“That’s the rainy season for you,” Allthier remarked happily, loosely holding onto a rope that was connected to Benny the ox’s neck. “Don’t be surprised if we don’t see the sun for another couple of weeks. There might be a couple of days here and there where there isn’t rain, but we’ll have cloudy skies pretty much every day.”

  Erich poked his head out of the shelter, looking up at the sky as gentle rain pattered down on his face. It might have been his imagination, but the clouds didn’t look quite as heavy or awful as they had yesterday.

  “Unless I miss my guess it won’t be quite as windy today,” Allthier chattered cheerfully. “Doubt the rain will get as bad either. Yesterday was hardly a monsoon, but it usually isn’t quite that heavy- here”

  The cinderborn bustled over to Erich, his eyes glowing a warm amber, and leaned in to adjust Erich’s collar.

  “That’s a proper rain cape you have there,” Allthier said, pulling Erich’s drawstrings tight with sure hands before tucking them into a pair of brass fittings that he hadn’t been able to find a use for his first time, “but you need to make sure that you’re wearing it properly or it won’t keep ordinary rain out, let alone the wet season storms.”

  He stepped back, looking Erich up and down once before shooting him a grin.

  “There you are, nice and dry. I bet today’s walk will be a lot more pleasant.”

  “The company will help,” Erich replied, speaking up for the first time that morning. “Wandering on your own for hours and hours without conversation to ground your thoughts will drive you a bit crazy before too long. I can handle it for a day or three, but after that it starts to wear on me.”

  “That’s why I travel with Benny,” Allthier said, one of his glowing yellow eyes blinking out in the cinderborn equivalent of a wink. “He’s a bit shy right now, but he’s a great conversationalist. We can go on for hours and hours if given the opportunity.”

  The ox mooed contentedly. Erich gave the cow a skeptical glance.

  “Don’t worry too much,” the cinderborn said, responding to his unspoken remark. “He likes you, it just takes him a bit to open up. Benny’ll come around if you give him a minute.”

  Erich felt the corner of his mouth twitch upward.

  “Isn’t that right buddy,” Allthier continued, leaning in to slap Benny on the shoulder. The ox mooed lowly in response.

  “See,” he said, nodding in Erich’s direction. “He likes you.”

  “Nice to meet you,” Erich said to the cow, feeling a bit ridiculous. “I’m looking forward to traveling with you.”

  “There we are, fast friends,” Allthier replied, puttering back to the ox’s harness to make sure it was tight. “Ready to set out Erich? Madia is about a day and a half away if we make good time. The sooner we get on the road, the sooner we get to spend a night in an actual inn rather than a leaky campsite.”

  Allthier bustled past him, tossing a handful of circular pieces of steel into a wooden box that had been nailed into the shelter wall.

  “That sounds pretty good,” Erich said, adjusting the straps on his backpack. “I’ve camped in much worse conditions, but as nice as it is to get out into nature, a warm bed is a good reward after a long journey.”

  “I couldn’t say it better myself,” the cinderborn responded, tugging gently on Benny’s rope. The ox started in motion, pulling the wagon with an audible squeak.

  Erich started walking alongside the merchant and his ox. He glanced over at the wagon as it creaked along. It was made of older wood, sealed with tar to waterproof it and lovingly maintained. The cargo itself was covered in leather tarps and tied down with tightly wound strings.

  He turned his attention back to the landscape. The flood plains had noticeably more water on them. Erich couldn’t see any soil in the fields, just a thousand ripples from the gentle but steady rain.

  “Looking for garr?” Alltheir asked, interrupting Erich’s contemplation. “I doubt there’ll be any active this early in the day, but being prepared is better than being lunch.”

  Erich looked back at the cinderborn. He hadn’t properly taken stock of the man during their time in the shelter. Allthier’s skin was as dark as any other cinderborn with hints of gray hair and wrinkles around the corners of his eyes betraying his age. He was slightly shorter than Erich, but his body was almost as well muscled, a sure sign that the life of a merchant involved consistent physical labor. At Allthier’s hip was a well worn leather sheath with a machete shoved into it.

  Now that he’d noticed the weapon, Erich began picking up on other details. The thin white lines of healed scars on Allthier’s hands, forearms and face. A slight limp. All signs that the life of a merchant on Tempest wasn’t nearly as peaceful as it was on Hollendil.

  “I actually don’t know much about garr,” Erich said, turning his attention back to the water and the distant drooping trees. “I could lecture you for hours about the panthers and bears back home and I know how to avoid the scavengers of the unclaimed lands on the bridge between worlds, but here you should me about as knowledgeable as a newborn.”

  “You should tell me about your panthers and bears sometime,” the merchant replied. “Some of the jungle areas of Tempest have them, but I’ve never had the chance to visit. For today, I should probably tell you about the threats we face right here and now.”

  “Garr aren’t much of a problem during the dry season,” he continued, his pleasant chatter filling the air as the three of them walked along the slightly uneven road. “Every once in a while they’ll leave their burrows to eat a farmer’s beans or domesticated animals, but they spend most of their time hibernating.”

  “The problem is the rainy season. Garr surface to breed, and breeding means they need protein. Unfortunately for us, cinderborn and our animals are one of the best sources of protein on Tempest. A solitary Garr isn’t much of a threat to an armed adult, but they breed in swarms making travel dangerous.”

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  “Why don’t folks just stay in villages during the rainy season then?” Erich asked. “If things are so rough this time of year, it doesn’t seem like a great idea to spend it on the road.”

  “Well,” Allthier replied cheerfully. “Some of us have to make a living on the road. The army needs food and gear in all seasons. They’re willing to pay a premium for those of us that are willing to brave the more dangerous roads, and unfortunately for me, my kids are going to need a decent pile of bits if they’re going to establish themselves when they come of age.”

  “As for everyone else?” The cinderborn shrugged helplessly. “The farmers need to grow rice. Most of them are slaves, but even the yeomen can’t afford to survive on just one crop of dry season beans alone. That means spending time in and around the flooded farm fields, and that’s where the garr live.”

  “Of course,” Allthier continued. “Even if someone is lucky enough to avoid leaving the village walls during the rainy season, it’s not unheard of for the garr to try and swarm the walls. Only happens once very three or four years, but if you let the garr breed unchecked for too long, they’ll start to get a bit bold.”

  “That sounds pretty awful actually,” Erich responded. “There are some regions like that on Hollendil, but only the hardiest and most desperate people will live there. I can’t think of anyone normal trying to farm or make a living on the Great Salt Flats. It’s all prospectors and trappers, rough folk that can handle themselves in a fight.”

  “Who’s saying I can’t handle myself in a fight?” Allthier asked, tapping the machete at his hip. “Still, fighting off two or three garr is a very different story from dealing with a full breeding swarm. No matter how skilled someone is with a blade, its hard to block an attack that you can’t see coming. Even if I put my back to the wagon, a garr can climb over it pretty easily. Having someone I can fight back to back with will triple my chances of survival.”

  “Glad to help,” Erich said with a half smile.

  “There we go,” Allthier responded, throwing his own smile at Erich. “That’s the expression I’ve been looking for. You’ve been so taciturn this entire time, I was afraid that you didn’t like me for some reason.”

  Erich winced. He could see how the cinderborn would think that, but at the same time it didn’t exactly make him happy to hear it.

  “Nothing like that,” he replied. “You’re perfectly nice and have been nothing but welcoming, but I’m just not in a great headspace. It hasn’t even been a month since I found out that the purpose of my life, everything that I’ve worked and fought for, means less than nothing. I’ve watched friends die in front of me for no reason, sacrifices to the greed fo their commanding officers.”

  He chuckled bleakly, shaking his head as his memory went back to the spire in the unclaimed lands.

  “I’m not sure whether it's better or worse that the officer didn’t get anything out of it. I hated the man for what he did to my friends, but knowing that their sacrifice meant nothing even in the context of a war that meant nothing? That’s almost worse than them being exploited.”

  “Oof,” Allthier said, following the word up with a low whistle. “That’s a lot. I’m not sure how I’d handle that myself if that happened to me. I’m not going to pretend my life is great, I’m out here suffering in the rain next to you after all, but I don’t think I’ve ever worried about my life not having meaning.”

  “Kids are good for that,” the cinderborn continued firmly. “Any time I struggle to find motivation, I think about the boys and its easy to remember that everything I do matters. I could go without a meal or a shirt on my back if necessary, but the idea of leaving my kids without every tool they need to live their best lives? That makes my skin crawl.”

  “I can understand that,” Erich replied. “Intellectually that makes complete sense even if it feels alien to me. I had family, but they never really felt like family to me. Even when I met my master, it didn’t really last long enough for me to develop a deep connection with him. Its more a sense of duty than anything.”

  Allthier sighed, shaking his head as he spoke.

  “That’s a shame Erich. I know that being a swordsman can be a solitary life, but you need to live for something. Unless you find something to strive for, it’s not really living. You’re just waiting for a chance to die.”

  Erich didn’t respond for a long minute. Allthier was right. He’d been upset about being sent to the front, but Erich had accepted his fate with minimal grumbling. Only after getting to know the rest of the Green River martial artists and making friends had he actually started to care about his own life or death.

  “I think you’re right,” Erich replied. “Right now I’m lost. I care about learning and perfecting my martial arts, but not much else. That said, I’m not broken enough to think my viewpoint is healthy. Half the reason for this journey is for me to find a reason to keep going.”

  “I can’t help but wonder if Master Sathis asked me to undertake mathliss as a last gift to me,” he continued, hand resting on the hilt of his sword as he ran his fingers back and forth across the pommel. “He knew my mental state fairly well near the end. Mathliss gives me time to find myself. Right now, I can keep driving myself forward out of duty, but at some point I’ll need to find my guiding beacon, my own reason to keep perfecting myself.”

  “Who knows?” Allthier responded. “I didn’t know the man, but that seems reasonable to me. If that’s the case, I can’t help but be grateful. If he hadn’t sent you to Tempest, you wouldn’t be here traveling alongside me, and I would be stuck talking with Benny for the the entire trip.”

  The ox mooed softly, its hide rustling as it shook its head.

  “I’m sorry about that,” Allthier said hurriedly, patting the ox’s side. “I like talking to you. You’re just not the best conversationalist, a bit taciturn for a long trip.”

  Erich fought a smile as he looked back out over the flooded fields. The rain was still pattering gently down, turning the water into a mess of ripples. Some three hundred feet away, a tree grew up out of the lake. The greenery and bushes around its base were the only real change from the gray and brown of water, dirt and wild rice.

  An animal, about knee high and dark green rustled through the bushes, slipping into the water with a small splash. Erich frowned, searching the water for signs of the creature. A couple seconds later, a pair of eyes, almost a foot apart popped up out of the water.

  “Good catch,” Allthier remarked, nodding in the direction of the animal. “That’s our first garr of the day. We should get a move on. One of them isn’t a problem, but I’d rather not stick around if there is a full swarm.”

  The cinderborn increased his pace, yanking Benny’s lead in order to make him follow

  “How many garr are there in a swarm?” Erich asked, matching speed with his companion. “Unless there are lot of them, I’m not sure how much of a threat they’re going to be.”

  Allthier glanced at Erich, looking him up and down for a second before responding.

  “Garr aren’t that tall but they’re pretty fast when they want to be. I’m not sure exactly how strong you are, so maybe a swarm wouldn’t be much of a challenge. For me? Two or three is my limit and I’d like to think of myself as fairly skilled for someone wihtout mana. A swarm on the other hand can be anywhere from five to a fifty. Every once in a while you hear about a wave numbering in the low hundreds, but those don’t even happen every year.”

  Erich chewed on his lower lip for a second, casting his gaze back out over the water. The monster’s big eyes stared back at him from between the floating rice plants, unblinking.

  He ran his hand over the pommel of his sword again. Maybe Allthier had a point. As nice as a bit more aether would be, it could wait for him to be somewhere more stable than an unprotected road.

  Erich turned back to the road, accelerating a little bit more. Hopefully they would make it to town soon.