The basin cradled by the mountains was no mere lake — it was a miniature ocean, vast and gleaming under the early light. The sheer volume of water was staggering, contained only by the colossal dam I’d spotted earlier. It was the only barrier keeping the entire valley from flooding large swaths of the forest far below.

  Scattered across this inland sea were more wooden constructions, some little more than clusters of huts on rafts, others resembling floating villages. But none came close to the scale of the titanic structure directly beneath us. Even from this altitude, it dwarfed the others in both complexity and sheer ambition — though judging distance from this height was difficult, if not impossible.

  “Hey, can you set me down there?” I asked, pointing toward a floating town made entirely of wood. It bobbed gently on the water’s surface, tethered in place like a leaf anchored by invisible threads.

  “Kay,” the harpy replied with alarming nonchalance.

  Before I could so much as brace myself, she tucked her wings and dove. Wind screamed past my ears. The world blurred into streaks of color. I might’ve let out a very undignified yelp, but given the howling air, I convinced myself it went unheard.

  In a heartbeat, she leveled out and dropped me as close to the ground as possible — a clean, practiced motion. I hit the platform with a thud and staggered to my feet, expecting her to land beside me.

  But she didn’t.

  Instead, she climbed again, circling high overhead. I didn’t have to wonder why for long.

  A bell clanged from a nearby watchtower — a harsh, metallic sound that echoed across the water. Within moments, the entire town burst into motion. Doors slammed open. Wooden shutters clattered. Dozens of beavers poured out of their houses, sprinting toward me on all fours.

  They moved with unnerving speed and coordination, their feet thudding against the damp wood of the floating plaza. Within seconds, I was surrounded.

  I blinked, trying to take in the sight.

  They were beavers, yes — flat tails, thick fur, strong limbs. But they were nothing like the woodland critters of old fables. For one, they were massive — easily as tall as I was when they stood upright. Their hands gripped sleek, polished bows, each notched with an arrow. Their eyes gleamed with something sharp. Intelligent. Suspicious.

  And they wore clothing. Actual clothing — tunics, belts, shoulder wraps — all made from fish skin, scaled and patterned in various shades of silver and grey. Every book I’d ever read described beavers as industrious, maybe even clever... but this? This was civilization. Culture. Military discipline.

  Tom had warned me they were isolationists. That was it. Nothing about this.

  I was still processing when one of them stepped forward, clearly a leader — not because of his stature, but because he wore a hat. A ridiculous, fish-scale hat with a feather in it, tilted at a rakish angle like some riverboat captain.

  He glared at me with narrowed eyes.

  “What’s a white bitch doing here?” he barked in Elvish.

  My mouth opened, then closed. What?

  A beaver behind him snorted. “Look at this moron. Can’t even comprehend speech.”

  I stood there, stunned. Just seconds ago, I hadn’t even been sure they could talk — let alone talk like that. Racist, sarcastic beavers? That wasn’t in the handbook.

  “Uhm... I… you can speak?” I asked, switching to Elvish out of sheer instinct. “It merely surprised me you could do so as well.”

  The hat-wearing one rolled his eyes. “Every beaver can speak to you, stupid idiot,” he said with the heavy exasperation of someone explaining fire to a caveman.

  I scratched the back of my head, struggling to keep my temper in check. Okay. They spoke. Problem solved. But how they spoke… that was becoming its own problem.

  “Alright,” I said, forcing a breath through my nose. “I came here with a request.”

  I was trying hard — really hard — not to let my irritation get the better of me. But if this kept up, I was going to forget diplomacy entirely and make history by starting a war against sentient aquatic rodents.

  “It’s always the pale ones,” the beaver snarled. “You show up uninvited, act like you own the place, then expect us to bend a knee because you talk pretty.”

  Negotiations weren’t exactly off to a great start. But I had to try, even if every second I stood on this damp wood felt like standing on a pressure trigger.

  “Just because I’m not brown—okay, never mind.” I took a steadying breath and pushed formality back into my voice. “I’m sorry for the intrusion. Truly. But this matter can’t wait. I’ve come to—”

  “Spare us.” The beaver chief, still wearing his ridiculous hat like it gave him moral superiority, raised a paw. “The last elf who came here with a ‘matter of grave importance’ didn’t hold up his end of the deal. Why should we listen to you?”

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  “I’m not an elf,” I said quickly, stepping forward and tucking my hair behind one ear to reveal the very human curve beneath it.

  “We noticed, you dumb mutt,” the chief spat. “Doesn’t mean we care.”

  There it was again — the casual disdain. It didn’t matter who or what I was to them. Human, elf, monster — all just “lesser” in their eyes. I briefly wondered if diplomacy was worth the air it cost me.

  But I pushed on.

  “Whether you trust me or not, you’ll want to listen. Your species — this world — is in danger. Real danger. And whether you like it or not, you’re among the few capable of stopping what’s coming.”

  The beaver narrowed his eyes. “That’s what every lesser race says.”

  My patience was thinning like ice beneath a flame. And all the water surrounding me? It didn’t exactly help. It never did. If this was going to fall apart, it would do so spectacularly — and I was more than capable of delivering on that threat.

  So I stopped trying to reason.

  With a slow breath, I reached up and removed the contact lens from my right eye — that faint shimmer of humanity vanishing as easily as peeling off a mask. The expression on my face shifted, drained of kindness, like I was stepping out of a costume and into something far older, colder, and far more dangerous.

  “Alright, you racist little shit,” I said, my voice calm but stripped of restraint, “do you really believe you stand a chance with just twenty-four villagers and some fish-scale armor against me?”

  Their bows twitched.

  “I’m not here as an envoy. I’m here as an executioner.” I continued, eyes glowing faintly now, the remnants of my disguise all but gone. “And you? You’re just slightly better-dressed cattle. So if you want to test your luck—go ahead. Let’s see how many arrows you can loose before I drink the blood of your children and turn this floating plank you call a village into driftwood.”

  Silence.

  Heavy, terrified silence.

  Even the air seemed to stop moving. The only sound was the faint slosh of water and the quiet rustle of bowstrings being gripped more tightly.

  They’d underestimated me. They weren’t the first. But now they saw what I was. And, more importantly, what I could do.

  No elven army would ever bother coming out this far. No human nation would commit the logistics. Their isolation had protected them for generations.

  But I wasn’t an army.

  I was the thing you hoped never showed up at your doorstep.

  And I had.

  The village chief closed his eyes, breathing deeply — the weight of the moment settling across his furry shoulders like a stormcloud.

  “What... do you desire?” he asked at last, his voice stripped of mockery, all earlier arrogance vanished like mist before the sun.

  Finally. Respect — or at least fear. Close enough.

  “I want half the water you’ve stored,” I said, turning and pointing toward the towering dam that loomed in the distance, the one that held back an inland ocean.

  “That’s impossible!” the village chief barked, the pitch of his voice rising. “That water is our livelihood—we drink it, we fish in it, we—”

  A delighted laugh echoed from above. The harpy, still circling overhead with rhythmic wingbeats, cackled at his outrage. She clearly didn’t care what the water meant to them; in fact, she seemed positively thrilled that the beavers might suffer.

  “And if you snort powdered roots fermented in it, I still couldn’t care less,” I cut in, voice like ice. “Open the dam—or live with the consequences.”

  The chief opened his mouth again, searching for words, but I gave him no time to find them. With one smooth motion, I grabbed the collar of his fish-skin tunic and hoisted him into the air.

  The crowd gasped. Good. Let them see.

  “You have until dawn,” I said calmly, my voice carrying across the wooden plaza. “Drain half of the water from your precious basin—or I’ll burn it down myself. And when the flames reach your little homes, your memories, your fish tanks, you’ll have no one to blame but your dithering ‘chief.’”

  His feet kicked helplessly above the wooden planks. “It took generations to build this dam!” he rasped. “Decades of work—of survival!”

  “And you’ll be the one remembered for destroying all of it,” I growled, locking eyes with him. “Don’t think for a second I won’t go through with it. This conversation is the only mercy you’re getting.”

  He gulped. “To drain that much… We’d have to dismantle part of the dam. The impact would be catastrophic. The entire valley will flood. Hundreds—thousands of elves downstream will drown. And afterwards? They will come for us!”

  I froze for a moment.

  Then I smiled. Slowly. Cruelly.

  So they did understand the stakes. And more importantly—they’d confirmed what I had only guessed.

  “It’s either them,” I said, tapping the flat of my sword against his stomach, “or you.”

  His eyes widened, voice shaking. “You’re insane … Lower. Your. Weapons,” he finally ordered the others, without tearing his eyes away from me.

  Around us, a few bowstrings eased, reluctantly. The villagers didn’t relax, but the tension shifted from aggressive readiness to anxious submission.

  Sometimes it paid to be feared. To be seen as a walking extinction event. It was the only thing that had gotten through to them.

  Being one of the last of my kind—hated, reviled, spoken of only in whispers and legends—it had its uses.

  Satisfied, I turned my head skyward. The harpy was still circling lazily above us, a wide grin stretching across her sharp face.

  I gave her a small nod.

  She’d helped me push these smug little racists to the edge. And now? Now they had no choice but to jump at my command—or be dismembered.