f herbs into the pot. The grey man grunted as he continued to sharpen his blade. Glancing to Marrow expectantly. The shade happily slurped from his bowl again, sighing contentedly before responding. “That’s Rodus, he’s still learnin’ common. He’s a giant barbarian.” He said, passing a large wooden bowl over to Max. Max sipped it tentatively, before gulping half of it down. The flavors were intense and wonderful, like nothing he’d ever tasted before. After he’d collected himself, he looked to the last member of the group. The peacock was studying his leather-bound tome with laser focus. 

“Hey, your highness!” Ardent called, tossing a bread roll at him. The bird squealed in surprise, flailing all six of his limbs as he tried and failed to catch it. Max couldn’t help snorting in surprise as the peacock’s feathers puffed up in indignation. 

“Would you stop that!” He cried, brandishing the book, “I’m trying to figure out how we can test the cu.. I mean, the human’s, skills!” His feathers puffed up again as he spoke, clearly frazzled. Ardent snickered as the bread roll bounced off his shoulder where the bird had thrown it. He turned to look at Max, still stifling his laughter. 

“That’s our resident magician, Rahdur…”

“Prince…” Rahdur interrupted in a distracted tone as he read.

“Right, right, Prince Rahdur of the Eastern Aarakocra.” Ardent amended, “don’t worry too much about that part, he only makes me use his proper title because I dyed his feathers yellow during a ball a few years ago.” The draconian whispered conspiratorially. 

“I still think you should have gone with red.” Shi said as he sipped his stew,  “We could have matched.” The elf caught the bread roll that Rahdur hurled at him with grace and dipped it into his bowl of stew. Seeing them all interacting like this, Max felt himself becoming calmer and calmer. Ardent glanced at him and gave him the same beaming smile he’d had at the summoning. 

“I’m glad you’re feeling better. Those thoughts you were having were dangerously dark.” He said. Max’s eyes widened in surprise, but before he could speak Ardent held up a clawed hand. “Don’t worry, I can’t read your mind. My skill is called Empath, it lets me sense the type of thoughts someone is having, and their emotions when I focus.” 

“So this really is like an anime,” Max said, mostly to himself, “everyone has a skill of some kind?” 

“Indeed,” Shi said, “Usually it is reliant on species or class in some cases, but summons are always a bit of a wild card.” 

“But don worry little guy, Rahdur made sure to do some specific summoning to bring you here. Whatever your skill is, it’ll be perfect for us.” Marrow chortled. Max looked down at his still bare feet, now stained and muddied by the ground. Ardent’s clawed hand moved to his shoulder again, his ochre eyes shining in the sunlight, but looking unbelievably sad. 

“Hey,” he soothed, “no more bad thoughts. We summoned you, you’re part of the party now. You can talk to us.” For some reason, despite his thoughts and history of self perceived failure, Max believed him. He looked to Rahdur hesitantly, taking in the arakocra’s concerned expression. 

“I think… your spell went wrong.” Max said haltingly. “I know you just need a human, but you probably couldn’t have picked a worse one.” Max rubbed his aching arms, glancing down at his scrawny form hidden under baggy clothes. “I’m… not well. I’d understand if you just wanted to try the summoning spell again.” He finished with a smile that refused to reach his eyes. They exchanged distraught glances with each other before Rodus rose suddenly. He buried his gargantuan blade into the soil and strode over in two wide steps. The giant knelt and took Max’s face in two of his fingers to look into the human’s eyes. 

“We know.” He rumbled in a voice that Max could have sworn shook the ground. Max was… more than confused. There really wasn’t a word for it. Confusion was simply the closest thing he could think of. Ardent, like the hero he was, came to his rescue. Sitting beside Max and upping an arm around his shoulders. Wordlessly, Rodus moved away and back to his spot, glancing back as he did. 

“We don’t want to overwhelm you, but we knew who we were summoning.” Ardent said. “Getting you here was really killing two… no maybe closer to five birds with one stone. “ Another indignant squawk from Rahdur was ignored as Ardent continued. “Some of it isn’t really our place to say, but just know that we summoned you knowing that you aren’t fully abled. We have a spot ready for you in the caravan, and we aren’t going to abandon you.” Max was crying, he knew he was. But he couldn’t stop. 

“I’m… You wanted… me?” He hiccuped. He looked around the campsite only to be met with genuine smiles and nods of approval. Maybe. Just maybe, this could be home.