<<You agreed to let her go, Crisp!>> He struggled to sound calm. <<What’s this now?>>

<<We disagreed.>> The biggest ‘ganth spoke up. It was probably the packboss. And yeah, poor Crisp bore fresh frays and oozed smoke from a new wound in his shoulder. He sulked off to the side of the formation. Timothy almost felt bad for’im— 'Ganths could be vicious to one another. <<Your worry about her body is noted. We’ll dispose of what’s left of yours somewhere nice and hidden, don’t worry.>> But then, maybe he was better off worrying about their skins, first.

This was gonna be bad. Timothy was far from defenseless. Nature was red in tooth and claw, and so was he. If you weren't, you didn't live long, and respect in the wild was won by being dangerous as much as it could come from kindness. Timothy could handle a single 'ganth; it was a fairer fight than he'd like, but he could do it, and beat the fear of…him back into them. But two was gambling with his neck, and three was just begging to be eaten. Especially when Meri couldn't see in the dark, couldn't fight, and was shaking in terror behind him.

Timothy breathed slowly, tensely, slowly sweeping his staff between them. Okay, keep it together, witch. We gotta run. Meri's a townie, so she's from up north or down south. Crap, I don't know which. Okay, okay, that doesn't matter-- no matter which way we wind up going, we need to get gone first. The wolf gulped. Only one choice, and that's to… to take her home with me. Frass, I really don’t want to do that.

But if I don't, she'll die. And I can't live with that. His stomach churned and boiled, in anger and dread. The thought of bringing her home, revealing where he lived, was just adding to the terror of the situation, and he wished he had just stayed by the river… for a moment. But then he shook his head, and with a swipe of his hand, killed the light. The clearing fell into total darkness.

"Civility's out." Timothy whispered, hoping her big ears gave her good hearing. "Time to run."

“O-okay.” Meri mumbled. “H-how?”

Shadow Spikes? No, they were spirits. Grave was out too, and they’d fly right over a Web Burst. Humoganths were weak to wind magic, but they could slash apart any wind he could conjure unless he basically started up a tornado. And there was no way he’d have time to spin up that much power— they’d be on him in a flash. But wait, Meri had been making a huge ruckus. With fire and noise and light, so much that he'd seen her from goodness knows how far away. …He didn’t have to be subtle.

<<I’m warning you,>> The witch threw his staff at his feet, making the 'Ganths flinch. Timothy set his jaw, and put his hands behind his back. His hands spun through motions he’d done countless times. Fire and light wove together into a tight ball, growing bigger and denser, hidden between his hands. Normally an easy ask, but the effort of controlling the churning energy made his hands shake, now. <<You do not want to step to me. Why don’t we all just go have tea instead?>>  A glowing bubble began to form between his hands.

<<Really?>> Crisp muttered.

<<Well, I don’t have coffee.>> Timothy said with a small, strained smile. Out the corner of his mouth, he fast-talked “Meri? When I give the signal, we’re going to turn and run. Fast.”

They were still approaching slowly and menacingly, clearly expecting him to try something. They were right!

In a flash, Timothy brought his hands together in front of him and dumped as much power as he could spare into the growing ball. It swelled up like an overblown balloon between his hands, bands of light arcing around it. A slightly mad grin spread across his face. The beasts recoiled briefly at the sudden warmth and light that spread around him. “Run!” He shouted, and hurled the ball not at the beasts, but at the ground before him. And then he took off behind Meri. There was a tear of wind as the beasts rushed at them—

“Eyes!”

—Before there was a deafening crack, and light and heat blew through the clearing with the force of a windstorm. His eyes had slammed shut just in time, but even through his eyelids he saw white. The bomb’s boom shook the trees around them, and even his fireproof body felt the heat of it as they ran. He was lucky dragons were fireproof too!

The bomb burned out fast. He chanced a glance over his shoulder. The grass at center of the clearing was scorched black, fading to brown away from the blast zone. The smoke cats yowled and thrashed in pain on the ground, clutching their eyes and scattered partially from the blast. Even more noise, good… before the cats could recover, a curgar bug roared into the clearing, axe-horn chopping blindly into trees and smoke alike. And he could hear even deadlier monsters rushing to the clearing to investigate. Ordinarily he’d love to see if any of them were up for a friendly chat, but he knew that there was no talkin’ to any of these guys once they were riled up.

…Oh, shadows, he needed to get them both out of here before he totally lost it. And he wasn’t going anywhere on these legs, without his staff. Timothy pulled in a torrent of the forest’s boundless darkness with both of arms. It crawled up to his hips, forming a writhing mass of shadowy tendrils. With a flick of his arms, eight bladed legs tore from the mass, clacking together like a curled up spider’s. He didn’t waste any time, hurling himself forward and letting his new legs catch him. “Meri, go limp!” With that, he skittered forward like a greased up spider, faster than he could ever run normally. He tentacle-yanked Meri onto his back as he blitzed past her— she yelped and threw her arms around his neck— and kept running, weaving around trees and hopping over rocks and speeding off towards home.