I smelled it before I saw it. Shit. Rotting shit. A decomposing body left in the sun and sprayed by a skunk… I didn’t quite know how to describe it.

  Bad. It smelt bad.

  I put my hand to my nose and noticed everyone else was covering their mouths as well. Saise tied a black handkerchief around her face, her long snout pushing through the front. Vekrem and Asema pulled up their collars. I didn’t have such luxuries, so I bore it as we crept closer.

  I could see it now; like a blistering pustule set against a vibrant green land. The Grimstead Thicket. Undulating red and brown, the forest that laid ahead lived in defiance of all that was holy. Even the horse at that point fought against us to continue the journey, and we staked it down on the side of the road in some tall grass. Sure, our stuff was out in the open, but I doubted any ventured this close.

  Nobody else was dumb enough.

  “Makes you think, doesn’t it?” Vekrem asked.

  My mouth was muffled under my hand as I replied, “Think of what?”

  Vekrem clapped me on the shoulder. “That there must have been an easier way to make… What did you call it again? Money. There must have been an easier way to make wealth than this.” He gestured to the world around him.

  I stared ahead into the dark of the forest, and it seemed to call to me. Beckon me. I felt like I was diving headlong into a plot from the Witcher series, but I didn’t have the luxury of a silver sword to help me. I gripped the silver necklace that Lucretia had given me, which was set in my right pocket. Then I fingered the Dragons-eye amulet, which was in my left.

  “Ah…” Dragon said. “Do you smell that?”

  “Yeah,” I replied. “I definitely do. Smells like crap.”

  “Smells like life,” Dragon corrected. “Decay may be the final stage of life—but it is still life. I have seen what the absence of life looks like.” Dragon seemed to sadden. “You do not wish to see it.”

  “You have?” I asked. “So you remember?”

  Dragon sent a smoldering wave of disappointment. The creature remembered nothing. This had happened a few times during the journey. A smell or a sound would trigger something ancient in the Dragon… but then nothing. Like a flickering light or a fading dream.

  Vekrem held his hand to his chest, right on top of his heart. “Odd,” he said. “It seems as if Dragon’s emotions can affect my own. I was not sad until a moment ago, but now I am, and I could not tell you why. Fascinating.”

  “Yeah, fascinating,” I replied. “Can we get this over with? I’m going to hurl.”

  ***

  As we approached the edge of the forest, I vomited the contents of breakfast into a small patch of grass. From where I was, I could see tendrils of rotted vines, which had spread out from the forest like grasping fingers. Everywhere the rot touched decayed. Nothing could withstand the corruption.

  “Can we even touch that stuff?” I asked.

  Vekrem scratched his chin. “I would avoid doing so with bare skin. Be even more careful if you have any open wounds; I’d hate to see the nasty infection that would spread from that.”

  “Yeah,” Asema said, dragging her mace behind her with one arm. “Nobody wants to become rotted. Disgusting even to look at, right?”

  She stalked off.

  Vekrem reached out, narrowly missing her arm. “I didn’t mean—”

  She ignored him and kept on walking.

  “I’m sure she’s just mad at me,” I said. “I wouldn’t worry about it.”

  “No…” Vekrem replied. “There is genuine anguish there. Hate. It is dug deep; not so unlike the corruption of this forest. And I cannot wholly say it is unwarranted. Humans are treated terribly. By my kind and by others. I wouldn’t blame her if she wanted us all dead.”

  I tried to think of something comforting to say, but nothing came to mind. Instead, we followed Asema into the thicket, with Saise trailing us, her chained-sickle weapon at the ready. As for myself, I gripped my dagger hard as I passed the first tree, entering the forest.

  The air was acrid, yet somehow less harsh than it had been just outside. In here—in the thick of it—it almost smelled sweet. Hell, I could almost taste that sweetness on my tongue. Yet that may not be from the smell, but from the plumes of tiny spores that drifted in the air. I couldn’t help but think of how those spores were likely ravaging my lungs as I inhaled them.

  Asema slowed her pace, and I took the time to search. The trees looked gnarled and wrong; darker than they should be. Any wounds in the bark oozed a reddish liquid, like blood. No manner of leaves grew on the limbs.

  I felt pain flare as I ran headlong into a spiked vine, which cut a nice neat line across my cheek.

  “Fuck...” I said, but before I could do anything, Vekrem appeared with something in his hand.

  “I knew this would happen,” he explained as he spread the off-white goop on the cut. It burned, but I let him continue. The stuff smelled just as rancid as the forest.

  Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

  “What the hell is this made of?” I asked.

  “Do you really want to know, or are you just making conversation to distract from the fact that I’m this close to your face?”

  I forced a light cough. “The second one.”

  “Will you two focus?” Asema said, annoyed. “By the First Ones, you two.”

  “Who are the First Ones?” I asked. “I’ve heard them mentioned, but I don’t actually know who they are.”

  Everyone stopped at once and turned to stare at me.

  I swallowed hard. “What?”

  “You really aren’t from this world,” Saise replied. “Are you?”

  “Nope,” I said. “Sure ain’t.”

  “The first of the hybrids,” Saise explained. “Each of us have our own, but we revere all equally.”

  “Then what about you, Asema?” I asked. “You seem to revere them too.”

  “I do,” she replied. “We all do.”

  “But why? Their descendants enslaved you.”

  “And? The First Ones were once human, and then an otherworldly entity blessed them; yet they are not the hybrids we see today. The First Ones could transform between human, hybrid, and even a fully animalistic transformation. They were the best of us all, and then…”

  “And then?”

  “They died,” Vekrem said. “The First Ones did not age, but there was a war. First One against First One. And you can guess the winner of such a conflict.”

  “... Lycan?”

  Vekrem nodded. “The leader of the lycans and First One—”

  There was a noise from out in the forest. A cracking of branches, and an overwhelming scent of…

  animal.

  ***

  I pressed my back firmly against a nearby tree. I had lost sight of the others, but I was too much of a pussy to go looking for them.

  Crack

  Crunch

  Crack

  Something lumbered through the dead woods and rotting vines. Something large. It had to be it… the Ursa Plaguefang.

  Somehow, the beast’s overwhelming scent washed away the rot, and even the spores thick in the air seemed terrified, fleeing away from the monstrous form.

  I dared not speak. Fuck—I didn’t even breathe.

  A lumbering shadow fell, casting its form out. I could see it from the vantage point behind the tree. They were close… they were…

  Shit!

  I leaped just as the tree that had been above my head exploded into small bits of bark, the larger of the felled tree falling just to my left. I rolled and turned to face my attacker, and saw exactly what I had expected: a bear of insane proportions. On all fours, it looked almost ten feet tall, and from the form of its muscles, I was sure it could smash a house in two if it wanted.

  It roared, and it smelled sour; like it was full of bile.

  Then it charged.

  I could feel the vibrations of its enormous body rumbling through the ground. I could see it in the air. I pushed against it. As I did, the wave rebounded against me, hitting me square in the chest and throwing me at least six feet back.

  I hit hard and slid on my back until I came to a halt against the roots of a tree with gnarled bark that looked like an old man staring down at me. If it weren’t an inanimate object, I could swear it was saying, ‘Sucks to be you,’ with that judgmental glare.

  “Hey!” Vekrem yelled, drawing the bear’s attention. He was hidden in the core of a collapsed tree with only his head peeking out.

  Plaguefang charged him, and he disappeared inside just as the bear collided with the log. Thick pieces of wood slammed against the ground as the bear clawed its way inside.

  Just then, in the trees, I caught a glimpse of Asema just as she leaped from the branches, holding her mace above her head. She came down, swung forward, and with a sickening crack, slammed the mace against the bear’s head.

  She bounced off.

  She bounced the fuck off.

  Shit!

  Plaguefang turned and slammed his enormous paw against her, sending her flying.

  Chains appeared, dangling from the limb of a tree. They wrapped Asema and slowed her, letting her land on her feet. She didn’t remain upright long as the attack had clearly hurt her, and she fell to her knees in the brush.

  Plaguefang turned, and I saw something odd in the monster's gaze. There was no hate there… only sadness. Yet despite this, it roared and charged once more.

  I stood in the way. Asema had said I didn’t care about others? Had said that I was selfish? I was dead set on proving her wrong… even though, when I really thought about it, she was right.

  I felt the waves of the claws striking the ground, and I held out my hand. What had I done before? How had I manipulated the energy in such a way that I could attack something?

  I shrugged and simply punched forward, thinking about my punch launching out some sort of magic force…

  And nothing happened.

  Plaguefang swiped his claw at me, and I hesitated. I could dodge, but if I did, Asema would be caught in it. Was I truly selfish? Was I willing to sacrifice for others?

  I dodged, to my shame, but a single nail nicked me in the arm, and even that small touch was enough to send me spinning.

  The good news: Asema had not been hurt as Plaguefang had skidded to a stop. The bad news: Plaguefang stared at her like she was tonight’s meal.

  Asema tried to stand, but her knees buckled. She was still hurt.

  I reached out and tried to blast the beast with the waves, but nothing happened. I pulled out my knife and threw it, the handle casually bouncing off the beast’s shoulder.

  “Run!” I yelled. “Run, for fuck’s sake!”

  Asema glanced at me. “I… can’t.”

  Plaguefang lifted his claw up, readying the killing blow.

  A scream echoed through the woods as Vekrem, of all people, landed atop Plaguefang. The creatures bucked, but Vekrem, no longer wearing shoes, dug his clawed feet into the back of their neck, deep into the meat. Plaguefang bucked and bucked like a wild horse, yet Vekrem held until something silver gleamed in the air. Vekrem’s tail curled around him, like a snake, and on the tip was a silver point in the shape of a tiny spear. In a flash, that spear disappeared, sinking deep into Plaguefang’s back.

  The creature roared in fury and pain, bucking even wilder than before. Somehow, I found my legs, and I ran to Asema, scooping her off the ground and running in the opposite direction. She continued to stare at the battle with a look of awe and fury. I set her some ways away against the edge of a tree and saw Saise spinning her sickle up in the trees.

  “Help Vekrem,” I yelled.

  Jumping from tree limb to tree limb, Saise effortlessly weaved the chain between the branches until Plaguefang was in sight. She leaped into the air; the chain spinning around her in an arc with which the sickle-like weapon cut the back of one of Plaguefang’s legs.

  Plaguefang slammed the ground once more, its leg giving out, and Vekrem was finally thrown forward, rolling into the landing, and sending an empty glass vial spinning away.

  The three of us stood there, staring down the monster of a bear, waiting for it to attack again… but it didn’t. Instead, it whimpered. Slowly, it began to shrink. Smaller and smaller it became until it was no longer a bear at all, but not a hybrid either. It was a man…

  Just a regular human man.