The delta was broad and still, sunlight glinting off long, slow channels of brackish water that twisted between sandbars and patches of forest. The air was clean, warm, and damp — not humid, but rich with the smell of fresh river mud and green things growing.
They moved along a narrow ridge of packed earth, high enough to give them a view of the winding river below. The trees here grew tall and well-spaced, their roots drinking from the hidden water veins beneath the loam. It was a beautiful place — deceptively so.
"You'd never know something big lived here," Jace said, glancing out across the river bend. "This place looks like a hiking trail. Peaceful. You could build a cottage here and not even think about it."
Mira snorted. "You first. Let me know how long it lasts."
Theo walked ahead of them, a long branch in one hand that he occasionally tapped through puddles or brush. "I haven't seen anything too weird. Just birds, frogs… a few gators. Those goblins from yesterday but even they looked more malnourished than normal."
"They're big, though," Mira added. "Did you see the one in the creek crossing? Had to be ten, maybe eleven feet."
Jace shuddered. "Yeah. That one looked like it was sizing me up."
"They probably are," Theo muttered. "Everything here's just a little off."
Sarah walked in the rear, her pack adjusted to sit high on her back, hair tied back tightly. She'd been listening more than talking, keeping one hand resting on the pommel of her sword. She didn't seem tense — just focused.
"They're not our target," she said after a moment. "Those are normal wildlife for this place. Elevated, sure, but natural. What we're looking for… won't behave like them."
Jace glanced back. "Okay, then how will it behave?"
Sarah stepped over a gnarled root and joined them near the front. "It's an ancient territorial lizard. What have all lizards done in any of the zoo's you went to. It won't patrol. It'll settle. Find a deep pocket in the delta and stay there, hidden. Or it'll be somewhere on the sandbar sunning itself."
Theo squinted out across the winding water. "So we're looking for somewhere it could hide. Deep channel. Slow current. Maybe a few sandbars or drop-offs nearby?"
Sarah nodded. "Exactly. Wide enough that it doesn't feel threatened. Narrow enough that it can control the flow. And quiet."
Mira tilted her head. "Quiet?"
"It's not just big. It's smart — at least in the way old predators are. It won't be anywhere that's noisy. It'll want to feel everything around it."
Jace sighed and pushed a hand through his hair. "So we're hunting a ghost in a river that's 2 miles wide."
"Not a ghost," Theo said, twirling the branch like a walking stick. "Just a lizard that thinks it owns the whole river."
Sarah stopped walking and looked out toward the water again. The river forked here, creating a crescent-shaped island covered in reeds and low brush. The current moved slower than it had upstream.
"We start looking in places like this," she said. "We won't find it unless it wants to be found. But if we're close…"
"It'll feel us," Mira finished.
"Right: Sarah said smartly,"we just need to make sure it's angry enough to move up and down the river to interfere with whatever Harold wants stopped."
They stood in silence for a moment, the breeze rustling through the trees, the faint splash of a heron taking flight somewhere downriver.
"Alright," Sarah said finally. "Let's split up by a few hundred meters. Stay within eyesight. Stick to the shorelines. We're not waking it yet. Just looking for where it sleeps."
Jace muttered, "This is gonna end great."
Theo grinned. "Come on. Nice day for a walk."
The day passed with a slow, simmering tension — the kind that made every snapped twig feel like a warning.
They moved in pairs along the river's edge, circling back to regroup every hour. The sun beat down through the trees, dappling the ground in shifting patches of gold and green. They found more gators lounging on half-sunken logs, mostly indifferent to their presence — but every now and then one would ease back into the water a little too quietly, a little too smoothly, and vanish into the murk. If anyone got too close to one, it would surge out of the water at them hissing. They were surprisingly fast when they wanted to.
A few times, they came across the signs of other visitors.
Once, a half-devoured deer carcass — not torn apart, but bitten clean through and dragged halfway into the river.
Once, a patch of trampled grass and broken reeds where something had clearly rested. Too large for anything they'd seen so far.
By midday, the goblins found them.
The first ambush was a joke — half a dozen of them, malnourished and barely holding together, rushed Mira and Theo while they were checking a low crossing. Mira shot two before they even got close. Theo cleaned up the rest with his blades. No injuries, no fuss.
"They're desperate," Mira muttered, wiping her blade on a tuft of grass.
"Yeah," Theo agreed. "But still watching."
The second group was smarter. They struck at Sarah and Jace along the tree line, using stones and spears from above, but the team had grown too used to this kind of harassment. Jace yanked Sarah down before one of the stones could hit, he threw one of his extra swords at them, his lucky hit obliterated one of their heads."
Sarah could only smile at his lucky hit.
"Persistent little bastards," Jace muttered.
"Yeah," Sarah said, adjusting her pack. "But I don't think they're hunting us."
"Not a fan," he muttered.
In the late afternoon, the last oddity came. A centaur — alone, and far off. They spotted him on a bluff across the river, half-shadowed by trees, watching silently. Then he was gone.
"He didn't move like a scout," Mira said when they regrouped. "Too casual. Like he already knew where we were."
"Or like he was checking something else," Sarah replied. "Either way, I don't like it."
They didn't see another sign of him for hours.
Evening came slowly. The heat drained from the air, replaced by a quiet stillness. The kind that comes before a storm or something worse.
Sarah found the cave by accident — a narrow opening hidden between two moss-covered boulders, just a few dozen feet above the waterline. It was surprisingly deep and ended up going further down into the earth. Sarah wanted to go scout it out completely but they ran out of torches the night before and hadn't made anymore. She was kicking herself for not doing it sooner.
"We'll sleep here," she said. "I don't like how quiet it's gotten. Mira, think you can make more torches? We're gonna need them if we get attacked tonight."
"You think we're being followed?" Theo asked.
"I think we're being watched," she replied. "That centaur was too bold. And I swear I've seen eyes on us twice since dusk."
Jace knelt just inside the cave's mouth and began setting up a low cookfire. "Then I'm not sleeping deep."
"None of us are," Mira said. "I'll take first watch and work on making these."
Sarah nodded, dropping her pack near the wall and rolling her shoulders. "Settle in. We'll search again in the morning."
Outside, the sky dimmed from gold to violet. The sound of frogs and insects rose up from the river.
Jace blinked hard and rubbed a hand across his eyes. The inside of the cave was warm, too warm, and the walls pressed in close around him. His head dipped again, nodding toward his chest, and he snapped upright with a frustrated sigh.
"Dammit."
It was around 0200. The fire had long burned out, leaving the air thick with the faint smell of smoke and damp stone. Mira was asleep, curled near the wall with her bow across her lap. Sarah and Theo were on the other side, both still and quiet.
Jace stood, shouldering his light cloak and stepping toward the entrance. His boots barely whispered over the rock. Outside, the night was cooler, with dew clinging to the leaves and the soft chirp of frogs echoing through the undergrowth.
He moved down the slope toward the treeline, walking slow and careful, placing each step with practiced quiet. The forest was still — peaceful even.
Should've set some trip lines, he thought. Something to give us warning. I'm getting lazy.
He shook the thought off and kept moving, stretching his legs just enough to chase off the numbness in his limbs. He was just comfortable gliding through the woods practicing what Garrick had shown him.
Then —
A thump.
Another. And another.
Hoofbeats.
Jace froze. The soft cadence of trotting hooves slowed, drawing nearer.
Shit.
He dropped low, slipping behind a mossy log, and began running through the steps Garrick had drilled into every would-be scout.
SLLS. Stop. Look. Listen. Smell.
He held his breath, eyes scanning the treeline.
Nothing.
Then he glanced back toward the cave. No fire. No light. No sound. There was nothing there to give us away.
That's when three centaurs appeared.
The largest — easily the largest centaur Jace had ever seen — emerged from the trees like a phantom of war. His upper body was wrapped in dark leather, and he carried a massive claymore over one shoulder. The weapon gleamed faintly in the moonlight, too polished for a backwoods raider. It had an ornate hilt and engraved guard. This wasn't some wild tribesman. This was a leader or some kind of horse warlord.
The two that flanked him were barely smaller. One had a heavy-bladed axe across his back. The other carried a bow — a massive, recurved thing that looked like it could punch through a tree.
They moved quietly, unnaturally so for their size, and stared toward the ridge where the cave was hidden.
Jace's heart pounded in his chest as they lingered, just standing there. Listening and watching.
Then they slowly retreated back into the woods. Jace exhaled.
Only for a new sound to reach him. More hoofbeats.
He turned his head slightly — and dozens of centaurs emerged, filtering between the trees in a loose crescent formation. At least thirty, maybe more. But they were quiet and disciplined.
They know. They're moving for the cave.
His breath caught in his throat. His heart leapt into his chest and he had to stop himself from breaking into a run immediately.
"Of course this would happen on my shift," he whispered bitterly. "Couldn't be Mira's watch. Or Sarah's. Nope. It's always gotta be Jace's fault. They are never gonna let me forget this."
He began crawling backwards through the brush, careful to keep the cave in sight, careful not to make a sound.
They were coming.
And he needed to warn the others — now.
Jace's foot slid over moss as he crept backward, heart pounding so hard he thought the centaurs might hear it. He was halfway between the cave and the treeline now — maybe forty meters from the others.
Too far. Even if he ran, even if he screamed… they'd be on him before he could rouse the whole group. Theo might get up in time. Maybe Sarah. But Mira slept light — she'd bolt upright, but her first move would be to reach for her bow, not dodge a spear. He ran over a mental list of his Perks but nothing jumped at him that would help him in this situation.
I won't make it. They won't make it.
He stopped, crouched low in the brush, breathing hard.
Think. Come on, Jace. What does Garrick keep saying? Panic can be more harmful than the actual threat.
He looked down at the small pouch on his belt — his gear was light tonight, stripped down for travel. But he still had a few things.
His flint.
A half-burnt torch stub.
A couple rags he had gathered from dead goblins.
Jace squinted toward the woodline.
The centaurs were spreading out — creeping through the trees like wolves. But they weren't rushing. They were cautious. Actively looking for traps. Which meant they didn't know exactly where the cave was yet but knew they were there.
He exhaled slowly. That's your edge.
His fingers worked quickly now. He wrapped the rags around the almost done torch, poured a splash of oil from the small flask he kept, then struck the flint twice.
Snap.
A spark.
Snap.
The rag caught.
He cradled the flickering flame for a second, then flung it as hard as he could into a dry patch of bramble off to the right, deeper in the trees. It thudded into the underbrush and lit with a dull whoomph as dry leaves and branches caught.
Then Jace took a rock — something fist-sized — and hurled it after the flame in the opposite direction, snapping branches loudly as it tumbled.
He heard confused snorts and a voice — low, guttural — barking a sharp command in a language he didn't know.
He grinned.
Okay. That did something.
He crouched again, picked a second rock, and threw it farther along the same arc. More noise. A crashing sound that could've been someone fleeing.
That was enough.
The centaur formation shifted — a dozen of them started moving toward the noise, toward the growing flicker of flame. They're moving. Go now.
Jace turned and sprinted for the cave — low and fast, not bothering with stealth now. He vaulted over a root, ducked a branch, hit the slope, and rolled into the mouth of the cave with a grunt.
He hit the wall with his shoulder, staggered upright, and hissed, "Up! Wake up! They're coming!"
Theo was already rising, hand on his weapon. Mira was on her feet in a heartbeat, eyes sharp, bow in hand.
Sarah was already grabbing her sword.
Jace gasped for breath, eyes wide. "They're right outside. I bought maybe a minute!"
Both Sarah and Mira spoke at once.
"How many?"
"What was it?"
Jace held up both hands like that might slow the flood of questions. "Big. I mean huge. Biggest damn horse I've ever seen — and it had the biggest sword I've ever seen. Looked like it was forged by a blacksmith with self-esteem issues."
Theo barked a laugh.
Mira smacked him on the shoulder. "Not the time, Theo."
"Sorry," he said, grinning despite himself. "It just sounded like he was describing a centaur that moonlights on the cover of a romance novel."
Jace gave him a flat look. "Well, he wasn't here to sweep me off my feet. He had friends, Theo. Like… a lot of them."
Sarah's expression shifted. Sharp. Calculating. "If we run, do we have a chance?"
Jace shook his head immediately. "In the forest? At night? No. They're organized. Moving like a trained unit, not raiders. Fast, quiet, and too well-armed for us to scatter."
Mira's mouth tightened. "What if we run for the river?"
Jace hesitated, then nodded slowly. "Maybe. If they can't swim and stab us at the same time, we've got a shot. But one of them had a bow the size of a church window. You want to cross open water with that watching?"
Theo looked toward the cave mouth. "So what, we make a break for it now?"
Sarah didn't answer right away. She stared into the cave's shadows, thinking.
"No," she said at last. "We won't outrun them. Not all of us. But we've got one advantage — they haven't found us yet. They're still searching."
She turned toward the rear of the cave. The walls narrowed, just a little, but there was a darker seam at the back — a natural passage, shoulder-wide at best, sloping down.
"We go deeper," she said. "Hide. If they're as big as you said, they won't fit. The tunnel's too narrow. We wait until they pass or give up."
Theo squinted. "And if they try anyway?"
"Then we fight," Sarah said flatly. "We hold the line at the choke. Even Mira will have trouble squeezing through there."
Mira smiled, visibly pleased. "Thank you."
They moved quickly. Mira slung her bow, shouldered her pack. Theo grabbed the leftover torch and sparked it to life, shielding the small flame. Sarah led the way, ducking into the tight tunnel.
Sarah grabbed some of the wood from the leftover fire they had, they would need all the light they could get.
Jace lingered a second longer at the mouth of the cave.
He could hear hooves now. Closer. Voices, too — low and confident. No more stealth.
He clenched his jaw, gave the dark outside one last glance, then turned and followed the others into the barely lit darkness.