We stayed that way for a while, my head resting in her lap as Verona stroked my hair and hummed her a lullaby. A few minutes later, I cleared my throat and sat up.

“Sorry about that,” I croaked. The words caught in my throat. I coughed again, and turned away.

“There's nothing to apologize for,” Verona said softly. “I've had those dreams too.”

“Was I...was I saying anything?” I asked.

“Nothing I could make out,” she said. “But you were lashing out, reaching for something. I imagine it was a painful memory.”

I looked at her. What did that expression say? Fear, sorrow, worry, pity?

“If you'd like to talk about it, I can listen,” she said.

Love?

“Painful's a word,” I mumbled, standing up as I realized I was alone with a beautiful woman in my bedroom. “Um.”

“I realize this might seem like an...awkward situation,” Verona quickly said, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, “But I assure you there's nothing to be worried about here. If you want to talk about this lately, I completely--”

She was interrupted by a grunt from downstairs, and what sounded like a small explosion. I ran out the door, slammed against the hallway, and flew downstairs, where I was greeted by the sight of five very different looking people.

There was an awkward pause as they decided who would take the initiative.

The blue-scaled dragonborn in purple scholar's robes sneezed in surprise, sending out a little cloud of flame from his nostrils.

“Hail and well met!” he blustered, waving at me. “My name is Nazaari Stormborn, of House Draconius, and we are--”

“Bati Katigbak!” the tanned human in tattered brown robes beamed, walking towards me with deceptive speed. She took my hand in hers, and began to rapidly shake it up and down. Her hand was rough and callused around the knuckles. “School of the Snapping Lion Turtle, Third and a half Order with Rice, pleased ta meet ya--”

“Gavin Shortington at your service,” a gnome wearing an open purple vest, a beret with a bell on it, and enough jewelry to outfit a harem said, tipping his hat as he did. It jingled. “Bard extraordinaire, and I'd say more, but I'm about to be--”

“CHAD!” a familiar large human boomed, outfitted in a variety of armor and equipment that clanked as he stood stiffly at attention, his hands held behind his back. “BARBARIAN. Present and accounted for,” he added afterwards, in a much quieter tone.

I stood there stunned, Bati still vigorously shaking my hand. Behind me I heard Verona smack her palms into her face.

“This wasn't what I meant by 'best foot forward', you guys,” she sighed. “Lang, I'm sorry about the noise, but these are-”

“Your party members,” I finished for her, slowly trying to release my hand from Bati's grip. She held on for a bit, checking to see how hard I would pull before she let go and grinned. “What are they doing in my house? What are you doing in my house?”

Nazaari cleared his throat. “Mr. Langolier, we have reason to believe--”

“What? How do you know that name?” I demanded. I reached to tug my hat down, only to find that I hadn't put it on. My ears were on full display. I started sweating.

Gavin shot a glance at Chad, who slowly edged towards the doorway-the only exit on the ground floor.

Nazaari held his arms to the sides, facing his palms toward him—the common gesture of peace for practitioners of the Art.

“We mean you no harm,” he said carefully. “A serious matter has arisen in your town. Upon Verona's suggestion, we came here to ask for your assistance.”

“As opposed to what? Taking me in my sleep?” I said, my voice high-pitched and strained. My fingers twitched. Bati's lips quirked in amusement. Her posture relaxed, her hands hanging loosely at her sides.

I looked back at Verona, who was looking nervous. “What time is it, even?”, I asked anxiously. “I thought we were supposed to meet in the morning.”

“This isn't what it looks like, darling,” she said, biting her lip. “We aren't here to hurt you.”

“We have reason to believe your sister has come into possession of a very dangerous magical item,” Nazaari insisted. Verona went pale.

My knees went weak. I felt like collapsing. “My...” I mumbled. I turned towards Verona. “What did you tell them?” I asked desperately.

She glared at Nazaari, who raised his eyebrows, and shrugged.

“Lia is in danger,” she said, slowly raising her hands. “Chad sold her one of our staffs by mistake, and she went out to the forest, presumably to try and use it. The staff is a seed for a very dangerous tree, and tonight, it's sprouted, with your sister trapped in its branches. If we don't deal with as soon as we can, it'll grow much, much larger, and it'll consume everything for miles around, including this town.”

“I...what?” I asked numbly. It felt like the room was spinning around me.

“We've seen it happen before,” she continued. “Thousands of people died. More now, if you don't help us.”

I bent over, placing my hands on my knees to steady myself. “What do you need my help for?” I asked weakly.

“We don't know for sure, but we think whoever wields the staff is placed in a state of heightened aggressiveness and desperation, escalating until the critical moment, when the tree...flowers, in a manner of speaking,” Nazaari said, pushing up his wire-rimmed spectacles. ”If it reaches that point, there's not much to do but evacuate, but if we can intervene early enough, aided with a familiar face like yours, then we have a chance to talk her down."

“One of our people is stuck up there with her,” Gavin added. He was strumming a ukulele. Had he always had it?

“Can't...can't he fix this?” I said.

“He's hurt ,” Gavin suddenly snapped. “If anything, he's probably in more danger than your sister is.”

“He's doing what he can,” Verona added placatingly, “But time's running short. We need to know if you're with us.”

I nodded, slowly. “How...is Lia? Is she alright?” I asked, feeling a twinge of guilt that I hadn't asked earlier.

“She won't be if we stand around talking forever,” Chad replied, arms crossed and a look of annoyance on his face. “Are you coming or not?”

I stared down at the floor between my feet. There was a crack there from where Lia had punched it earlier. Had it really just been a few hours ago? So much had happened, and the man responsible for all of this was standing there, waiting for me to answer. I curled my hands into fists, but quickly stopped that train of thought.

I licked my lips. “Give me two minutes,” I said. “I just need to...grab my things.”

Once Lang was upstairs, the group visibly relaxed. Gavin stopped strumming his ukulele, and sighed. He touched the earring that dangled from one of his ears, and thought:

What a basketcase. Can you believe I had to burn a slot to calm him down? First I had to restrain Makaze, and now him. At this rate, I'll be out of spells before we even get to the tree.

Verona leaned against a wall, and closed her eyes. She fiddled with the woven leather bracelet around her wrist.

Thank you, Gavin. I owe you one.

Gavin shrugged.

I hope it was worth it. Chad, how's Makaze doing in there?

Chad shifted uncomfortably, and brought out the white ball he was holding behind his back. About a foot long, and completely opaque, it shook this way and that, but his grip held it firmly. He hooked his thumbs around one of his belts.

I'm sure he's still mad after we wouldn't let him challenge Lang. Not happiest camper, but I'm sure he's fine. Hey, Ronnie...Doesn't Lang kind of look like...?

Verona didn't open her eyes, but her lips tightened into a grim, trembling line.

Bati looked down and rubbed at a dark, metallic ring around her left middle finger.

I'm sorry, Verona. We should have known.

I kept a bag under the floorboards of my room for a time like this, back when I was ready to go on the run at any given moment. I'd waited years for someone to finally come after me, but I hadn't expected it to be under these circumstances. The bag was covered with a thick layer of dust, which I quickly wiped off before I checked the contents.

A couple of medium health potions. A change of clothes, a small bag of gold, a small wheel of cheese, now since completely molded over, and the hunting knife. At the bottom of the bag lay my hero's license, which every hero used to identify himself to other heroes, and entitle himself to the perks of the business, like discounts at inns and pubs, and of course, the exceptions to the laws for them. It was a small leather wallet with a tarnished silver badge on one side, and a few leather straps on the other, intended to place a hero's achievement pins and ranking scores. They were empty.

After a moment's thought, I took a small stack of blank paper and wrapped it into a roll, secured it with some twine, and took a few pencils from my desk.

Was there anything else I needed to bring? If things went badly, there was a chance that I wouldn't be back here for a while, if--

My knees finally buckled, sending me kneeling down onto the floor.

What was I doing? Years of living quietly about to be thrown away completely for this? A stupid staff my sister had plucked out of a hero's garbage? And now another a group of heroes wanted my help to save the town?

Hiding, scraping to get by, struggling to run a shitty little shop in a shitty little town, unknown and unloved. It would have been fine. Preferable to whatever awful fate a fairy's blessing would have given me. But now, off goes the heroic me to save his sister? The look they'd given me when I'd finally remembered to ask about her...They knew what I'd done.

They had to. It was only a matter of time before my past caught up to me, and here I was running to meet it head-on.

I looked at the window, the cold, quiet night that was outside it. At this time of the night, no one would be awake to notice. If I could past the heroes downstairs...

I couldn't do this.

I couldn't run with a party. Not again.

As disastrous as the encounter with the cave wyvern had been, in the end it had proven to be very beneficial to my career as a young hero-to-be. Wyverns, even the young ones, were considered to be a higher challenge rating than I was supposed to fight at my apprentice rank. Even licensed heroes usually formed parties to fight wyverns.

The fact that I'd won, let alone come away from it in one piece, meant a significant rise in the ranks. Enough, in fact, to qualify me for a license. Usually, a town would hold a competition for its prospective heroes, and choose the top ten to be licensed, but as I was the only one Sweetroot had, I was automatically approved.

I remember the graduation ceremony. The whole town had showed up to watch. They'd decorated a chair with the nicest fabrics in town, and placed it on a stage, where they'd made me sit for the entire thing. At this point, Lia had since disappeared from the army, and my mother was still shaken, but she managed to give me a proud smile as I received my license.

Esmet's eyes were cold and detached as she handed it to me. When I'd come back from the hunting trip, everyone had praised me on a job well done, and how brave and talented I'd been, no mistake.

No one had thought to ask why my hunting teacher had thrown me into an area of the forest with such a dangerous monster in it, and left. Had she known it was there? What did she expect would happen? Either way would have gotten me out of her hair, and her salary into her hands. It didn't matter. I never saw her again after that.

The next day, I was told I'd been assigned to a newbie party, which were adventuring groups that were required for newly licensed heroes looking to gain some experience before they either headed out on their own, or formed parties of their own.

I'd politely refused, and asked if I could be assigned some other time. I'd wanted to stay to help look for Lia. My father had already left to go search the nearby towns, and with my new license, I was sure I could do a lot of good.

But they'd insisted. The newbie party was going to set its home base in Wolfacre, a larger hunting town fifty miles northeast of Sweetroot, and it was likely to be the only group that was going to be in the area for a while. They would leave for a further region the next day, so I couldn't put it off, and the town had already spent the money registering me, so it'd be a waste.

Out of obligation, and my mother's encouragement, I accepted.

In a way it was good that I left when I did, as soon after. rumors as to how and why my sister had disappeared began to spread across town.

When she came home, they would be the least of her worries.

Behind me, I heard Verona gently knock on the open door.

“Are you ready to go?” she asked. I turned away from the window.

“Almost,” I said. “I just have one question.”

She raised an eyebrow, but smiled. “Alright,” she said.

“Why are you helping me?”

She frowned. “I thought we already went over this, Lang.”

“I know,” I said. “I thought you were trying to get something out of me, or set your party on me, but now they're here, and you're still going out of your way to help me.”

I walked one step towards her. She inhaled sharply.

“Your people are on guard against me. Like they're expecting me to do something. But you, I don't feel that from you at all. It's almost the opposite.”

I took another step. Verona closed her eyes.

“So it's not what you want from me,” I continued. “It's me, isn't it? There's something about me. Is it because I'm a half-elf?”

Verona shook her head.

“Not quite,” she said. “I hate to answer your question with another question, but Lang...is your sister important to you?”

I blinked. “I mean...she's family. Of course she's important.”

Verona smiled bitterly, and placed her hands on my shoulders.

“You haven't quite dodged the question, I fear. I've been watching you for a bit longer than you've watched me. I've seen the way you move around her. The way you talk, the way you look when you try to help her, and she won't let you.” She bit her lip. “So much unsaid between you two. It's not mine to know, but I'll ask it again. How important is your sister to you?”

I staggered, her words pricking at an emotion I hadn't known I had, welling out from inside my chest, spreading throughout my body. I swallowed.

“More important than anyone in the world,” I whispered.

Verona opened her eyes. They glittered with tears.

“Lang, melda. You remind me of someone who was very, very important to me,” she said.

Soon after, the two half-elves came back downstairs. Bati nudged Chad with her elbow. He growled, and handed her five pieces of gold.

Told you he wasn't going to run.

I'm pretty sure you bet that he wasn't going to succeed.

Potato, envelope. Gavin didn't even think he was going to live.

Shut up, you two.

Gavin smiled, the relief genuine and visible on his face. “Good to see you're ready,” he said. “Let's get a move on.” He gestured towards a door in the middle of the room that opened up into a different place entirely.

Best be quick. If Majesty stays up there any longer, we're going to have another bloody tragedy on our hands.