I was panicking.

  Two days had passed since the attack. The trolls were still out there, but they seemed to be handled for the moment. They’d been halted by the ferocity of our defence, but this enemy wasn’t unfamiliar. In fact, at least one in four people in the village had fought them before. The minds of the war trolls weren’t so very difficult to fathom. They attacked relentlessly. Goblins could be a little more subtle, attacking when they saw no resistance, but retreating when the defenses were strong.

  Obviously, even trolls could be made to retreat if they saw something shocking enough.

  The veterans were pretty sure we wouldn’t see another attack, now that so much time had passed with only a few goblins attempting sneak in. The monsters found Pemolar’s Hill to be too tough a nut to crack, and so their primitive brains sought easier targets.

  They seemed to understand that bigger numbers meant a more successful attack, so they would wait, sometimes. In doing so, they tended to cull their own numbers by fighting one another. Either way, no one was willing to take the chance that they were completely gone yet. The guard rotations continued.

  Mularet’s scouts had confirmed that most monsters were fleeing the area, not gathering in it. We’d dealt them a blow, and they’d learned to fear this place. Unless something had drastically changed with how the rift monsters behaved since our veterans had been on the front line, that should be the last of their attacks here. Not that they wouldn’t gather up and try to attack elsewhere, though.

  Dolundant and Potato Gully were at risk, but thankfully, we’d received no refugees from either town. From Mitoras, there was still a steady stream of refugees that the village was doing its best to accommodate.

  My spare room was now housing a small family. I’d slept in my parents' bed for the first time in a long while, but that hadn’t caused any problems. Neither of them had been able to stay home long enough to catch much sleep. Dad, especially, had been doing his best to help with the harvest as much as he could.

  The village was no longer afraid of the attack. Instead, they were afraid for the twins.

  I’d gotten word to Mularet that his daughter’s needs had been crafted, and he’d told me they were mostly working non-stop in the shop, building spear after spear after spear. They were also tasked with making the shafts that would then need to go to the fletcher to be made into arrows, but that explained where they’d been the past few days.

  The crossbow and vest were gone.

  No one had seen either girl pick them up. The two items had been left in the bar, quite openly, so anyone could have taken them, but I didn’t think anyone else would have. The village was a safe place, for the residents anyway. No one would have stolen something made specifically for the twins.

  But now, they were missing, and I was terrified for them.

  ‘Could… it be my fault?’ I thought, horrified.

  “I made the things my talent said they’d need, but I didn’t think they’d run off! Where would they have gone?” I asked a worried Omoali.

  “Nowhere!” the woman said. “They have good heads on their shoulders. They’re little troublemakers, sure, but they wouldn’t leave at a time like this.”

  “Not unless there was something important enough to take the risk for,” Reid said. “Or… or they may have been snatched. Goblins do that sometimes.”

  Omoali let her face sink into her hands, blonde hair the same shade as her daughters’ drooping low. “Don’t… don’t say that, please.”

  Reid winced. “I’m sorry…”

  Omoali shook herself and met Reid’s eyes. “No. No, you’re right. It is possible. I just… There were some signs. Arrows and spears were scattered about the place. When I noticed they were gone, I didn’t think much of it. We’ve all been so rushed, and Eysee is a mess at the best of times…”

  “Frankly, if goblins or trolls did manage to take them, I refuse to believe they’ve left the perimeter. Our teams should’ve noticed,” Tom said. “Either way, we need to get a search party ready. Reid, I need you to go get Oxana. She’s the best tracker in the entire town. If something happened at the carpenter’s shop, she’ll be able to tell. I’m going to go find Mularet. Someone needs to let him know.”

  “Yes, Dad,” Reid replied.

  I got up to follow him, and he turned, confused.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going with you!”

  “Why? You… Mera, everyone knows your skills, but you’d be more help here,” he said.

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  “What if it's my fault!? What if they knew about the crossbow and the vest and decided that made it safe? I…” I trailed off bitterly.

  “Even if that was true, it’s not your fault. Besides, I’m pretty sure you already used up all your luck with one war troll.”

  “I’ve got forty free points right now, Reid.” I lied. The number was actually in the seventies. “I could drop them all into tracking and–!”

  “Mera… that would be stupid, and you know it.”

  “Fuck!” I screamed, wishing suddenly that I’d taken the opportunity to train all the weapons and magic skills I could. I’d had years! I could’ve been becoming a warrior or at least someone capable of following where a hunter could go. Instead, I’d been wasting my time on concrete and porcelain and… and fucking pepper paste.

  He was right, though.

  I grabbed a coat and tugged it on.

  “You’re going anyway?” Reid asked, resigned.

  “No, you jackass. You’re right. I’d just get in the way… I’m fucking useless,” I breathed. Seventy points would be valuable in any skill, but there wasn’t any one skill that would definitely be useful in this sort of situation. Even if I did drop them all into tracking, Oxana would still be better at it.

  Jack of all trades, master of none.

  “You’re not useless, Mera,” he said.

  “Feels like it. It’s okay, though. I’m not going to follow you into the woods looking for them. I’m heading down toward the lake. I think if I work hard, I get enough pearls to craft your mother’s need,” I said bitterly.

  Irena Hunter wasn’t a hunter at all. She was… well. The best description I could think of for her was ‘midwife.’ That wasn’t a specific role. She was just the most experienced with helping mothers through childbirth, and the town always had at least one woman expecting at any given time.

  She’d been spending most of her time since we’d been warned of the attack with Imogaesa, whose baby was due within the month. Similar to Akkiwa, she needed something with pearls, though this would help her with a very unusual subsect of household magic she possessed called ‘reinforcement.’ She would need it to reinforce a door. I suspected it would be an amulet similar to the one I’d made for Edra.

  It had taken me hours to find half the pearls I’d needed for Akkiwa, but fortunately, the townsfolk had helped me find the other half. Unfortunately, Irena required even more pearls than Akkiwa had. It might actually be a better use of my time to go to Imogaesa’s home and try to get to know the Hunter matriarch a bit better, but I wasn’t feeling very social at the moment.

  Reid breathed a sigh of relief, the jackass. “Good. I’ll let you know the moment we find anything, okay. And Mera, this isn’t your fault.”

  “I know,” I lied again.

  We strode out of the building together and turned separate ways. After a few steps, I turned back to watch him go.

  ‘Shit!’ I thought, embarrassed, as our eyes met.

  We blushed and turned again, walking our own way.

  This was so stupid. There was a fucking war on, the twins might be in danger or worse, and I was still thinking about…?

  Gah.

  April wouldn’t have been embarrassed like this. Or… well, she’d never been married. Never even really dated much. Maybe she would?

  I was just thankful Haddy wasn’t around to see that. She’d never let me hear the end of it. Still, I was glad for the brief moment of embarrassment. It pulled me out of my irritation at how useless all April’s modern age talents were.

  A quick stop at the bathroom reaffirmed my belief that I wouldn’t be quite so useless if I could just create a working toilet.

  These people were smart, but this was still a medieval society, even with the magic and the talents and stats. Diverting a nearby creek through town before building a large outhouse over it was the maximum effort anyone was willing to put into a bathroom.

  I wondered how the royals did it in Denarla and Tacuria? Were chamberpots still a thing?

  Credit where credit was due, this method worked, but I felt pretty bad for anyone who lived downstream. That disgusting little stop reaffirmed my goals a little, as it did every day. Even if I was useless for this particular circumstance, the world would fucking thank me if I could get working indoor plumbing.

  Edra certainly would. She was the one who came and cleaned the place with her water magic every week or so.

  The beach on the Great Ophiscian was picturesque as I approached. Morning sunlight had just crested the treeline, reflecting off the lake to make a calm mirror that lit up the surroundings. The Ophiscian was big enough to have waves and a thin beach, comparable to the ones I remembered from Florida, if they were shrunk down to only a few yards in width. There were also large rock formations that created a segmented beach with many small alcoves between the sand.

  A great place to play hide-and-seek as a kid. It was beautiful, and completely at odds with the panic in my heart.

  The twins wouldn’t have run off. If they had, the only place they would go would be to get more sandstone or maybe reeds here by the lake. They’d be safe there, though. The lake was completely surrounded by the perimeter and the patrols. Sure, some goblins or trolls could have gotten through down by the beach…

  Common knowledge said they wouldn’t though.

  Rift monsters hated open water. They avoided it like the plague. During a famous battle back when the rift was new, and the monsters weren’t fully understood, a great host of them were pinned between the much greater combined forces of Rechin Amut and Tacuria, and the lake.

  The monsters, given the choice between jumping into the lake and rushing into the blades and arrows of the armies, chose the blades and arrows. They would never attack by water.

  Still, the beach itself wouldn’t really scare them…

  I hadn’t even been thinking of how likely it might be that the girls would come down here when I’d decided to hunt for pearls, but the more I thought about it, the more sense it–!

  I blinked as I noticed a small hint of red on the sand. I focused harder and used a skill I probably should be exercising more often. Observe highlighted the red substance, and more of it besides, slowly being washed away into the sand and rocks.

  Blood. A trail of it, heading off into the alcoves.

  Oh no.

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