Chapter 15

  Is it just me, or are there a lot of bandits on this road?

  When I woke up—or at least thought I did—it was still pitch dark outside. I could hear the others moving around the camp, their quiet voices and the occasional shuffle of boots, but it felt way too early for this much activity. Either it was barely dawn, or the sun just hadn’t shown up yet.

  I hesitated, trying to figure out how to ask the obvious without sounding clueless. After a moment, I slipped out of the tent, stretching and shaking off sleep like nothing was unusual. Act casual, I told myself, even though it felt strange to be up when it looked like midnight.

  As I made my way toward the cooking area at the fifth wagon, I slowed, giving the appearance of casually checking whether breakfast was even a thing at this hour.

  “Do y’all usually have breakfast on the dark day?” I asked, trying to keep it light. “Where I’m from, we just called it ‘dark day.’ What do you all call it?”

  Rebecca glanced up from where she was sorting supplies. “Dark day?” she repeated, amused. “We just call it the monthly eclipse. You must come from an unusual village. And yeah, we like breakfast on the last day of the month same as anybody else.” She shot me a curious look. “You headed for the cooking station? Got something in mind?”

  I rubbed the back of my neck, smiling. “Nothing fancy. Some eggs, bacon, maybe home fries. I’ve got a sweet tooth in the mornings, usually go for juice, but I’m out. I could make pancakes, but it’s not quite the same without maple syrup.”

  Rebecca raised a brow, intrigued. “Maple syrup and pancakes? I can’t say I’ve had much maple syrup. And pancakes… well, I like cake, but that doesn’t exactly sound like breakfast food—though I wish it did.”

  “I’ve got an idea to substitute for maple syrup that y’all might like—if you’re feeling adventurous this morning. Bacon, eggs, home fries… you got butter?”

  Olivia appeared around the wagon just then, jumping into the conversation with a spark of interest.

  “We’ve got some butter,” she said, her ears twitching slightly. “And we can probably replace it when we get to the next city. If you can promise these pancakes are worth the butter.”

  The way she said it made me grin. She definitely had a sweet tooth that rivaled mine.

  “I’ll cook the rest first and finish with the pancakes. I’ll make a butter glaze for them—it’s not quite maple syrup, but it’ll do the trick.”

  “Go right ahead,” Rebecca said, gesturing with a thumb toward the cooking area.

  Rubbing my hands together, I headed toward the fifth wagon, already thinking over what I’d picked up from the conversation.

  So, last day of the month and a monthly eclipse. I hadn’t noticed anything in the woods, but that explained the darkness. Still, the regularity of it was surprising. Then again, I was on a different planet—what did I know?

  I asked around if they wanted their eggs regular or scrambled. To my surprise, everyone leaned toward regular, and they even knew what I meant when I asked if they wanted them over-medium or otherwise. Nice.

  I sliced up the potatoes fairly thin and got them sizzling in a pan with oil, salt, and pepper. While those cooked, I mixed up a pancake batter from scratch—a rough recipe I remembered that was a bit different from the YouTube hacks I’d seen back home.

  The bacon wasn’t cured the way I was used to, but it was well prepared and stored in a cooled box with the other cuts of meat. Slicing enough bacon only took a moment, and once the potatoes were done, I threw the bacon in the pan.

  With the main dishes nearly ready, I poured the pancake batter into a cast-iron pan with a little extra butter for that golden, crispy edge. I let it come up slowly over the heat, watching it bubble as the smell filled the air.

  I dropped a chunk of butter into a bowl, balancing it high above the fire—just close enough to melt but not so close that it smoked. Slowly, I added some powdered sugar, cinnamon, and a couple of my secret ingredients to bring out a little tang, so it wouldn’t just be an overpowering butter-sugar-cinnamon bomb.

  Once everything was ready, the crew lined up at the wagon again for what had basically become a buffet-style drive-by. I served up whatever they asked for. Rebecca went heavy on the bacon, Olivia couldn’t get enough of the home fries (especially after I hit them with a touch of cayenne), Gary wanted multiple eggs, and David—well, David wanted everything and in absurd quantities. I couldn’t blame him. I remembered being his age and feeling like I could eat an entire fridge without slowing down.

  Thomas, though, was the one who made a point of starting with the pancakes. There was a curious glint in his eye, and honestly, he struck me as the kind of guy who thought butter made everything better.

  There wasn’t much talking at first, but I figured that was mostly because everyone was too busy scarfing down their food as fast as humanly possible. I didn’t think I was that great of a cook, but maybe this style of cooking was just a nice change from their usual fare—and okay, maybe I was a little heavy-handed with the spices.

  Either way, I decided I’d leave them some silver for the supplies I’d used, even if we didn’t hammer out a trading deal later.

  Thomas was the one I was waiting on to comment about the pancakes. He’d polished off his food the fastest—even beating David, who was practically inhaling his meal between excitedly pitching some half-formed idea from a dream to Gary.

  Thomas said, “This is the fluffiest cake I’ve ever had—and I’ve had a lot of cakes. That sweet butter glaze is wonderful, and I can easily imagine maple syrup taking it to the next level. If you set up a stand in the city selling just this, you’d sell out every morning. You’d also have a lot of competition before the week was over.”

  I gave a small shrug and replied, “It’s not my plan to open a business in the city, but I do want to help someone else start one. Maybe offer the idea and take a percentage of the profits. But restaurants—and food stands—are notoriously difficult. One week the demand is crazy, the next, no one shows up. You have to have a very specific angle: something like the expectation that you’ll sell out fast to create urgency, or a rotating menu that keeps things fresh.”

  David’s eyes lit up at that. Even though I was only half-sure about the information myself, it clearly sparked a fuse. He turned right back to Gary, already off to the races with his next “brilliant idea.”

  It didn’t take me long to pack up the tent after a bit of personal grooming. I made sure to help clean the dishes too—I wasn’t about to be the guy who just stood around while everyone else worked.

  Once everyone was packed and ready, we started back on the road. Nobody really asked, but it seemed like everyone just assumed I’d be traveling with them until we reached the city.

  As we walked, I chatted with Olivia about her trade. She didn’t sell clothes, but she was all about fabrics and specialty materials. She wasn’t a crafter or seamstress herself, but she knew where to get the good stuff—and how to sell it where it was hard to find. She made a tidy profit by being the link between supply and demand.

  She was also the one giving David most of his training. He wanted to learn everything—every trade, every angle, every little nuance of product value. He was determined to become the kind of merchant who could talk business in any room.

  Instead of trying to buy clothes directly from Olivia, I asked if she could recommend one or two businesses that carried extremely high-quality clothing without being too flashy. She eagerly launched into a detailed rundown, chatting about several shops—one with excellent fabrics but a tendency toward flamboyant designs, another with durable materials but poor tailoring, and so on. In the end, she gave me two solid recommendations: one shop for loose, comfortable clothing and maybe a formal outfit, and another that specialized in durable, even enchanted gear for dungeon diving or other adventuring.

  Around what I guessed was close to eleven o’clock, the sun abruptly broke through, and the temperature jumped a good twenty degrees. It was warm, but we were still under the shade of the high forest canopy, where only a jagged stripe of sunlight cut across the road we were traveling.

  After gathering some great ideas from Olivia, I hopped down from her wagon and waited by the fourth wagon, which Rebecca was driving. She slowed just enough for me to climb aboard, and I immediately started peppering her with questions—what she sold, what she was looking to buy for resale, where she saw the biggest opportunity for growth with the kinds of items I had.

  I was only halfway through my first question when a sharp itch crawled up the back of my neck, and my instincts went on high alert. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught movement—something darting through the trees, keeping pace with the wagons.

  Trying not to spook Rebecca, I asked in as casual a tone as I could muster, as if I were merely making conversation about the weather, “Are there a lot of bandits on this road, by chance? It’s my first time heading to Gauntlet.”

  Rebecca’s demeanor shifted instantly. I hadn’t fooled her for a second. Her voice was cool but focused as she asked, “What did you see?”

  “Someone in the woods—about thirty feet in, on our right—keeping pace with the wagon train. Could just be someone curious, but I’ve already been attacked once on the road. Twice, if you count the massive wolves that hunted me until I holed up in a cave. Well… I guess there was that other camp I came across—the one with slavers who got taken out by a different bandit group. So, three times.”

  Rebecca gave me a wide-eyed, startled look, as if the idea of me fighting off a group of bandits was laughable. To be fair, she’d only seen me in my friendly, “I’m the cook around here” persona.

  “I’m going to hop out and trail the guy in the woods,” I said quietly. “Act like nothing’s wrong, but if there’s some kind of signal you can give the rest of the group to be ready—something that won’t tip off any bandits—go ahead and give it.”

  Before she could reply, I slipped out of the wagon, keeping low to avoid catching the scout’s attention. I let myself drift back behind the last wagon and, just before it rolled past, I dropped flat to the ground. Heart pounding, I counted fifteen seconds, then sprang up and sprinted into the woods, arcing wide so I could come around behind the figure shadowing the caravan.

  Moving carefully now, I slipped between trees, tracking the scout’s movements from behind. There was no doubt—he was watching the caravan, gauging its strength and looking for openings.

  I quietly pulled out three runes from my personal space, setting them in my left hand, ready to toss like a frisbee if needed. My right hand gripped my combat knife, fingers tightening on the familiar handle.

  The guy I was tailing had a short sword at his side, a bow in his left hand, and a quiver of arrows strapped to his right hip. I was surprised by how quietly he moved, practically jogging to keep pace with the wagons.

  After a minute of following him, I watched as he passed another man crouched in the brush, pausing just long enough to whisper something before moving on. The second man picked up a bow from the ground, slung a quiver over his shoulder, and began creeping toward the road, keeping pace so he would fall in behind the wagons.

  I decided to interrupt his plan.

  As quickly as I could, I closed the distance, swept his legs out from under him, and landed on top. My knife was at his throat in an instant, my left hand wrapped with a rag to gag him if needed—but mostly to keep him from biting a chunk out of me.

  I leaned in close, voice low and sharp. “Are you after the wagons? Nod or shake your head. You’ve got four seconds to answer, or I cut your throat and go after your friend.”

  The look in my eyes must’ve told him I wasn’t bluffing. He jerked his head in a quick nod.

  “You guys robbing, or just collecting a ‘tax’? Nod for robbing, shake your head for tax.”

  He shook his head firmly.

  “Are there more than five of you?”

  A nod.

  “More than eight?”

  A shake.

  “You have a camp nearby?”

  Another nod.

  “Less than an hour’s walk from here?”

  He nodded again.

  I wasn’t sure how much of this I believed—but he’d already confirmed they were targeting the wagons, and in a world like this, bandits weren’t known for leaving survivors. That was one of the first things Fu drilled into me during training.

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  Two days before leaving, Fu had made a comment that I wholeheartedly agreed with. “In your search for compassion, it’s important to remember that you are responsible for the actions of those you show compassion to—specifically, the actions they take after you’ve let them go under the false promise that they’ll ‘be good.’ If they kill, rob, or injure someone after that, it’s directly because of your inaction.”

  Back on Earth, things would’ve been different. There were police, detectives, and agencies specifically meant to deal with people like this. All I would have to do was call the cops, lose a big chunk of my day, and sit through a round of questions to prove I wasn’t setting some poor guy up.

  But out here, in the wilderness of Sky? No police. No agencies. Just the law of the land. And that law gave everyone the right to defend themselves. Without any guarantee of a change in behavior, letting a bandit walk away was basically shrugging and saying, not my problem—and leaving the next poor soul to get killed or robbed.

  Pulling out another rune, I activated it in my right hand and pressed it to the guy’s forehead. He dropped, unconscious on the spot, and would stay that way until I removed the rune. I could already tell these were going to be popular. The effect only lasted about a day per charge—but a whole day was plenty. I decided to call them my “night-night stones.” Definitely something I’d have to be careful about when it came to selling.

  Moving on to catch up with the first guy I’d seen, I came across another bandit—also with a bow, keeping a steady pace near the fourth wagon. Apparently, these guys had a system, shadowing each wagon or key person before making their move.

  This time, I decided to test a new little toy. Slipping a shuriken from my storage, I aimed and threw it at the guy’s back. He let out a quick yip before dropping, silent and motionless.

  I’d been crossing my fingers on how well this would work. The runes on the shuriken created a paralytic effect as long as it stayed in contact with the target. And, as part of the safety feature, once it was removed from the body, it wouldn’t reactivate—mostly to make sure I didn’t freeze myself in place when pulling it out.

  I went over to the guy I’d just taken down, pressed another night-night stone to his forehead, and moved on to the next one I was sure would be nearby.

  The next guy wasn’t as easy. He’d crossed the road to the opposite side of the wagons, and after a few moments, I slipped into the trees behind him. Apparently, I didn’t do a great job—because when I was about four feet away, he spun around with a vicious grin, thinking he’d caught me by surprise.

  Well… okay, he kind of did. But it didn’t help him.

  The fight was fast and brutal—about five seconds of furious back-and-forth. He managed to slice into my right shoulder, and let me tell you, it stung like something I won’t even mention.

  The moment the blade cut me, instinct kicked in—I activated Clear Mind. I couldn’t afford to get seriously hurt, and this guy had officially earned a spot at the top of my “done with this” list.

  In a snap of clarity, I knew exactly how to dismantle him. Four quick strikes.

  I lined myself up just enough to make him think he had an opening for a clean stab at my midsection. The second I saw his shoulders shift, I pivoted—he missed me by three inches. I clamped onto his knife arm, slammed my foot into his opposite knee, and sent him crumpling to the ground. As he fell, I twisted his arm back, angled the blade, and drove it into his chest as I landed on him.

  When I looked up, another bandit had frozen mid-step, halfway to helping his now-dead companion. He was standing there like a deer in headlights.

  I spoke quietly, keeping my voice low and sharp.

  “Kneel down on the ground and don’t run. Or I’ll kill you.”

  I could see him hesitate, eyes darting, calculating.

  So I added, cool and deadly, “If you run, you won’t make it. And if you alert the others, you’ll just be the first to die. And I’ll make sure it’s the most important thing I do.”

  The look on my face must’ve convinced him—or maybe he just didn’t care enough about his crew.

  Either way, he slowly sank to his knees.

  Good. I needed someone alive to take me to their campsite after this was over.

  Carefully moving closer to the guy, I made a show of acting like I was about to search him—then instead slapped a night-night stone on his forehead and gently laid him down on the ground. I had to assume the first guy I’d questioned had lied to me, and there were probably at least four to six men left.

  Catching up to the wagon train, I walked right up to the next bandit without him even bothering to turn around. Apparently, he was expecting his buddy. He was completely surprised when I slapped a night-night stone on his forehead and eased him to the ground as well.

  About then, my luck ran out.

  I heard someone yell toward the wagons, barking a signal for the rest of his crew to get ready.

  For some reason, I felt like I should have had more time—but the moment I paused to reflect, I realized how naive and silly that thought was.

  What I took to be the lead bandit immediately started shouting.

  “Oi! Whoever’s in charge—get your ass out front right now! I don’t have time to lollygag around!”

  Thomas stood up, climbed down from his wagon, and raised his arms.

  “I’m Thomas. I’m in charge of this caravan. What do you want with us?”

  The bandit sneered.

  “First—you’re gonna haul out all your coin and anything else worth even a second glance. After that, you’re bringin’ out your two young women for inspection. They’ll pay a little skin tax before we let you move on. And if they don’t put on a phenomenal show, we’re keepin’ ’em as long as it takes to convince ’em they love the life of working on their backs! Lastly—is that an herbalist?”

  He waited, eyes sharp, as a few nervous nods went around.

  “Good. You’re makin’ some tinctures for the boys—got some, uh, performance issues. And don’t try anything clever—we’ll be watchin’ real close.”

  By this time, I’d finished prepping the first part of my plan: Distraction/Shock and Awe.

  I’d tossed three explosive runes on the opposite side of the caravan, set to go off in about thirty seconds. As soon as they detonated, I’d start peppering the visible bandits with arrows.

  Then came phase two—letting myself “get caught.” I’d stumble forward, pointing wildly behind me as if some mystery attacker was running away—the supposed archer behind the chaos. The key was selling it: acting like an absolute buffoon and terrified crybaby.

  I really, really hoped my acting skills were up to the task.

  The first part of my plan worked beautifully.

  The three explosive runes went off in rapid succession—boom, boom, boom! I felt a little bad about scaring the horses (and the oxen pulling the wagons). The blasts quite literally scared the crap out of a couple of them, and honestly, it was a miracle they didn’t bolt and tear off down the road.

  The bandits were completely rattled. Judging by their panicked expressions, I doubted any of them had ever heard such a loud, sudden noise in their lives.

  My follow-up went even better. I loosed three arrows instead of the two I’d planned—two bandits went down hard, while the third took a hit and tumbled to the ground, groaning but still kicking.

  Quickly stashing my bow back into storage, I threw on my next mask—the pitiful bystander.

  “Are you crazy?! You’re gonna get us all killed! Get away from me!” I shouted, stumbling forward into the bandits’ line of sight.

  I raised my arms, making myself look as harmless as possible, and dropped to my knees in the dirt, as if begging for mercy.

  “Please, don’t hurt me! I was just hitching a ride—I don’t even know these people! That crazy bastard’s the one who shot at you! I’ve got gold, just—just don’t kill me!” I pleaded, ducking as if I expected a blade or arrow to come flying.

  Truthfully, I wasn’t too worried about arrows—most of their archers were already down. My only real concern was whether one of them had gotten a good look at me when I was firing from the shadows. But I was betting they hadn’t.

  The leader stormed toward me, sword raised, furious.

  “Where’d the man go who shot my men?! Tell me, or I’ll cut you down right here!”

  “He ran into the woods—off to the right!” I babbled, wide-eyed. “He already killed the rest of your guys! He’s insane! He even cut me when I tried to warn you! Look, I don’t want to kill anybody—I just want to go home!”

  The bandit leader turned to the man on his left—the one still clutching his shoulder with an arrow sticking out—and barked, “Rick, go find him. If you can’t track him down in five minutes, get back here—we’ll take it out on the rest of this garbage.”

  His voice carried a thick accent, and while I wasn’t exactly an expert, it reminded me of someone from New Zealand. (Not that I’d met many Kiwis, but hey—some things stick in your head.)

  The leader pivoted to the man on his right.

  “Don, grab this one. Have him empty his pockets on the ground.”

  Then his eyes locked on me.

  “And if there’s not enough gold when you’re done, well… you’ll be done. And one of them,” he jerked his head toward the wagons, “is going to suffer for your stupidity.”

  Oh, this guy had no idea he’d just walked himself right into the worst possible position.

  ‘Don,’ the loyal muscle, stomped over and grabbed me by the scruff of the neck and my arm, hauling me toward the front of the lead wagon where the bandit leader stood, sword in hand and murder practically written across his face.

  As I stumbled along, I palmed one of the smaller electric runes from my storage—my makeshift supercharged taser—and, with a smooth flick of the wrist, slipped it right into Don’s pocket. I’d set the delay to thirty seconds.

  Keeping up my pathetic act, I fumbled into my jacket and pulled out a pouch—heavy with silver—and tossed it onto the ground. The bag hit with a satisfying clink and spilled open, shining in the dirt.

  As expected, the leader’s eyes narrowed.

  “I don’t see any gold in that pouch, boy.”

  Not really having any good tracking skills to speak of, I decided it was time to use one of my new items. I’d never used it before, so I made sure to focus hard on what I wanted as I activated the Pathfinder Ring. I concentrated on the last bandit—the guy who ran off. Rick. Green tunic, darker skin, black beard, carrying an axe.

  After about three seconds, I had another Skyrim-like moment as a faintly glowing purple trail appeared, hovering just above the ground. Muttering under my breath, I said,

  “Okay, you are officially the Dragonborn.”

  I shook my head at the absurdity but followed the trail as quickly—and quietly—as I could. I noticed the path was starting to dim, almost like the ring was running low on juice. Focusing on it, I pushed mana from my own core into the ring, and sure enough, it visibly brightened, the glowing path steady again—just transparent enough to see without blocking my view of the world.

  I found Rick just as he was walking up to the last guy I’d taken down. He spun around as soon as he saw me.

  “You little git!” he stage-whispered, like we were in some badly written tavern brawl.

  I don’t know why people—including myself—do that during intense situations. It’s the strangest thing, but somehow, it always feels right in the moment.

  So naturally, I stage-whispered back,

  “Didn’t your mother ever teach you? Crime doesn’t pay. Let’s end this.”

  Rick readied his axe and squared up, looking like he was about to charge me. The confidence on his face was almost comical, especially considering he still had a broken-off arrow sticking out of his shoulder.

  Though, maybe his confidence came from the fact that I stood there—calm, back straight—raising empty hands into an archer’s stance.

  When he was about six feet away, I retrieved my bow and an arrow from storage in one smooth motion, already drawn and ready. I loosed the first shot right into his chest.

  “What—!” was all he got out before I fired again, this time into his abdomen. As he staggered, I calmly nocked a third arrow and sent it into his chest, close to where I figured his heart would be. He was still trying to process it when he hit the ground.

  Not sure if there were bounties or anything—and regretting I hadn’t thought about it back at the last encampment or when I’d met those two girls—I waited for the guy to be absolutely dead before putting his body into my storage. Then I made my way to each of the other bandits, quickly ending their lives, and stored their bodies as well—except for the last living one.

  I removed the night-night stone from his forehead, and a few moments later, he woke up with a start. I grabbed his attention by pointing my sword at him.

  “You’re going to lead me back to your camp and tell me everything you know about what you all have been doing the last few weeks.”

  The guy swallowed hard and muttered, “I can’t. They’ll kill me as soon as I show up. And if they don’t, the others robbing the wagons will when they come back.”

  I gave him a steady look. “The others robbing the wagons are all dead. It’s just you and me.”

  A strange mix of relief and resignation crossed his face.

  “Good. I hated all those bastards. I never wanted to be a brigand. They caught me a few months ago, forced me into camp as their cleanup boy—made me deal with their messes, chained me up at night. I would’ve run, but the last guy who tried… well, they came back with his body, beaten to death.”

  I nodded slightly. “I’m glad you’re getting some catharsis out of this, but I still need you to take me to their camp. You won’t have to go in with me—just show me where it is, and you can wait for me.”

  He hesitated for a moment, then gave a small nod. “It’s east of here. I don’t know the way perfectly—I wasn’t really one of them—but I remember the direction we came from. About a twenty-minute walk.”

  Gesturing eastward with my hand, I said simply, “Lead the way.”

  Turns out, it was more like twenty-five minutes—and southeast, if I was being particular.

  It was a log cabin surrounded by several tents. As soon as we got just barely within view, I had him stop and asked, “How many men are left in the camp?”

  “There’s four of them,” he said. “George has a broken arm, and Tommy’s down with a fever. The other two, Kane and Dale, are supposed to be on watch, but they’re probably just playin’ cards or passed out from drinkin’.”

  “Anyone else in the camp?”

  “Yeah… there’s a girl, maybe fourteen years old. She’s in the cabin. They weren’t gentle with her. Don’t know her name—I only saw her for a moment that one time—but she was pretty banged up.”

  I nodded slowly. “Okay, I’m going to use her situation to vet you a bit. So be ready.”

  He gave a resigned shrug. “I got nothin’ to hide. Ain’t never killed nobody.”

  With a deceptive motion, I suddenly jerked my head to the right, making him instinctively look the same way. That was all the distraction I needed—I slapped a night-night stone onto his forehead and carefully laid him down on the ground.

  Thinking it through, I decided to hold off on attempting to rescue the girl. I’d seen too many movies, TV shows, and read enough books where the protagonist immediately rushes in to save the girl—only to get captured, slowed down, or accidentally given away by her when he could’ve taken the time to gradually acclimate her to the idea that she was actually free.

  Taking an already stressed person into an even more stressed environment and then trying to escape with them… yeah, I wasn’t a SEAL team, and I was fresh out of duct tape to keep the girl quiet—not that it would’ve been a good idea even if I had it.

  Keeping a good distance from the camp, I began to circle it until I reached an area without many trees.

  Just like the captive had told me, there were only two guys in sight—and they were, indeed, half-drunk, playing cards at a table. They sat on the porch of the cabin, which was much smaller than I expected: only about 30 feet long, single-story, and maybe 20 feet wide if I was being generous. Circling around, I checked for a back entrance, but no luck. The windows near the bedroom were boarded up, nailed shut. That was a clear confirmation someone was being kept inside—or at least, that’s what it seemed to me.

  Now, I could take out the two guys at the table, but my options for doing so were either loud or risked burning the cabin down if I wasn’t careful. I wasn’t too worried about fighting them both at once, but I wanted to pull them away from the cabin first—and ideally, not have them on high alert while doing so.

  Seeing how much they were drinking, I decided to wait five minutes. If one of them didn’t get up to answer the call of nature by then, I’d risk making a strange sound nearby to draw their attention.

  My planning worked out just right. No more than three minutes after I decided to wait, the biggest of the two stood up, walked down the steps of the cabin, and headed off into the woods—toward what I was assuming was their latrine.

  Carefully and slowly, I followed him, waiting until he was focused on his task. I was praying fervently that it was only number one. Then, I pulled out my recharged shuriken and flung it at his lower back. (Yes, I was still a terrible throw.) Luckily, it struck home—he immediately seized up and dropped backward to the ground. He wasn’t exactly stiff as a board, but aside from gravity pressing him down, he had no control of his limbs thanks to the paralysis effect.

  I made my way over slowly, ended it quickly, retrieved my shuriken, and wiped my blade clean on his shirt.

  As I thought hard, I realized I couldn’t remember if this was Kane or Dale—I didn’t want to call out the wrong name and wreck my plan. I was still puzzling over it when Dale’s voice rang out, conveniently solving the problem.

  “Kane, you wanna build up the fire while you’re over there? Just grab one of the logs the camp boy left by the tree. I don’t wanna get cussed out again by Charles. He’ll lower our share if he’s gotta start the fire himself, the lazy ass.”

  Dale was slurring in a drowsy, drunken stupor, and it convinced me that I probably didn’t even need a plan for him. He’d likely be asleep before I even reached him.

  And sure enough, I just walked right up. Dale was still sipping from a clay bottle, facing away from the cabin steps and staring into the woods, shuffling his cards absently.

  I stepped up behind him and calmly asked, “You’re Dale, right?”