Gristle’s gait was steady. Unforced. He didn't squeeze. Didn't pull. Just sat and let her follow the column on her own terms. She seemed content with the arrangement. The warmth radiating from his torso bled through the saddle, through the blanket beneath him, into Gristle's back. He could feel it in the way her muscles relaxed slightly, no longer tensed against the cold. She was benefiting from him. He almost grinned at the absurdity of it.

  'I'm a living campfire,' he thought.

  Around him, the rest of the column suffered. Men on foot stamped their boots, breath clouding thick in the pre-dawn dark. Riders hunched low over their horses' necks, trying to shield themselves from the wind. The horses' hooves crunched through the snow, each step sinking into the powder before pulling free with effort. Gristle's hooves were no exception, the warmth radiating from her back did nothing for the cold biting at her legs.

  The captain raised a gloved hand, slowing the column. His horse shifted nervously, ears swiveling. Gristle bumped into the horse ahead of her, jostling Christofer in the saddle. Pain lanced up his ribs. The green glow under his bandages flared involuntarily, bright enough to cast faint shadows across Gristle's mane and reflect off the snow around them.

  Gristle froze mid-step. Her ears pinned back, not flat with aggression, but sharp with attention. The glow dimmed as Christofer forced himself to breathe through the sting. She didn't bolt. Didn't toss her head. Just stood there, waiting for the signal to pass. When the glow faded, Christofer cautiously patted her neck. She started moving again without prompting, keeping more distance from the horse ahead this time.

  'She's learning,' he thought. 'Or I'm training her by accident.'

  The gecko's voice rippled faintly. "Both, technically."

  The fortress disappeared behind them, swallowed by snow and distance. The torches on the walls faded to faint orange smudges, then vanished entirely. Ahead, the forest closed in, dark trunks rising like bars on either side of the narrow road. The trees swallowed what little light remained from the pre-dawn sky. The captain didn't look back. Just kept moving, one hand resting on his sword.

  The path cut into a grove that shielded them from the wind. Wooden idols lined the path. Crude figures carved from timber, weathered gray, moss creeping over split wood. Snow had buried some to their shoulders. Others stood clearer, only dusted white. Runic marks scored into their bases where the snow hadn't covered them. One tree stood taller than the rest. Its trunk had grown around a stone carving, bark folding over the edges like a mouth slowly closing. A bearded figure, grinning, one hand gripping a staff. Half-swallowed, still visible through the wood. The tree looked ancient, its roots threading through cracks in the stone.

  More wooden idols circled it, hammered into the snow-covered ground. Some clear, some half-buried. Newer offerings surrounding the old. The column slowed as the path narrowed. Christofer sensed something he couldn’t put into words. He shifted his weight, trying to ease whatever was bothering him, but the tension didn't leave. Gristle's ears swiveled forward, then back. Her gait stayed steady, but something in her shoulders tensed. Christofer felt it through the saddle.

  “The locals call this the Toll Road," the older guide said, nodding at the idols. "They leave offerings for safe passage from the old ones. We pay by keeping our heads down and our hands off their timber. We cut through here."

  The trees opened ahead into a clearing. Ruins. Stone foundations poked through the snow like broken teeth. Collapsed walls, half-reclaimed by the forest. Timber beams rotted black where they hadn't been swallowed entirely by moss and vine. What might have been a town once. Now just bones.

  "Here it is," the guide signaled, pointing a gloved hand at the broken stones. "The Old Arganth Outpost. The secret path cuts through the center. Saves us two days of climbing the ridge."

  "Usually, there’s squatters here," the younger brother muttered to the Captain. "Smugglers. Hunters. But today... nothing. Not even a cooking fire."

  Christofer's skin prickled. He rubbed his arm through the gambeson, trying to chase the sensation away, but it lingered. A faint pressure at the base of his skull. Nothing sharp. Just there. Gristle snorted. Her breath misted thick in the cold. She didn't slow, still following the column, but her ears stayed pinned back now. Listening.

  The captain raised a hand. The column stopped. Christofer felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise. Slowly. One by one. Like static building before a spark. He turned his head, scanning the treeline. Nothing moved. Just branches. Snow. Shadows. But the feeling didn't stop. His pulse ticked up. Not fast. Just... aware. The heat beneath his bandages pulsed once, faint, responding to the shift in his body. Green light flickered under the cloth for half a breath, then dimmed. Gristle shifted beneath him. Not nervously. Warily. Reacting to Christofer’s slight movements. Her muscles coiled tighter, ready to move if needed.

  The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

  "Brother," the younger guide whispered, pulling his horse up short. "Look at the snow. Unbroken. No deer tracks. No foxes. Nothing has walked here for hours."

  One of the soldiers ahead dismounted, boots crunching into the snow. He approached the nearest ruin. A collapsed doorway, its lintel cracked in two. He crouched, brushing snow aside, revealing more stone. Carved stone. Symbols, worn smooth but still visible.

  "Look at the scratch marks on that beam. Too big for a bear. Looks like recent damage."

  Christofer's breath came shorter. He didn't know why. The pressure at the base of his skull spread. Crawling forward, over his scalp, down his spine. His fingers tightened on the reins without meaning to. Gristle's head jerked slightly at the tension, but she didn't pull away.

  The green glow pulsed again. Stronger this time. He felt it radiate warmth up through his ribs, into his shoulder. Another soldier moved past the column, scanning the ruins with a torch raised. The light caught on something in the trees beyond, a reflection. Brief. Gone.

  Christofer's stomach tightened. Cold sweat formed along his collarbone, soaking into the bandages beneath the gambeson. His breathing stayed controlled, but his body was screaming now. Every instinct he had pulled taut like a bowstring. The gecko stirred on his shoulder. Gristle took a step back without prompting. Then another. Her nostrils flared wide, ears flat against her skull. The glow under Christofer's bandages flared bright. Brighter than before. Bright enough that the soldier nearest him turned, hand moving toward his sword.

  "Norseman—"

  Christofer held up his hand to gesture for him to stop.

  “I’m okay, I just…”

  Christofer's heart slammed against his ribs. The gecko moved. It shot up from his shoulder, across his neck, past his cheek. He felt it. Heat and motion and something else, something deeper as it stopped in front of his right eye. It crawled closer.

  ‘What, where? Hey- What are you doing? Hey!’

  It flicked into greenish-yellow light and plunged under Christofer's eyelid. He felt everything. The gecko half-dissolving, spinning around the ball of his eye, sending tributaries branching along veins he shouldn't be able to feel. Coiling around the optic nerve, a pressure he'd never noticed before, suddenly undeniable. It atomized, and he felt that too, passing through membranes, through cell walls, flowing into his nervous system, his brain, every pathway lighting up at once.

  Information crashed into him. Not just sight. Everything. The cold on his skin mapped in excruciating detail. Gristle's heartbeat through the saddle. The weight of his own breath. The texture of snow in the air. Too much. All of it, all at once.

  "...Shit." Christofer grunted, blinked twice and bent forward, stomach lurching against the flood.

  His brain was being bombarded with stimulation. His head jerked into the direction of the treeline, guided by instinct.

  “I move by your will. Power resides in sacrifice, close your right eye. Depth perception can be momentarily sacrificed to unlock what you are mentally blocking. You may not hold it long, but we don’t need long. Verify the threat.” rippled out from the gecko.

  ‘I just wish every magic experience wasn’t a crash course’ Christofer thought back in reply.

  He saw something. Not from his opened eye, but from his closed one. The dark red behind his eyelid lost its hue and edges, but a new color bled through. A haze of vivid green. The green in his hazy vision clumped together into a mass on the branches above. It was hard to determine what it was, the size of a rabbit, hunched over, with a neck that was slightly elongated forward, and appeared to be made of a black, semi-solid tendril-like substance. It had a ritual bone mask on its face, which shone with a pale orange light through a hole in the middle. He was being watched.

  “Small, Trolls… with masks?” Christofer blurted out loud enough for the men to hear.

  Its gaze followed him like the surveillance cameras overlooking the streets back home. Each of its arms was composed of three intertwined tentacles that occasionally separated; when wrapped around each other, these tentacles' tips seemed to mimic the fingers of a human to grab onto the branch. He realized that it was not one, but around the treetops identical creatures began to take shape and pale orange dots lighting up and focusing on him. He saw them, and in turn, it seemed they saw him. Christofer paused.

  "Masks?" Halvar drew his horse closer, looking grim. "Ritual behavior? Scouts? Trolls are beasts, lad. If they're wearing masks, they aren't just the bottom rung."

  The column rippled with unease. Heads turned. Swords scraped inches from scabbards.

  "Eyes up!" The Captain’s voice cracked like a whip, silencing a mutter from the rear. He didn't look at Christofer; he looked where Christofer was gesturing, swaying his hand in a circle in the general area.

  "I don't care what they're wearing. Distance and direction. Now."

  Christofer ignored trying to judge distance, disoriented by the information and subdued depth perception. He instead relayed the gecko’s information as it started to generate a headache. He felt a hint of a sniffle and a warm trickle over his lip. He wiped it with the back of his hand. He looked down. Dark red smeared against his skin. Blood. His nose was bleeding.

  ‘That’s usually not a good sign.’ he thought.

  He looked back up.

  "Twelve o'clock. High. In the canopy," Christofer said, feeling the Gecko vibrate against his temple. "Lots of them. Just, watching."