True to his word Rima set off at first light, his broad-shouldered figure settled comfortably on Tima’s back as she slunk through the forest. Truth be told, I think I was going to miss the sassy lizard more than the kiss-ass Guardian but I didn’t mention it out loud for fear of a swat from Nel.

Speaking of Nel, the generously curved woman nearly bounced in place with excitement as her brother disappeared from view and I was momentarily distracted by the…bouncing. When I asked why she was so happy she explained that it was her first time to truly be away from the rest of the Brood. The few times she had made the trip to the Grove and even a little further, to the trade town, she had been accompanied by Saza or Rima. Her first taste of freedom suited her and helped brush off the dark mood that had hung over her since the mass funeral.

Part of me, the newly awakened hormonal side, was twisted into little knots of anxiety at the thought of being alone with the gorgeous woman. The other part of me, you know, the horrible pervert part, was ecstatic at being able to ogle her without fear of brotherly eyes seeing me.

If you have ever been in this situation you know the tightrope of emotion I walked. If I looked at her ass too much, in the tight black pants that stretched ever so invitingly over each firm round mound as her full hips swayed….okay, I did look at her ass too much and I admit, I felt a little creepy but she was also incredibly interesting and a fount of useful information.

When she wasn’t telling me about a certain plant or flower she was telling me about the world and how it all fit together or laughing at some stupid joke I made. For the first time in a long time, I found myself relaxing and getting along with someone other than Sanderson. I stopped looking at her like a horny teenager who had never seen a pair of tits larger than a B cup and looked at her like an actual friend…

Needless to say, I was not sure how I felt about this growing maturity.

By midday, we had left the dead village and the surrounding woods behind us and were once more crossing over a grassy field. Nel pointed at a hawk as it rode the thermals and lamented her loss at not being born a Fury, which was some type of flying woman thing found in Denarii. I watched the bird of prey and lamented my loss of a projectile weapon. I image hawk taste much like chicken.

I briefly considered throwing my new shiny axe (recently purchased from one headless Alpha) at it but changed my mind. It was bloody heavy for one. It was new and shiny (to me) for another.

I did share a loaf of seedy bread with Nel and she even let me eat half her peach. No, that wasn’t anything sexual. She had hidden a little cache of fruits away from Tima and only felt safe pulling them out now. Once I got a taste of real fruit though, let me tell you, she learnt to fear me. I walked behind her then and spent most of my time checking her out or trying to get into her bag.

She stopped walking and I almost bumped into her, my arm up to the elbow in her pack. She turned to glare at me and I overclocked to jerk my hand away in time.

“I swear! You’re worse than that damn lizard!” She growled though she smiled at me when she said it.

“Take that back!” I said clutching my heart in mock pain. “Take it back right now! Tima is the worst!”

Nel just sighed before turning back around to pointing off to our left.

“You see those small trees, the ones with the low hanging branches? Yea, those are known as the Citrus Nut trees. Twice a year at random they’ll grow little clusters of nuts, as big as your knuckles, and as brown as dirty. If you crack open the shell though the insides are soft and juicy and smell like Oranges or Lemons but taste like the little candy sweets Saza likes to buy from the trade town.”

“I take it that means the Citrus Pools are close by?” I asked, shading my eyes against the sun so I could see the small cluster of trees.

“They start around there,” Nel admitted before turning more to our right and pointed off into the distance. “But we can head that way. It’s closer to the Grove and there’s a pool I like, it’s deep enough to dive in.”

“Lead the way, oh awesome leader!” I said.

Nel blushed a little. I think she liked being called awesome leader.

“So are the trees the reason they call the pools Citrus Pools?”

“In part. These trees only grow along this river. Also when the nuts fall into the water they sink to the bottom and the hard shell softens overtime before dissolving completely in the water. The smell from the flesh inside saturates the pools and makes the water smell like fruit.”

“So you go skinny dipping and come out smelling like an orange?” I nodded my head thoughtfully. “Sounds cool.”

“Skinny dipping?” Nel asked, confused.

“Naked. You swim naked.”

She blinked her long lashes at me and laughed as I wiggled my eyebrows suggestively. I don’t think she really believed me and continued to laugh as we turned to the right and set off at a casual pace.

I smelt it first, the cloying sickly sweet smell of decomposition. Nel blanched when I mentioned it to her, the image of the village still fresh in her mind, and we picked up the pace, almost jogging as we neared another cluster of the Citrus Nut trees.

Pushing Nel aside so I could take the lead I ducked under the branches and gagged as a mixture of sweet-smelling fruit and rot and ruin assaulted my nose. Nel retched behind me. I moved past the last tree, expecting to find a scene of murder just like the village and blinked in confusion when what I saw instead was an idealistic little pool glittering in the sunlight and surrounded by a small pebble bank a soft breeze drifted through and made the branches sway peacefully.

The trees hanging over the water were alive and well, the leaves bright green. Clusters of nuts hung from the junction between the branches, the nuts large and brown. A creek burbled quietly as it snaked through the trees to feed into the pool. The water was crystal clear and I could see all the way to the bottom and the seed that had fallen and mixed with the stones there.

“Something isn’t right.” Nel said, a hand covering her mouth and nose as she looked out across the water.

“No shit,” I said back, my hand in the exact same place as hers as I pinched my nose shut. “Oranges must smell like crap in your world.”

“The pools should not smell like this.”

I watched her walk closer to the water, her spider legs splaying out wide to help her balance as the pebbles moved under her feet. I switched my attention to the surrounding trees, my body taut, expecting trouble.

“Alexander, come here,” Nel called.

Mumbling to myself I made my way over, with a great deal less finesse, and crouched down next to her. From the new angle, I could make out a thin layer of what looked like oil floating on the surface of the water. The rainbow hue of colours was only visible in certain spots as the sunlight reflected off it.

Nel fumbled in her satchel for a moment before pulling out a strip of cloth and a small wooden box. Dragging the cloth over the surface of the water she coated the material with the oily residue before putting it to her nose to sniff. She coughed and spat in a very unladylike manner before putting the cloth safely away in the box. It all disappeared into her satchel.

“The smells coming from whatever that is.” She got up, dusting her hands off on the thigh of her pants and made her way back up to the grass. I followed behind her. “I think it may be related to what happened at the Pack’s Village. The black veins and the unbalanced change to Forgotten. It’s like something is poisoning the land…some disease or infection. It’s like nothing I’ve ever heard of”

I watched her bite her bottom lip, her sharp canines dimpling the soft plump surface. Her eyes darted away from the pools, back the way we had come, and I took a stab at what she was thinking.

“Worried about the Brood?” I asked.

“My brother will warn them and Saza will know what to do. The Brood Mother is wise and will do what she must to protect them all. I know all of this and yet I still worry about them. I thought being out here away from it all would mean having a great big adventure with excitement and yet now all I can think about is going back to ensure their safety.”

I put an arm around her shoulder in support and pulled her against me, her toned form-fitting beneath my arm with startling ease.

“I understand what you mean,” I admitted as Nel snuggled a little closer to me and I pretended not to notice. “I keep thinking of Sandy being trapped back on Earth and being hunted by the Government…and I want nothing more than to go back and make sure he’s safe, you know?”

She looked up at me, her dark hair falling around her face to frame her sharp cheekbones and the warmth in her tone when she spoke matched the softness in her dark red eyes. “And yet you are willing to help us, delaying your return to your friend?”

She was so close I could feel her breath tickle my neck and I unconsciously pulled her tighter to me, her pert breasts pressing into my ribs.

“It’s more complicated than that,” I admitted, looking down into her eyes. “and even if I left instantly I would still need to find where the humans from Earth have their gate and borrow it, and that would take time. Whatever is happening back on Earth…I have to trust Sandy to deal with it…just as you need to trust your brother and master.”

“You are right. I told Rimatrastorama that we would continue on and find what clues we could, so that is what we will do.” She smiled, her cheeks dimpling. “You are being remarkably sensitive at the moment, Alexander.”

“I can see down your top!” I said, sticking out my tongue and dancing back as she tried to swat me playfully.

The fact that Nel didn’t seem to mind me being a little soft was…nice. In Dockside you have to be all sharp angles and hard edges, you show weakness and be nice?…fuck, you a dead man or worse…someone’s bitch.

“So what do you wanna do now, mighty leader?”

Nel considered it for a moment, her eyes darting around the clearing as she thought. I wondered if she noticed the lack of animals but didn’t mention it, not yet at least. I didn’t want to spook her any more than she already was.

“We’re making good time. If we follow that creek through the trees it’ll lead us straight to the Grove. We could be there early tomorrow morning I think.”

“You realise that fucked up smelling oily crap is probably coming from upstream right?” I asked.

“All the more reason to follow the stream. Perhaps the Dryads will have answers, or perhaps…perhaps they will not be there.” Her voice got thick near the end and I remembered that she had friends there. What's her face, the one who had the gift of strength. Named after a flower or a season or something hippy-dippy.

Once more pushing Nel aside so I could take the lead I led us through the Citrus Nut trees and the regular trees that followed. Calling over my shoulder I interrogated Nel as we went.

“So Dryads are considered Denvii too, correct?”

“Yes. They balance their human halves with their nature spirit halves. The Grove is governed by an elder, though perhaps govern is a strong term. They mainly do what they want: farming, planting, animal husbandry…Oh, you have to try their honey. They get the bees to produce the very best honey to be found in all the lands. ”

“What happens when they become Forgotten?”

“They devolve into nature spirits,” Nel’s voice dropped into a quiet murmur. “And will roam the forests attacking anyone who enters what they perceive as their territory.”

“Are they strong?” I was thinking about what I would do if a whole Grove had turned into a cluster of Forgotten, I doubted I could kill them all and the thought of Nel getting hurt was making me….very uncomfortable.

“Stronger than humans, certainly, as are all Denvii, but weaker than the Pack and the Brood. They are pacifists, their Guardian is an overweight old man who carries around a sickle.” I looked back to see her smiling. She caught my eye and said. “His name is Glen, and he’s a sweetie.”

I stepped over a root, slipped a little in the soft mud, righted myself, and went right on walking. Nel snickered behind me. The smell wasn’t as bad here, with the flowing water, but I would occasional catch a whiff of rot and if I looked at the creek beside us I could see the telltale oil rings of rainbow colours swirling around the banks or between the reeds that dotted the shallows.

“No fish.”

“What was that, Alexander?” Nel asked.

“I said: No fish.” I indicated the stream with my hand.

“That is not strange. There have never been fish in these waters. The water is too acidic from the nuts. The brook does gradually widen before becoming a river up near the trade town and there are fish there, where the water is fresh.”

“How far up does this river go?”

“All the way to Champions fall.” Nel said.

I did a double-take at the name. “Come again? I thought for a second you said Champions fall?”

“I did.”

“And?” I said, waving my hand for her to go on and share more information. The Blasted woman just blinked at me. Letting out a long-suffering sigh I said. “And why is it called that?”

“Oh, I thought you were trying to swat a fly that had flown too close to you. To answer your question, it’s called Champions fall because a Champion fell there.”

“No shit!” I growled, starting to get a little fed up. “But seeing as I am a Champion, don’t you think I deserve to know a little bit more about HOW a Champion fell there?”

“Many, many years ago The Champion of Aeris and the Champion of Hela stood together to bring about the fall of the Champion of Lumin. It is said that the battle lasted for days and changed the shape of the land. Mountains crumbled to dust and rivers of liquid fire covered the ground. They say that the Champion of Aeris used all his mana to smite his foe and as he and the Champion of Lumin lay there weakened the Champion of Hela slayed they both. Aeris rose a mountain to act as the monument to his Champions sacrifice but such was his grief that he wept, his tears wetting the ground before overflowing from the sides and spilling out in a stream that moved across the land.”

“Is it true?” I asked, making a mental note to not trust any Champions…ever…

“Who knows…Saza has been there and says that near the peak is a stone pyramid, as tall as a man can stand, and though worn and weathered it is seamless and perfect still. I asked to see it but she says the air is thin and the taint of betrayal and hate still lingers there.”

“Saza is one weird cookie,” I muttered.

“Weird cookie?” Nel asked.

“On Earth, it means that someone is weird, but we add 'cookie' to take most of the sting out of if…make it a gentle tease...”

“Ahh...I see,” Nel ducked under a branch, pushed another aside and looked at me. “So you are also this weird cookie.”

I couldn’t argue with that.

We continued on, the light fading slowly as it sunk behind the horizon and Nel suggested we move away from the stream to where the smell wasn’t so bad to make camp quickly before it got too dark. It was simple with just the two of us; she tied up a hammock while I went looking for wood for the fire and she got it all ready while I watched. I admit, It was a little strange not having Rima and Tima here and I wondered at my sudden need to have company.

The firelight reflected off Nel’s skin, turning it a rich orange-gold colour. She looked beautiful.

Tonight's the night, I told myself, tonight's the night I make my move.