During the last hour that we let Nyx sleep from her late shift, Theron and Silas pored over the map I had to Whispermere. Eventually, I wandered over to them, to learn their plans if nothing else.
“...it's a tiny village made of nothing more than huts,” Theron was saying. “I doubt it.”
Silas glanced up as I approached. “We're trying to figure out if we should head to Amere.” He pointed on the map, where a tiny village was drawn with its name beneath it. “We'll be passing there a little before evening, so it would be ideal to stop and rest, but Theron's been there, and says they probably don't have an inn.”
“I haven't been there,” Theron corrected. “I've passed it. There's literally nothing to stay for.”
I shrugged. “It couldn't hurt to stop there and ask for shelter. Perhaps they have something they need help with that we can exchange.”
“If that's the case, I doubt they have any gold. Shelter would be the only thing they could offer,” Theron mused.
With that, we planned to stop at Amere that evening, after a full day's walk. Even if they had no shelter, staying the night near the village would be better than in the middle of wilderness.
The four of us set out as soon as we woke Nyx, our pace brisk with the energy of a night's sleep. With the valleys of Sera to our left and the forest to our right, we would eventually hit the village we were looking for, which sat on the edge of the Seran Forest. Today, we passed a few other travelers, some on horses and some on foot, and we offered greetings before continuing on our way.
Just as the sun was painting the sky a beautiful mirage of coral and mint green, we saw smoke rising from the distance at the edge of the wood. A few minutes after that, and a tiny, ramshackle village began to come into view, nestled at the bottom of a small hill, the backs of its huts to the forest.
“Maybe we should just pass it,” came a mumble from Theron's direction.
Amere was unimpressive overall. It was a ragtag group of houses, nothing more. The homes were made of rough stone with roofs of layered straw, giving away the fact that the village was a pretty poor one. Fields of grain swayed softly in the breeze within the confines of short, hastily built stone walls that looked as if they hadn't ever kept anything out as intended. The gray smoke that rose into the early evening sky from the village came from a small outdoor fire, where a few people clad in dirty, frail clothes huddled to cook a meal.
I heard a moo, and looked around to find a pasture of cows, most of them teetering on the edge of malnourished. Hearing the curious noises of their livestock, the villagers looked our way, their eyes following our footsteps.
This was probably a stupid idea. The group looked as if they didn't have two gold coins between all of them. I felt particularly awkward about going up to such a group of poor people and asking them for shelter.
One of the group, an older woman, stood from a roughly made bench that sat beside the fire, wiping her hands off casually on her pants. She wore a bonnet that kept her greying hair and most of her face out of the sun, and her skin held a map of wrinkles that directed toward the sun spots that were the result of years of hard labor. She watched us approach cautiously.
“Hail, travelers,” she greeted, glancing through all of us, her eyes lingering on Nyx. “Welcome to Amere. Where are you from?”
“Sera, originally,” I replied. “You have a nice little village here.”
The woman chuckled. “I appreciate your courtesy, though you are either lying or blind. We do what we can. Is there something we can do for you?”
I glanced back at my group. Everyone seemed content with at least asking. “Maybe, ma'am. We're mercenaries, and we're making our way east. We were looking for shelter and would be willing to trade a night's stay for work. Would any of you here happen to need assistance with anything?”
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The woman took in my statement with curiosity, before turning back toward the group. “Hank?”
My eyes followed her gaze to a plump, middle aged man who looked perplexed. “Vilma, I ain't got nothing for them.”
“Your livestock—”
“Listen, friends, here in Amere, we got problems, but no gold.”
“We're not particularly worried about that,” I replied. “We're just looking to stay the night.”
The villagers didn't look like they fully believed that statement. Perhaps no mercenaries had ever bargained with them before.
“What kinds of problems do you speak of?” Theron finally asked the man.
“I got livestock that goes missing. One cow a week, like clockwork. Didn't know if they was gettin' out or what, until last week, when I come out one mornin' and one of my cows is eaten alive, right there in the pasture. Something's stealin' my cows, and I ain't got a clue as to what.”
Theron looked off into the forest, thinking. “We're about a day's travel from Sera. It can't be much more than wolves, goblins, or bandits. Considering they only take one, and they'd usually disappear for all but last week, I don't think it's wolves that are to blame.”
Hank watched us for a moment, before reiterating, “I ain't got no gold.”
“What do you have to offer?” I asked him.
With a glance off toward his pasture, Hank twisted his lips, thinking. “I got cows.”
I chuckled lightly.
“If you're considering helping us, I'm sure we could scrounge up some type of reward,” the older woman interjected, a little desperately. “We owe a lot of money to Sera, and Hank's the only one here who raises livestock. His losses are making us all try to bridge the gap in profits, but grain doesn't sell for as much as beef.”
“Ma'am...we're not looking to take your gold,” I repeated, feeling like that wasn't getting through to them.
“Mercenaries never stop here. They figure we're poor, I suppose. You all are our only hope, unless we all get our weapons and try to take care of it ourselves, and we're farmers, not fighters.” The woman's voice held a tinge of desperation, as if she figured we were about to turn and leave.
“I'll tell you what, ma'am. If you can give us food and lodging for the night, we'll pull this problem of yours out by the roots.”
“By the gods, you'd have yourself a place to stay whenever you're in town if you'd do that.”
“...and the loot,” Theron hissed from behind me.
“Oh, and if the creatures that are causing this ruckus happen to have any gold on them—”
“It's all yours,” the woman replied, nodding with hope.
“You have yourself a deal, then.”
The look of absolute relief on the woman's face filled me with joy. I was also just relieved to have finally bargained with them.
The old farmer led us out to his pasture, and he showed us the location where the cow had been found gutted. By this point, the corpse was gone, so we had to rely on the farmer's memory.
“Was it just killed, or was the meat torn from its body?” Theron asked, crouching to the ground and sifting through the grasses.
“A lot of the meat was gone. Not all of it,” the farmer replied, watching Theron as he pulled something out of the grasses. It was a dark brown tuft of hair. Bringing it to his nose, the ranger looked up, and toward the woods.
“Goblins?” Silas asked, watching as the ranger stood, and walked to the small stone wall separating the pasture from the nearby woods.
Theron shook his head distractedly. “Brownies.”
“What's a brownie?” I asked. I was unfamiliar with the creature.
“They're small woodland creatures. Usually quite peaceful,” Theron explained, following a specific path to the woods from the small wall, stopping and crouching along the way. At the edge of the forest, he took note of the matted grass between two particular trees. “Easily controlled, though. They worship these...totems. Somewhat like goblins, in a way. If a smarter creature gets ahold of the totems, brownies have been known to treat them like gods and do their bidding. Any time I've ever heard of brownies getting into trouble, they're being controlled.”
“How do we kill them?” Nyx asked, getting straight to the point.
“They're small and frail. Made of equal parts wood and flesh. So use weapons against flesh, and avoid their mouths. They're poisonous.” Glancing back at me, he added, “And obviously, for your sake, use fire.”
I nodded, understanding. Because Theron was already in the midst of tracking the creatures, I turned back to the farmer, who was still in his pasture.
“We'll be back when the job is done,” I said.
The man nodded. “Please be careful.”
Nyx looked nothing but excited as she began to follow Theron into the woods. “Let's bake us some brownies,” she said to me, as she passed.
The four of us slowly made our way through the woods, allowing Theron time to correctly track the creatures. Above us, through a canopy of leaves, the evening sky was darkening. I hoped we would be able to finish the job by the time it got completely dark.
I found that I was quite nervous leading up to my first real battle. I had trained for years at the university for this, but somehow, this already felt much different than practice. Mages had to consider all of the reactions their elements could have on environments, and even the allies around them. When in controlled environments at the university, this was simple, and even educational. Out in the real world, I wouldn't have anyone warning against my move if I were to misuse an element or not fully consider its repercussions.
Also, I had never actually killed anything or anyone with my magic. These brownie creatures sounded like victims themselves, beholden to another creature's will. How would I feel right in killing them?
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