“According to the map the room with the artifact is through the door at the end of the hall,” Kayde mentions to the others as he holds the blueprints of the ruins out in front of him. His eyes catch on a sapphire handle fixed upon a door and he knows this has to be the right room.

Kayde pulls a long piece of rope out of his bag of holding; “I brought the rope this time. We are getting all four chests”.

“We could probably leave the sapphire one unless you want another gun,” Xander points out, not wanting to waste time when they run from the stone golems guarding the treasure within the room.

“You’re right, we might have to carry other chests,” Kayde agrees, remembering the trap on that chest.

After prepping the rope and going over the plan, Kayde goes invisible and enters the room. He ties up the ruby, gold, and silver chests and lets out the same bird call signal from the time before.

Drakthar holds the door open and Xander warps next to a now visible Kayde. He grabs the golden bow on the pedestal with one hand and Kayde with the other. Once they are outside, Drakthar slams the door shut and he braces himself against it.

Xander gives Gwendolyn the bow and pushes himself up against the door as well, now hearing the banging from the stone guardians coming after what was stolen from them. As he slams against it he feels a sharp pain in his shoulder, forcing a pained expression onto his face.

“You okay?” Drakthar asks, witnessing the ragged look.

“It hurts like hell, but I’ll be fine,” Xander assures him as they both fight to hold back against the incessant hammering from the other side of the door, the guardians intent on breaking it in two before killing whoever stole its treasures.

Kayde inspects each chest, trying to see if they can just open them there and not have to drag them out of the ruins. He first looks at the golden chest, with twirling gilded vines sprawling across the lid, but aside from its fine pattern, there doesn’t seem to be anything else to it. He opens it tentatively and finds a bunch of gold pieces inside. He quickly funnels all of it into his bag of holding.

He then moves on to the ruby chest, fine wooden carvings of leaves lining its lid. When he puts a hand upon it, he feels a mysterious heat, scalding his hand. Kayde quickly pulls his hand back, shaking it to dissipate the pain.

“This one’s trapped,” Kayde alerts the others.

“Just leave it we don’t have time,” Gwendolyn insists watching the door slowly starting to break down.

Lastly, Kayde looks at the silver chest, plainer than the others, and apparently untrapped as well. When he opens it, he finds a piece of paper sitting inside. Upon closer inspection, he finds that it’s some sort of map. He pockets it, knowing he doesn’t have the time to study it further.

“You got everything?” Drakthar asks Kayde seeing him stand up. Kayde nods. Drakthar and Xander let go of the door and the four of them run back down the hallway towards the large room.

They hear a loud crash behind them, the thundering steps of the stone guardians booming through the narrow halls. Xander soon begins falling behind, the lack of sleep and blood loss slowing him down.

As he makes it through the doorway to the large room where Drakthar lost to Sharn, rubble flies towards him, the golems decimating the doorway to the larger room as if it were constructed of decayed wood.

The delirious Xander slips on a piece of rubble on the floor in front of him, hitting the ground hard, face-first onto the rough stone floors. He turns, blood now flowing freely from his nose, only to see a bigger piece of rubble crush his leg.

“Guys!” He calls out for help as he frantically tries to pull himself out from under the large chunk of the doorway. The others, who were nearly out the other door, look back to see Xander on the ground, one golem already approaching while another bashes his way into the room.

“Kayde, lay down cover fire, Drakthar, help me get him out!” Gwendolyn springs into action, rushing forward with Drakthar as Kayde follows orders, drawing his rifle and fires at the golem directly in front of Xander.

Gwendolyn gets to Xander just as the golem in front raises its fist, intending to crush the lovers below him. Drakthar sprints towards them, arriving just in time to block the mighty golem's blow.

Shaking from the effort of holding the golem's weight at bay, he yells, “Get him out, I can’t hold him much longer!” His strength still depleted from his defeat against Sharn, he begins to falter. Gwendolyn looks down at Xander’s leg, his ankle crushed from the rubble.

“Pull it out when I lift,” she tells Xander as she moves her hands underneath the rubble for leverage.

“Alright one, two, three!” She strains as she lifts with her legs, giving everything she has to shift the hefty chunk of stone off Xander. As soon as a bit of the pressure is lifted, Xander grabs his leg with both arms, dragging it out from beneath the stone, the skin of his lower leg scraping off against the ground and rubble as he pulls.

“He’s free,” Gwendolyn alerts Drakthar, who shifts to the side letting the golem’s fist collide into the ground, creating a small crater on the floor. Drakthar sweeps Xander up off the ground and throws him over his shoulder.

“We all good?” Kayde asks as the others run past him out of the door. He looks back and sees all four golems now in the room.

“Yeah, I’d say we're good,” he mumbles to himself sarcastically as he takes the time to close the door behind them when leaving the room.

“I can run on my own,” Xander tells Drakthar, not wanting to be carried in this sort of situation.

Gwendolyn takes one look at Xander’s leg and declares, “Drakthar, if you put him down I’ll make your life hell,” knowing there is no way Xander will be able to run on that crushed ankle.

“I wasn’t planning on it,” Drakthar lets her know he’s on her side as he strengthens his grasp on Xander, not wanting him to try anything stupid. They finally make it up the stairs and out of the ruins, collapsing as the tension leaves their bodies.

Drakthar lays Xander on the ground, his unusually pale skin burned by the sun above them.

“He’s not awake,” Gwendolyn starts to panic as she looks at him.

“He’s lost too much blood,” Drakthar observes, noting Xander’s extreme pallor.

Gwendolyn pulls off his shirt and sees that his shoulder wound has opened up again. Not knowing what else to stop the bleeding with, she rips off the lower part of her shirt and pushes it against the wound.

While she deals with that, Kayde takes a look at Xander’s leg. It’s no longer bleeding, but it’s caked in dried blood where it was scrapped when he removed it from under the rubble. Kayde pours some water on it and begins washing away the blood so he can clean up the cuts and see just how bad his ankle is.

“Drakthar, can you feed him some food? He’ll need it with all the blood he’s lost,” Kayde requests, knowing Xander needs the energy to replace the blood he’s lost. Drakthar listens but finds the idea of shoving food into an unconscious man’s mouth ridiculous.

Things start to calm down once the bleeding has stopped and Xander’s leg is patched up. He lays there for a couple of hours longer before finally coming to.

“Hey, we made it,” he comments, seeing the others sitting around him exhausted.

“You are so reckless!” Gwendolyn starts to yell at him.

“How could you do something so stupid? I know you want to get stronger, but you can’t do that if you die!” Xander watches as moisture starts to collect around her eyes as she is screaming at him.

“I know… I’m sorry,” he apologizes, knowing he shouldn’t have trained all night before this. He does think to himself that it would have been fine if not for the injury he sustained while defending her, but he doesn’t dare mention it to her.

“You just need to be more careful, I don’t want to lose you,” she calms down a bit, starting to reiterate the same sentiment over and over.

“I know, you won’t lose me, I’m not going anywhere,” he assures her.

Kayde, not interested in the display in front of him, pulls out the map he found in the silver chest, “I think this is what Sharn was telling you about”.

He shows the map to the others; it is predominantly green with a couple of little symbols marking locations.

One symbol is to the bottom right of the map on a smaller island surrounded by water. The actual symbol is three tents lined up together. Other than that there is one location in the middle; it looks like two lowercase Rs back to back with each other.

“Where is this a map of?” Gwendolyn ponders as they all look over it.

“This tent symbol must be some sort of encampment,” Kayde speculates trying to piece together what it all means.

“I don’t know about this other one… It kind of looks like water spouting out of the ground,” Xander begins to decipher what it might represent.

Drakthar’s eyes light up as he realizes exactly what that symbol means, “It’s the fountain of luck”. He gets looks of confusion from the others, not sure what he is talking about.

“Kali, the woman who wanted to challenge Orrin, she said she was the guardian of a fountain of luck in the marshlands. That must be what this is a map of,” Drakthar reminds them, piecing together the location of the map.

“I feel like an idiot, of course, it’s the marshlands, the entire map is green,” Kayde throws his hands up at his own oversight.

“It looks like we know what our next destination is,” Drakthar grins, already looking forward to his rematch with Sharn.

“Okay, but before we go we need to wait for Xander’s injuries to heal,” Gwendolyn tempers the excitement of the others for a second.

“That will give me time to train,” Drakthar notes.

“How is that ankle buddy?” Kayde asks, knowing he likely cannot walk on it.

“Let me check,” Xander lifts himself up, wincing as he puts the slightest amount of weight onto it.

“Yeah, Drakthar is carrying you until it heals,” Gwendolyn informs him, not wanting it to get worse.

“No, I can walk myself,” Xander disagrees, wanting to hold onto the last little bit of pride he has.

“No, you can’t,” Gwendolyn stares daggers towards him, not giving him a choice.

Drakthar starts to approach Xander, but he swivels towards his friend and tells him, “Don’t, I’ll be fine”.

Xander starts to limp off, heading deeper into the mountains.

“Drakthar, pick him up,” Gwendolyn orders, not letting Xander decide for himself.

“Don’t listen, I’m fine,” Xander immediately disagrees.

“I’m not involved in this,” Drakthar grumbles, tired of being up in the middle of their disputes. He begins to follow Xander up the mountain.

“Hey, walking off is letting him win… dammit,” Gwendolyn turns towards Kayde.

He shrugs, “I can’t carry him”. She rolls her eyes at him before jogging to catch up with the other two.

She ducks underneath Xander’s arm and pulls it over her shoulder to help him walk, “Let me do this much at least”.

“Okay, I guess that's fine,” Xander lets her, his ankle starting to actually hurt quite a bit while slowly walking uphill.

“So where are we going?” Kayde asks the others as he trails behind them.

“I know a place near the mountain pass that leads to the marshlands; we can hide out there until we are ready,” Xander mentions, familiar with the area.

“Sounds good, lead the way my dude,” Kayde puts the map back in his bag.

They walk through the mountains for a couple of days before reaching the place Xander had mentioned. They walk through a clearing, a forest of variably sized boulders sitting in the clearing, some of them starting to be permanently embedded in the ground. At the other end of the clearing sits a wooden cabin resting beneath a copse of spruce trees.

“Here it is,” Xander notes unenthusiastically as he opens the door to the cabin.

“What exactly is this place?” Kayde asks Xander as he looks around.

“When I ran away from the Sacrosanct empire, this is where I lived for three years,” Xander explains, making his way to a dusty old chair.

Drakthar grunts in approval, “Living out here for three years, I’m impressed”.

There is not much in the cabin, just a desk in the corner, a table in the center, and a dusty bedroll that is starting to fall apart after being abandoned for so many years.

“As much as I enjoy the ambiance in here, I’m going to set up the tent outside,” Kayde mentions, due to the sun starting to go down.

“Come on Drakthar,” Kayde recruits him to help him out.

“You guys don’t have to sleep outside there’s enough room in here,” Xander tells them trying to be hospitable.

Kayde waves him off, “Nah dude, it’s too dusty. Plus I don’t think you actually want us to stay inside”.

They remain at the cabin for weeks, waiting for Xander’s injuries to heal so they may move forward. Drakthar trains at all hours of the day while listening to Xander’s coaching on all of the ins and outs of Sharn’s fighting style. Each day they try to brainstorm new tactics on how to counter it.

Gwendolyn and Kayde feel inspired seeing the other two work so hard every day, so they do some target practice here and there while waiting for Xander’s wounds to heal.

“Hey, can I ask you something?” Kayde asks Gwendolyn after a round of firing.

“Yeah, sure, go ahead,” she responds, curious as to what Kayde might have to ask her.

“First off I have to admit something to you. Originally I didn’t trust you much, I kind of thought you were someone from the Sacrosanct who was trying to get close to Xander in order to manipulate him or something,” Kayde starts to explain.

“What gave you that idea?” Gwendolyn laughs, finding it ridiculous.

“I don’t know, the way you gravitated towards him so fast, I mean I understand why he took to you so quickly, but I never understood what you saw in him. It just seemed off to me, why would someone like you be into a guy like him? Don’t get me wrong Xander is great, but I feel like it takes a while to know that,” Kayde elaborates on why he felt that way.

“I see, so you want to know what it is I saw in him?” Gwendolyn asks, trying to figure out what Kayde’s question is.

“Yup, pretty much,” Kayde responds, realizing he could have made that more brief.

“If you really want to know… it’s how he treated me. My entire life, the men around me only treated me like an object. They would approach me with crass one-liners hoping to score one of the only girls onboard. When I was younger I agreed to go out with the first person who came onto me, but I realized that it meant nothing to him, I was just a trophy to be shown off to his friends. I thought Cenred was different, he had been my only friend growing up, but he too only treated me like a toy that would eventually be discarded. The reason I fell so hard for Xander is that, for the first time in my life, a man treated me like a person; no that’s not right, he treated me like a goddess,” Gwendolyn finishes, the emotion behind her words proving to Kayde that she is telling the truth.

“I see… Well, I’m sorry for doubting you. I just wanted to clear the air if we are going to continue to travel together like this,” Kayde apologizes for questioning her intentions.

“Don’t worry about it, I understand,” Gwendolyn tells him.

Every night Gwendolyn checks on his shoulder to see if it is finally healed.

“It took a while, but I think I can pull out the stitches Sharn put in now,” She mentions seeing as how the skin has started to seal off the gouge.

“It’s probably going to hurt a bit,” she warns him as she starts to remove them. He feels some slight pain, but at this point, it doesn’t really register as anything for him.

“Alright, it’s out,” Gwendolyn tosses the bloodstained wire to the ground.

Xander looks at his shoulder and sees the large scar now present there.

“Damn, I didn’t really want a scar,” he comments, eyeing the new imperfection on his body.

“It’s okay, I actually find it kind of sexy,” Gwendolyn tries to make him feel better about it.

Xander raises his eyebrows at her, “You like scars? Should I be worried that Drakthar is going to take you away from me?”

“Maybe,” Gwendolyn coyly responds.

Xander’s face turns sour before Gwendolyn backpedals, “I’m just kidding, I like the single scar not scars everywhere”.

The next morning Gwendolyn informs the others that Xander’s injury has healed and that they can move out towards the marshlands.

“Great! Although, I’ve been studying the map for a few days and there might be an issue. See this blue around the green? There is a swamp that surrounds the marshlands so we have to come up with a way across it,” Kayde points out, holding up the map.

“There has to be a bridge or something,” Gwendolyn speculates, not sure how people would come and go otherwise.

“If not, we can always just build a boat,” Xander suggests, thinking of the worst-case scenario.

They arrive at the edge of the swamp. They look out across its dark waters; the pungent odor emanating from the acrid waters filling nostrils.

“I would say this is it,” Kayde stands at the water’s edge. He pulls out his rifle and uses the scope as binoculars to look from side to side, seeing if there is any way across.

To the far right, he spots a small bridge.

It looks more like a couple of wooden planks shoddily put together, but not having found anything else, he points it out to the others, “There is a bridge to the North”.

They walk along the swamp until they find the narrow bridge Kayde was talking about.

“This almost seems too thin,” Xander looks down unimpressed at its shoddy craftsmanship.

“What other choice do we have?” Kayde points out.

“Any path that will get me to Sharn I will take,” Drakthar walks out from taking the first step onto the bridge.

“Might as well give it a try,” Gwendolyn notes as she watches Drakthar continue across the bridge.

The others begin to follow and they tentatively make their way across the long narrow bridge. The wood underneath them creaks at every single step they take.

From deep beneath the water small yellow eyes begin to peer up at them. They make their way to the surface to get a better look at the prey who were foolish enough to journey into their waters.

Kayde is the first to spot them, “Guys look at the water,” he whispers calmly trying not to provoke the swarm of yellow eyes staring up at them.

“Let’s just move slowly, don’t make any sudden movements,” Xander suggests as they are now tentatively creeping forwards.

The silence is almost suffocating as they carefully make their way across the bridge. That is until Drakthar steps on a weak plank causing it to snap in half. The sound of wood cracking reverberates across the surface of the swamp.

They all look into the water and for a second nothing is different, but that second is fleeting. They watch as the eyes start rapidly approaching them. A couple of the creatures jump out of the water revealing themselves to be black oversized lizards.

“Run!” Xander calls out to the others. They begin to travel as fast as they can. Lizards approaching them from all sides, taking turns emerging from the water and launching themselves at them.

One goes towards Gwendolyn at the back. She quickly draws her bow already loaded with an arrow, firing it through the lizard’s skull at point-blank range. Its corpse splashes back into the water.

Another jumps at Kayde’s blind side knocking him off the bridge towards the water. Xander quickly reacts catching Kayde by the arm and putting him back onto the bridge in front of him.

“Thanks,” Kayde tells him as he gets back up and continues forward.

After cutting through what must have been thirty lizards at the front, Drakthar finally spots land on the other side.

“Guys, we are almost there,” he calls back to the others.

Xander looks up and starts to scan the shore for anything he can switch all of them with.

He finally finds something and he yells, “Grab onto me!”

Gwendolyn puts a hand on his back as Xander reaches forward to grab both Kayde and Drakthar. Once he has made contact with all of them he switches them onto the shore.

Behind them, they hear a crash. They see a tree-destroying the section of the bridge they were standing on. A feeling of despair hits Gwendolyn as she realizes there is no way back out of the marshlands.

“You trapped us here? Why did you destroy our only way out?” Gwendolyn questions Xander’s decision in a raised tone.

Xander doesn’t expect this outburst from Gwendolyn so he snaps back at her angrily, “Sorry! I was only thinking of the fucking lizards trying to kill us!”

They each feel and hand on their shoulders. Their angry glares pause for a second as they both turn their heads to look at Kayde.

“Calm down guys, you wouldn’t want to say something you can’t take back,” he tries to prevent any potential damage to their relationship.

Xander is the first to attempt an apology, “I am sorry. I should have waited longer until I could have found something smaller to switch us with”.

“No, I overreacted, I know you were only trying to get us all to safety,” Gwendolyn apologizes as well.

They calm down and assess their surroundings, a dense dark forest in every direction.

“This must be the sacred forest Kali mentioned,” Drakthar declares, an ominous feeling accompanying his words.