I woke up to howls of pain coming from somewhere in the camp.

Looking around, I noticed three soldiers sleeping in their cloaks nearby. My hand let go of the sword’s handle. If these men considered their sleep to be more important than whatever was happening outside, I was also certain that this wasn’t an arm-wide emergency. I quietly got up and stepped outside to put my armour on. It was the unspoken rule of the tent — those who stood a night watch had earned their sleep.

The morning greeted me with chill air, and the small strip of the grey sky unobstructed by the Forest canopy — gloomy drizzle. I tightly latched my brigandine and enveloped it with my kaftan to keep the warmth inside and moisture out; today’s march would be a lousy one. Taqi and Sif, two servants assigned to our finger, were busy making breakfast and getting pack animals ready for the road ahead, while Irfan and Roshan were taking care of their gear.

As the leader of our unit, Irfan was excused from the night watch while Roshan was likely roused by the shrieks just as I was. The last two spears were somewhere at the camp perimeter for the final, dawn watch.

Further into the camp where fingers’ tents left out a small open area, a half-naked soldier was getting mercilessly whipped.

“What is going on? An enemy scout?”

“As if. Some shit-for-brains decided to sleep through the watch,” Roshan put aside his spear and a whetstone and glanced at me, “Mule… ah shit.”

I grimaced. I was aware that arms practised corporal punishment for egregious mistakes, and sleeping on guard duty while in the middle of the Forest was indeed a flogging matter, but this wasn’t the first time this happened and others weren’t that severe.

“The wermages are antsy.” Irfan correctly understood the frown on my face. “There is a rumour that one is lurking in the Forest nearby.

My eyes were instantly drawn to the silent Forest looming past our camp’s palisade. The arms were marching through a well-established route with large clear-cut areas for overnight stops. They were well spaced out for half-day marches, close to sources of fresh water, and even had some terrestrial grass for animals to graze on. But when I looked at the towering ‘trees’ it didn’t feel enough. My next glance was toward my shield and spear. Both to check that they were still here and to prime my body so that it knew where to grab if someone sounded an alarm.

“Am I allowed to heal him afterwards?”

Irfan harrumphed. “Not our maniple, thank the Goddess. You can try bothering our First Spear to ask their Manipular on your behalf. You are not the only healer here, not even in our maniple. They have theirs and they will wash his back and stitch it if they need to.”

“How pointless,” I murmured as I went to grab my kettle. “If he doesn’t die from infection afterwards, he will be a dead weight for a while.”

“We are in the fucking Forest. A sleeping guard can kill half a maniple if not more.”

Taqi tried to take the kettle from my hands, but I silently pushed him aside, filled it up with water, and set it on the small ‘breakfast’ campfire.

“I don’t disagree that there should be a proper punishment. What I am talking about is the severity of this case and, most importantly, the arbitrariness of it. If he survives, he will remember it not as the punishment for sleeping while on guard duty but for being unlucky enough to do it while his commander was spooked.”

Irfan paused for a moment, then shook his head and resumed sharpening the blade of his spear. “If he survives, he will know that there is no second chance after this. He also serves as an example for others. Use your southern words on Samat wordsmiths if you want to argue. Or, better yet, stay silent if you wish to stay in the good graces of our commanders. Manipulars don’t take kindly to spears questioning their decisions.”

His spear twirled in his hands and stopped near my face. “You might’ve impressed our First Spear with your tricks and built that skyship, but the General didn’t promote you. So for anyone outside of the first maniple, you are nothing but a pair of legs for your shield and a pair of hands for your spear.”

The tip of his spear didn’t linger. A second at most and it was back in his lap with a sandstone sliding down its edge. His words were similar — gruff but without anger directed at me. They were a warning, not a threat.

I sighed and started rummaging through my pouch. After the Collector attack, I’s split my gear into important and useful types and kept the important stuff on me as much as possible. Luckily, there was not that much that I was really concerned about; just the grub, two still-growing lashes, and a few dry pouches filled with unique mixes. Isra’s weapons were strapped on me while stuff that would raise eyebrows and bring up questions that I wasn’t ready to answer — like the ocular implant and the artefact farter coin — were stashed inside my body pouch.

“Yes, such talks need to happen between Speakers at the Summit or between Manipulars and the General,” I conceded. Irfan was right — not only were we in the military and expected to obey every order without question, but Emanai itself wasn’t too conducive to individual freedoms and personal expressions. Unless you were one of the elite, that is. Through my marriage to Anaise and my ‘daimonic’ status, I could now be considered as part of that elite, even if only within Aikerim’s Manor. And yet I still had others trying to impose their will on my everyday life.

Neither that hapless guard nor the soldiers of my unit had such luxury of personal status. On the other hand, I was nowhere influential enough to sway all of Emanai or even some parts of it with my opinions. Yeva and I had to mollify Aikerim again and again with current and future profits for her to even consider the eventual transition from slave labour. The Summit of Speakers would eat me alive whether Albin was on my side or not.

When it came to Sophia Chasya, I was hopeful that she wouldn’t use the suffering of others to influence me directly if I were to bring it to her attention. That would be a very shortsighted move and she clearly had the ability to plan much farther ahead, but I was also certain that she wouldn’t entertain my suggestions at this moment either.

The General was so busy with thoughts of the upcoming battle that she couldn’t afford to continue her ‘daimon hunt’. At the absolute best, she would just refuse to listen.

“May the Goddess give you luck. You will need it.” Irfan voiced my thoughts.

I pressed my lips thin. “I think that the First Spear would be interested in seeing my ‘combat’ medicine in action.”

I could not depend on luck — she was a fickle mistress that came and went whenever she pleased. While others might be content to offer their livelihood into her hands so that they could avoid a life of misery and mediocrity either by striking big or by crashing into oblivion, I had too many plans that I ought to fulfil. Too many people depended on my survival and, most importantly, my knowledge assured me of my eventual success.

“Why waste your medicine on a miscreant when you might need it to help real warriors after the battle?” Roshan spoke up. It took him a while to realise that I didn’t particularly care about him calling me names.

“I have plenty of emergency medicine and if I do run low — I will get more from Samat,” I replied and grabbed a nearby cup.

That was the crux of my current dilemma. Did I care about that murk? Not particularly — he was just one among many. But I had the ability to help him and doing so cost me little to nothing. On the contrary, it could solidify my status as a healer and slow down the rate of attrition in our arms ever so slightly. As such, doing nothing felt wrong.

“Hey! That’s my cup!”

“I am aware.” I ignored his outrage as I stirred the mixture with hot water. “Here. Drink this.”

Irfan glared at his cup. “Another one of your medicines? You owe me a clean cup.”

“Yes,” I drawled as I filled my cup. “This is a special medicine to ward off the chill of rain and make your marching step sure and steady.”

Irfan cautiously sniffed the brew. “Looks like liquid shit.”

After blowing on the hot liquid, I deliberately took a sip in front of him and beckoned the two servants over. “Well, you only get one portion for the march ahead. Don’t want it? Give it to Taqi or Sif then. I don’t think that we will be marching less than we usually do, and the autumn rain will sap a lot of our strength. If wermages are indeed antsy, this finger needs to be at its strongest.”

Taqi and Sif glanced at each other and then at my single cup.

“Everyone will get a cup,” I assured them.

“A cup of what?” Arash asked as he emerged from the tent, wiping his eyes open and grimacing at the drizzle. “Where is my portion?”

“A cup of morning hot chocolate, old man.”

XXX

“You can heal that spear when we stop for the night,” the First Spear huffed as she walked near me. “Once the tent is fully set up and the camp is built, that is.”

While she looked disgruntled it wasn’t directed at me — we had been marching for a few hours and the drizzle never stopped. Most of our woollen cloaks had been fairly drenched by now and even I occasionally felt moisture under my layers despite additional waterproofing.

“Thank you, First Spear. Did their Manipular ask for anything burdensome?”

“No, she saw merit in your suggestion. Well, she saw merit in having an alchemist of a Pillar Manor making the moans go away.”

I nodded and glanced at the Forest. Even though I had managed to sneak out to ‘fetch water for the finger’ last night, I wasn’t sure that I could repeat that tonight. It was a task for a slave and not a spear so there was no competition to take that spot, but I did it to study the farting artefact in relative privacy. Right now, sneaking alone into an area close to the Forest when seasoned soldiers were feeling some bad juju would be the epitome of stupidity.

That honestly sucked. A small runic ‘detection array’, that I had carved for this artefact, made it abundantly clear the trinket was manipulating Flow during its activation apart from keeping its reinforcement runes permanently active. As far as I could tell, it ‘emitted’ Flow as I pressed it only to ‘suck’ it back in right after. As if it was some sort of a squeaker toy but I tried to avoid easy assumptions for now, especially since the difference in activation pressure had no effect on the sound nor the Flow’s… flow.

Yeah, I was probably discovering basic truths that every wermage child knew from birth.

The artefact produced distorted sounds underwater so it was unlikely that it was working with wind or air specifically, but it was definitely a physical interaction and not just some mental magic in my mind. Unless it was creating those distortions because I assumed they might exist, I couldn’t discard that either. But the distortions were… weird, so that theory was rather weak for now.

My attempts at making a working copy had failed so far. From my conversation with Sophia, the material didn’t seem to matter but my resin replicas remained inert nevertheless. Considering that Manors of Emanai were eager to increase their stock of similar artefacts yet were unable to do so, there was some sort of ‘priming’ ritual to convert the paperweight into an artefact.

Was that something that only the heurisk race could do? Catriona Emanai was unlikely to spend her afternoons crafting fart pillows, but there were two heurisk guards by her side. It was likely that heurisk artisans existed as well.

Or was that the Shebet secret magic? Neither of the Chasya twins showed any significant inclination toward their ‘traditional’ wind magic, and I saw Albin blatantly mimic Aikerim’s Orb of Truth in his hand like it was some basic flame spell. That explained why Sophia wasn’t that concerned about distributing ‘divine’ artefacts for her personal gain without fear of Divine Retribution.

If that was the case, Sophia was indeed selling me glass beads from her personal glassmaking factory and her demand to research the coin-shaped artefact took a completely different meaning. She wasn’t expecting me to reinvent the magical wheel and somehow do it better than entire generations of wermages. Similarly to our ‘Cancer’ exchange, Sophia wished to superimpose my ‘ancient’ knowledge onto her ‘divine’ one. And, honestly speaking, so was I.

I just had to make sure she wouldn’t stiff me at the end of this exchange.

“Hey! Are you listening?” Hajar growled beside me.

I flinched and glanced around as my ears took in every sound just in case. “Yes?”

As far as I could hear, nothing was out of the ordinary. Well, there was the slop of feet through the mud, occasional sniffs from runny noses, and a slight rustle of alien needles somewhere in the Forest’s canopy.

“I asked you a question, spear. Were you listening?”

Ah, shit.

“Er…” I gestured vaguely in the direction I was staring at as my thoughts rapidly backtracked from the artefact I was forbidden to talk about to our initial conversation. “My apologies-”

A shrill whistle from above pierced my ears, and the whole column stumbled in its tracks.

“Spears out! Shields up!” Hajar roared at the top of her lungs and kicked me toward the rapidly forming line. “Charge for Them!”

My backpack dropped into the mud and I quickly linked my pavise with the rest of my finger. I couldn’t help but appreciate how smooth the transition happened. A few seconds ago, we were marching in a loose formation, and now, two walls of shields and spears were rapidly expanding in both directions. Someone, somewhere figured out the perfect spacing and composition of the marching column just to make this happen.

I could see very little of the commotion happening behind my back and I heard even less due to the rapid-fire of commanding barks all around me. Mages and archers had their positions and orders, along with servants who got pushed into the middle of our two-sided wall with our gear and animals. There was a loud thud somewhere to my side as one of the Kausar sisters landed from the balloon and I felt the ground under our feet harden into a solid surface.

We offered grunts of gratitude but no one spared a glance. Our eyes and our spears were aimed at the Forest and anything lurking within. Ready to strike and defend.

 

Then we waited.

 

And waited some more.

 

“Damn, I wanted to take a piss,” someone groaned nearby.

Someone snickered, few shushed back.

I reached into my pouch and dipped my fingers into a tiny poison jar, scooping its contents out. The toxic compounds within had a consistent and rapid effect on alien flora and I hoped that it would cause at least some response within the fauna as well.

Ignoring the hushed bickering around me, I pulled my spearhead back to me and deftly ‘greased’ the edge with the oily mixture as my nanites honed the blade. If my chemistry proved ineffective, I now had physics of sharp edges to back up my claims. “It’s coming.”

“Explain.” Behind me, the First Spear demanded immediately.

“The rustle in the Forest. It’s drawing closer.”

“No one asked for your farts, merk,” someone spat nearby.

“Silence!” Hajar barked and leaned closer to me. “How close?”

“No idea. Never heard them up close. How loud are they?”

“The General’s arusak is nearby,” Hajar boomed over us. “We are her shield and our duty is our honour! Stand strong and remember that the best war mages of Kiannika are standing ready behind your backs! Emanai victorious!”

“Ul-lah!”

As the spears cheered, her hand grabbed my collar and pulled me closer, “like a person walking on gravel.”

I grimaced. “Close.”

My eyes looked back at the nearby arusak that was now sitting on the ground and then upward. Something told me that arusak and its residents might not be the main Creature attraction here.

“Huare Kausar!” I yelled to the familiar wermage. “Pull the venting line and bring it down.”

Seeing the deer girl nodding in confirmation, I turned around and sighed.

“Very close.”

My ears prepared me for its entrance, just as the Creature’s carapace in Aikerim’s manor primed my eyes for its shape. Yet the alien surprised me nevertheless. I was aware that crab-like body shape could be fast, as I was aware that Creatures were avid climbers in the Forest. What I was not prepared for was the sheer speed at which it traversed through the complex web of branches growing in every direction.

The yellow-glowing comet of white carapace sailed across the Forest canopy faster than a hungry spider could dash across its web toward the caught prey. How? I did not know. Most likely magic.

Kiannika bristled at it with spells and arrows and its flight turned erratic.

No, not erratic — wild spins and sudden dips kept the Creature just a hair’s breadth away from flying arrows or exploding fireballs. This thing was intelligent enough to understand ballistics. New movements also told me that it wasn’t magic that kept the Creature sailing — it was in a constant ballistic trajectory itself. As it moved, one of its tucked appendages would lurch out and grab, stab, or scrape the nearby ‘tree’ and adjust its flight. When it needed to do a sharp turn, it would use one of its prehensile tentacles to spin around a trunk and preserve as much momentum as possible.

And rustle the Forest in the process.

I felt my palms sweating. It was strong enough to launch its body with just one of its numerous segmented legs and tough enough not to have said leg ripped apart from the immense stress in the process.

And it was still getting closer to our line.

I felt the itch to look back and check on my wives just as I wanted to look for the Chasya siblings. Their time-stop spell would be quite timely right now. I knew that matter acted differently when it was frozen in such a way — I crunched on the time-stopped wine myself once — but Albin had one of my sharpened swords with him. In him.

Yet the Creature maintained its dance without scattering into hundreds of tiny pieces.

Irje’s magical hands rustled my hair under my helm and gripped my shoulder. A prank that she pulled occasionally now filled me with support. The abilities of others were outside of my control and thus — not important. I could ask later why they couldn’t or wouldn’t use their secretive magic. I had my skinsuit, three sharp blades, and knowledge that Creatures weren’t invincible.

A loud crack thundered through the opening and the Creature tumbled downwards, still hugging the leftovers of a tree branch. Spinning faster and faster.

Shit.

“Brace.”

“Wha-”

I raised my spear upward. “Brace!”

The frayed log crashed into our ranks with a glancing blow, breaking spears and scattering shields. Someone screamed, waving his broken arm around. I cursed to myself and threw him back. Sometimes, triage was getting the wounded the fuck out first and dealing with them later.

“Pick up your shields and stand!” the First Spear roared. “Sif! Bring spares!”

Spikes of stone sprung up from the ground, barely slowing the barrelling Creature, while fire, boulders, and arrows tried to pin it down. I gritted my teeth, the alien planned this and our formation was still too loose for contact.

Time to see how well I was prepared for this.

I yanked my shield from the ground and moved to where our line was at its weakest and intact spears — sparse. If this thing was as smart as it appeared to be — I was standing in its path. “Bring it, Seafood.”

Its tentacle gripped the magical stalagmite nearby, bringing the Creature to an immediate stop and the rock — hurling into me.

“Erf!” I heard Anaise.

The wood of my pavise groaned under the impact, but her magic kept it strong enough to hold.

“Holding!”

The Creature darted sideways, weaving through the spells, but I could see it wasn’t done with me as its path was slowly curving back to where I was standing. Despite the words of the Kiymetl sword master, it didn’t try to crush me with its body. The Creature was cautious.

I glanced at the brownish sheen on my spear. Was it familiar with one of the chemicals I was using? Repulsed by it?

The magical crustacean made a sharp turn and lunged at our line once more. It hit our ranks to my side, ignored stabs by other soldiers, and then snapped sideways. Another tentacle hissed through the air and spearheads scattered on the ground. Including mine.

Cursing the rigid form of pike formation, I yanked my kattar out and swiped at the white tentacle coiling around my torso. The blade cleaved its flesh and I was immediately kicked backwards. The Creature used me as a springboard, disengaging from the line once again. By the time I had recovered and back on my feet, it was gone.

I suddenly realised that there was a cacophony of sounds all around me. People were yelling — some were cheering while others groaned from pain. Commanders were barking orders left and right, drowning the sounds of flying fireballs and the twangs of werbows. The battle was still happening somewhere close.

“Where is it?” I asked after picking up the tip of my spear. The wet ground already rusted its edges — the sharpness wasn’t without consequences. Well, when used on steel, that is.

“Not here. You have survived it, Well done!” Hajar patted my shoulder only to shake her hand in disgust. “Eugh, you have its ichor all over you.”

“Yeah,” I grabbed my new ‘sash’, “it left me a parting gift. Ah, shit!”

The Creature’s flesh was rapidly disintegrating into copious amounts of pinkish ‘ichor’ sloshing inside the translucent-white outer shell. “Damn it, I need a jar.”

“You need a spear,” the First Spear wiped her hands on my kaftan. “What? Your clothes are dirty.”

A horn rang through the column, causing cheers among the soldiers. That was a general order to stand down and regroup — the fight was over.

I craned my neck. While spears had to hold rank, archers and mages were a lot more mobile inside our ‘shell’. Once the Creature went elsewhere, Irje and Anaise moved away as well. “Do you think they killed it?”

“That, or it quickly nabbed someone and left. Things aren’t people — hurt them hard enough and they will seek easier prey elsewhere.”

I said nothing and kept looking. Due to their height, Irje, Kirana, and Huare were easy to spot and I could see the familiar red hair between them as well. Good. I could also see numerous casualties scattered around. That was not so good.

I glanced at Sassan, the self-proclaimed prettiest man of our finger, casually blowing blood from his nose as he helped the grimacing soldier — a rib fracture, most likely — to take off their armour. Their gear was decent, but it couldn’t keep them completely safe against the flying log, thrown with power comparable or even superior to that of a wermage. Or the half-a-ton Creature that slammed into their shields just to dump its momentum. The scuffle was quick, but it wasn’t bloodless.

“Time to lick our wounds, then.” I opened my pouch and started rummaging through it. “Fuck!”

“What?”

“That piece of seafood crushed my grub.”