“JESUS CHRIST!” Kevin screamed jumping into a sitting position.

Oh, he’s going to regret that…

Yep, he fell to his side, clutching his body. Soon he was in the fetal position, moaning (let’s be generous and not call it whimpering). I reached towards the fire and grabbed two skewers.

“Hey Kevin, you hungry over there?” I asked in my most cordial tone, “I hope you like seafood!”

I walked over to him and held the freshly cooked octopus before his nose. Hopefully this made him feel better because if it caused him to puke, I was not cleaning it up. While still trembling, he looked up in disbelief.

“Tome?”

“Were you traveling with someone else this devilishly handsome?”

“You’re, you, you’re dead!”

“WHAT?!” I look down at my body, using my left hand to frantically pat my corporeal, not spiritual, body (though I distinctly avoided the chest).

“Whew! Had me worried for a minute there!” I smiled, shrugging off his statement.

“I, I saw that thing stab you, straight through!”

“Kevin, you need to calm down. Did you hit your head?”

“The octopus lady, what the hell happened!?”

“Oh, that. Nothing of note,” I motioned to her dismembered corpse between our camp and the lake, “She wasn’t that tough.”

Kevin’s eyes widened upon seeing our acquaintance from several hours ago. The sun was already setting. He took a careful look at her sliced off tentacles before gazing at the skewers.

“YOU’RE EATING HER?!”

“Kevin, it’s really bad manners to shout at the table, er, campfire?”

Maybe the rules for the two weren’t the same.

“How? What? Why?” Kevin asked in stunned disbelief, no longer yelling.

We’ll count that as the second victory of the day, now I just need him to stop asking about things he’s best not knowing. At least he doesn’t understand our, his, true problem at the moment, if so then he’d probably never stop screaming and whimpering.

“Kevin, the lamia hit me near my chest, it wasn’t…”

“The blood!”

“KEVIN, do not interrupt when I’m speaking.”

I picked up my nearest, largest, knife, still dripping with blood. The knife, cleaver, had served me well on the lamia preparations. I pointed it decidedly at Kevin.

“Are you going to interrupt…Me…Again?”

Kevin managed a low, raspy “No.”

“Good, like I was saying, it hit between my body and arm, just grazing me. When the tentacle cut me it wrapped around, holding me tightly. It knocked me out for a minute or two. Then your screams woke me up, and while she was distracted…”

I made a slicing motion across my throat with the cleaver.

“Nothing to it.”

“The, the blood…”

I looked down at my shirt, there wasn’t even a fraction of cloth that wasn’t not deep red. I had managed to sew up the hole in the center of my chest, always important not to overlook such details.

“Yeah, she bled a lot, probably going to need to buy new clothes.”

I jabbed the skewers nearly into his face. Finally, with a supreme amount of pained exertions, he took them. His eyes were lifeless as they stared.

“Isn’t this cannibalism?”

“Depends, are you a lamia?”

Lamias were only female, but I doubt he caught that part of my joke.

“No…”

“Then eat up,” I leaned towards him, “You’re not in the best of shape at the moment. Even if you’re not hungry, you need to eat.”

Kevin did his best. After ten minutes he managed to keep the meat down and I gave him three more skewers. It was vital he eat as much as he could before I gave him the tea, or else he would certainly throw up. I felt bad, my lies were only making him more concerned and wound up. It would’ve been better for him to be calm, and not ask questions. Another 10 minutes and I took the three empty skewers from his hand, noticing his now suspicious gaze.

“I think I did hit my head, I, I seem to’ve forgot. Um, what was our regiment, Tome?”

In his condition I probably shouldn’t, but why not?

“Why the 2nd, of course, Schelm’s finest!”

His expression became one of horror. He tried lifting himself to his feet only to fall screaming back into his favorite fetal position. That lamia had done a number on him, his joints were no longer capable of supporting his weight, or probably any weight for that matter.

“Lodestone Republic’s 4th, dumbass. I’m not a mimic, so try to sit still before you injure yourself more.”

“Why didn’t you say so?!”

“Because you’re being asinine.”

Ugh, a poor choice of words to calm someone down. In my defense the pain in my chest was similar to hot coals that were also living, flesh-eating, maggots. My cordiality could not withstand both that and his stupidity.

“Now I know it’s you, you’re so mean!”

Ah, my attempts at being nice had not gone to plan. Well, why not crush a few naive ideals while I was on a roll?

“Kevin, how many people haven’t been mean to you, you know, since you popped into our little world?”

“Well, well, the clerics at the church and nobles weren’t!”

“And EVERYONE else?”

He sat, thinking in between winces of pain. I gave a few minutes so that he could fully analyze the past few weeks. I wasn’t completely sure, but the odds were in my favor. Sure enough, he was dumbfounded upon his revelation, muttering incoherently.

“Kevin, did you ever stop to think that maybe? Perhaps? Just possibly, that the people who were being nice to you only wanted something from you?”

“Tha, that’s not right! No, they, they wouldn’t… Why…?” Tears began to well up in his eyes, time to dial it back a bit.

“The world’s a cruel place Kevin, if someone’s being overly nice to you, they typically want something. Now I admit, I can be an ass sometimes, but tell me Kevin, have I ever tried to hurt you?”

That you know of…

“N, no…”

“That’s right, it’s because I’m not so base as to stab a companion in the back. I’m sorry I couldn’t take down that Godsdamn lamia quick enough, but I hauled you back to shore and gave you a healing potion, did I not?”

Well half a healing potion, no need wasting a full bottle on a dead man.

“Yeah.”

I nodded to reinforce my words, “You don’t have to like me Kevin, the Gods know I don’t care much for you, but I have your back. Now, your wounds are pretty bad, I want you to drink this tea. I put a little healing potion in it so it should ease the pain more and help you rest. We’ll set out first light tomorrow.”

“But, I don’t think…”

“I’ll carry you if need be, listen closely Kevin. I promise you one thing, upon the Rimoude family name, I will not leave you out here to die alone.”

Kevin stopped fidgeting as much and smiled despite the pain. I helped him with the cup, and he slowly imbibed. I laid him out on his blanket near the fire, his eyes growing heavier by the second.

“You really won’t leave me?”

“Never,” I answered truthfully.

Kevin shut his eyes; his body relaxed. Soon he was in a deep sleep, that sleeping potion I’d also added to his tea doing its job wonderfully.

I looked at him a moment more. I had wanted his last waking moments to be sweet and comfortable, but I’d screwed that up by being nice.

Bah, no sense in beating myself up, I had tried.

I took out a dagger from my belt and carefully set it beside his head. Tomorrow I’d test the feasibility of dragging or pulling Kevin. In my state I already knew the answer. So, when I inevitably failed, I would quickly slice his throat, allowing him to die painlessly in his sleep (there was more sleeping potion if required). Leaving him out here alone to die was too cruel. Even for someone as annoying as Kevin.

I fell back against a tree, letting my body slide down to the ground. I grimaced as I allowed a growl to escape my throat. It hurt, it really, really, Godsdamn hurt. I pulled down the top of my shirt, the gaping hole was still there, maybe a quarter of an inch smaller than before. I could see inside, as half of my heart thumped while the other seemed to be slowly reconstructing itself.

I thought back to that moment in the battle, when my senses and perception had disappeared.

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There was nothing but the darkness, it was so quiet, so peaceful. Surely a small rest couldn’t hurt. My mind began to drift away, interrupted by a series of pops and cracks. Then an unearthly scream.

I focused, there was something I was forgetting… Something left undone… Perhaps also someone, a slower someone, needing me…

I wanted to rest, to just be at peace, but there was yet something I had to do. My mind desperately searched for why I couldn’t just let everything go.

Women and wine, nice, but no.

Sharp metal things stabbing into me, no.

Tentacles, maybe.

Something green, no… Yes?

Wait a minute, something green… That fancy word… Chlorophyll, what were those things?

Trees, yes. TREES! YES!

That’s what it was. TREES. I was going to rip every last one of them out and form the world’s largest bonfire. My work wasn’t even begun, I couldn’t rest. As the anger washed over me, clarity was being restored. I saw the water lamia in front on me, quartering Kevin.

I could lift my chin, but nothing else worked. I felt my body fighting, whatever remained of my heart desperately trying to reconstitute a fraction of its former self. The cracking continued, Kevin’s tendons and joints past the point of no return.

Crap.

I tried to will my body to obey me, my fingers wiggled a bit. Blood wasn’t pumping, I needed something more. I thought back to all my attempted murders, nature turning on me…

My left hand angled to grab hold of the still hanging axe, before meeting in the air with my right hand. I was only going to have one chance at this, I needed a bit more strength… I reminisced my grandfather’s stories, the rivers of blood, the loss of centuries of hard work, and those lying Godsdamn abominations...

Rage exploded more than I’d hoped. I swung, screaming just before the strike connected. The flesh parted as the wedge sank deep into the lamia’s neck. Blood gushed out, dark and fragrant. I could taste the iron and ammonia.

The body convulsed explosively, throwing me some distance away while releasing its hold on Kevin. There was no guttural scream, no roar of defeat. The body collapsed spasmically into the shallow water, the head slumping to the side. It still held to the body by a small portion of flesh. The half woman turned her eyes at me. Pain and anger slowly glazed into an accusing glare as she now faced the darkness.

I fought the pain and dragged myself fully to the shore, dirty lake water slowly draining from my chest cavity. My skin was tinged gray before I reached my rucksack. I fumbled with the burlap to get into it. In due course I felt what I was after and withdrew the healing potion. I undid the cap, took a quarter swig, and then poured it into the hole via the edges. I leaned back and dumped more onto what I thought was my heart. The healing rapidly intensified, some part of my heart beating just as the skin of my fingertips was nearing indigo. I laid there for some time before finding the strength to stand.

The pain was excruciating. I stumbled over to Kevin’s belongings to grab his healing potion. I stopped midway. Shit, Kevin…

He was on his back in the water, passed out from the pain. I retrieved his healing potion first, swigging a fourth of it before going to him. I pulled him into a shallower section before kneeling beside him, pinching his nose shut with one hand. With the other I opened his mouth and jammed the end of the bottle in. The liquid flowed into his mouth. His unconscious body tried to cough it out, but I held tight, forcing him to swallow.

I corked the bottle before collapsing next to him. I was not looking forward to dragging him fully onto the shore. Gods Kevin, why couldn’t you have been skinnier?

After half an hour of pain, I finished what was left of the healing potion. Healing potions were amazing substances, but they weren’t cure-alls. They regenerated flesh rapidly, but wouldn’t regrow a limb. While they could be lifesavers, their greatest use was as a pain killer, many regiments trained their soldiers to take a swig before storming the enemy.

Odds were if it didn’t save a soldier from a lucky strike or two, that soldier would at least have the strength to take out one more enemy before noticing how screwed he was.

They didn’t regenerate organs either. I assumed it sped up whatever my healing ability was and let the thought drop. Surviving trumped my curiosity and I needed to get things done before nightfall.

Slowly, and very painfully, I dragged Kevin into the woods near the road. Next I created a pathetic camp for us, gathered wood for the fire, and set things up for when Kevin awoke. Finally, I dragged the lamia a bit to shore, cut off a few tentacles for cooking, and sliced open the top of her body from her neck to the navel. I had several vials ready to collect what I wanted.

This wasn’t my first time scavenging a monster, and Gods willing it wouldn’t be my last.

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I sat still slouched against the tree. The sun had set, an hour ago, two, maybe four? Gods I still felt like orc shit. I crawled nearer the fire to grab the least over cooked skewer. The skin was black. Waste not want not.

There was a sound from the other side of the road. I stood up, and wished I hadn’t. The pain killing effects were gone, and I felt what most people with a hole in their chest did. My mind screamed while my mouth opened, not a sound escaping. This was not the time. My eyes darted the tree line several times. There was nothing, that I could see…

I sighed, preparing to fall back against my tree. I froze. There were now two figures in black hooded robes opposite me and Kevin on the other side of the campfire. They sat on the ground, watching me with interest. One rose a gloved hand in salutation.

“How are things going traveler? You would not require a spot of mercy, would you?”

“Interesting,” I said, reaching for my cleaver.

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Never forget the weary traveler, my sons. No one gave me succor in my dire flight, one glass of beer and I would have been a boon companion the rest of my days. We do not turn away, but even in hospitality, keep your wits and blades sharp. Woe to those who think our accommodation without limit.

-Aquinas Rimoude, the lone survivor, the fool who never forgot, our founder.