The sun is high in the sky next thing I know. I stretch and realize the wisdom of my Mother. I wouldn’t have made it ten feet out the door, much less to town.

Jill has yet to awaken. I put a brave face on for Momma, knowing she’s just as worried as I.

Ran paces out the door by my side. The many trees are turning from shades of green to the golden and red of the sunset. It’s been almost twenty-four hours since Jill’s spell. And still she has not woke. I allow a few tears to fall, wishing there was something more to be done. Something to fight. Sitting around waiting... it’s torture.

I stop when I nearly stumble as my eyes blur with moisture. I look around but only see Jill laying on the couch, still as death besides the slight breath keeping her tethered to this planet.

Ran cocks her head before pushing her forehead into my chest. I squeeze her warm, furry head and sink my head into the velvety ears.

“Be steadfast and valiant. Do not be anxious or discouraged, for your King is with you wherever you go.” Her quiet voice recites the Wisdom from memory. She repeats it again and again, until I join her. “... is with you wherever you go.”

Peace invades my heart. He’s with me. He’ll lead me. A few more tears leak out as a purr vibrates from deep inside my wolf.

I pull back, only to kiss her furry head. “Thank you, beauty.”

She sends warm, fluffy emotions my way. She is so much wiser than I ever gave her credit for.

I dry my tears and get up. Ran bows before me to allow access to her back.

It takes a matter of moments before I'm seated on her soft back that leaves white fur on my pants.

The brown and green around us blurs as she lopes through the forest. I imagine we are a streak of white lightning as she runs toward town. I've seen her run. She's quick... and that is an understatement when she really lets loose. Which she can't do with me on her.

Trust me—we've tried.

I lift my hands above my head, my hips rocking with the movement and my legs clenched around her sides. The wind dries the tears on my cheeks while my dark cloak snaps behind me. Riding a Timber is soul quaking. Terrifying. And, strangely, freeing.

She is designed for speed and grace, allowing her to outrun even the quickest race horse, but with a smooth, rocking gait not unlike the small cats that live on the edges of the forest. The only thing I could imagine close to riding her is flying, drifting through the clouds with naught but the wind beneath you, spreading for miles. The Earth is my companion's domain like the sky is the dragons'. Ran is its master.

My legs grip tighter as she leaps a fallen tree, landing with a whisper of paws on gentle loam beneath us. We startle a rabbit from its den. It makes a beeline for a thick copse of grass to hide its trembling form.

“Raaannn… Nuh-uh. Don’t even think about thinking about it.”

She growls low in her throat and flicks her tail up to slap me on the back.

“OW. Ran!” I scold.

Her snicker is a rumble through her barrel. I feel it more through my legs than a true sound I can hear over the whispering of leaves and rustling of branches as creatures dart away from us.

Her amusement is cut short as we reach the road leading into town. My skin crawls in unease. This is not good.

Ran paces the side of the road, crouching into the undergrowth and behind rocks and bushes as I bend low over her back. A silent snarl pulls her lips back from flashing fangs and her lynx-like ears swivel on her head.

Black-robed men line the decently well-kept road leading into town. I count twenty men.

They are similar to the evil being I had the misfortune of seeing in the library. Their cowls cover their features, making it impossible to see beneath the deep shadows. They slowly make their way to town with strangely quiet donkeys—packed with goods ranging from pelts to exotic fabrics—following placidly behind.

It's impossible to determine if they are that Thing's companions or not, but it's a frightening prospect all the same. Darshius' one companion, or whoever or whatever he was, almost killed Ran. What would happen if we came up on twenty of the strange and magical people?

One looks around as if sensing something in the wood. Ran halts beneath me, grasping the innate wisdom of the wild—a moving creature draws the eye much quicker than a still one. The dark shadow within the cowl passes us without pausing. I breathe a silent sigh of relief.

The common folk in drab colors give them a wide berth as they make their way past the checkpoint and into the city proper. I debate following, but know my family has needs right now that can’t wait.

Coin for a healer and food is my priority.

My heart hurts at what I must do, but do it I must.

My arms and legs tighten on Ran as we sneak over the outer wall, dodging a patrol of clanking guards as she hugs the shadows of the wall. They pass, and we silently go up and over the crenelations and the walkabout. She spins, carefully easing her claws into the other side of the wall, towards the city. Here comes the best part. Ran descends—backwards—in a zig-zagging route. I lean forward until I catch a mouth full of fur as she scales down the almost completely vertical wall at the very top, but slowly gets larger the further down. The wall is like a noblewoman's dress, thin at the top and growing larger the further down you get.

This isn't as bad as sneaking into the library—at least I'm not hanging upside down.

Once inside the city itself, we both keep to shadows by years' worth of ingrained habit.

Ran stays behind with my cloak stuffed in the harness configuration on her back. She licks me on the nose, and I grin at her before darting away. It's time to see what I can do about some coin, and I can't do what I need with Ran involved.

I smooth down the front of the nondescript little dress I placed over my tunic and pants. It's large on my tiny form, made for an especially buxom lady... which I am not. I had to hem the drab grey skirts up five inches, and taking in the waist was nothing short of a nightmare.

But I did it... even if it ended up needing ribbons placed on either side of the waist to cover up folds of fabric. The bust still sags a bit, and I purposefully left a little more room at the waist to fit a few shiny, sharp objects.

I still feel like a little girl in her mother's castoffs, even with the alterations.

Leaving the side alley, I smile brightly at an old man sitting beside one of the outer edge village fountains. He gives a double take and just about falls off the step he's perched on.

I quickly catch his arm before he can fall. “Easy there, grandfather.”

He slaps at my arms with his cane. “Look ‘ere, youngster! You better not be taking advantage of Gilbert! No sir-ee. You just stay away from Gilbert or he'll show youngster if Fifth or Sixth 're real!”

“Ouch!” I shake my stinging hand as his blasted cane finally lands a blow to my arm. “Listen, old man, I was only trying to help.”

“Youngsters have no respect for elders. They think Gilbert decrepit and old. Gilbert wonders what this world comes to.” He shakes his head, snapping the ground with his cane and complaining in between thwacks.

I wonder off, muttering about crazy old men and a certain cane I would love to snap in two.

Ran snickers in my mind as she replays my horrified face before the humpbacked old guy. Grand. She must've followed me. Not that I didn't expect it... but I hoped she didn't see that.

I shake her off, but her amusement follows me all the way to the inner city and towards Mid.

~~~

The Herbal Exchange is my destination. It's on the south side of town. The floor to ceiling windows show a mixture of tonics, teas, and flowers growing in pots. It's, in essence, the picturesque and homely place you'd want to visit for an evening to smell roses and buy a calming tea to go with a good book while sitting beside a roaring fire.

What most don't know is her second realm of business—the supply of drugs and poisons. I found out through a man I saved from a nasty bout of retribution from a competing guild, and then the idiot decided to attack me and Ran. He was on a drug that incapacitated his brain and his pain sensors. Well, I like to think it incapacitated his brain, but I can't be sure it wasn't just the guy's plain lack of sense. Before he passed out, he told me to take him to Madam Nika for the antidote to a poison.

Thus began my business relationship with Madam Nika... but she never saw me until I came to sell a batch of nightshades I'd had Ran scavenge from the foothills miles away.

Nika often rips me off, but she also doesn't question where I get the things I do.

Not to say I get things through unscrupulous means, but when I bring in a rare and poisonous mushroom that only grows in the upper boughs of Eldertrees... she doesn't ask how I came by them.

She just gives me a third of what they should be worth.

"Ria! How is my favorite apprentice today?" The dark-haired lady with a figure most nobles would kill for leans her well-blessed chest over the soft blue countertop with blooming daisies in vases on the ends of the counter.

Where do you think I got my dress from? Yep, I stole it from her when I got angry at her for ripping me off some months back. She knows I stole it; I know she knows it, and we both ignore it.

A quick look around says I came at the perfect time. No one else to overhear in the quant little shop that smells of peppermint and honey.

I nod at the lady in greeting. "Nika. Have you need of Red Blood?"

She whistles through puckered red lips. "Straight to business, I see. In light of your previous exemplary findings, I will give you double what I did for the Basilisk venom."

I snort. "We both know this mushroom is worth five times the venom for the rarity of their growth. And these," I say, pulling out the mushroom in question, where I had it carefully stashed in Eldertree bark to keep it fresh. "Are in bloom from the light of the Blood Moon." I'm totally shooting in the dark here at what it may be worth, but I've learned a thing or two from Nika about bartering.

Her jaw drops.

I was saving this mushroom for my own use. The library barely had any information on it besides its rarity and drug-like qualities... but there was a cryptic sentence about a supposed healing tonic.

So I sought it out, hoping it would help Jill and if not, I could make use of it. But when I asked a healer, he warned me only mages of old dared make anything good from the mushroom. So I asked Momma, and she said to hold on to it in case we came to a time of desperate need. I think this counts.

The deepest, selfish part of me hoped times would get better and I could use it for my own purposes. When you ferment this mushroom in sap, it produces a drug that knocks out a man in seconds from any introduction to the bloodstream. I was going to make some to coat my blades, as it would work quicker than the previous drug I've been using. Those take at least two to five minutes. The Blood Sap would take a grown man down in seconds.

But my family needs this more than I need a new drug, even as my heart hurts knowing I'm selling something that was a gift from a friend. I haven't sold it before now... because Momma said not to, of course, but also because it felt wrong. Still does. But my options are limited.

Nika stares at the tiny golden star-shaped bloom on top of the blood-red cap-shaped mushroom with a green stalk.

"I will give you five times the price of the Basilisk venom."

If she gave me that much so quickly... this is worth much more than I thought.

"Seven times. And I need two sprigs of Belladonna." When in doubt, fake it 'til you make it.

Her brown eyes narrow beneath the smokey eye makeup, but I cross my arms and glare.

She finally shrugs, tossing her brown braid over a shoulder.

"Deal. Be a dear and lock the front door before I dig into my stocks."

I do as asked, letting my shoulders slump as a weight lifts off my shoulders. I would've sold the mushroom long ago had I known what it would bring. My family will be well-fed and have enough left over for trips to healers for Jill. It gives me the freedom to compete in the coming competition.

If I ever make it into said competition.

She comes back, placing a sack of coins on the table with two fresh stalks with clusters of purple flowers in a wet-sack beside it.

I place the mushroom and the bark on the table.

Nika pulls a pair of gloves on before gently easing the tiny mushroom and bark from the counter and putting it in a glass cube. She seals the top and takes it into her hidden back room without so much as looking at me.

I walk out the door, wondering if I just got ripped off more than the rest of my dealings with her combined.

But the sack of coins dangling from my hand makes me happy. I stash it inside a hidden pocket beside my blades.

~~~

Meat. Bread. Herbs. Chickens for eggs. The last got killed by that weird ape man thing. Feed for said chickens.

I tick these items off my fingers, remembering what I've come for.

The herbs come first, knowing that when, not if, Jill wakes she’s going to need White Willow and Mimosa tincture for the headache plus Echinacea to prevent her system from catching cold. The aches and pains and lack of energy and why the seizures happen... I have nothing for that. I pray we someday find an answer.

These herbs I do not get from Madame Nika. She is great for dealing in rare herbs, but the more common stuff is out of her expertize.

I get the White Willow, Mimosa, Echinacea, plus a batch of Mullein and Calendula from a small shop in the middle of town. It doesn't look like much, but the sweet old lady behind the table is well-known to healers and midwives for her proficiency on these herbs. She picks them at the best time for nutrient dense teas and tinctures.

The spices and some day old bread come from carts selling wares in the middle of the street. It'll be enough for a week to come. I splurge and buy enough pastries for all of us from a cook down River's Row.

Last will be the very northern end of the market. The best animals come from there, upwind of the main market.

The coins jangling in my pocket give me goosebumps. Pickpockets and thieves are typically not an issue, as I normally have nothing they'd want. But now, my family's survival depends on these coins, and I'm loathe to travel with them. I should've dropped the excess by to Ran, but too late now.

Five steps before I reach the primary thoroughfare, I’m ambushed and pulled into a side alley with my mouth covered by a thick and calloused hand.