Chapter 138: HOLDING

As the days passed, food became Aiden’s main problem.

He had brought hard rations into the fen, but they were disappearing faster than he liked.

Miasma could hunt, but venom ruined more meat than it saved. Nyx could catch things when she felt like it, which wasn’t often enough to build a meal around.

Cinder ate the most. She was bigger than the others, and Aiden was already keeping her fire use low because the fen barely replaced the Ember Motes she burned.

So Aiden started fishing.

The fen kept its eels deep and its marsh-hens high in the reeds. His first lines came back empty. One lost its bait without moving enough for him to notice.

At this rate, the fish are eating better than I am.

He learned which channels held eels and which only wasted his time. He found where the marsh-hens nested and learned not to chase them through water deep enough to hide something larger.

Aiden ate less when the catch was bad.

The cat noticed.

It watched him divide one small eel between Cinder and Nyx, then looked at his empty plate.

"Don’t."

The cat licked one paw, fully committed to contributing nothing.

Miasma ate better than any of them. Vesperian Spores gathered thickest around the stagnant pools, and the fen suited her so well that Aiden sometimes suspected she had personally arranged the weather.

At least one of us picked the right swamp.

The rest of them adapted.

Aiden kept the shelter dry enough to sleep, replaced traps when something stole them, trained when he could, and made sure he was still there each morning.

That was what the Assessment required.

Hold the territory until the first assessment.

So he held it.

At dusk, Seraphine and Vigil continued their patrol along the southern boundary.

Some evenings Aiden saw her through the fog. Other times, Vigil appeared first, his pale antlers lit with soft gold as he walked beside her.

They never crossed the boundary. They never missed a patrol either.

The warrant Seraphine had filed was still somewhere between her hands and the authority that could approve it. Aiden had no way to know when it would arrive.

Other people get deadlines. I get a Grand Inquisitor walking past every evening until mine becomes legally enforceable.

Nyx gave him a different problem.

Her shadow kept spreading farther whenever she absorbed Void Fragments. Since Aiden had stopped choosing her training grounds, she had started finding richer pockets on her own.

She also kept going east.

The waterways grew deeper in that direction.

Aiden followed her, then brought her back before dark each time. He wasn’t stopping her. He just wanted to know what she was walking toward.

So, after two weeks, Aiden had three problems he couldn’t solve quickly: the warrant, Nyx getting closer to evolving, and a food shortage.

Wonderful. Three problems, and apparently all of them know where I live.

That night, the cat woke first. It stood near the fire and hissed toward the eastern waterway.

Miasma raised her spines a second later.

Then Aiden heard water crashing against the bank. Something heavy was moving fast through the eastern waterway.

It came up out of the black at the camp’s edge, and it was the size of a cart.

It was a bog-thing.

Its body was broad and flat, almost as wide as it was long. Six thick legs stuck out from its sides, each ending in a wide foot that sank into the mud. Dark plates overlapped across its back and sides. Its head was blunt and nearly neckless, with a mouth that split across the entire front of it.

Aiden knew the species from an Academy field guide.

Bog-things waited in deep mud and ambushed beasts from the waterline. Boars included. They were Water-affinity beasts.

This one rushed up the bank at full speed, crossed into the firelight, and saw the cat.

It lunged.

Water surged out of the channel behind it and spread across its back and sides.

The bog-thing opened its mouth, water spiraling inside.

A compressed jet tore through the camp.

Aiden Shadow Stepped aside before it hit.

So that’s what you do.

He appeared beside its head and snapped Acid Weave across one eye. The thread cut through and melted the exposed flesh.

The bog-thing screamed and swung one of its legs toward him.

Before it hit, darkness swallowed its remaining eye. Nyx had spread a patch of shadow across its face.

The bog-thing snapped at empty air as Aiden backed away.

"Good."

Nyx widened the darkness.

The bog-thing thrashed its head, but the shadow clung to it.

Cinder circled from the left. She leapt at the thing, claws burning.

Fire burst across the water coating its plates. Steam exploded outward, thick enough to hide half the camp.

The bog-thing staggered. Then water rolled over its body again.

The steam cleared.

Scorched marks ran down its plates, but the beast was still standing.

Cinder gathered fire for a proper burst.

Aiden saw the fire along her body already flickering.

"Save it!"

She growled.

"It’s not worth it."

She took a slow, reluctant step back.

Anywhere else, she’d cook this thing. Here, it’s fighting on a full tank while she doesn’t even have half of hers.

The bog-thing shook free of Nyx’s shadow and charged toward the shallows at the camp’s edge.

Miasma was already there.

She slipped beneath its front leg as it passed and drove her spines into the soft flesh behind the joint.

The bog-thing jerked sideways.

Miasma rushed away before its weight came down.

Green spread beneath the plate. The beast turned toward her.

Nyx covered its eyes again, and its bite came down a body-length off.

Miasma was already gone.

With an enraged roar, the bog-thing blasted water jets blindly across the bank.

Aiden dropped beneath the spray and whipped Acid Weave around the leg Miasma had poisoned.

The thread bit into the joint. He pulled.

The bog-thing lurched forward and nearly dragged him off his feet.

"Right. Its size’s not just for show. Should’ve considered that. But I have someone heavy on my side, too."

Cinder slammed into the bog-thing’s side. No fire. Just her whole body.

The impact drove the poisoned leg into the mud.

And Miasma was there again.

She climbed onto the joint and drove several spines deep into the same wound.

The bog-thing screamed.

Water burst from beneath its plates and hurled her back.

Shit, Miasma!

Aiden caught her against his chest and stumbled.

The bog-thing charged Aiden and Miasma.

Nyx’s shadow dropped over its face for the third time, but this time it stopped trusting its eyes. It swung its head from side to side, water gathering around its mouth.

Aiden saw the poisoned front leg tremble.

Then buckle.

"Cinder!"

Cinder understood. She raked its wounded leg with all her weight behind it.

The bog-thing collapsed hard enough to shake the bank. Its water jet tore a deep gash into the reeds instead of the camp.

It tried to rise.

The poisoned leg didn’t answer. Neither did the one behind it.

Miasma’s venom was spreading through something the size of a cart. Slowly, but it was spreading.

The bog-thing dragged itself toward the shallows with its remaining legs.

Aiden set Miasma down behind him and ran after the bog-thing.

Oh, no. You don’t get your full tank back. You’re not leaving after wounding Miasma.

He snapped Acid Weave beneath the edge of one plate, cutting into the softer flesh underneath.

The bog-thing twisted toward him.

Aiden dodged the useless bite with a Shadow Step. He appeared beside the thing, Solar Plexus flaring through his palm as he drove his hand into the opening Acid Weave had cut.

Heat tore through the exposed flesh where the water couldn’t reach. Steam burst from the wound.

That’s what you get for wounding her.

The bog-thing convulsed once and crashed into the mud.

Its last scream died with it. The water covering its body slid back toward the channel.

Aiden glared at the carcass. Solar Plexus had faded, but his pulse was still hammering.

He didn’t move for a moment, until Miasma struggled to her feet.

She wasn’t bleeding, but the blast had thrown her hard. Miasma was small and the bog-thing was the size of a cart.

So was the amount of meat on it. He looked toward the last of their rations.

Finally. Something in this fen wants to be food. You’d better taste good. Miasma deserves it.

"Well. That’s one problem solved. Cinder, help me drag it. Nyx, look after Miasma."

They dragged the bog-thing farther onto the bank before the channel could take it back.

Aiden fetched his knife and started cutting the wounded leg free before Miasma’s venom spread into the rest of the carcass.

He had barely started cutting through the joint when he noticed the bog-thing’s trail in the mud.

Deep gouges ran straight out of the eastern waterway and up the bank.

No circling. No waiting in the mud. No sign that it had been stalking anything.

Bog-things hunted from the waterline. This one had already been moving at full speed before it entered the firelight and saw the cat.

Aiden stopped cutting.

You weren’t hunting.

He looked east.

The waterway disappeared into the fog, toward the deeper channels Nyx had been following for days.

The bog-thing had been in its own element. Water everywhere, armor wet, strong.

And something deeper in the fen had made it leave.

Wonderful. Something scares cart-sized Water beasts out of the deep water, and that’s the direction Nyx likes.

Aiden finished cutting enough meat for the night and left the rest where he and Cinder had dragged it.

By the time he turned back, Miasma was resting on his bedroll and steady again. Nyx was gone.

He found her at the eastern waterway.

She stood at the edge, staring into the black water.

"No."

Nyx didn’t move.

Aiden came beside her and looked down. He still couldn’t see the bottom.

The bog-thing had fled it.

Nyx wanted in.