WREN Book Three Prince of Dragons

Bandits in the wood

The sun had barely risen, before I was up cooking for the others. I made a small campfire to heat coffee. The old man must have seen it. He came out to check on us. He glanced at the fire, the coffee, the cooking food I was using to bring my companions awake.

"Spent some time in the hills, have ya?" the old man asked.

"Pretty much grew up outside." I commented.

There was something ... odd about him. I hadn't picked up on it last night. He didn't move nor speak like a typical human. I watched as he scratched at his shoulder. Not saying anything, I offered him some food. He blinked.

"Shouldn't I be the one hosting?" he asked. He scratched at his ear. I smirked.

Growing up with Shea as my parent, I noted the differences between a human and a wolf, pretty easily. I said nothing about the odd way he was behaving. To me it was normal. It felt as if I was back at the school with Shea sitting at our campfire. I handed him a cup of coffee.

"That isn't the way I was raised. If we had food to share, and someone was there to eat it, we shared." I smiled at him.

He laughed about that. He told me to call him Bob, I introduced myself. Sleepily the others began to wake. They took their coffee first, before I had all the food ready, for them. Once everyone was more awake, fed and had their stuff packed we set out to pay for our nights stay.

Bob only asked us to help with his well. It had run dry a few days prior. I sent Neffy and Cordgi to fix that. Ash took Snow out to the fields to plow up better dirt for the garden that didn't look to lively. Ammedidon, Valkyrie, Attroxia and Bran fed the animals under Bob's watchful haze. I heard him laughing from time to time. The rest of us set to fix up the holes in the roof, steps and porch around his house.

My mid morning we were done. Our packs were back on us as we bid farewell to Bob. He couldn't thank us more for the help we gave him. He even offered us a place to stay on our way back. We thanked him.

"Like we will be walking back." Baram pointed out.

Phoebe shouldered her pack. "If we make it back." She muttered.

That was the silent truth we all walked with. For some of us, this may just be our finally adventure. I tightened my hold on the straps over my shoulders.

"Look, I will do everything I can to ensure..." I was silenced. Three bands covered my mouth, the twins along with Cordgi.

"We aren't here to watch you fight for us." Baram snarled in my face.

"We all have our reasons for going back there." Cordgi bowed his head, his eyes looked haunted.

"You never were the reason we teamed up with you. You were just the guy with the biggest fight to be had." Bran laughed at me.

"We all know the risks. Even Kara did." Phoebe muttered.

"We're here to change the life we led for those still fighting that hell." Dyami insisted.

"Then, let's kick ass together!" I snickered holding out a closed fist, palm down.

They all piled their hands on top of mine. Some laughing, some joking, all in a better mood as we separated. Cordgi found my hand. We walked through the cool forest.

"You look happy here." He noted.

"There was never a day I didn't walk in the woods, back home." I said.

"Hey, what's that?" Bran pointed to a large something on the side of a tree.

Ash, Wics and Attroxia moved closer for a better look. I saw something I couldn't comprehend at first. The thing was wiggling, moving... it clicked then.