Becoming Her Knight

Chapter Fifteen

The next evening, Finn set out to scout the forest to the north. She felt a bit like she had a rock in her stomach from all the turkey she had eaten the night before, but otherwise she felt excellent. She expected she would be able to range pretty far before she would have to turn back.

Finn tried to keep an eye out for animals along the way, but was also conscious that whatever she shot she would have to carry around with her the rest of the night. That wasn't something that she was looking forward to, so she intended to keep her bow stashed unless she saw something really amazing.

She needn't have bothered, as it took Finn barely two hours of careful stalking before she came to the edge of a tilled field. Itchy vines boasting vibrant yellow flowers crawled all over the carefully plotted out field. They were pumpkin plants, if Finn had to guess. Finn didn't know much about plants, but the grannies who helped with the barracks often grew pumpkins behind the baths, and she was pretty sure they looked like that.

Beyond the field was a small grouping of buildings. From what she could see, they were what looked like a nearly falling down barn, a field stone building that likely housed a family of humans and a few sheds that looked like they weren't in much better condition than the barn. Beyond that, Finn could see rolling hills, all of them tilled and still sprouting neat rows of plants, with just a few trees here and there. Finn assumed the trees were used to mark off where one farm ended and another began.

Beyond the rolling hills of farm land, sticking up like a little spiky beetle on the edge of the night, was a large fort. It was a bit difficult for Finn to see from such a far distance, even with her excellent eyesight. Finn could just make out stone walls fortified with sharpened logs aimed out at the surrounding countryside. From beyond the walls, Finn could just make out little dark blobs disgorging smoke into the sky that must have been houses.

"Well. That was easy," Finn muttered to herself. She stuck her head out from the edge of the trees to get a better look at the surrounding countryside. As she suspected, she could see the shining strip of the river to her left, glinting silver in the moonlight. To the northwest, Finn could make out more settlements from the columns of smoke marching out from more squat blobs dotted along the gently rolling hills. Beyond that, there was a pointier blob that sort of looked like a castle.

Finn squinted at it, trying to get her eyes to focus. But, it was too far away and the smoke screen provided by other settlements made it too difficult to make out.

Finn had never been far enough into human territory to see a castle, but she had heard about the tall fortified palaces in which kings and queens of the human kingdoms lived. A shiver of fear wormed its way down Finn's back. It occurred to Finn that she and Adi might have struck quite deep into human territory, if they were within sight of the capital of whatever kingdom they had ended up in.

That was going to complicate things a bit, to be sure.

Finn ducked back behind the treeline and turned things over in her mind for a moment. She had found the town. It was nearby enough that they didn't have to move their impromptu camp, she didn't think. She still had most of the night to hunt for their dinner, and the nearby fields were sure to draw in some animals. Finn would need to report to Adi about how far into the human lands they might be, but she doubted it would deter her from pursuing the caravan. Adi was fiercely determined to rescue her father and people. Finn worried that the caravan was likely far from them by then, but she wasn't looking forward to telling Adi that. For the time being, she would avoid that difficult conversation and continue to work toward their self-imposed mission.

Finn ducked back into the woods, walking slower now that she was heading back and taking a more winding path. While she did so, she tried to keep an eye out for signs of recent animal tracks. Failing that, she thought she could find another nice tree and try connecting to the natural magic in the forest again to find something to bring back to camp.