Barry walked the forest feeling a strange ease and calmness as he did. His shadow was thick, meaning Orion was there. The Hound barely if ever came out, only to eat and a few other occasions. She was hard to read, but Barry found her quietness something he’d grown to appreciate from time to time.

Looking around, the young man realized he’d walked a bit into the outer perimeter of the safe area for the Court. It was easy to tell, the lowest branches in the trees had scratch-marks. Not really visible unless one looked for them. Heading further out would mean a larger risk.

“You can come out.” He tapped his foot to the ground, his shadow wavering slightly. Barry was fairly sure Orion was a bit nervous, so he reached into the pouch he’d been given and pulled out some fruit. “I’ve got something tasty for you, if you’d like.”

Crouching, he put the fruit on top of the shadow, watching it be absorbed into it. The second piece he held it a bit over the shadow, this time a clawed hand emerged, trying to reach for it. But Barry pulled it further away, and the claw followed, until Orion was mostly out of the shadow and had managed to snatch the fruit out of his hands.

The young man smiled at her, and she met his expression with the usual blank stare. “See? We’re alone.”

The canine maiden glanced around, ears perked and rotating this way and that, her nose sniffing for a bit. It was only then that she fully stepped out of the shadow, looking at him, and throwing the piece of fruit into her mouth.

“Orion.” He spoke her name, and her ears instantly perked up. “How have you been doing today?” A nervous laugh followed as she just blankly looked at him. “Mine’s been good too.”

Orion just looked at him, her eyes calm and barely blinking, her gaze meeting his own and not looking away. Barry tried to focus on her eyes, but couldn’t really keep it going for too long. Turning around to begin his walk, he offered a hand for her to take, but the maiden looked at his hand, and then at him.

“Here, like this.” He grasped her paw and began pulling slightly, walking forward.

Three steps later, she was gone, vanished and back into his shadow.

“Guess you just prefer it there, huh.”

Barry nodded a little, dropping down more fruit, and watching it vanish into the darkness. Calmly, he set himself to walk, dropping a little food from time to time, checking whether it’d vanish or not and continuing onwards. The forest was calm, peaceful, and a lot less threatening. The human relished on that calmness, on that sense of… safety.

His thoughts turned to Mark, his aunt, his family.

Embla had said she’d sent scouts but had found no other humans in the forest, and he couldn’t really bring himself to believe they were all… gone. It didn’t make sense, there should at least be signs but it’s not like the Court could spare resources to send a whole squad that far East.

Not when their strongest fighter and wisest leader was incapacitated.

“I don’t really think I’ll be able to help them.” Barry’s words were muted, a half-whisper. “I mean, I know I need to, they’re desperate for good healers, but…” Scratching his chin, he thought of trying to force someone to just do what he told them to do. “I know Mark would do it, blink of an eye, snap, just like that.” A slight sigh. “Then again, I guess he’d be just as likely to run off as soon as someone asked him to do anything.”

Deflated, the young red-head ruffled his hair, trying to find an answer.

“Just be confident.”

His shoulders squared and then dropped.

“Just be confident.”

Shaking his head, he turned back towards the Court, meandering through the trees and trying his luck at figuring out the layout. The Court itself wasn’t really large, barely a tiny village’s worth of houses. But the houses were spread out and many were well hidden, with the sole exception of the palace. So Barry still hadn’t really seen the whole thing just yet.

Or any humans, for that manner.

Walking about, he noticed the number of “faux walls” had drastically increased during the time he’d spent with them. It was straight up impossible not to find the court if one stumbled onto the nearby area, the Elves had clearly been put to hard work.

There was a lingering question over how much of that work would actually help if the next rush came from the wrong place.

Orion rumbled in his shadow, a slight shift of her shadow making Barry’s feet feel slightly colder.

“Is someone there?” He spoke out to the surrounding forest, glancing at the trees, unsure as to what to expect.

“Only guards, sir.” A voice spoke out from above. He didn’t recognize her, but judging by the tone, she definitely did.

“Good girl.” Barry whispered under his breath, dropping some extra food into his shade, feeling it waver as Orion took the offering without much hesitation. He added what little dried meat he’d been carrying too.

Continuing towards the center of the Court, meandering through the defenses that had been put in place. Eventually, he managed to get fairly close to the Court, but had stumbled upon a large willow. Its trunk was large enough Barry could recognize it as another of the “houses”, but the rest of the tree was abnormally… aggressive.

The large hanging branches were covered in bright red bloody thorns, the tips embedded to the ground and the branches tense, as if ready to spring at the slightest touch. Barry felt a sense of foreboding danger in their presence, it was easy to imagine that a disturbed branch would lash out as it sprung, ripping flesh and muscle along the way.

Frowning, his gaze turned towards the tree, there were windows, but they were small and round, barely large enough for someone to look through. The inside of the tree itself was impossible to discern this far out, but the sheer size of it felt like it could fit at least four or five floors.

Two maidens, dressed in thick green leather, moved up to him from within the thorny cage. They wielded whips, their expression somber. “Sir, the prison doesn’t allow guests.”

“This…” Barry looked at the place, feeling the shadow under his feet shifting, his soles practically frozen cold. Orion did not like this place one bit. “What sort of prisoners do you have here?”

“Human prisoners.” The guards both scowled, lips thin and eyes cold. “The Lady forbids execution of humans, so our only option is to keep them locked.”

“What sort of crimes did they do?”

“Enslavement of maidens, those are the ones treated most leniently.” The guard closest to Barry shook her head. “But we have others that have done far worse than that. Ones we happened to catch by chance, and that the world is better off without.”

“Torturers, breakers, traders. Humans who’ve abused maidens their whole lives.” The other guard spoke with a cold edge. She pointed to her arm, showing white lines, scars, littering her right forearm and shoulder. “My old owner among them.”

“It’s… that doesn’t sound good at all.”

“It’s not.” The taller one replied, giving a curt nod. “Sir, we have our orders. Please return to the safety of the Court. This place has too much filth for one such as you.”

He nodded, feeling a chill as he turned to leave and head back towards the parts of the Court he knew better.

As he walked, he felt eyes were on him. He looked over his shoulder, not seeing anyone looking his way, but unable to look from the black holes that littered the willow-tree’s walls. He was being watched, by someone within.

He hurried his steps all the more.