I had noticed, over the course of several months of human life, that humans sometimes had a strange sense that told them when they were being watched. I couldn’t quite figure out how it worked, exactly. My best bet was that the subconscious gathered pieces of information and processed them to calculate a heuristic, and if that heuristic indicated that it was likely that the human was being watched, they experienced a sort of sensation that was uncomfortable and put them on alert. It also, apparently, magnified in intensity as more eyes were added, because to my instincts the ant-covered branch might as well have been as dangerous as a live grenade with a missing lever.

I didn’t get the chance to act on the impulse, however. Just one heartbeat later I heard a twang from in the woods, then something ripped past my neck, slicing it open. The pain of the wound and the healing pulled me back into action, and as I spun around I saw Vaozey throwing my sword towards me, sheath and all. I moved to snatch it out of the air, shifting the ball of light in my hand out of the way, another arrow ripped through the air in front of my eyes, narrowly missing me. It was impossibly fast, so much so that the fletchings were being torn apart by air currents as it moved.

“Look away!” I shouted, and Vaozey realized what I was doing just in time to cover her eyes. The ball of light exploded with radiance, turning the entire scene before me bright white even through my shut eyelids before winking out. After the flash attack I summoned a second ball above my head to illuminate the woods like a floodlight, then scanned the scene for our attackers.

At least five humans, wrapped in black fabric that covered the majority of their heads and bodies, were hiding in the brush. Were it not for their clothing, I probably would have spotted them immediately, because their locations were obvious and they hadn’t done much to disguise their outlines. Three of them had comically thick bows reinforced with metal on the limbs, clearly intended for force magic users, and the other two were using swords not dissimilar to my own.

Though all the humans were affected by my light, the one who had been knocking an arrow took his shot anyway, nearly hitting Vaozey in the leg. Someone else shouted from behind them, and three more humans with swords ran into view, moving as though they could still see. There could be even more, I realized, we need to lose them in the woods, if they’re all magic users it’s too risky for just Vaozey and me to fight them directly. Guerrilla tactics are more appropriate, or just evasion. I turned to run and saw Vaozey, who looked to have the same idea. Wordlessly, she gestured southeast, and I gestured southwest, then both of us dashed off into the darkness.

Once I evaded my pursuers and found a tree to wait in, I remembered a couple of issues with my plan. Firstly, my throwing knives and axes were still at the campsite, so most likely I wasn’t going to be getting them back. Secondly, Vaozey was not used to navigating woodlands and other natural areas, so she probably wouldn’t be able to find her way back to me without help. While the direction she ran in meant that she could essentially just head west to find the road, I wasn’t sure that she would know that fact, or even how to find out what direction was west.

Those problems, however, were future issues. About a minute into my wait, I heard voices in the distance, shouting commands I couldn’t make out due to the audio distortion caused by the trees. They don’t sound like they’re heading this way, I thought, Maybe I should descend and start pursuing them. A few seconds later, I was on the ground again and jogging along in near-silence through the trees. For all their attempts to remain invisible, when contrasted with the typical noise of the woods at night the sounds of a group of humans moving through the brush were quite obvious, and soon enough I was within about twenty meters of the group as they walked along.

“Hey, stop,” one of the humans whispered. Female, I thought, possibly the group leader. Another human lit a small flame, illuminating the group for a moment as they held position, not exchanging any words. Not even gestures, I thought, what are they doing? A moment later, the flame went out, and the group began to move in the same direction again. Then, all of a sudden, two humans flipped around and drew their bows, facing my direction and shooting. The first arrow went wide, but the second punched right through my gambeson and into my abdomen.

“Get him!” someone yelled, but before they could I turned and bolted, ripping the arrow’s brutal hooked point out of my belly and tossing it aside.

Getting away was pretty easy, disturbingly easy in fact. The group of humans were not very adept at tracking, clearly, and started to lose me even before I jumped up a tree and started jumping between branches to avoid leaving footprints. How did they spot me? I wondered, There’s no way that little flame was enough. Did they hear me somehow? I was much quieter than them, and they didn’t have any dogs, so how? For a moment, I realized I hadn’t seen a dog since coming to Uwriy, but my situation demanded too much of my attention to allow me to think about it further.

A lone human, broken off from the group, was walking just below the tree I was hiding in. From his head movements, it didn’t appear that he knew where I was, but it also didn’t appear that he was doing any form of tracking at all. Yet, despite that, I watched him circle around the three closest trees to me five times, like he knew I was hiding nearby but wasn’t quite sure exactly where. Once I was sure that nobody else would be coming, I shifted my balance on the branch and prepared to drop.

The sixth time he passed beneath me, just before I started to move, the human looked up. A split second later, my sword rammed through his face and my body’s weight shoved him to the ground. How? I wanted to ask as I pulled my weapon out. Luck? No, there’s no way. He looked right at me, into my eyes. He knew I was there before I made any noise. With the assistance of magic to help my grip, I dragged the man’s body back up the tree, then began to search it.

Much to my chagrin, the man didn’t have any throwing weapons on him. He was also one of the sword users, so his weapon was useless to me. It didn’t have as much mass as mine, and its shape was less conducive to the kinds of chopping I tended to use. My initial pat-down revealed very little, but then I noticed a strange lump as my hand was crossing his torso. Pulling aside the black fabric and the tunic underneath, I saw that the man was wearing a bandolier of six vials not unlike the magic boosters I carried along my back.

What is this? I wondered as I removed one of the vials to examine it. Using a very dim yellow ball of light, I examined the contents of the vial and saw that they definitely weren’t blood or anything blood-like. Instead, the vial contained a watery yellow liquid and was sealed with just a cork, probably not tightly enough to keep air exchange out. Hesitantly, I uncorked the vial, and my nose was assaulted with a horrible smell that made me seal it again immediately. Chemical weapon? I wondered, looking at the other vials. Whatever it is, I’ll take it for now. Could be worth throwing either way.

I removed the black outer fabric that the man was wearing and put it on, keeping the spots that had become wet with blood away from my face as much as possible. Then, I used strips of the man’s pants to bind him up in the tree so he wouldn’t be found, and descended to the forest floor again. Though I was larger than him and my black covering was tight, I doubted that anyone would be able to tell the difference between us in the darkness quickly enough to prevent my disguise from being effective for its intended use.

Damn these ants, I swore as I felt a nip on my lower eyelid. The insects seemed to be attracted to humans, or perhaps heat sources, and intent on using what they found as a source of food. Considering the regeneration ability of any mammalian prey, it was possible that their hit-and-run tactics were a way to acquire greater amounts of food from one victim, as magic would replace the food they took within an instant. It was a smart strategy if that was the case, but that didn’t make it any less irritating. As with the others that had dared to bite me, I boiled all the water in its body instantaneously with magic, causing it to pop quietly.

“He’s over there,” the leader woman said, pointing in my direction. “He got behind us again.” How? I raged, There’s no way she could know that. I didn’t so much as snap a twig on the way over here. Don't tell me she heard the ant, there's no way her ears are that sensitive. For a moment, I debated just engaging the group, but as they drew back their bows I disengaged again. Fighting five humans of unknown magical skill was too much of a risk, and since I still lacked any proper ranged weapons my only options to soften them up first were using light or throwing rocks. Both were inferior to a proper ambush for different reasons, so I backed off.

Maybe I should just escape, I considered, They can’t find me, the only reason they keep spotting me is because I’m trying to hunt them. There are six here including the corpse, so I doubt more than that are after Vaozey. If the ones I saw at the campsite are all of them, there should only be two. Though Vaozey had been fighting Rehvites for several years, I doubted that most of them were properly trained fighters, so whether or not she could defeat two of these humans was unknown. Still, I thought, I can’t exactly track her down right now, and wasting these idiots’ time is the best way to keep them from going after her.

Some arrows flew in my general direction, but none of them came close to me. Soon enough, I had lost the humans again.

I found an abandoned animal den in a small clearing about thirty minutes later, and my brain started to allow me to notice my fatigue once it saw a safe place to rest in. I wasn’t entirely sure where I was, relative to Towrkah at least, but I knew I couldn’t be more than a few kilometers east of the road. Squeezing into the hole in the ground was a little bit uncomfortable, but the interior of the den was larger than the entrance. Whatever had lived in it before looked to be the size of a naalfay, which was to say about the same volume as a large human but shaped differently. That meant that, while I couldn’t stand, I had plenty of room to get comfortable on the ground.

Facing my eyes to the entrance so I would wake up when sunlight came in, I quickly found myself falling asleep. It’s so inconvenient, I sighed, sometimes I can stay awake easily and sometimes it’s like I have a sedative in my system. It’s a wonder that humans, or any animals, can survive at all with such a terrible weakness. Just before I drifted off, I felt a familiar tickle on my brow, then a distant pinch of pain. The culprit popped half a second later, and all was peaceful again.

I woke up from my dreamless sleep to the smell of smoke and burning pain in my lungs. Still in a daze, I had just enough awareness to light up an orb so I could see the exit to the den and begin crawling towards it. Someone had attempted to plug the hole with soil after lighting the grass inside ablaze. Paradoxically, the arsonist’s lack of knowledge was likely what prevented the flames from incinerating me, as the instant I shoved the plug out of the way the flames in the den roared, licking at my skin. Still, force magic was enough to help me shove my way out before the burns became serious, and soon enough I was gulping down fresh air again as I patted out embers on my clothing.

I didn’t get much of a chance to enjoy the morning sunrise or the feeling of a normal blood-oxygen level, because what felt like just one or two breaths later arrows started to hit the ground around me. The combination of a headache, my second night of disrupted sleep, and sheer annoyance at my attackers having found me again whirled together into a rage that threw me to my feet, sword in hand. Four humans, three with bows and one with a sword, stood just thirty meters away across the small clearing where the den was located.

Thirty meters wasn’t very far compared to the speed of force-magic-enhanced running, so the archers each only managed to get one more shot off before I was upon the group. All three arrows were on-target, but I managed to dodge two, with the third impacting my left shoulder. The archer who landed a hit was the first to die, trying and failing to block a vertical chop with his bow, and having his skull split in half for his trouble. The human with the sword tried to slash me in the back as I killed his comrade, succeeding in cracking my ribs but not breaking the fabric of my gambeson. He died next, losing everything above his sternum and splattering the remaining combatants with hot blood.

The remaining two archers tried to run, unsuccessfully. I threw my sword at the first, taking him through the center of his back, then threw the other human’s sword at the second, getting him a bit lower near the top of his hips. The one who was struck with my sword had his heart destroyed and bled out in seconds, but the unlucky fourth human with his comrade’s sword through his gut was merely stunned. The sword had missed his spine, but apparently the pain was too much for him regardless, and he couldn’t do much more than groan and crawl on the ground as I retrieved my weapon and walked over to where he fell.

“How do I get into Towrkah?” I demanded, covered in blood with my sword pointed at him. “What password do you use? Where is your entry and exit point?” The archer grabbed my weapon and tried to shock me, but since I knew he was probably a Rehvite I had already insulated my hand. “Don’t make me ask you again,” I threatened.

“Death is a momentary inconvenience, and pain exists only in the mind,” the archer winced. “You have nothing to threaten me with.”

“Yes, but what about all the things that can happen before death?” I asked, pulling the arrow out of my shoulder. “Think carefully before you answer.”

“As I said, you cannot threaten me,” the archer cackled. “Know this, jhaoyeyl. The strength of Rehv, and the strength of his followers, far exceeds whatever your shahpeymoyt god could hope to muster. You have already lost, the outcomes of these battles cannot change that.”

“I don’t see any gods here,” I replied. “Just a man who gets to choose how quickly and easily he’s killed.”

“Indeed,” the archer winced, and he pulled out a knife from his waist. “A broken thing like you would know nothing of gods.” Before I could stop him, he superheated the knife and then shoved it through his left eye. I should have expected that, I sighed as his corpse slumped to the ground, Well, maybe next time. I need to find the road to get my bearings, then figure out what happened to Vaozey.

If I didn’t know better I’d say they were using a satellite, I thought as I trudged along the road. It turned out I was only about four kilometers from it when I found the animal den, and I recognized my surroundings enough to know I was a thirty-minute walk from where the campsite was. They couldn’t have had night vision unless… No, there’s no way they could implant reflective layers into their retinas, I thought, That would require more extensive surgery than healing magic allows, and it would probably result in the same swelling and pain as the facial implants I made. A satellite with recordings of the area would explain it better, but that’s just not possible.

When I reached the campsite again, I saw that the tree that had been covered in ants was still home to a great many of them, though they were not as densely packed now that it was daytime. Unlike before, they didn’t pause and look at me, instead going about their business as they normally would. They looked to be pruning the tree somehow, cutting off excess growths and sticks while leaving the larger branches and leaves on the outside alone. Maybe it was just the light magic that caught their attention? I supposed, I probably got spooked over nothing, they seem benign, I’d bet the biting is just reflexive.

My missing gear was gone, as expected, so I decided to just follow Vaozey’s tracks and figure out where she had gone. Thankfully, she wasn’t nearly as good at being stealthy in the woods as I was, so following her path was trivial.

After only about an hour, I realized I was practically starving and just hadn’t noticed because of how frantic my morning was. Since whatever had happened with Vaozey was probably over, there was no need to rush, so I picked up a few rocks and began looking into the trees. Two shots later I had a squirrel in hand, and I also remembered I was still covered in dried blood and ash. The idea of a mace is growing on me, I sighed as I skinned the animal, I wonder if it would be worth switching at this point.

Using magic to cook food wasn’t something I had practiced, but I always kept the possibility in the back of my mind. Since I couldn’t risk a fire, my current situation was the perfect excuse to try it. Levitating the butchered squirrel above my left hand and forearm, I carefully extended an even volume of heat over it, then began raising the temperature until I could hear sizzling. The amount of power it used was too high to be acceptable for common use, but after only five minutes I had a nutritious, if not delicious, meal to chew on.

As I ate, I pulled off the bandolier I had taken from the one tracker Rehvite and examined the vials again, then removed my boosters and examined them as well. Definitely rotten now, I thought with a grimace as I saw the clotted and brown blood I had been carrying. The vial with Vaozey’s cores was also rotting, but its seal kept the solid magic fuel intact, so the contents could be used if I could create a larger vacuum. The other two, however, were likely unusable. The possibility of bacteria that consumed magic fuel being part of the rot, like they were in the corpse rat nest, was too high.

After dumping the useless boosters and re-stowing the vials, I went back to the tracker’s chemicals. They appeared to be the same, but I noticed that the corks were labeled with the same Rehvite script used in their documents: Three had one character, and three had another. I found the vial I had examined during the night and uncorked it again, holding my breath to avoid the smell. It’s like some kind of sulphur compound and an ester mixed together, I thought, It’s certainly vile smelling, but what could it be for? They never used it against me.

Movement on the ground drew my eyes, and I looked down just in time to see a swarm of ants crawling towards me from all directions. They smell it, I realized, corking the vial shut quickly. Still, the ants didn’t disperse immediately, and I was forced to incinerate scores of them with magic as they tried to crawl up to my feet. After half a minute things died down, but a few lines of insects remained, snaking along the ground beneath my feet as they followed some unknowable purpose. So it’s an insect attractant for the biting ants, I thought, looking at the vial, If I opened this and threw it at someone, they’d be swarmed in seconds out here. That means logically, this should be…

I pulled the other type of vial out and opened it. Despite the liquid inside having the same color, it smelled very different, like a cross between vinegar and blood. I didn’t even have to bring the vial close to the ground to see its effects, as the lines of ants broke up almost immediately and fled, rushing off into the forest. A smile crept onto my lips, and I corked the repellent vial. Very interesting, I thought, these could be useful.