring now that I had a moment. I could take out the eyes, which might upset it but not much else. Limiting its mobility wouldn’t be worth much of anything unless I could somehow slow the arms. The thing’s body took up every inch of the chamber anyway. I had killed monsters before, I reasoned, I could kill this one too. My hands were still shaking as I slowly slid down the wall, my white hair matted down into a grey-brown tangle of filth. I’d occasionally throw out bones to make sure the arms were busy. Maybe I had to get under it somehow, assuming this was an exoskeleton.

  There was only one way I could see to reaching that goal, and I’d get ripped in half before ever seeing any soft squishy bits. I had an idea, it was a bad one but an idea nonetheless. Crawling around the edges of the creature, I began gathering bones.