Tess was still in bed, but she hadn’t been asleep for some time. She just kept staring out the window, waiting for the sun to rise, which seemed to be taking forever. Finally, she decided it was close enough and rolled onto her side to look at Ayden. She could see his dark shape on the floor. “Ayd?” she whispered.

“Yeah?”

“Are you sleeping?”

“What do you think?”

“Are you gonna sleep anymore?”

He turned over on his bedroll and looked up at her. “No.”

“I can’t sleep.”

“Me neither.”

“You wanna go now?”

“Okay,” he said as he cast his light spell.

Once his bag was repacked, he went to change in the bathroom and when he returned, Tess was ready and waiting on her bed. He sat behind her to brush and braid her hair, while she bounced her foot, unable to hold still in her excitement. He smiled. “You do realize we’ll be traveling most of the time?”

“I know, but we’ll be out there, and if we can’t find anyone who needs help in the city, we’ll just go into the country and hunt some monsters.”

“Yes,” he agreed. That had been their plan for a long time, but he had to remind her, “We’ll still be traveling most the time.”

She turned her head to look at him. “Why aren’t you acting excited?”

He laughed softly. “Trust me, I am. I just know how to sit still.” He gave her hair a light tug. “Now turn around so I can finish.”

“You know,” she mused as she faced forward again, “if we just chopped my hair off it wouldn’t be such a hassle.”

“No. It’s not a hassle,” he insisted, then added dramatically, “and if you cut it I’ll cry.”

“You’re such a girl,” she teased.

He smiled as he finished her braid and tied the end. “One of us has to be.”

“So you grow your hair out and I can cut mine,” she suggested. When she turned around, he raised a brow at her and she laughed at the mental image. “Okay, maybe not.” She messed his short curls and grinned. “Come on, adventure awaits!”

He took the hand she offered and let her pull him off the bed. Grabbing their stuff, they headed downstairs. Tess cringed each time a step creaked, worried about waking anyone up. She was done with goodbyes. She was thrilled to be going, but there was a part of her that was sad to leave her family. I’ll be back soon, she thought, trying to soothe the sudden pang she felt when they reached the front door.

“Meeeeow.”

They whirled about and looked down at a silver and black tabby cat. He was looking up at them with that look of quiet amusement that cats had, especially this one. “Jade!” Tess said in a whispered yell. “You scared the crap out of me!”

He laughed, a kind of wheezy sound, then nudged Tess' leg and meowed again. He was her mother’s familiar—an animal whose soul was linked with their mage so that they were as intelligent as a human. Though he could understand people, he could only communicate telepathically with Julia.

Tess bent to pet him. “Sorry, I guess I didn’t tell you goodbye. Well, bye. Tell Mom not to worry so much, okay? And make sure you annoy Gavin for me.”

Jade nodded and then nudged Ayden’s leg. Ayden smiled fondly at the cat and bent to pet him as Tess stood up again. “Bye, Jade.”

The cat answered by moving his head against Ayden’s hand and purring affectionately.

Tess rolled her eyes. “You know, you’re my mom’s cat. You should like me more than him.”

Ayden chuckled as he stood up. “Yes, but I wasn’t the one who tormented him when we were kids,” he said pointedly.

“What else was I supposed to do with Sera’s dumb doll dresses?”

Ayden shook his head at her. “The fact that he didn’t scratch your face off shows how much he loves you.”

Jade nodded his agreement.

Tess smiled. “Guess so. Bye, Jade,” she said once more and left with Ayden.

Before they left town, they went to the cemetery. Even though Ayden had just been there the night before, he wanted to go again. He picked a single flower from the temple garden on the way—a snowdrop, his mother’s favorite—and set it on her tombstone.

Tess wandered aimlessly, giving Ayden his privacy. She usually didn’t come here with him. She didn’t like cemeteries. They were boring, but mostly they just didn’t make sense to her. The people were dead, they weren’t there anymore... so why did the living come and talk to slabs of marble? She had no idea, but then, she had never lost anyone. She figured she might understand if she had.

A movement deeper in the graveyard caught her attention, and she walked closer until she could see what it was. She had to blink a few times to really believe what she was seeing, not that it should have surprised her—the twins were always up to something unusual.

Danis and Vinius were identical twin brothers who were the same age as she was. They were very pretty for guys, though a bit strange-looking with their long, silky black hair, pale skin, black clothes, black nails, and black eyeliner around their slate blue eyes. The only thing they wore that wasn’t black was their silver meerkat necklaces.

They were sitting on a black blanket that was spread out beneath them with some silver-iced cupcakes and a bottle of Lornwest wine in the center. Tess wondered idly how they could afford the most expensive wine on Kelstone when they had no jobs, or even parents that she knew of.

“What are you doing?” she asked them.

“It’s not what it looks like,” Vinius said.

“It looks like you’re having a picnic,” she told him.

“Oh. It is what it looks like.”

She shook her head. “Why are you having a picnic in the graveyard... at night?”

“When else would we have one? During the day?” Danis asked with a huff like it was a ridiculous question.

“It’s not actually night, though,” Vinius said. “It’s morning.”

“It’s before sunrise,” Danis told his brother. “That means it’s night.”

“It’s morning. I can see light.”

“Then what’s that?” Danis asked, pointing up.

“Stars.”

“And when do stars come out?”

“At night... and in the early morning.”

Danis rolled his eyes at his brother at the same time Tess rolled her eyes at both of them and walked away.

“Should we go? The sun will be up soon,” one of them said behind her.

“It’s okay, we brought the umbrellas,” the second said reassuringly.

“They’re so weird,” she muttered to herself as she continued toward Ayden.

Tess and Ayden left the cemetery, got their horses, then stopped by Kalos’ Tavern at the edge of town and looked back. Brunya City really was a beautiful place. Nestled in hills and forest, it was a picture of safety and warmth, especially at that moment. The early morning light was barely starting to touch some of the cream-colored buildings, giving everything a golden hue. It was the perfect image of home to carry with them.

Ayden looked over and smiled at her as if to say, Are you ready for this? She grinned in response and they turned their horses around and headed east toward the sunrise.

__________

After putting in a full day’s traveling, they made camp that night in the pine forest a mile east of Oraunt. They gathered some wood, and Ayden lit the pile with a fireball spell. They didn’t need it since they were just eating sandwiches for dinner, but it made the experience of their first night camping feel more genuine. The weather was nice, so they decided against using their tent and laid their bedrolls beside the fire.

“Goblins would be a good start,” Tess said, lying on her stomach, propped up on her arms.

Ayden was positioned in the same way, facing her. “We should have camped further away from the city, then.”

Goblins were nasty, strong creatures who liked to cook and eat people and then use their skin to make tents and clothing. They were as tall as an average human, with greenish skin, long pointy ears, beady black eyes and hooked noses. They were often decent fighters, but they were also very stupid.

“Still, we could get lucky,” she said hopefully. “Did you set your alarm spell?”

“Duh.”

The spell surrounded them like an invisible barrier, extending twenty feet in every direction. It detected any life that was bigger than a house cat. If something came through the boundary, Ayden would hear a bell-like sound in his head.

Tess grinned. “Can you believe we’re actually out here?” she asked excitedly. “Finally.”

“Kind of surreal after so many years of waiting.”

“Yeah. And just think; you won’t ever have to work at the forge or listen to your dad bitching again.”

He frowned a little. “I’ll still visit,” he reminded her. “Though he’s gonna be pissed for a while.” He sighed at the thought.

“Don’t know why you actually wanna see him,” she grumbled. “He’s a serious jerk, and I hate the way he treats you.”

“He’s my dad, Tess.”

She rolled her eyes, but quickly let it go and bounced back to her cheery mood. “Are there any caves around here? We could run into minotaurs.”

Minotaurs were huge humanoid creatures, between eight and ten feet tall, with bull-like heads, long horns, and muscular bodies covered in shaggy brown hair. They typically fought with axes, or charged, slamming their heads into their victims.

“There’s some southwest of here,” Ayden answered. “But minotaurs are always fighting each other over the caves, so if there are any, they won’t stray this far. They need to stay close to protect their homes.” When she huffed a sigh, he told her, “There’s kropidites south of Rosewall. We could go a few miles out of the way and see if we can find some.”

The lizard-like monsters were two feet tall on all fours, and five to six feet long, not including the tail. They lived in the tall grasses of the Everett Plains, and blended in well. To make them even more difficult to catch, they only came out at night. They couldn’t see too well, but they were very sensitive to vibration around them and were quick and vicious. Occasionally some would make it into the city sewers and become very problematic.

“Okay,” she agreed.

He smiled. “Can you go to sleep now that you have something happy to think about?” he half-teased.

“Yep.”

He chuckled. “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight,” she returned, smiling as she lay down on her bedroll and closed her eyes.