The road to Lugg was a lot easier after Rowboat joined. Having someone carry the luggage meant that Norman had to take fewer breaks because of his pathetic stamina, and Pail had someone else to talk to instead of peppering him with nonstop questions. Traveling with two adults was also a lot safer than just one. Norman was glad to have another pair of eyes keeping track of the kids, trying to keep Pail from stuffing bugs in his pockets while pulling Pretty out of rabbit burrows, which, at the same time, had been a real struggle.
Eventually, the walls surrounding Lugg came into view, making both Pail and Pretty dart forward excitedly. Trekking through the woods had taken a toll on all of them, and the outline of the village on the horizon looked like an oasis in the desert. While the adults knew how to keep their irritation to themselves, the kids were more than happy to show how excited they were to be out of the forest. Rowboat, Pail, and Pretty were sick of forests because of the miserable lives they’d lived inside of them, while Norman was just tired of getting bitten by bugs.
“Mister! Mister! Do we get to eat more’a that yummy food when we get there?” Pail asked, practically shaking with excitement. He was more excited about the food than anything else. The dried rations they had on the road were yummy, but nothing was as yummy as that stew at the inn.
“If you stop running. You’re going to trip.” Norman barely finished his sentence when Pail fell on his face, just like he had predicted. It was inevitable; running on a muddy road in sandals was a sure way to faceplant.
Pail was the kind of person who saw the bright side of everything. He could laugh in almost every situation and brush off most things thrown his way. This, however, HURT. His lip quivered as he looked up at the adults behind him, monitoring their reactions to see if crying was okay. When he didn’t sense any anger, just a general feeling of quiet defeat, the floodgates opened.
Norman sighed deeply, he knew this was going to happen. He couldn’t even tell why the boy was so upset after falling on soft mud, it was impossible to hear anything he was saying when he was blubbering like that. “This is why you listen when adults tell you something.” Despite his agitation, Norman dutifully picked Pail up, letting him put his arms around his neck for support. “I told you not to run, didn’t I?”
Norman was thankful that they were only a few minutes away from civilization. If he had to carry a muddy, sobbing child while navigating the uneven terrain of the forest, he might have just given up. If he had a penny for every time he arrived at a village covered in mud, he’d have two pennies. It wasn’t a lot, but he didn’t like that it happened twice.
Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.
If Hardwood was a little hamlet in the middle of nowhere, Lugg was a proper village. The village was bustling with activity and noise. The group expected another questioning when they arrived at the gate, but thankfully, they were just waved through by an uninterested guard. Norman didn’t know how he would have explained the crying child in his arms if they asked him about it. The world of Silvae didn’t seem to have any child safety laws.
The first order of business was to find somewhere to stay. Norman had originally planned to head to the tamer’s guild as soon as he got there, but getting everyone clean and patched up took priority. Norman couldn’t help but find the village very overstimulating. Cities on earth were undoubtedly busier, but they had a sense of order to them. Norman found comfort in the predictable humming of cars, whirring of trains, and ticking of crosswalks back home. Here, however, he was assaulted by strange smells, the yelling of merchants, and the screeching of children and animals.
The fact that they were being stared at didn’t help, either. Casually travelling with two hybrids of different demon types made him look like either a pervert who kept playing with monster girls or a slave trader. Both were worth staring at as far as the villagers of Lugg were concerned. Rowboat was utterly unaware of the gaze of others. She’d been stared at enough throughout her life to become immune to it. A two-meter-tall amazoness was hard not to look at, after all.
After a bath and a nap at the nearest inn, the group was off to the tamer’s guild. Everyone was worn out, but Pail was especially tired. The pain had long since faded, but the boy was still pretty shaken. It wasn’t a particularly traumatic experience, but the shock of getting the air knocked out of him made all the excitement over the last few days catch up with him. It was impressive that he managed to keep up the energy for this long in the first place. No matter how energetic he usually was, he still had a mental battery, and right now, it was empty. Holding Norman’s hand was the only thing keeping him from falling asleep where he stood.
The cool monsters at the tamers guild made him perk up, though. Not enough to start running around again, but just enough to hold his attention. The tamers guild was a small building in the middle of the village, manned by a single front desk woman. The woman in question was surrounded by magical birds of all kinds, perched on her head and munching on her desk papers.
While Norman filled out the paperwork needed to have Pretty tested, Pail’s eyes were glued to one of the birds. It was very strange-looking. It had ash gray feathers, an egg-like body shape, and a very flat head. The clerk noticed his obvious staring and took the opportunity to show off her pets. She called over the bird to perch on her arm, then crouched down to the boy's level, letting him take a closer look.
“She's strange looking, isn't she?” She said with a cheeky grin, earning herself a beak to the face in response. “She's a Phoenix, and she looks so wonky because she's in the middle of reforming from the ashes. Her name's Charcoal. Fitting, isn't it?”
Pail gently petted the bird on the head, giggling when it leaned into his touch. It was cute in a way, but it didn't give off the impression that a majestic phoenix usually does. Still, he liked birds, even wonky ones with flat heads like this one. Being half harpy, he felt a sense of kinship with them. He also had an uncanny ability to befriend whatever bird he came across, something he demonstrated when the reforming phoenix stepped on his head.
The clerk is completely unimportant. She's just a self insert >:) Here is real life Charcoal.
