Chapter 13 #3
Theron’s bear made another bite at him. Theron swatted the head away with his axe, stepped in, and slashed again. He hit the precise spot behind its skull as he had last time. This time, the axe got through, severing the rock bear’s head.
At Garrett, his bear charged again. Garrett hit it with the shield straight on the snout, stopping it in its tracks with a loud thud.
Garrett shifted his weight, ducked, and hit it with an uppercut of his shield.
The bear’s head and torso flew up, only the rear legs remaining on the ground.
Garrett pressed in, hitting its chest with his shield, toppling it to its back.
Theron rushed in, and as the bear fell, he jumped on it and cut its throat with a single swing of his axe. The bear soon stopped moving.
“Well,” Garrett said. “That was passable.”
Alsen felt only a slight pull of exhaustion. Good. Yes, that was passable.
Marena cleared her throat. “That’s not how I would describe this…” she pointed her staff at the hole in the rock. “What was that?”
Alsen formed a broad smile. “One of my better offensive spells. I have great penetrative power.”
“Just with the spell,” Luna snapped in.
Everyone, even Alsen, snorted. Way to kill the interrogation, together with his moment. That was an acceptable sacrifice.
[SYSTEM MESSAGE: ENEMY DEFEATED – ROCK BEAR (4)] [EXPERIENCE GAINED: 800]
[LEVEL UP!]
[CURRENT LEVEL: 7]
Luna finally slipped past Sonja, who was scanning her to see if she wasn’t wounded. She walked to Theron’s side, who was examining the belly of the toppled rock bear. “This looks edible,” she remarked.
“That’s what I’m trying to figure out.” He nodded with a pleased smile. “We killed it, so we might as well eat it. It has to have some muscles.”
“Got a carving knife?” Luna asked.
He reached behind his belt, pulling out a wicked, curved knife.
“Thanks.” She took it, stepping toward the bear.
He joined her, axe in hand. Sonja and Garrett went to clean the blood off themselves, so Alsen remained idle with Marena.
Marena crept closer, daring a glance at him. “That was quite the spell. I mean, the spells. All of them were quite impressive.”
A broad smile took over Alsen’s face. “Thanks.”
“How do you do it? I mean, the offensive spells. I’ve never quite figured those out… sorry.”
“I pull in my energy, mold it, compress the result, and then release it in a direct thought. Here. I have written it down.” He pulled his spellbook from its bag, flipping a page to the Lance of Annihilation. He showed it to Marena. “I’ve tried to write it down so that others might learn it.”
“You’ve… invented a spell?”
“Yes.” His chest swelled with pride. “I make my own spells. One day, I will open a school of magic and teach the arts I invent.”
Marena looked over the page. As she read, her face slowly paled, eyes wide. “I see… that’s quite something. I… I only pull on spirits to convince them to help me a bit. Sorry, I don’t understand anything you’ve written there.” She turned red and stepped aside, gazing at her feet.
Luna and Theron broke the rock bear with expert efficiency. He made the major cuts, and she carved the meat from the bones. Marena joined them to help with the packaging, wrapping them in large leaves she produced from her backpack.
Within an hour, they were done, and the entire group headed out.
The group’s energy shifted. Nobody said anything, but the air felt lighter.
Nobody walked straight in front of him. Garrett maintained his position at Alsen’s side and was busy telling the story of how they hunted their first rock bear.
They searched the hills for days, only for them to realize the bear was asleep, curled up to look like a rock, the very rock by which they camped every night.
Sonja seemed to be deep in thought, not even chasing after Luna.
The afternoon sun crept lower as the terrain became less rocky and more wooded. Sonja spotted a clearing suitable for camp, and so Garrett called the stop early. They had made good progress, and they lacked the reason to push through the night.
Camp went up with practiced efficiency from Garrett’s group. Theron gathered firewood. Marena set wards. Sonja prepared the fireplace and then did nothing because there was no reason to hunt. When Luna and Theron started preparing the meat, Sonja sat next to Alsen.
He raised an eyebrow. “Problems in paradise?”
“Not really, just that Kitten plays hard to get. She was supposed to fall to her knees, thanking me for protecting her. Instead, she ignored me and went to cut bear meat. But anyway. Here.” She put a pile of golden coins next to him.
“You’ll need it after dinner. And don’t pretend you have your own gold. You don’t. I’ve checked.”
Alsen shook his head. How? No way Luna told her. He took the gold and slipped it into his pocket.
Sonja winked, patted him on the thigh, and went to help prepare the fire. She stacked the wood and went on to look for her flint.
Alsen focused, and the lightest wood at the bottom of the pyre caught ablaze.
Marena and Theron cooked. Alsen pulled out his spellbook and started writing down Cleave. It needed a better name, though. He would have Cleave, then Slash, then Cut, then Cleave Two, then Cleave Mark Two, and then he would get lost in the names.
The spell used pure energy, formed into a direct line, with which he cut. Okay, that worked. He wrote down the spell as Line Cleave.
The fire crackled, the food cooked, and Theron told a story about a blacksmith who accidentally made a sword so sharp it cut through the anvil. Garrett laughed. Marena hummed under her breath, off-tune, while stirring a bowl of something herbal.
Luna said nothing for the rest of the evening. She didn’t get a chance to. Sonja filled the silence for her, a constant stream of compliments, questions, and increasingly creative reasons why Luna should share her sleeping bag. Or wear a collar. Or, ideally, both.
When they finally settled for the night, Luna took her sleeping bag and rope and climbed up a tree.
Sonja stared up at her, forlorn. “Kitten, the branches aren’t safe.”
Luna ignored her, vanishing in the treetop.
“So,” Theron said, stepping to Alsen’s side. “Want to make a bet?”
Out of nowhere, Garrett, Marena, and Sonja appeared near him.
“It’s a bit of a tradition,” Garrett said. “We like to bet on things. And right now, the hottest thing to bet on is how long it will take Sonja to get a collar on Luna.”
Alsen sputtered. “What’s the buy-in?”
“Twenty-five gold.”
He rubbed his chin with his hand. He understood the game Sonja played here. And he was going to absolutely play into it. “Winner takes all?”
“Yes,” Sonja said. “I bet I will get her in four days from now. That will be the first night of camping in the dungeon.”
“I bet on never,” Marena said. “Sorry.”
Garrett tilted his head. “On the way back. A week from now. She will lower her guard when carrying all the treasure we will find.”
Theron shook his head. “I’m with Marena on never with this one.”
Alsen thought back to how the evening went.
Luna sort of refused Sonja’s advances, but not really.
Knowing Luna, if she wanted to completely avoid her, she would have managed.
But she didn’t do that, and beneath the protests, whenever Sonja called her kitten or ran fingers through her hair or bought her drinks, something in Luna’s expression softened for a fraction of a second before the walls slammed back down.
She wasn’t into Sonja. Not even close. But after weeks on the road next to him doing breathing exercises, she might have enjoyed the attention.
Not to mention her going to sleep up in the tree was clearly a challenge, not a refusal. Climb up here if you want to pester me.
“Tomorrow,” he said. “I bet Kitten will be going to sleep in the collar tomorrow.”