Harold left Dalen’s hold setting at a jog, similar to how the knights had jogged to rescue the civilians from Henri. The pace was steady and deliberate, shaped by rough ground, caution, and Harold’s insistence on maintaining the pace despite barely being able to maintain it for long himself. He found himself using his mana more than the others. He suspected the only one having a harder time than himself was Centurion Carter, who, despite having a higher rank than the other legionaries. Did not have as much experience using mana.

  They left Dalen’s Hold as soon as the oath was complete. The gate closed behind them with the solid sound of work completed rather than the sound of something abandoned. Patrols remained on the berm as the column disappeared into the trees, and Dalen stood with them, posture straight, watching until the forest swallowed the last person. Harold had promised a supply shipment of potions and left a list of supplies he needed harvested from the forest close to him. He would leave the details up to Caldwell, but he would do his best to support Dalen.

  The terrain erased any sense of road almost immediately. Grass lay flattened where others had passed before, brush cut back into narrow lanes, and the ground bore the memory of traffic rather than its permanence. A large part of this expansion would involve cutting roads into the earth to ease travel. Scouts from the Knights ranged ahead and to the flanks, shifting wider as the forest thinned and closed again. Harold maintained the pace as much as he could, even when the Landing pulled at his thoughts.

  They would run until just before nightfall, when one of the scouts would lead them into a defensible area, and he was dreading the run already, even though he knew he needed it.

  The fire already going was a welcome relief as he took off his boots. On the second night, when there was a large boar roasting, he almost collapsed in thanks. When he was finally able to carve a chunk off the boar, he almost cried as the meat melted in his mouth. When he woke up the next morning, his body protested so much he almost gave in. It took a supreme effort of will to cycle his mana and put his boots on.

  It wasn’t until Harold heard two of the knights making bets about how long he would last that he got up. He remembered them from the first visit to Dalen’s Hold. They were the two sent to watch the kids as they fished with the nets. But he didnt remember their names, and he damned sure wasn’t gonna let them know he forgot. It was Leroy and Henkins or something, and they did. Not. Stop. Talking.

  On the third day, a couple of hours out from the new farming village, a small goblin band tested the dispersed column, slipping in through the undergrowth and looking for weakness. They never reached it. Despite being spread apart for the run, the knights formed without urgency, shields coming off their backs, and they engaged in pairs. Most of them didn’t even use mana. The fight ended quickly, the bodies dragged clear and burned before the smell could carry far. It was a testament to how far they had come that 28 of his most experienced legionnaires could cut down 40-50-something goblins without breaking a sweat. Even those two idiots from yesterday were useful.

  Harold just watched them work as he sucked in air, just thankful for a dam break. A tear almost left his eyes when Carter called for them to continue with a smirk. He didn’t understand how he was maintaining the pace he was. Harold had more mana than all of them, but was suffering the worst.

  The second encounter, an hour later, was louder and less meaningful.

  A small hunting band rushed from the rear treeline, braver than they were clever. A tired scout nearly took a spear in the gut before Carter called a warning, and the line turned almost as one to engage them. This time there were a couple of hobgoblins in the group, but it didnt matter. They died all the same.

  By the end of the third day, the farming village came into view.

  It was larger than it looked at first glance, and rougher the longer Harold studied it.

  Two hundred people occupied a small hill right where the ground sloped up onto the plateau the Landing was on. It spread out in a sprawl of lean-tos, rough canvas shelters, and half-dug windbreaks. Nothing was permanent yet much less comfortable, but they were making progress. Despite the chaos, the scent of wood smoke from a half-dozen cookfires threaded through the air, a constant reminder of warmth and communal life amidst the bustling movement. People were moving constantly, hauling, digging, cutting, arguing, resting for a moment, then getting back to it. It was a beautiful moment of controlled chaos and progress.

  Forty adventurers ranged the perimeter, hunting and securing the area.

  They were easy to spot once Harold knew what to look for. Small groups moving through the tree line. Another up on a rocky outcrop farther back, scanning inland. They didnt advertise anything, but the work was done deliberately, and he could see Garrick's teachings in it. Harold slowed, smiling despite himself. He could see the purple pillar near the construction, shining brightly as they approached, and soon people were calling out to them.

  They’d beaten Centurion Varo’s century here, and that gave Harold no end of satisfaction. Not enough to forget the constant pain everywhere in his body, but it helped.

  The wagons told the rest of the story of their journey down here. Three of them sat empty near the center of the rise, wheels still caked with mud from the descent. Their tatanka tethered nearby, grazing as the settlement worked.

  Near the middle of the settlement, the first hall was already going up.

  It dwarfed everything else around it.

  The footprint had been staked wide and true, the corners squared carefully despite the uneven ground. Massive posts had been sunk deep, braced with crossbeams thick enough that Harold paused to judge them twice. Timber lay stacked nearby, stripped and sorted but not yet shaped. Stone was being dragged from the hills nearby, already piled along one edge where a proper footing would go once they had the time. They were being chiseled into the precise shape they needed.

  It was half again as large as the biggest hall in the Landing.

  Big enough to sleep everyone if they had to. Big enough to serve as an administrative center when the place grew into something more than a farming outpost. Someone here had been thinking past the next week. It was an ambitious construction.

  Harold stopped at the edge of the rise, hands on his hips, breathing hard and not bothering to hide it.

  Work slowed, then resumed when no one shouted or panicked. A few of the builders glanced up, curious but focused. One of the adventurers peeled off from the treeline and jogged over, mud-streaked and alert.

  “You’re early,” she said, smiling, as she shifted foot to foot as she spoke.

  “We ran,” Harold replied. “I see, you’ve all been busy.”

  She nodded a couple of times quickly. “We have been,” pride evident in her voice.

  He looked past her again, at the hall frame rising against the sky.

  “No cut lumber hauled in?” he asked.

  “It wasnt planned in the original load,” she said. “The wagons are headed back tomorrow morning to get more supplies, Aiden figured food and tools mattered more on the first load.”

  Harold nodded, approval plain. “He figured right.”

  Behind him, the knights finally came to a halt, armor creaking as they rolled shoulders and loosened straps. A few villagers stared openly now, taking in the dust, the sweat, the sheer fact that the column was still on its feet after the run. They didn’t look pristine, but they looked steady. Harold caught sight of a father swatting his teenage daughter lightly on the back of the head to stop her from staring, earning a muttered protest and a quick apology in his direction from him.

  Harold looked over the rise again, eyes moving across the hall frame, the scattered shelters, the patrols threading through the trees.

  “You’ve already done the easy part,” he said, voice carrying without effort.

  “Now you’re doing the part that matters,” Harold continued. “Turning ground into shelter. Turning space into something people can come back to.” He nodded once. “This is good work,” he patted her shoulder and walked into the space for the new village.

  That was all he offered and all they really needed. They all knew what they signed up for; they just needed someone to recognize the sacrifice.

  People straightened without realizing it. Someone went back to hammering. Another group resumed hauling stone. The settlement didn’t stop for him, and Harold found himself quietly pleased by that.

  He stepped forward to greet a few of the workers closest to him, offering brief words, nods, and a hand on a shoulder here and there. He knew most of them had seen him before, most more than once, but the proximity still drew attention, too much, really. There were a few faces he didn't recognize, and he assumed they must have come from the stele. They had the same dedication to purpose that he came to recognize in all the people who came from it.

  The run was catching up to him now. His legs burned. His chest felt tight. He leaned more heavily on cycling his mana than he liked, and he kept himself upright through stubbornness alone. Carter stepped up to shadow him more closely than usual reconizing he was flagging.

  Before it showed too much, a man stepped in smoothly at his side.

  “Mayor Aiden,” Harold said, grateful for the interruption. “Show us where we can crash for the evening, and we’ll stay out of your way.” He glanced over at Centurion Carter, who stood nearby in perfect, unmoving discipline, and something mischievous settled behind Harold’s eyes. “Carter can detail himself and a few of our better-off soldiers to help gather materials for your construction while we’re here.”

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Carter’s jaw tightened. Just barely.

  Mayor Aiden noticed both expressions immediately, the pained one and the smug one, and chose the safest possible response.

  “I’d appreciate that, my lord,” Aiden said evenly. “Even a few more trees will help. Until the wagons return, we’re sourcing everything by hand.” He gestured toward the center of the camp. “Let me show you where you and your men can bed down. In the morning, there are a few people I think you’ll want to meet before you head back.”

  Harold fell into step beside him as they walked, listening while Aiden gave a concise update. They’d made good time getting established, people had taken initiative without needing to be pushed, and everyone was working well past what their bodies wanted to allow. Harold nodded where it mattered, filed away the rest.

  When Aiden finally pointed out a cleared patch near the hall frame, Harold didn’t bother with ceremony. He wrapped himself in his cloak, stretched out on the packed earth, and let the day end.

  Sleep took him immediately.

  He woke to voices a little later that evening.

  “…that won’t work, he’s a light sleeper.”

  “No, he’s not. Look at him.”

  Harold cracked one eye open. Two figures loomed overhead, whispering as if they were solving a tactical problem with great urgency.

  "Gods," he muttered. "Elroy, what do you need?"

  Elroy started as if struck. "Uh—food, my lord," he managed before grabbing Jenkins by the arm and retreating at speed.

  Harold rolled onto his side just in time to see Centurion Carter watching the retreat with quiet satisfaction.

  Harold closed his eyes again, smiling faintly as he drifted off back to sleep.

  Revenge, it turned out, traveled both directions.

  ?

  Harold woke to the sound of grunting, boots scraping dirt, and someone laughing a little too hard for it to be an accident.

  He rolled onto his side, blinking grit from his eyes, and found three of the knights tangled up with two broad-shouldered men near the edge of the clearing. A spirited disagreement was being conducted with arms and leverage. One of the lumberjacks had a knight in a headlock that wasn’t quite working, while another knight had clearly decided that wrestling was now part of morning PT as he uproariously laughed.

  “Alright, alright,” someone said between breaths. “I get it.”

  “So are you,” the lumberjack shot back. “You still cheated using mana.”

  Harold pushed himself upright, every muscle lodging a formal complaint.

  A few paces away, Carter sat up at the same time, moving more slowly than usual. He rubbed his face with both hands, then froze as his eyes focused.

  He looked at Harold and looked around. Then his expression hardened.

  “OPTIO.”

  The word cracked through the clearing like a snapped branch.

  A man halfway through tightening his boot cursed loudly and broke into a sprint, skidding to a halt in front of Carter and snapping to attention despite still being half-dressed.

  “You had one job,” Carter said, voice low and dangerous. “One. Where were you when I woke up and found the Lord unguarded?”

  The Optio swallowed. “Sir, I was—”

  Carter didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t need to.

  “You do not assume,” he said evenly. “You do not guess. You do not decide the Lord is safe because nothing has gone wrong yet. You failed to maintain watch, and you will explain exactly why.”

  Before the Optio could answer, the air beside a few crates shifted.

  A figure resolved itself out of nothing a few steps away, straightening from a crouch with an easy smile. He was partially concealed behind some crates, but he appeared as if someone had lifted a veil. An adventurer, ragged light armor, forest-colored cloak, eyes alert despite the casual posture.

  “Morning,” he said pleasantly. “I had first watch. Then the second. Thought I’d let your people sleep.”

  Carter stared at him.

  Harold glanced between them. “You were… how close the whole time?”

  The adventurer tilted his head, considering. “Close enough to trip anyone who tried something and hear you snore.”

  There was a beat of silence.

  Then Carter turned back to the Optio. “You,” he said flatly.

  The Optio straightened instinctively, shoulders locking.

  “You allowed an unvetted individual to maintain watch on the Lord,” Carter continued, voice even and cold. “Not assigned or cleared. ”

  The Optio swallowed. “Sir, he said he was on rotation and—”

  “You don’t accept statements,” Carter cut in. “You verify. You confirm. You maintain positive control of anyone within reaction distance of the Lord at all times.”

  He took one step closer.

  The Optio’s face flushed. “Sir, I thought—”

  “That,” Carter said sharply, “is not part of your job.”

  A few nearby knights had gone very still. Even the lumberjacks had stopped pretending not to listen.

  “You’ll rewrite the watch roster,” Carter said. “You’ll re-brief every sentry personally. And until I’m satisfied you understand what failed here, you don’t sleep unless I tell you to.”

  “Yes, sir.” Carter finally turned away.

  Harold had listened without interrupting, arms folded loosely. When Carter looked back at him, expecting correction, Harold just nodded; he had no business in NCO business. Turning towards the ragged adventurer who was crouched there still. “So what perk was that? That's an impressive stealth skill, I didn’t think there were any monsters in the Basin that had something like that?”

  The man blinked, then straightened a little, clearly caught off guard by the question.

  The adventurer scratched at the side of his neck, eyes flicking briefly toward Carter and then back to Harold.

  “One of them ambush cats,” he said finally. “We took the escort quest on the way down here, and good thing we did, too.”

  Harold raised an eyebrow, waiting.

  “It was the biggest dammed cat I’ve ever seen. As big as that lizard from the campaign,” the man added, as if that explained most of it. “Smart, too. It didn’t stalk like the others. Just… waited.” His jaw tightened. “We lost six people trying to kill it, and we got lucky doing it.”

  The clearing had gone quiet again, not abruptly this time, just naturally.

  He continued, "It hit from the trees," his voice lowering as if the memory was a weight. "Never heard it coming. By the time we figured out what was going on, half the team was already down." The scent of bloodied leaves seemed to flash before his eyes, a silent scream buried in the rustling wind. He paused, then shrugged, though the memory was not so easy to cast aside. "I got the last hit. That was about it."

  Harold let out a soft breath through his nose, something between a snort and a laugh.

  “I doubt it was just luck,” he said. “Stealth that complete doesn’t come from a single perk.” He looked the man over more carefully now. “That one’s at least Rare. Probably has some conditional modifier on it. And I’d be willing to bet you’ve got at least one other stealth-adjacent perk propping it up, and to power that most of the night, you must have quite a few other strong perks.”

  The adventurer stared at him as he adjusted one of the knives on his body.

  “I… yeah,” he said slowly. “There’s another one. Makes it easier to stay still and lowers how noticeable I am if I don’t move.”

  Harold nodded, like that settled something. “That explains the edges, don't trust that too much. Anyone with a decent smell or hearing perception perk will still find you.”

  “You didn’t even see the screen,” the man said, disbelief creeping into his voice.

  Harold shrugged. “Perks leave patterns. Once you’ve seen enough of them, the effects tell you what the system’s doing.”

  The adventurer didn’t look reassured by that. A tired sigh drifted in from behind them.

  “Of course it’s you.”

  Mayor Aiden walked up, rubbing at his face like the day had already gotten away from him. He stopped beside the adventurer and gestured toward Harold.

  “My lord,” he said, “this is Lukas. One of the people I mentioned.” He shot Carter a sideways look. “The one I said could think under pressure.”

  Lukas shifted, suddenly very aware of himself. “Sir.”

  “He pulled together half the perimeter the first night,” Aiden continued. “Didn’t wait for instructions. Just started moving people where they needed to be and is responsible for foiling at least two attacks here.” He paused. “Apparently neglected to mention he can disappear when he wants to.”

  “I didn’t think it mattered,” Lukas muttered.

  Harold smiled faintly at that. “You’ll be coming back with us. Alright, I’m up, and the morning has been interesting already. Who else do you want me to meet so we can get out of your hair?”

  Aiden nodded, looking relieved. Lukas looked unsure whether that was good news. He guided Harold away from the hall site and where he bedded down and toward the cookfires, talking as they walked.

  “Before we left,” Aiden said, “Your council left a lot of questions you needed answered.”

  Harold winced alittle. “They’re probably from me.”

  “One of them was communication without using the forum,” Aiden went on. “Everyone uses that. But what happens when it goes down, or when you don’t want something broadcast to half the region?”

  Harold slowed just enough to signal he was listening.

  “We use runners,” Aiden said. “But they're too slow, and too easy to lose. Signal fires only work if you’ve got prepared stations, and they don't actually carry information. Drums carry, but not far enough, and not clearly. They also have the same limitation.”

  They reached the cookfire. Harold accepted a bowl and spoon without comment, the guards closing in around him as naturally as breathing.

  “Then yesterday,” Aiden continued, nodding toward the treeline as Harold took his first bite, “the portal spit out a falconer.”

  Harold paused mid-chew. “Now that’s interesting.”

  “He’s an interesting fellow, didn’t ask about pay. He wanted to get right to work and asked about wind patterns, predators, and whether we had anything shiny.” Aiden said while eating.

  Harold swallowed eagerly. The food wasn’t great, but it was filling, and he was starving. “What can he train?”

  Aiden tilted his head toward the treeline. “Come see.”

  They walked together, guards drifting with them without crowding. The noise of the cookfires faded as they moved, replaced by the softer sounds of wind through the leaves and distant hammering. Near the edge of the clearing, a man stood with a leather glove on one arm and a bird perched there, hooded and still.

  The man looked up as they approached, eyes roaming over them all until they settled on Harold.

  “My lord,” Aiden said, gesturing. “This is Kess.”

  Kess dipped his head once. “Lord Harold.”

  Harold glanced at the falcon. “What can you train?”

  Kess didn’t hesitate. “Anything that flies and survives long enough to learn. Falcons. Hawks. Crows, if you’re patient. Even some of the stranger things, if they don’t mind coming back. Monsters are more difficult, but it can be done.”

  Harold studied the bird again. “What kind of range does a bird like this get?”

  “Oh, she’ll get from here to your town in about a day if I have the range correct. Depends on the bird, though. Short hops are safer. Long runs are faster if the bird has the conditioning.” He shrugged. “They won’t replace your forum.”

  “No,” Harold agreed slowly. “But they don’t have to, not yet, at least.”

  Kess listened, then said, “I can mark routes and teach them landmarks. They’re smart birds and learn where home is.”

  Harold nodded, already thinking ahead.

  He didn’t say anything about the other uses that had surfaced the moment the idea took shape, and he had everything he needed to make it happen now.

  ?