Night had fallen, and the others were already sitting around a small campfire, when Rhunal finally reached them. As he was the only one not busy eating, Hugh looked up to greet her. 

He pointed at what remained of her rabbit. “I see you found dinner.”

She frowned, “Uh yeah. I’m not much of a cook though.”

“It must be handy to be a mage, cooking on the go! Well, you’ve always got time to practice.”

The last part was an unhelpful statement, but somehow it made her feel better anyway.

Her grim mood broke for a moment. Hugh reminded her of her friend Gilbert in that he made her feel like she belonged. He seemed to be a competent leader as well. 

She took out her poor excuse for a knife and cut away the most charred sections from the rabbit. It didn’t leave much by the end, but it was at least edible. She dug into it with gusto.

“Hey Hugh, do we need our weapons tomorrow?” Lovell asked.

“Yes, and be ready to drop our packs if a fight happens.” he said.

“Are we that close to the thieves’ den already?” Brondulf asked.

Lovell shook his head, “They are still a day’s travel away. But we are only a few miles from the border.”

Bron was confused, “Which border is that? Nobody has a claim up here.”

“You are right to say that we are leaving the lands claimed by Greihold. But to think of these lands as empty would be almost the same as thinking them safe and a mistake. Everything that lives in the north has a claim to it. And most of it is looking to spill your blood.” Hugh said ominously.

Snap, Crunch!

Hugh was interrupted by the sound of the rabbit’s bones being turned to powder by her teeth. The meat had not lasted very long. She decided to crush the bones and eat the marrow. She looked up as their conversation stopped. All three of them were looking at her with expressions ranging from bemused to annoyed.

“What?” She had heard nothing they’d said.

They couldn’t think of a response to give her. She had accidentally punctuated Hugh’s point rather well.

*

Rhunal’s insufficient meal only made her hungrier. Her fears of her lack of any combat experience continued to nag at her as she tried to sleep on her simple cloth bedroll.

'There is nothing to stop me from walking out. I’m not a fighter, and it’s not like I can assume I’ll be able to hang back and safely cast firebolts. Now that I’m out of the city, I’m free to go anywhere. It can’t be too hard to find out where other orcs live.'

A nagging thought came to her then. 'How did I end up with Carinus at all?' 

She had no memory of her life previous to the manor. There was a genuine possibility that any life with her own people could be a nightmare. She was a stranger, and she knew they would have no reason to take her in. This was a worry she’d had many times over the course of her life. It was one of many reasons she had never attempted escape before.

She was still running over scenarios of leaving during the night or not, when Hugh spoke nearby.

“You’ve been tossing and turning all night.”

Rhunal sat up quickly, angrily, “What’s it to you?”

“Woah, easy. I know you’re hungry.” he sat down next to her and held out a large smoked side of pork.

“You don’t owe me anything.” Despite her words, her mouth watered at the sight of it.

“True, but I need you and I need you at your best. We’re shorthanded for this quest. But that doesn’t mean we won’t be successful. If we hold together and fight as a unit, then we will come through it. I suspect you have little actual combat experience. You don’t know what will happen tomorrow when things get more dangerous. One goal of any adventuring party is to keep their mage out of the fray. We will protect, and you will protect us in return.”

Rhunal nodded, “I’ll do my best.” She didn’t, however, break eye contact with the smoked side of pork.

“Oh, I’m sorry! I got too busy talking again,” Hugh laughed and held it out to her.

Rhunal snatched it a little too greedily. But she restrained herself from tearing into it. “I appreciate what you said. I’ve never been part of a group before. I needed to hear that.”

“No problem, I’ll leave you alone now.” He was gone in an instant, and she didn’t even hear his footsteps as he left. He was oddly light-footed for a man of his stature and sturdy build.

She polished off the smoked pork in a hurry. She slept soundly the rest of the night, resolved at last to see the quest through to completion.

'It’s not like I know where I would go if I left anyway.' She thought, as she faded to sleep.

Rhunal the Cartographer

     The four left early that morning. The atmosphere of the party had changed. There was much more idle chatter, and even Brondulf seemed to be talking with Lovell about martial tactics. Yesterday it had seemed like Lovell might have something against him, fixing him with an icy glare. Rhunal had found another nice chunk of jerky meat next to her pillow when she woke up. She decided to keep it till later when she was more hungry.

Late last night, she had resolved to stick with the quest and see it through the end. After all, it had been her friends who had been killed in the break-in. She felt shame for wanting to quit so soon.

'What’s wrong with me?' She thought. 'Shouldn’t an orc want vengeance?' She looked towards Hugh. It galled her to admit it, but he would probably know the answer. She wasn’t about to ask him directly though, she had her pride.

*

As the morning wore on, Shattered Mountain diminished in the distance. The widespread plains, scattered boulders, and short, dense brush were replaced by thick spruce trees. Ahead of them some distance off was a river. It was the same river that fed Greihold and passed between Shattered Mountain and a different mountain on the west side. It was this river that brought so much prosperity to the town.

On a whim, Rhunal began to sketch some of the notable landmarks on the side of her pack with a piece of charcoal. She noted the location of Greihold, Shattered Mountain, and the path of the river. She looked at the small markings and felt odd. Those three marks represented everything she knew about the entire world.

She had asked plenty of questions of her master, and he had answered her with brief descriptions of various places. But, she didn’t know where these places were. She knew that somewhere to the south of Greihold was a nearly unending desert. Somewhere in that desert a massive river split off and met the sea. Her master had called it a delta. And on the delta was the biggest city on the continent. But without any form of reference for it, she couldn’t even treat it like a real place. To the north would be the frontier Hugh had talked about. She would just have to ask him.

She reluctantly approached him. “You’re from the desert, right Hugh?”

He looked at her curiously, “A long time ago I was.”

“How far away is the capital, in days walk?”

“Why? Are you planning on going there?” he said bemusedly.

She shook her head, how could she get across the disquieting feeling she had? She pointed to the east. “You know what is over that way, over those smaller mountains don’t you?”

He nodded, “several small frontier towns are there, including my home, Refuge.”

She filed that away in her memory then pointed west. “And that way?”

“The end of the rest of the mountain range that Shattered Mountain is part of. And shortly after that, the Great Sea.”

She pointed south. “Some distance past Greihold is the desert right?”

Hugh nodded, “it’s a very large desert.”

“But you are personally familiar with much of it aren’t you?”

“Enough to make my path through it yes.”

“See? You can look in any direction and you know exactly what you are looking at. You know what the world is and the parts that make it up.” She unrolled her bedroll and showed Hugh her ‘map’ with three locations on it. “Everything I know in the whole world is currently less than a day away! It’s pathetic.”

“Your master really didn’t teach you much about the outside world did he?”

She bristled a bit inside at that. She was surprised by this, after all, she had been his slave. But he hadn’t really treated her like one since he started teaching her magic. Hugh wasn’t wrong in his assessment of her knowledge of the outside world though.

“He told me about most of the places you mentioned. But, without going there or at least knowing where they were, they might as well be made-up. But, you’ve been everywhere! Your world is huge.”

Hugh chuckled a bit at that, then more seriously, he pointed north, straight down the road they were traveling. “Not exactly true. This road continues north for most of a day, then it gradually turns east and loops back around towards the frontier towns that are directly east of us. Everything north of that road once it turns east is wild territory. The only place I’m sure even exists, is the orc homeland. Though no two stories of its exact location are the same.”

“I’ve never been there,” she paused for a long moment. She wanted to say something else, but she couldn’t find the words for it.

Hugh finally broke the silence. “Well I suspect you have. But you were probably too young to remember. And further north than that? Well it’s all myths and legends from there.”

“May I interrupt?” Brondulf, who was in front of them on the road, turned to look at them. “I caught the end of your conversation. Far to the north and beside the sea, there is one more place that was as real as they come. My father’s homeland.”

“Was as real as they come?” Hugh asked? “I heard of the nation in the snowy north, but of course no one I’ve ever met had really been there. It would be an impossible journey through dangerous territory.”

“My father never spoke about the exact circumstances, but he was one of the last to leave before the collapse of his whole kingdom. It seemed his was the last remaining civilization in the far north. I do not know if he was alone or with companions when he started the journey towards the domains of Greihold. He never spoke of anyone he knew from his homeland. I do know that when he arrived; he was completely alone.

"He says there are others out there, but I do not think he really believes that.” His deep bass voice carried across the river valley in the dense chill air of the morning. It was the first time she had heard any kind of deep emotion from him.

“Do you want to go there?” she asked.

He shook his head. “It does not exist anymore. No one lives in that place. What is left there but bad memories?”

“There could be memories of many kinds there. Ancient heirlooms and weapons locked away for generations now. Hell you might even find someone living there.” she protested.

“I am only interested in the future. He gave his two-handed bearded axe a little shake. “And as for weapons, I don’t need anything special to be lethal with it.”

“You seem to have the interests of a treasure hunter.” Hugh observed, to her.

“It’s not just treasure. It’s everything else too. How many kingdoms and cities existed on this continent before that worldwide storm?”

“Nobody really knows. A lot of them I guess.”

“How many kingdoms are there now?”

“Well I can’t say for sure. Everything past a certain distance north is too dangerous for travel. Greihold is the center of our little kingdom here. And Qismat is the center of the empire to the south.”

“It’s an empire?” Rhunal asked, interested by the prospect.

“In name only. The city of Qismat itself is impressive, but not much else is. Everything else is a collection of small settlements or places that only exist to gather whatever resource happens to be nearby. Qismat happens to be located on a river delta leading to the ocean. It is one of very few places in the whole south capable of growing good crops. Still it’s a much much bigger city than Greihold. Someday I wouldn’t mind going back.”

“If you count my people, I guess there are three kingdoms then.”

“Well I really doubt your folk run themselves exactly like a normal kingdom.”

“Why not?” she countered, defensively.

“I’m no expert, but it is well known that orcs are a little too surly to stay in large groups too long. You only see groups bigger than four orcs when you meet a war party.”

Rhunal rolled her eyes, “My language teacher used to say I was surly. But I did throw a chair at her head once.”

Hugh stopped in front of her, “That was the only time you did that?”

“Well she didn’t call me surly anymore so yeah. She ducked it, if you need to know."

“I see.” Hugh continued walking. “Well your language teacher did a good job.”

“Thanks!”