At the village gate, the chief stood motionless like a dark statue cut against the fading light, his gaze fixed on the backs of the three orcs until the forest swallowed them whole. Behind him, his two sons watched in silence, wearing the expressions of men forced to swallow stones.
"How dare he." The chief's knuckles whitened against the gate's edge. The words came out low, almost to himself.
High in the watchtowers, the guards looked down and said nothing. They stared somewhere past the treeline, careful not to watch too closely, careful not to seem as though they were listening.
"Father." The eldest son stepped forward. "Should we send men into the forest? That brat is no woodsman. And the girl, even if he finds her, is dead weight. They won't survive the night. We could have them back by dawn."
The chief didn't answer. His mind was still churning, replaying the meeting with the Masters, combing through every detail, every shift in their expressions, searching for the true shape of their intent.
"No," he finally said. Some of the fog cleared, replaced by something grimmer. "I'm afraid this is a crisis. One we can neither overcome nor escape."
"Crisis?" The eldest frowned. "What do you mean, Father?"
"I told them a human had spoken their tongue. Without the gu worm." The chief paused, turning the memory over. The orcs' expressions came back to him, and the more he examined them, the heavier his sense of powerlessness became. "Do you know how they responded? They weren't troubled in the slightest. It was as if—" He stopped, then said it plainly. "As if they didn't believe me. As if what I described simply couldn't exist. They dismissed it and sent those three merely to survey the village."
He shook his head slowly. "But why? What more could they want from us?"
Before the eldest could speak, the youngest cut in. "Why wouldn't that concern them? And how did the brat speak Orcish to begin with? Did they implant him with the gu?" His voice sharpened. "Wait! What if another orc tribe is using him to lay claim to this territory? To possess us?"
"I already told you it's impossible for that boy to have been implanted with the gu that fast." The chief turned to face them, his expression as tangled with confusion as their own. "And last night I saw no trace of the gu's strength in his body. His Orcish was poor, far too poor for a worm-implanted envoy, though he claimed he was learning it directly from the mighty Volrag." He let that sit for a moment. "Every sign pointed to a different puzzle entirely."
His voice dropped. "I'm afraid of what this boy's disappearance means for this village. His and the girl's both. Whether they are harbingers of something coming. Or something already here."
"Then let me act." The eldest's gaze flicked briefly toward his brother. "Give me the men. I'll have him back in chains before dawn."
The younger stepped forward at once, dipping his head. "Father. I have a hound that can track a scent to the ends of the earth. Let me go instead."
The chief looked at his sons, at the ambition burning bright and untempered in their eyes, and let out a long, weary breath. "You are both too inexperienced to see the trap. Though I don't blame you. I have only just seen it myself."
"A trap?" The eldest stiffened. "What trap? Whose?"
"Do you truly believe they would let a ten-year-old girl slip from their grasp?" The chief's voice was quiet now, almost tired. "If she had actually escaped on her own, they would have scoured every inch of this forest and found her before nightfall. With ease."
The brothers went still as the shape of it settled over them.
"They have already decided to harvest us," the chief said, the words landing like stones dropped into still water. "I don't know how many they'll kill this time. I don't know what they'll take in the name of punishing a crime they themselves arranged. But I doubt even delivering that boy and his sister on a silver platter would change what's already been decided."
The two brothers clenched their fists, muscles taut with helpless rage. The ambitions that had burned so brightly moments ago now felt small, trifling things held up against the weight of the village's survival.
The chief placed a hand on each of their shoulders. His grip was not gentle. "Don't entertain foolish ideas of resistance. This is not a struggle we can win. It is not a war we dare to fight."
He released them, and the absence of his hands left something behind, a chill that had nothing to do with the night air. Then he turned and walked toward his house, shoulders bowed beneath a burden no one else could see, until the darkness took him and he was gone. His sons remained at the gate, watching the place where he had been.
••••
Aris opened his eyes to darkness. He stood and stretched, his body stiff from sleeping against the cavern wall, back scored with the rough imprint of stone. A quick scan confirmed he was in decent condition, though his stomach voiced its disagreement.
He walked to Lilly, knelt beside her, and pressed a hand to her forehead. Her condition had improved, but the cave's cold still clung to her. She stirred at his touch, eyes opening slowly, hazy and unmoored in the dark, until they found his face.
"Brother…"
"Yes. How are you feeling?" The words left him before he remembered he'd already scanned her.
"I'm feeling fine—" Her stomach growl answered for her.
A smile tugged at his mouth. He rose, crossed to the heap of loot, and pulled free the pouch of dried meat. "Eat these for now," he said, pressing it into her hands. "I'll find us something better later."
He watched her eat, then his gaze drifted to the deer carcass. That could wait. He'd deal with it later.
When she finished, he rose and turned toward the waterfall, then glanced back at her. He didn't like the idea of keeping a growing child locked away from sunlight in a cold, dark cave, but he knew it had to be done. Not until he could secure the outside. Not until he found a better place to call home, perhaps another human settlement.
But even then, were other settlements any different from the one he was running from? Were they not also under orc control? The memory of those chained captives being herded toward the bone-village crept back in, and with it, doubt that safety existed anywhere at all.
"Wait for me here. I'll find fruits for you." Before leaving, he grabbed the second bamboo container, walked to the cascade, filled it, and carried it back to her. "Make sure to drink enough water. And you can relieve yourself over there." He pointed to the eastern corner of the cave.
"Relieve?" Lilly asked, confused.
"I mean—peeing. Taking a dump." The words came out awkward, and he knew it. Rill would never have said relieve. That was Aris reaching for something, trying to build a bridge, and somewhere beneath the effort, he knew he was failing. Part of him wanted to fail, wanted family without the weight of thinking too hard about what that meant.
Part of him saw her as a burden, a compromise he hadn't chosen. And part of him was afraid—afraid of what he might do if the orcs, or the chief, or anyone used her against him. He wasn't a threat yet. His eyes moved to the bamboo container of orc blood and the bundle of poisonous herbs beside the loot. Soon. Soon that would change.
For now, Prime still needed to finish analyzing the orc blood, after he returned from his survey. But first: the pool. He needed to see its bottom, to understand how far the drainage system truly reached.
He began stripping off his makeshift outer layers until he stood in only his vest and pants, then spread the rest across the cave floor to dry. He couldn't afford to stay in damp clothes any longer.
He turned to Lilly, who was watching him from her nest of clothes, and smiled. Then he walked to the cascade and stepped through the waterfall.
Outside, morning light pierced the canopy in shifting ribbons of gold across the pool's surface. He didn't linger to watch the sight. He dove, the cold biting into him as he kicked deeper. The pool was deeper than he'd expected, fifteen meters at the center, he estimated. As the sunlight faded to a dim glow below, he activated the scan, its blue grid sweeping the dark water.
No fish were around, not a single one. It confirmed a suspicion he'd been carrying: this waterfall might be artificial. Or at least, deliberately shaped.
At the bottom sat a triangular boulder, roughly three meters across. He swam around it, scanning. The water pressure here was different, and beneath the boulder he found what he was looking for: a drainage system, with the boulder placed over it like a valve controlling how much water could pass through. He wouldn't be able to move it with his frail physique. But that didn't mean he had no options, as a plan was already forming in his mind.
He surfaced slowly, head barely breaking the water, and swept the bank with his eyes. Nothing moved. He slipped into the undergrowth, wrung out his vest, and sat until the scan's side effects faded and his stamina crept back. Then he began searching for basalt stones.
He found dozens within minutes, more than he needed. It made him wonder if a volcanic mountain lay somewhere nearby, or once had. The thought didn't hold. He dug a Dakota fire hole, set the stones to heat, and moved into the undergrowth to forage while he waited.
Most of what he found was poisonous, useful in its own way. The edible fruits he ate on the spot, and few he set aside for Lilly, tucked into a makeshift wooden box.
He was still eating in the brush when heavy footsteps sounded in the distance. Orcs. He dropped to the damp ground at once, stilling himself until the sound faded. Only when the forest settled back to silence did he rise. He crept to their path and crouched over the tracks. With Prime's help, the picture became clear: the area he'd been foraging in was laced with frequent orc traffic. He left immediately.
He didn't stop until he reached the Dakota fire hole. The fifteen stones were hot and ready by now. He coated them in clay from the pool, played the coated stones beside the hole, then headed back to the cave with the fruits in hand.
Inside, he found Lilly had moved near the cascade. She sat watching the water crash down, eating the dried meat in small, unhurried bites. She didn't speak. The silence around her felt heavier than usual, not sullen, just worn, as though the running and the fear had used up whatever words she might have had.
He arranged the hot stones around her without comment, placed the poisonous herbs and fruits beside the loot pile, and tucked the dagger into his waist. The deer carcass was waiting.
He paused at the waterfall's curtain, carcass slung over one shoulder, and told her not to touch the poisonous fruits. She nodded without turning from the water. He stepped through.
He found a spot far enough east, near the forest's edge. If orcs discovered the remains here, they would blame the villagers. And the villagers would assume the same of each other; no one kept that careful a count. He hung the carcass from a branch with vines to drain the last of its blood, then set to work.
He skinned and butchered methodically, carving several kilograms of meat from the small deer, wrapping each cut in large leaves and binding them with vine. When he was done, he gathered the packages and carried them back.