Chương 40: Chapter 35 — Under the Stars

⟨ [NOTIFICATION] ⟩ Current XP: 3, 650 / 10, 000 They pushed too late. The forest path darkened faster than an open road — the trees closing off the sky in sections, the light going in stages rather than gradually, until the wagon lantern was necessary and the road ahead was a narrow pale strip between dark trunks. Nutter Estate was still four hours ahead, maybe more, and the wagon had one wheel that Jenkins was describing as fine but which Fenwick had been watching for two hours with increasing alarm.

"There's a pull-off," Jenkins said.

"Half a mile up, maybe a bit more. Good flat ground, used it before. Be comfortable enough." Lady Nutter said nothing. She had been saying nothing since the carriage. Dabbing at her eyes every so often and staring off into space. It was the composed stillness of someone working through something privately. Fenwick had noted this. Max walked beside the wagon with his eyes on the treeline. His eyes had been on the treeline since the carriage.

The pull-off was exactly what Jenkins had promised — flat ground off the road, screened by a stand of old oak, an old firepit surrounded by stones to the edge, with the remains of a fire maybe a week old. Jenkins unhitched the iguanas with the practiced efficiency of someone who had done this ten thousand times, fed them from the feed bag without commentary, and had a small fire going in the fire pit before Fenwick had finished checking the perimeter.

"I'll take first watch," said Fenwick.

"Don't need one," said Jenkins cheerfully.

"Been stopping here for thirty years. Nothing ever bothers this spot." Fenwick looked at Max. Max was looking at the trees above the camp.

"I'll take first watch," said Fenwick. Max did not sit down. He circled the camp twice while Jenkins worked, moving in the methodical widening arcs Fenwick had seen at the carriage wreck. He stopped at the treeline on the north side for a long moment, looking at something or listening for something, and then came back and sat at the edge of the firelight facing out. He had not been asked to do any of this. He had simply done it.

Fenwick watched him settle and felt something he recognized from the Order — the quiet of working alongside someone who understood the job without needing it explained. He caught himself. He had a word for it. He just hadn't expected to apply it here. Lady Nutter had required her second-best trunk to sit on. She had pointed at the second-best, looked at it, then at Fenwick. Who, for his credit, had tried to lift it.

After struggling for about five minutes and barely moving it, Jenkins had retrieved it without comment. She had tested the ground twice with one foot before positioning it, then sat with her back straight, her hands in her lap, and looked at the fire. Jenkins produced a pot and began making something that smelled considerably better than its ingredients suggested it should.

"Now I had a fella once," said Jenkins, stirring, "couldn't sleep on the road to save his life. Every noise, every branch cracking, up he'd be. Said to him, I said, Gerald, the road's been here longer than you, and it'll be here longer than whatever's troubling you, and you know what he said to me—" Lady Nutter's tail bristled fully. She smoothed it with one precise hand without looking at it.

"—said I was the most aggravating creature he'd ever been stuck with on a road, which I thought was a bit much, but then Gerald always did have strong opinions about things. Good fella though. Sent me a card every winter solstice for twenty years." Max was sitting at the edge of the firelight, cross-legged, facing outward. Fenwick had given him a piece of jerky, which he was chewing on while watching the road. The hunger bar was stable. The treeline was dark.

Fenwick sat between Max and Lady Nutter and felt, not for the first time, that his clerical skill set had expanded considerably beyond what the Order had originally anticipated. You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

"You should sleep," he said to Lady Nutter, quietly. She looked at him.

"Horatio has been with my family for twenty-two years," she said. Fenwick said nothing. There was nothing useful to say.

"He will have tried to protect them," she said.

"He always does. He would have—" She stopped. Looked at the fire.

"He would have stood in front of whatever was coming."

"Yes," said Fenwick.

"That's what I think too." She looked at him for a moment.

"Are you telling me that because it's true or because it's kind?"

"Both," said Fenwick.

"In this case." She looked at the fire for a long time.

"I see," she said. Quietly. She looked at the fire a moment longer.

"Twenty-two years," she said.

"He used to bring me a warm syrup drink when I was small, when I couldn't sleep. My parents didn't know. He would have been dismissed if they had." Fenwick said nothing.

"He was very good at not being seen doing kind things," she said.

"It was his nature—" She stopped. Looked at her hands.

"He was good at it." She was quiet for a moment. Then she looked at Max.

"The hero," she said.

"He's been watching the treeline since we found the carriage."

"Yes," said Fenwick.

"Is that—" She paused.

"Is that because he thinks whatever did this is still close?" Fenwick looked at Max's back, still and patient at the edge of the firelight.

"He doesn't think it's gone," said Fenwick.

"He hasn't said so. But he hasn't stopped watching." Lady Nutter looked at Max for a moment. Something shifted in her expression — not comfort exactly, but the acknowledgment of a fact.

"Good," she said. Quietly. Jenkins, who hadn't heard any of that conversation, kept talking. As the quiet enveloped the two of them, they heard him begin a story about a goat. Lady Nutter's tail bristled. She lay down on her trunk, pulled her traveling coat over herself, and closed her eyes with the deliberate composure of someone going to sleep rather than admitting she couldn't. Fenwick kept watch until the small hours. Max kept watch the whole night.

Sindy read to him quietly — no screen tonight, just her voice in his head through the bond that had always been only theirs. The rest of the camp saw a ghoul sitting at the edge of the firelight, still and watchful. Max was somewhere else. Ash and Authority by elektrik. star They were at the part of the story where Lavender helped the injured dragon home and had to travel through strange territory and weird animals. Fenwick glanced at Max once during his watch. The ghoul hadn't moved.

His eyes were open and pointed at the treeline, but something in the set of his shoulders said he was somewhere else — following something inward. Fenwick looked back at the road. Some things didn't need watching. He sat at the edge of the firelight, facing the dark, and listened. The hunger bar held at 7. He did not wander. Dawn came grey and cold, and Jenkins was already up, moving with quiet efficiency that came from thirty years of early starts.

He had the fire banked and the grain bag put away before Fenwick had fully woken. Max was looking up. Fenwick followed his gaze. The light was just enough — the first pale rays clearing the eastern treeline, catching the world at an angle that made certain things visible that the dark had hidden. The oaks above the camp were old and broad, their upper branches spreading wide and flat, perfect for roosting. Twenty-three dragonflies. Maybe more.

Wings spread and still, catching the early light in iridescent flickers that moved across the camp in slow pulses as the sun climbed. The smallest were four and a half feet long. The largest, roosting on the thickest branch directly above the wagon, was roughly Max's height, its body as long as a man was tall, wings spanning six feet wide on both sides. They had been there all night. Fenwick looked at Max. Max was already standing, sword on his back, watching the branches with the focused attention of a predator.

Jenkins had gone very still in the driver's seat, which was, Fenwick reflected, the most sensible thing Jenkins had done in twenty-four hours. He was looking at the largest dragonfly with the expression of someone composing a story he was going to tell for the rest of his life, and wisely keeping it inside for now.

Lady Nutter, who had been sitting up with the barely awake alertness of someone who had not slept as much as she had pretended, looked up, looked at the wings catching the light, and then looked at Fenwick with an expression that was a lot more alert and scared out of her mind. Fenwick picked up his notes very quietly. They began to pack. Nobody spoke above a whisper until they were back on the road. ⟨ [SYSTEM PRIVATE LOG] ⟩ [Sindy — Private Log — Day 67] He watched all night. He didn't wander.

Twenty-three dragonflies. —We slept under them. ▌ Becca, if you're reading this: ▌ They didn't attack. The night's cold kept them asleep. ▌ We need to go now before they wake up!