Casually informing an overly worried Suri that I was going to need Reya hadn’t been very smart of me. It had simply slipped out, with me being more worried about needing to talk to that woman again than anything else. As a result, I ended up needing to reassure the amputated man’s wife as well.

All of my reassurances that Uncle Tare would be fine sounded flat, even to my own ears. I knew the statistics my father had taught me far too well. Even with magic, even when you made no mistakes, amputations were risky. It made me wonder if I had done the right thing, amputating the blacksmith’s lower leg.

I tried my best to calm down Suri anyway. When I finally got her to stop jumping to conclusions I had her provide me directions to Reya’s place. Suri led me outside and pointed out the village healer’s farm. It was visible even from the road in front of the blacksmith’s place. Well, for her it was. I could barely make out her hand pointing me the way.

I pretended to understand which building she was pointing at. Second farm on the right after exiting the town center, how difficult could it be. If I focused hard enough I could even pick up the vague scent of the town healer working in a field, along with two other people I did not know.

I left Fern with Suri and set out. It felt stupid, idiotic, leaving my horse behind. I wouldn’t be able to flee without her. After all, I couldn’t leave a well-trained courser and all my gear behind. In a way, that was exactly why I did leave her there.

Can’t chicken out on this if it’ll cost me my horse.

To distract myself from my own worries I wondered about this tiny cluster of houses surrounding the bunkhouse, the town center, if this place was big enough to even have a town center. I never counted how many people lived here. But it could not have been much more than a couple dozen. A handful of houses and equally as many farms was all there was.

While I plodded towards Reya’s farm, uneven, occasionally bouncing steps sounded behind me. The footfalls, alternating between hesitation and speed, highlighted the uncertainty of the approaching man far more than the cautious edge to his crisp, winter-workout fragrance.

I hastened my step ever so slightly, in an attempt to not let him get closer. I recognized this man’s scent. He had been sitting at the same table as Limn in the bunkhouse. Worse, he was coming from the river, where he had been working along with Limn and the Tempered-steel woman. Really, nothing good could come from talking to him.

“Hey?” he called out the second he saw me accelerate.

“Um… hey?” I responded, giving him the pretense of a wary look over my shoulder.

“Wait… please?” the man begged me.

I suppressed a groan. Running away would not work. I was too unsteady on my feet during the day for that. It was better to just get this over with as fast as I could. I slowed my pace and snapped at him. “What do you want?”

“Can we talk?” he asked.

Talk. Right. Another one of those things then. I stopped, turned around, crossed my arms, and glared up at him. I never missed Fern as much as when I needed to glare up at people. I should never have left my horse with Suri.

When he did not immediately speak up I motioned with my hand for him to get on with it.

“Um… right… um…” the man stammered.

This was not the belligerent attitude I was expecting. If anything this man was almost apologetic. I examined his scent. Scared, unsure, reluctant, meek almost. I wasn’t entirely certain as I could not read his face, but at first glance, he felt harmless enough.

In fact, he was so lost this talk wouldn’t get anywhere if I did not force what he wanted to say out of him. It was about time I moved his halting attempt at conversation along. Wiping the frown from my face and changing my posture to appear less threatening I motioned once more for him to continue. I even gave him a gentle, if toothless smile for extra encouragement.

“I’d um… like to thank you… for taking care of Uncle Tare?” he offered after some hesitation.

“Right. You are welcome.” I sighed. I seriously doubted he was as thankful as he claimed to be. I feared he had an ulterior motive as well. No one ran after people just to thank them.

“He’s seriously a great guy, welcomed us when we got here, made us feel right at home. We thought we were going to lose him, you know. It was horrible, seeing him get worse day by day with nothing we could do for him but pray,” the man continued. “So, thank you, for saving his life.”

He was rambling.

Does everyone in this town ramble?

“And I’d like to say sorry as well, for how we treated you,” he apologized. “You’ve been nothing but helpful, and we’ve treated you with suspicion and hostility.”

“Right.” I tilted my head. “And I am supposed to simply believe you are no longer suspicious of me now?”

“yes?” He startled.

Really?

Does he not see himself startle back?

Does he not hear the questioning tone in his own voice?

This man was confusing not being openly hostile to me with trust. All he did was maybe trust me not to kill him. Feeling generous I kept my dislike out of my face and allowed him to continue.

“Limn would like to apologize as well.”

Limn? Apologize? Hilarious!

“Limn?” I barely held back a choked laugh. “Point a bow at me Limn? Don’t let it out of the water Limn? How can you people trust that thing Limn?” Resentment was maybe seeping into my voice. Just a little bit though. Only a little.

“We were scared, okay!” He defended his friend. “Gery didn’t come back. Onar’s stories, Onar showed us things. You know how things are like over in Ostea!”

He was throwing ever wilder reasons my way to defend their actions. But more than anything, it pissed me off, being lumped in with Ostea once more. I did not care that it was a logical reaction. I did not care that the first thing on anyone’s mind when hearing of vampires was always the absolute mess the continent of Ostea had become.

No one knew what the situation was really like in Ostea. The Inquisition kept such a tight lid on things that most of what leaked out was nothing but exaggerated rumors. I could guess though. My parents had been to Ostea, before I was born, and I knew, some of those exaggerations were nowhere near as exaggerated as people thought.

He’d stopped throwing excuses at me. I did not know if it was because he had run out, or because I had started glowering at him in barely suppressed rage. He was terrified, so probably at least a little bit of the latter. I was beyond tired of this. First Onar had lumped me in with Ostea. Now this guy. Even when pretending to apologize these people couldn’t stop insulting me.

“You are scared of me,” I told him as much, my tone only a hair removed from a snarl, and gave an exasperated hiss. “Even now you are still scared of me.”

He opened and closed his mouth, pitiable sounds coming out that absolutely weren’t words.

“What do you people even want from me,” I ranted, fangs bared. “I save your lives, over and over and over again. How much do you need, how much do I need to give before you see more than just… THIS!”

At that last word I threw my glove to the ground and waved my claws in front of his face. I regretted that action almost as soon as I had done it. Even blind I could see how much his face paled. This town, these people, they were just so horrendously good at getting under my skin.

He stood rooted to the ground, staring at me after that outburst. “Sorry,” I mumbled, dropping to the ground to search for the glove I had tossed aside, all the while trying to hide my claws close to my body. For all their excess length, the clothes Meg had given me did not have enough sleeve to hide these monstrous things on my fingers.

He still stood there when I got back up. “Sorry,” I repeated. “You have every right to be afraid of me. You should be afraid of things like me. It’s just… fuck my life!” I gripped my forehead in frustration and gave him a pleading look. “Tell Limn I’ll listen to his apology if he seeks me out. I’ll probably be around somewhere until the doctor gets here.”

“Right. Right,” the terrified man nodded and stumbled back several paces before turning around and sprinting away.

I shouldn’t have snapped at him. I shouldn’t have waved my claws in his face. The man had been trying to make amends and instead I had only made him fear me more. Why had I done that? I had returned with such good intention and it hadn’t even taken me an hour to screw it all up again.

And now I had even lost track of which of these farms was Reya’s. He had distracted me and now I couldn’t recall if this was the first or the second farm. Instead of venting my frustration, I should have taken the time to ask him for directions, that would have been the sensible course of action.

Not that it really mattered anymore. I glanced to the left of me, where in the distance a dark layer of haughty, bemused resentment caressed a zesty core of peppers.

Aaaah… she’s been standing there all along, hasn’t she?

The blurry, human-sized shape that smelled of pepper detached itself from a larger blurry shape. “Are you done terrorizing Cadge, Vale?” Reya asked me.

Oh gods, how much of that did she see?