I shrugged and went into the forest to find a large tree, these ones on the mainland were so small compared to the trees back on the island, and they didn’t have these annoying spines that pricked me as I climbed. They mostly hurt on my vulnerable skin on my upper body, but I barely felt them on the scales on my tail. Eventually, I was high enough to see over the forest, and looking around I tried to find some familiar landmarks that I could use to orient myself.

Behind me, I can see the mountains we came from. I thought towards Lubus, we must have traveled pretty far for them to look so small in the distance. I mean they didn’t look small, but comparing them now to when I stood directly at their base made a lot of difference.

Yes, to the north, he answered

Right, I can see a river coming from the mountain range and joining with the lake, creating a waterfall.

Yes, that must be the spring river. What else can you see, is there smoke anywhere? Lubus asked, and I looked around seeing if I could spot some.

Now that you mention it there is smoke coming from directly east of here I guess.

Are you sure it’s not closer to the mountains? Lubus interjected.

Yes, it’s pretty much in line with the lake, straight as the eagle flies.

That’s a bit worrying, do you see what color it is?

It’s black Lubus, why?

It’s as I feared, it’s probably a trading caravan or something that’s been attacked on the road to Yhester. There was silence for a while after that before Lubus continued in a strangely enthusiastic way. Actually, this might turn to our advantage, it is too late for us to help defend them against whoever or whatever attacked. But if we can find another way to be of assistance it might help you to ingratiate yourself easier in the small town up the road. We don’t want them to break out the torches and pitchforks thinking you are some kind of monster.

What do you want to do in a town, I thought you wanted to gather materials?

Yes, but they might have what I need, and we can trade with them if nothing else they should know the area better and I can get a good idea about where we should look.

What will I do when I get to this road, I’m pretty sure I can only talk to you because it is in my mind, they won’t understand me.

Oh right, I didn’t think about that. Lubus answered, sounding a bit embarrassed. I guess I’ll just translate for you and tell you what to say so you will be understood. The summer festival hasn’t started yet, so judge Lyle shouldn’t know that we are gone and not send guards out to look for us yet. I would say that we should head back to Yhester, but I have no idea how the troll got here so fast, if we traveled by horse we would still be too late.

I sighed and made my way back to the ground, it was a bit frustrating how everyone on the mainland who saw me grew afraid. At first, it was those guards I had run into in the forest outside Yhester, they had fled at first sight of me. Lubus grew frightened when he first saw me as well, I could even see it in the eyes of the townsfolk. The only reason that they didn’t run in fear was the fact that we were being escorted by guards half the time I suspected. Now back on solid ground, I slithered it the direction I had seen the smoke coming from.

On the way I amused myself by comparing the plant life to those back home, I saw chubby little growths on the forest floor that looked almost like they had grown hats. I asked Lubus what they were and he told me that they were mushrooms. This surprised me so much that I almost stopped moving forward but managed to keep slithering. We had mushrooms on the island of course, but these here on the mainland was much smaller most plants that I could recognize were smaller than their counterparts back home. Everything seemed smaller on the mainland, except for their buildings, were they trying to make up for something?

I could make out the scent of burning wood on the wind, and it got stronger until I made it to a river. This must be the river I had seen before, Lubus had called it the spring river, it was slow moving but fairly wide. I didn’t know how deep it was but the water was dark and I couldn’t see the bottom. I decided not to risk another bath to potentially tangle with the wildlife, so I got ready to jump by bunching up my tail behind me. Hopefully, I would make it all the way to the other side, but I would probably land close to the shore if I didn’t get far enough and not have to spend too much time in the water. I pushed off the ground with my tail, and I flew through the air to land on the other side of the river as I had planned. I startled some animals that I hadn’t seen from the other side, and they scampered off into the bush as I landed, Lubus told me it was a family of boars with their young. The idea of having children was still strange to me, and I wondered what it would be like as I stared after the little piglets, smaller versions of their parents.

I tore myself from my thoughts and used my tongue to taste the air again. The scent of burning had grown stronger now, and I followed it until the trees thinned and I slithered on to a road of hard packed dirt. There was what looked like a still smoldering open cart piled high with cut down trees. There were what I now knew was three men on the road, one of the sides of the wagon had apparently broken and spilled its load of trees on the road. One of the men had gotten caught under a pile of logs and was now trying to free his leg with little success. Another man was helping the first with trying to get free, while the third was yelling something into the forest a little ways up the road, a name I thought from the sound of it. They hadn’t noticed me yet, and I asked Lubus for a good way to introduce myself he told me just to say ‘Hello’ and not make any threatening gestures.

“Hello,” I said trying to imitate the way it had sounded in my head from Lubus.

They all heard me and turned their heads to look at me, they seemed surprised at first, but when they looked down and saw my tail, they grew pale and yelled something which Lubus translated as “Monster” and “Run away.” Two of them did run but stopped when they realized they had left their friend stuck struggling to get free. They turned around grabbing the axes they had stuck in their belt loops, but they didn’t draw them out as they saw I hadn’t moved from my spot at the edge of the road.

“Your friend, seems stuck, help?” I asked Lubus what to say and I imitated him as best I could, they answered, and Lubus translated.

“Get back monster, just get back into the woods where you came from and maybe I won’t cut you in half,” the younger of the two was saying, the one who had been yelling into the woods earlier.

“I’m no monster,” I said, imitating Lubus. “My name is Eshanai, fight in arena, Yhester. The judge made posters, must have made it here by now.” They squinted at me for a while then the grey-haired one's eyes opened wide, and he put his ax back in his belt loop. He turned to the younger one and started a whispered conversation that quickly grew heated. Finally, the young man seemed to relent with a sullen expression on his face, but I couldn’t help but notice that he still had ax in hand. The older one approached looking apologetic he said.

“Forgive our caution miss, it’s just that we are a bit jumpy at the moment. You see a forest drake came out of nowhere and burned our wagon and flew off with our draft horse in its talons. The grumpy one back there is named Jared, we had his daughter with us today, and he told her to run and hide in the forest, and she still hasn’t come back.”

“Don’t tell her about that, who knows what she’ll,” Jared started, but the older one interrupted him.

“Oh shut up Jared, she might be willing to help you find her if you could just be quiet and keep your thoughts to yourself.” As they started arguing I took the opportunity to ask Lubus a question.

What’s a forest drake, do you know?

It’s basically a huge flying lizard, these guys were lucky it was only after their horse. Drakes can be really vicious with their prey, almost like cats in that way. Lubus answered, and I could feel the excitement growing within me. Another thing that didn’t seem to be smaller on the mainland was their monsters. First, we had run into that huge troll, and now I hear big lizards are flying about, we had nothing like that back on the island. My thoughts were interrupted as I noticed that the argument had stopped and the older man I had been talking to turned back to me and continued.

“As I said, a bit grumpy that one, I’m Lito by the way,” the man said and held out a hand towards me which I took and shook up and down. “I’d be awfully grateful if you could help me with old Bernie over there,” I moved over to the logs and got a good grip under the one that was pinning the man's leg, Bertie's leg. “Hold on a moment, and I’ll help you, I’m not sure what you think you could do on your own. We have been stuck here for,” he stopped speaking his mouth hanging open in shock as I lifted the log off the man's leg seemingly with little effort. The man who had been trapped seemed stunned to as he stared at me, a look of awe on his face. I smiled at him showing teeth and gestured for him to get out from under the log that I was holding. He shook himself and moved quickly, keeping his weight off his injured led he limped over to where Lito was standing. They both watched as I gently sat the log down on the ground and as I turned to them, they just stared at me, open-mouthed.

They don’t seem to be getting out of their stupor any time soon, maybe you should ask about Jared’s daughter. Offer to help look for her, I thought that was a good idea and agreed. Lubus told me what to say, and I impersonated him as best I could.

“Jared’s daughter, how she smell?” Lito was the first to snap out of his surprise, he told me something with a dubious look on his face and Lubus translated for me.

“Why would you want to know that?” The others came to their senses at the question and were now looking at me for the answer.

“Me very good at smelling things can help track her down,” I said, trying to clarify.

“Oh, well I think Jared has a few of her belongings, Jared?” Lito said with understanding before he looked at Jared questioningly. Jared looked startled to be addressed and he looked from Lito to me and then quickly back to Lito.

“Are you crazy? I’m not gonna let this, this… whatever she is near my daughter,” then his gaze traveled to the third man, Burnie I think his name was.

“Are you not even going to say anything, who’s side are you on?” Burnie just shook his head at the accusation, waving his hands in front of himself, Jared sighed, and Lito started talking.

“As far as I am concerned we need all the help we can get, none of us are experienced at tracking, and what if she has gotten in some sort of trouble, you know what types of creatures lurk in these wood.” Jared seemed to shiver at Lito’s words before he spoke again looking resigned.

“Fine she can come with us to look for my daughter, but I will be keeping my eyes on her,” then he turned to glare at me before saying. “You will only help us track her, do you hear me? Once we find her, you will not touch a hair on her body.” I nodded reluctantly at his words, he seemed satisfied as he held out a red cloth towards me. “This is hers, she kept it with her all the time, should have her smell on it.” I flicked my tongue against it, and Jared flinched back, this amused me, and I found the scent in the air, not too old, and I was off into the forest, the men struggling to keep up.