A lone fat raindrop plopped right down onto the middle of his map. Nolbin studied it ominously and not three seconds later, a downpour commenced, and he was completely soaked. He decided, teeth chattering, that it would be best to stop using the map. It was an incredibly fickle, unreliable thing (that’s what he got for stealing it: divine retribution and all that). A squiggly misshapen sun hovered over Vastland, proclaiming that the weather was fine and summery, when in reality it was...not.

For the past three days he’d been wandering in this forest, desperately searching for a road that the map promised was nearby. But all he’d seen was row after row of spindly trees. He was becoming rather tired of the color green.

A scream pierced through the forest and he startled, heart leaping in sudden anxiety. He whipped around but could see no one in his immediate vicinity. The scream faded off and a strange smell reached his nose. Swamp. He frowned. There were no swamps in these parts, and yet, he could practically hear the water bugs buzzing.

He looked down.

Oh.

A slimy substance coated the floor – barely an inch thick – but it was unmistakably bog juice.

He checked his map for a bog, but the parchment was just a mess of smeared lines and he felt guilty, momentarily, until those squiggles began to write out insults. He crumpled the map up into a tiny ball and stuck it in his pack.

Another scream broke out, sharp against the smooth, slow sound of the rain.

Nolbin cupped his hands around his mouth, “Hello! Is there a bog monster in these parts?”

He was answered by a very loud tirade of cursing…terrible, completely inappropriate, hilarious cursing. Intrigued despite himself, Nolbin inched deeper into the bog, the effusive bad language his guide. Soon, the rotten smell was almost overpowering, and the muddy swill sloshed up against his ankles. Tripping, he nearly lost his balance as the bog abruptly became more like an ocean. He grabbed hold of one of the thin and ill-looking trees surrounding him.

In a large clearing, bubbled and popped a bog; and in the middle of this very improbable bog stood a man (a boy, really), hands on his hips, glaring at the mess around him. He was swaddled in a cloak, ridiculously long sleeves hiding his hands, and drooping hood protecting his face.

Nolbin didn’t understand at first what the screaming had been about, but then the boy began to disappear…into the bog. In retaliation, the boy made a mighty leap. He made it to about two inches in the air until the bog, hugging his ankles, sucked him right back down.

With a loud plunk, he landed on his knees in the brown, sticky goo and glared heavenward, “Blithering idiots! A bog is not enough to ensnare me!”

“Do you need help?” Nolbin called out.

The boy whipped his head around to look at him, hood flying back, his orange hair sticking out at odd angles, “No! I got this. Absolutely fine over here.”

His tone was imperious. Bored. He slowly sunk down into the mud.

Nolbin raised an eyebrow, “Right. Well, enjoy your love affair with the bog then. Have a nice day.”

“Yes. Bye-bye,” he smiled brightly.

With an immense and abrupt SLURP—

the bog swallowed him up.

Nolbin sighed.

He created, with a little bit of magic, a very nice-looking shadow sprite. The sprite, a gigantic bird, reached in with its talons, grabbed the boy by the shoulders and pulled him up. Nolbin broke out into a sweat– he never exactly trained to have a tug of war match with a bog – but the strength of his magic overcame the sheer stubbornness of the bog, and soon the boy was free. After the bird dropped him to the ground, Nolbin willed it away and the shadow sprite went back to being what it was: a nice little patch of shadow underneath a pine tree.

“Are you all right?” he leaned over the boy.

He sputtered, hacking up nasty bog slime, “I’m just fine. Perfect. It’s not like I actually needed your help.”

Nolbin bristled, “’Course not. It’s not like you were sucked down into the bowels of a bog or anything, were you?”

“I was going down there to have words with it!”

The boy stood up, mud all over his face and clothes.

“I was never in any danger,” he continued haughtily, hands on his hips.

“Well good. I’ll be seeing you then,” Nolbin spun around and headed in a random direction.

“I should hope not.”

Nolbin didn’t dignify that with a response and instead kept trekking through the shrubbery, trying to look like he knew where he was going. He hoped he never saw that stupid boy ever again!

Fate, of course, had other ideas.