Sylrienn didn't ask us to leave.
But it didn't ask us to stay, either.
The veil had been restored. The Hollowpine Stalkers were gone—for now. The wards hummed again with old power. The songs in the treetops returned, faint and silvery. But everything had shifted.
Elven glances lasted longer now. Voices lowered when we passed.
They didn't fear us exactly… but we'd been noticed.
Changed something.
Especially Selaithe.
Thal'Zurein.
The Wild Fang.
She carried the title like a scar she hadn't decided whether to cover or wear openly. Children whispered it. Elders spoke it with a mix of pride and hesitation. She had become part of the village's stories—maybe not a heroine, but certainly a turning point.
We were leaving at dawn.
That night, we packed.
My borrowed cloak. The last of the rootbread. A rough-cut map etched into bark, gifted by a quiet elder who never met my eyes. We wouldn't travel openly—the elves said there were still strange movements in the north. Something stirring near the ruins of old outposts. Something that listened when names were spoken too loud.
They gave us charmstones.
Small, smooth things that smelled faintly of river clay and pine.
"For hiding," they said.
We didn't ask what from.
⟡
"You'll want to follow the ridgeline," one of the scouts told us.
She was older, missing two fingers, her braids bound with wolf teeth.
"The forest thins in three days. After that, you'll find old trader stones. If the ground starts to hum, turn around."
"Why?" I asked.
She looked at me with eyes like split granite.
"Because it means the land remembers something it shouldn't."
I nodded.
Didn't ask more.
⟡
The next morning, the village stirred early to see us off.
Not in ceremony. Not in song.
Just presence.
They stood in the trees, on branches, on platforms. Silent. Watching.
Some nodded. Some didn't.
One little girl waved and whispered, "Fang girl," before ducking behind her mother.
Selaithe stood straight, chin high, one hand resting on the hilt of her knife.
I think she wanted to smirk.
But something in her didn't let it happen.
We left without a word.
The veil shimmered as we passed through—cool mist curling around our shoulders.
It left a tingle on my skin.
Like walking through memory.
⟡
The forest changed quickly.
Less sacred. More wild.
Twisting roots again. Thorn-thick brambles.
Tree canopies that blocked the sun until midday.
The map bark said there were old ruins nearby, but we avoided those.
Selaithe steered us away from broken arches and vine-strangled staircases.
She said spirits lingered in places like that—not evil, just… unfinished.
Around noon, she sniffed the air.
I raised an eyebrow. "Don't tell me you're tracking deer now."
"No," she said, grinning. "Steam. Sulfur. That weird sweet-wet smell? We're close."
"…To what?"
She pointed ahead. "Hot springs."
I blinked. "Wait, you were serious about those?"
"Why wouldn't I be?"
"I thought you were joking."
"I never joke about baths."
"You're gonna take a bath there?"
She smirked too widely. Her tone shifted—flirtatious, glinting.
"Why? Are you planning on joining me?"
⟡
The spring was hidden between stone outcroppings, half-covered by moss curtains.
Steam rose in thin veils, trailing between tree trunks like silk ghosts.
The water was clear but laced with glimmers—tiny mineral flecks caught in shafts of sun.
It was warm. No—inviting.
The kind of warm that felt like it could crawl into your bones and shake the cold out.
Selaithe dropped her pack with a relieved sigh.
"Finally. If I smelled like victory before, I now smell like moldy victory wrapped in swamp regrets."
"You're exaggerating."
"I've smelled corpses that complained less than my boots do right now."
She started undressing. I saw a glimpse of her bare stomach—
I turned fast.
Too fast.
"W-What are you doing?"
She paused. "Undressing?"
"Why?"
"…To bathe?"
"You're doing it here?"
She tilted her head. "It's a hot spring, Kaelen."
I coughed. Looked at a tree very hard. "I'll—uh—I'll stand guard."
Selaithe's voice was smug. "Oh, will you?"
"I'm being chivalrous."
"You're being adorable."
"I'm being professional."
"Mmhmm."
I guarded that spring like it was a royal relic.
Every rustle made me flinch.
Every splash made me pray to whatever gods hadn't abandoned me.
I focused on not looking.
On the patterns in the bark.
On my own knees.
On the concept of dignity.
I'm mentally three times her age after all—
"Water's perfect," she called out, laughter in her tone.
"You're missing out."
"I'm not getting naked in the woods."
"No one said you had to get naked. You could just simmer modestly."
"That's not a thing."
"It is if you believe in yourself."
She splashed. Loudly.
I heard humming.
Casual. Carefree.
It made my ears burn.
Eventually, she climbed out—damp, smug, smugger than anyone had a right to be—and pulled on her tunic while I stared resolutely at a particularly ugly mushroom.
"Your turn," she said.
"I'm good."
"Kaelen."
"No, really—"
"You smell like a haunted forge."
"…Fine."
⟡
I bathed in silence.
She sat on a rock nearby, back turned, tossing pebbles and whistling.
"You're guarding, right?" I called.
"Absolutely. Not peeking. Not even tempted."
I sank lower into the water.
"Are you smirking?"
"Can't prove it."
The heat was incredible.
My joints loosened.
My heartbeat slowed.
For a few precious minutes, I wasn't running.
I wasn't haunted.
I wasn't glowing with something I didn't understand.
I was just a kid in warm water.
When I climbed out and dried off with the world's most damp cloth, Selaithe tossed me a berry from a nearby bush.
"You survived," she said.
"Barely."
"Proud of you."
"Never speak of this again."
She grinned.
"Already writing it into your legend. Kaelen the Blushed.Guardian of Springtime Innocence."
"I will end you."
"No, you won't. I'm your emotional support elf."
She bumped my shoulder.
I didn't push her away.
⟡
We camped near the spring that night.
No monsters came.
No dreams whispered.
Just stars above and warm earth beneath.
Before we slept, I stared up and whispered,
"Do you think Eirenhald will take us in?"
Selaithe didn't answer right away.
Then:
"They'll try to chase us off."
I blinked. "Comforting."
She turned toward me, eyes soft in the starlight.
"But I'll chase back harder."
I smiled.
Just a little.
Then we both drifted off—side by side, one more night bought in a world that didn't offer many.
And somewhere beyond the trees,
something old turned its gaze north.
But not yet.
Not tonight.
Tonight was warm.
And quiet.
And safe.
For now.
⟡
All good things come to an end.
We'd left Sylrienn before the sun kissed the upper canopy, slipping past sleeping sentries and soft farewells whispered in moss and wind. I thought we might have at least a day's grace. Just one.
Instead, we were woken by mosshounds.
Dog-sized, bark-skinned beasts with glowing green eyes and jaws full of root-fangs, guardians of sacred places. The kind you weren't supposed to disturb unless you wanted to be chased into the next century. They didn't bark so much as growl like thunder rolling through the underbrush. We bolted. No time to draw swords.
Then came the silverbeaks. Those were worse.
Birds with mirrored feathers and long hooked beaks, always circling when magic moved too near the surface. And of course—because the world hated me—they started screeching overhead the moment my aura flared in a reflex, just enough to veilstep away from a mosshound's snapping jaws.
By the time it was noon, we were already dying.
"Stupid fucking monsters," Selaithe smudged, mud streaking across her cheek as she wiped sweat with the back of her wrist. Her braid had come undone, wild strands clinging to her face, and there was a leafy twig stuck in her ear.
I blinked at her. "Since when can you curse?"
She grinned, baring her teeth. "Since we ran for our lives three times before breakfast."
"I think I liked you better when you were pretending to be polite."
"Too bad," she said, already ahead again. "You're stuck with the real me now, Kaelen Selkareth. Congratulations."
We walked. Or more like limped, scrambled, and flopped down every time the trees gave us an inch of flat ground. The forest here was denser than even the paths around Sylrienn—older, darker, the kind of place the sun only visited in scattered shafts of gold.
My boots were soaked from a stream we'd fallen into, my knees were bruised, and Calden's sword had nearly slipped out of its wrappings twice.
But despite everything, we laughed.
When the danger faded, Selaithe had started mimicking the mosshounds—snarling and pretending to bite my arm whenever we stopped. I retaliated by calling her a feral sprite and offering her actual moss to eat. She took it. Chewed dramatically. Spat it at me.
We weren't safe.
But we were free.