I woke up much earlier than the day before, not wanting to lay on the hardwood floor of the treehouse and listen to Trelain snore through the morning. But when I dislodged my head from underneath my pillow and slid out of my bedroll, he was already gone.

  I looked around the room for any sign of the old Apostle.

  Not seeing him, I picked myself up and made my way down the rope ladder to the clearing below.

  Leaving a dead body in a well was a recipe for disaster and disease. And though I didn’t exactly appreciate being ambushed by the cocky dude, I also didn’t want to just leave his body for the wolves. Or… rats… I guess. Everyone deserved a little respect, and I hadn’t even meant to kill him. I had to bury him.

  That plan went out the window when I entered the clearing and found that I was not alone. A group of six people stood in a half circle with one person on their knees, inspecting a corpse.

  One of the six was coiling up a length of rope, and turned to look at me.

  He had a bit of a sneer on his face, like he had just come out of a church on Sunday and stepped over a homeless person as he was off to brunch. Pure, unadulterated, toxic, entitlement. He wore a red jerkin, black pants, and was adorned with a shock of white hair despite his young age.

  His companions had matching red jerkins, and with a whistle from the rope guy… all turned and looked.

  Two of the five looked on with curiosity, instead of abject hatred. Of those two, one had red hair and a smattering of freckles on his face. I’d place him around 26 years old. The other not sneering type was a young woman with a dark black intricate braid and piercing blue eyes. She was also extremely buff.

  Like… really, really strong. She gave me a little smile. I waved.

  “What the fuck do you want?” Rope guy spat.

  “Well, you’ve got some dubious manners,” I said, calmly.

  He just looked at me incredulously. The man inspecting the corpse stood up and whispered something in scar face’s ear.

  When they didn’t say anything more, I continued, “I just came for a spot of water. But it looks like this well is older than… well…”

  I trailed off, noticing the older woman of the group (who hadn’t spoken yet) slowly inching her hand down to her sword.

  I continued, trying to be as nonchalant as possible but failing, “Well, it looks old.”

  The man who had stood up from the corpse, looked up at scarface and the sword lady like one might look at your parents when they’re about to ask you to do some chore you didn’t want to do. He glanced over at the redhead kid and the braided girl, who shared the glance, and then he nudged his head towards the trees.

  If looks could kill, I still would have no idea what was going on here fully.

  But I knew enough about body language that told me that the three younger members of the group didn’t want to be here.

  Rope guy had finished coiling and was doing his best to intimidate me, and it was working. He slowly, methodically, walked over to me and stopped just a few inches from my face and sniffed.

  “You smell like fear.”

  Okay the intimidation thing was working until that line, and then I just couldn’t take it… my life be damned… I just started busting up laughing. I couldn’t stop. The floodgates were open and I wasn’t going to breath for a good long while. Rope guy went to grab for his sword, seeing me uncowed clearly got to his little ego. It’s not that I wasn’t scared.

  I was terrified.

  I was in a new world, with new powers, and I was pretty sure this was the Hoarfrost Gang. Before a few days ago, I’d been in absolutely zero fights and didn’t exactly think of myself as a violent person.

  But that line was so fucking edgelord, I couldn’t help it.

  There were tears coming down as I cackled madly in the man’s face. He went to draw his sword. Just before he cleared the blade from the scabbard, the redhead shouted.

  “Manno, don’t!”

  “Shut your fucking face, Benji,” Rope guy, apparently named Manno, growled.

  The braided girl spoke up next, “He’s right Manno. You’re not in charge here. Guthred is.” She turned to an older man. He was probably in his thirties, relatively plain, brown hair, brown eyes, and except he had a huge scar that ran from the bottom of his right eye down and across his mouth. Braid went on, “Guthred, stop your brute before he kills our only lead on what happened with Randall.”

  The older man, Guthred, gave me an appraising look. His experienced eyes scanned my disheveled state (I had just woken up and wasn’t expecting to see anyone but Trelain). After a few heartbeats, his gaze shifted and he gave me a warm smile and said, “Sorry for my friend here. Manno, put the sword away. Let’s show our guest a little courtesy, shall we.”

  Braids put a hand on her hip and shot Manno a dirty look. Redhead smiled at me from behind shy, downcast eyes. The corpse checker that was looking over Randall’s body, relaxed a bit and sat down on the well stone.

  Guthred sidled up to me, putting an arm on Manno’s shoulder and gently guiding him away. The older woman said something to the guy on the well, and crouched down beside Randall’s corpse. His sword was still sticking straight up through his throat and out the back of his skull. I couldn’t look away. Guthred made me, by shifting my attention.

  “Are you… okay?”

  “Huh? Oh… yeah. No, I’m good. Just wasn’t expecting to see—” I pointed at Randall’s corpse— “Today.” I lied.

  “Ah yes, a gruesome sight indeed. Poor Randall. Right class?”

  “Poor Randall,” Three of them murmured in a sort of creepy sing song way. Mannon and the older woman just grunted.

  “So… you knew him? I’m guessing? I mean because, you know… matching tops and all. I heard something about you guys. No shade or anything. I just heard you were a gang of sorts? Look I don’t want any tr—” I rattled off.

  Guthred stopped me with a hand on my shoulder, “You seem nervous, friend. Why are you nervous? Tell me.”

  He said the last sentence in a way that sounded more like a command and less like a request. But there was something else about it. It felt odd. Like I was compelled to tell the truth. I shook my head a bit and wiped my face.

  “Not nervous, just wary. Six armed strangers. And this hulking behemoth,” I gestured at Mannon, going for flattery, “Who wouldn’t be… you know… just a little?”

  Guthred’s expression shifted quickly from what looked like surprise to ease. Though he had put on an air of casual before, now he looked more like he meant it than he was trying to exude it.

  “So, you don’t know anything about poor Randall, then?” Guthred said, gesturing at the skewered man on the ground.

  “No, but that looked like it hurt. Friend of yours?”

  “Of sorts,” the woman said, speaking for the first time. She was still rifling through Randall’s pockets.

  “Ah, well. My condolences. Bad way to go.”

  Guthred just nodded, but I didn’t see any remorse or sadness in his expression. Maybe more so… disappointment? Or was that frustration? Exacerbation? I didn’t know.

  Facial expressions were my dad’s thing.

  Guthred stood there studying me for a minute. It was a weird appraisal sort of look, like he was assessing my value or something. I’d seen the look on a few actors faces in Spartacus when they were buying slaves. The dude was really starting to creep me out. He stopped his diagnostics and spoke again.

  “So… friend. What’s your name?”

  “Greg.”

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  “Well hello Greg. We know you don’t know anything about our poor Randall, but what brings you around?”

  “Like I said, just looking for some water.”

  “Some water, he says,” Guthred turned to look at the older woman. She was now putting something from Randall’s pockets into her own.

  She just smiled and gave Guthred a knowing look.

  “Yep. Mighty thirsty. Saw a well, thought…. Well… why not?”

  I didn’t much like where this was going and I wasn’t quite sure what their predatory looks were about. Three out of six of them didn’t look like they wanted to be there, body postures unsure, slumped, and slightly drawn back.

  The older woman, now done with the corpse, walked over to stand next to Guthred.

  Mannon lingered in the back, idly pawing at his sword. No one had responded to my last sentence, and I was starting to get really creeped out. Finally, the older woman spoke, breaking the silence.

  “Looking for work?”

  “Work? Oh no, I’m employed. Happy as a clam. You have those right?”

  “What?” She asked.

  “Nothing, never mind. No, why do you ask?”

  “Hoarfrost needs a new Initiate,” she said while throwing a chin over at Randall’s slumped corpse in semi acknowledgement.

  “Ah…I see. Too bad, though. I’ve got a dominus of sorts already. Er, I mean, I’ve been helping out this old guy.”

  “Oh, he won’t miss you, I’ll make sure of it,” Mannon said from behind a yellow toothed grin.

  I caught the eye of the redhead, I think his name was Benji. He looked at me, meaningfully, widening his eyes as if in warning and then gesturing with his chin towards the trees. Noticing his three superiors couldn’t see his face, he mouthed “go!”

  The woman with the braid just sort of stood there with a blank, shell shocked look on her face.

  “Miss me? Why would he miss me?” I said, knowing perfectly well now that these people meant to take me… somewhere.

  “Oh, don’t worry about Mannon, Greg. We’re a friendly bunch. And you’re all alone. Do you have any supplies?” Guthred said, looking me up and down again for effect, “I don’t see a pack or anything. How are you surviving out here?”

  “I make do,” I said, inching a little way away from Guthred.

  “We’ve got a nice camp, you know. Not too far from here. Why don’t you come back with us and we’ll have a nice lunch. No pressure, I think it’d be nice,” the older woman said.

  “Yeah, no pressure,” Mannon said with a grin and narrowed eyes.

  “Shut up Mannon.”

  “No, you shut up, Rowena.”

  “You always do this. Show the man a little common courtesy. He answered our questions, he’s still here. We can’t make him stay,” Rowena said.

  At those last words, ‘make him stay,’ warning bells went off in my head and were further exacerbated by the fact that I did not see Guthred. One minute he was there, the next he was gone.

  The hairs on the back of my neck prickled up.

  Something was very, very wrong. I should have left when I had the opportunity. If I even had that chance. I didn’t. I looked past the bickering pair and saw the eyes of Benji go wide… just before my whole world went black.

  -

  I came to a few minutes later to a sight I truly could not comprehend. Mannon, Guthred, and Rowena were fighting something… something really, really fast. I couldn’t see what it was at first. But the attacker was brown, I think, and whirling through the clearing at top speed brandishing flashing objects.

  As the stars in my vision cleared, I saw two axes in either hand of the still blurry combatant bouncing between the three creepy Hoarfrost elders. Mannon was doing a good job of parrying each blow that came for him while edging up to Rowena to cover her back. Guthred was in the air, on a huge pillar of ice, shooting bolts of frost down at the whirling attacker.

  As he missed each shot, the clearing became more and more encased in ice. Rowena shot off what looked like a blast of wind that took a nearby tree down. The attacker did not stop, careening between the three making savagely fast attacks.

  I started to stand up to help, but quickly fell on my ass due to the ice on the ground and the blood pooling around me. I was in a bad way. My mana felt low, and slowly rising. I didn’t have enough of to be effective.

  Mercilessly, the three younger Hoarfrost members were not involving themselves. They were just standing there, in semi shock, watching the spectacle.

  Guthred’s blasts had slowed as he seemingly switched from quick targeting to timing his shots. After a few beats of waiting, he got a glancing blow with one bolt and one of the axes went flying. And that’s when I finally understood why Trelain sent me on that quest.

  The attacker stopping my abduction, wasn’t a person or a creature. It was a bucket. Every time Trelain referred to his bucket as a “he” finally made sense. The bucket had white arms and white legs with black gleaming shoes.

  There was no face, but now that it had slowed down for a beat I could very clearly sense Trelain’s power pulsing out of it.

  I didn’t know if the old Apostle was controlling him from afar, or if he had animated this bucket to watch over me. Or maybe there was just a sentient race of buckets…and I had, had him in my inventory.

  I shook off my internal musings about inanimate objects having conscious thought and got to my feet more carefully this time.

  Rowena reacted quickly, sending a blast of wind my way. I was ready and cast Furnace, lighting myself and the ground around me on fire.

  Furnace: [Active] [Elemental Spell] [Domain: Metallurgy] Engulf your body in flames as hot as your forge. Become invulnerable to elemental damage while the spell is active. Gain the retribution passive. Lasts a short time. As a passive trait, become invulnerable to base level fire damage after first use of the spell (Mana cost: moderate).

  The wind still blew me backwards, but did not have the freezing affect she was going for. Instead, the oxygen in the gust caught and made my flaming presence even stronger. I cast Mirror Door as I flew and set my exit to just behind Guthred on his ice pillar.

  Mirror Door: [Active] [Conjuration/Escape Spell] [Domain: Mirror] Conjure two 12 ft tall mirrors that you can jump through. You must be able to see your exit, visually. Mirrors can be destroyed by your enemies. If destroyed while you’re in the mirror, you may be subject to temporal displacement. Use at own risk. (Mana cost: low).

  I popped out just as Guthred was turning to target Bucket… again. His eyes widened with shock at my sudden appearance. I dismissed the Mirror Door before he could damage it and cast Summon Sledgehammer and brought the hammer down on Guthred’s unsuspecting face.

  Summon Sledgehammer: [Active] [Conjuration] [Domain: Metallurgy] Conjure a 3 lbs high-carbon steel hammer that swings like a war hammer. This hammer cannot be taken from you. If disarmed, the hammer reappears in your hand. If the hammer flies too far from your sphere of influence, you must resummon it. Hits with a combination of force and blunt damage. Hammer is resistant to effects of extreme heat. If you are in your Spirit Avatar Form, the hammer cannot be summoned. Can be used for crafting. Lasts a moderate amount of time. (Mana cost: low).

  Guthred didn’t have time to block, so he just took the hit square on the forehead which sent him tumbling off his ice pillar and into a nearby tree… falling the 20 odd feet to the forest floor. I didn’t see him get up, and his pillar was melting fast with my burning arrival.

  I let Furnace do its work, and rode the pillar down like an iceberg… crashing into Mannon.

  Mannon lashed out with a frost covered sword, but it was too late. The sheer volume of ice buried him waist deep. Immobilized for a minute, I moved for Rowena.

  But she was faster. She whirled on me and lanced me with an icicle to the thigh. It melted quickly with Furnace active, but it sent blood gushing down my leg and had me staggering for balance. Apparently, my invulnerability to elemental damage didn’t apply to higher rank spells?

  “Mother fu—”

  She sneered at my amateur defense and backhanded me with a fist covered in a green orb. I felt my lifeforce slip away.

  You have been poisoned! Drink an antidote or health potion to recover. This is a damage over time affect and cannot be cured by non-magical means.

  I was dead on my feet. Just as she was about to wind up and throw another sickly orb at my face, what I think was a lightning bolt shot into the side of her head and crumbled her to the ground. I looked around, expecting to see Tre’s bucket wielding some sort of wild magic gun. But I saw the outstretched hands of Benji. He looked at me, smiled, looked at Rowena’s body, and shrugged again.

  But there wasn’t time for any other communication.

  Mannon came crashing out of the ice, swinging his ice sword at my neck. But Bucket was there, parrying the strike with a great axe. When did he get that? Mannon was strong, and had Bucket on a retreat. I got out of the way as best I could. But I was losing blood fast and my toxin levels were rising. If I didn’t heal quickly, I was dead. I cursed at myself for leaving my bandolier of potions in the treehouse.

  If I survived, I’d never go anywhere without it again. At the very least, I resolved to start carrying some spares in my inventory. Access to that never went away.

  Benji was now shooting yet another line of sparking white light. This time, at Mannon’s sword, which was locked in a battle of strength with Bucket. I moved to back up my new inanimate, animated friend but slipped on my own blood. I fell over, coughing. Ichor dripped out of my throat as my toxin levels rose to nearly critical.

  My lungs felt like they were on fire and my eyes were starting to bleed. If I could just get to the treehouse, I could heal. It worked last time, why not this one? But I couldn’t move. My body was going into shock, and I could no longer concentrate so Furnace dissipated. My hammer also dismissed.

  Through my bloody gaze, I could see a man with a giant mace swinging hard into another man with… was that an ice shield? My face was peppered with shards of glass-like ice crystals and I slipped again. This time, trying to prop myself up with my arms wasn’t working very well. I was on my very last wind. I could see a very clear downward trajectory for my chances at living.

  But I just got here, and I needed to get back. Back to Naomi, if only to bring her here. Back to tell my parents I was okay and living a life I had only dreamed about. I refused to give up, warnings be damned.

  I gritted my teeth and forced myself to concentrate.

  I gained a bit of metaphorical ground. It was slight at first. I could breathe a little better. Ragid breaths became deeper and I felt my consciousness and present state of mind return. Clarity came to my vision once more and I regained partial control of my legs. My blood pressure stabilized. I could almost feel my lifeforce grab a small foothold. Or maybe it was a toehold.

  But that was it.

  Congratulations! You have unlocked the key passive Mana Burn. Spend a portion of your Mana to stabilize you from negative effects. Works as long as you have Mana to spare. Cannot exceed or circumnavigate a higher level effect, but can slow it down.

  I was still going down, and I didn’t have any more options. I lay back down and hung on. A few moments passed, and then strong hands grabbed my collar. There was a flash of red and blood flooded back into my legs and I watched with awe as lifeforce replenished.

  My breathing returned all the way to normal, the hole in my leg closed, and the sickly green ichor stopped seeping from my mouth. I looked up and saw the woman with the braids looking down at me with those piercing blue eyes.

  You have a new ally and have been affected by their spell! Health stabilized.

  Bolster: [Active] [Defense/Healing Spell] [Domain: Enhancement] Improve or fortify a physical aspect of target ally. (ex: bolstered low health will be brought back to stability) (mana cost: varies).

  “Don’t die, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  And then I passed out.