Chapter 127: Long Story
I gripped the hilt of my dagger tightly and started up the slope again. Once we reached the top, I found myself looking back toward the rundown cabin in the distance, and all I could think was that if it had not been for Mio, I would probably be dead too, swallowed up like that man had been.
"We can wait for two hours," I said as I followed Ken along the path. "Once they are gone, we could go back into the city."
"And they would send us here again," Ken replied with a slow breath. "No chance. We have to do this. We don’t have any other options."
Yeah, I had thought so too. Fucking Queen sending me out on an errand because I hadn’t fed her ego or played along with the whole case like she wanted.
Yeah... the case. There was also the third suspect I still needed to find, and now everything felt like it was piling on me all at once. I just needed to finish this stupid task and get back to the city.
"Jelda," Ken muttered after a moment as we kept walking. "I heard she, uh, took a liking to you."
I kept my eyes on the cabin as it slipped farther behind us on the left. "Yeah."
"Um... did you?"
I shook my head. "We were not that close."
"Mm." He glanced at me for a second, then looked forward again. "Well... have you ever been in love?"
I didn’t answer right away and just kept walking. Being asked that right after watching a man get absorbed in such a twisted way felt almost ridiculous, like the world was trying to mock me.
I shrugged. "You?"
"Yeah," he said. "Third grade. A girl named Jinmen." A faint smile touched his face. "I loved her, man."
We turned slightly to the left as the road bent around a cluster of overgrown bushes. The dirt beneath our boots was thick and wet, sucking a little at each step we took, while the trees on either side leaned inward enough to make the path feel narrow. The road zigzagged badly through the forest, and because of the bushes and the trunks crowding the sides, we could only really see a little bit ahead of us at a time.
"Then what happened?" I asked.
He let out a breath that sounded half embarrassed and half amused. "She found someone better."
"You were in third grade, Ken. How would she even know some other boy was better than you?"
"I didn’t have my two front teeth," he said with a small chuckle. "And I had big ears. Thank the gods my body finally decided it was time to look like a human and stopped making me look like a walking disaster."
I gave a faint smile. "I was awful in third grade too."
"You still are, I mean."
"Ah, fuck you."
"Just saying, man. Do not shoot the messenger."
We kept following the road and turned a little more to the left around another bush, and then, the moment we took one more step, I nearly jumped out of my skin.
A woman stood ahead of us in full gray armor, and over the hood she wore was some kind of white mask marked with red lines above the eye holes. The mouth section was open with sharp teeth carved into it, which gave the whole thing a permanently grinning look that made her seem even more disturbing than the armor itself. She was dragging a man behind her by the hand, and he looked unconscious, with a collar around his neck. A prisoner, then.
"Oh, shit..." Ken muttered.
The woman didn’t seem to care that we were there. It was as though we had simply failed to matter to her, and she moved right past me while dragging the man along behind her.
"That was the assassin," Ken whispered, sounding almost stunned. "Fuck, fuck, that was the unnamed assassin."
"What?" I asked.
"She is probably the most famous person in the whole Circle," he said. "We should be thanking the gods she is not after us."
"Oh... who does she work for?" I asked.
He shook his head. "I have no idea. Why not ask her?"
I gave a low chuckle and kept walking. "Nah. Thanks."
ꨄ︎ꨄ︎ꨄ︎
We’d been walking for about fifteen minutes, and so far nothing had tried to kill us, which honestly felt suspicious in the Circle. No monsters, no psychopathic prisoners, no Teleporters appearing out of nowhere. Just Ken and me, the dirt road, and that sickly green sky hanging over everything like it was about to start raining at any moment.
"They didn’t even let us have breakfast," Ken muttered as we kept moving. "I’m starving. I need water too."
"Same," I said with a tired exhale.
The road we had been following was starting to disappear into the forest, the dirt path becoming less of an actual road and more of a vague trail that bent and zigzagged through thick trees and overgrown bushes. Every now and then we heard branches rustling somewhere nearby, along with strange bird calls that didn’t sound quite right for a place like this, and even though I was pretty sure there weren’t supposed to be animals in the Circle, the sounds still came and went like they belonged there.
Then we heard laughter from our right.
Ken and I slowed immediately. He reached for the bow on his back, and I bent my knees slightly, turning toward the sound as we listened.
"You hear that?" he asked.
"Hmm."
We moved toward it carefully, and a few steps later we reached the edge of the forest. On our right, the trees opened into a wider dirt road, and just off to the side of it there was a small campfire surrounded by five men sitting on the ground. They were talking and laughing like they had absolutely no reason to be worried about anything in the world. None of them wore collars, so they weren’t prisoners, and beside them sat a pile of food and water. One crate had been turned upside down and used as a table, and on it I could see bananas, apples, a chunk of cheese, some bread, and a few glass cups filled with water.
"Oh, man," Ken muttered. "They’ve got food."
"You think they’re friendly?"
"Never trust anyone in the Circle," he said right away. "Never."
"Then what do we do?"
"Steal from them," he suggested. "They’ve got more than enough supplies. We just take some and leave."
I shook my head. "That sounds like a bad idea."
We stayed where we were, watching the group around the fire. They did look rough, all burly men with weapons close by, but the way they were sitting there talking made them seem more relaxed than dangerous. That didn’t mean I trusted them, though. I wasn’t about to decide anything without at least talking to them first. This whole place made every decision feel like a trap.
"We can find supplies in the safe zone," I said.
"With what coin?" Ken asked. "No way I’m selling my bow or my dagger just to fill my stomach."
"Look, just don’t be dramatic, all right? We’ll go near the safe zone, grab what we need, and leave. Easy."
He exhaled and gave a reluctant nod. "Yeah... okay. Fine."
Before we could move, a hand suddenly grabbed my shoulder from behind. I jumped in surprise and spun around, swinging my dagger at whoever it was, but the attack never landed because the stranger caught my wrist and held my arm up in the air like I weighed nothing.
"Ace!"
I blinked at the man.
"Bone?"
He wasn’t wearing a collar this time.
"You’re that man," Ken said, staring at him with recognition. "I know you."
"What are you two doing here?" Bone asked, letting go of my arm. "You in trouble?"
I shook my head. "Long story."
"Well, we love long stories. Come sit with us by the fire."
He slapped my shoulder as he walked past us, and the hit hurt a lot more than it should have. I rubbed the spot he’d struck while Ken and I exchanged a look, and then Ken shrugged and followed after him. Still rubbing my shoulder, I fell in behind them.
"Oi, Boney!" one of the men called out. "Who are those? I thought you went off to piss, not drag back some lost kids."
"This is Ace, and this is..." Bone said, glancing at Ken.
"Ken," Ken cut in.
"And this is Ken."
"Well, nice to meet you, fellahs," the man said.
The three of us took seats around the fire. Ken sat beside me, while Bone sat across from us and immediately grabbed a banana from the crate. He peeled it and took a bite before pointing at the food with it.
"Don’t be shy. Eat."
"Sure," Ken said, taking an apple and biting into it. "Man, am I hungry..."
