“Finn? Why are you looking at me like that?” Arilyn asked.

  “How is it that there is only one new God?” I finally forced out. “I mean, haven’t they been around for a very long time? A small amount of discretion is to be understood. But not one of them slept around? No turning into geese or bulls or anything like that?”

  “Um, no. I don’t know where you got such ideas, but the Gods are usually pretty busy with things to be looking for lovers. And definitely not by turning into waterfowl. That’s just weird!”

  We rode in silence for a bit, with Arilyn giving me odd glances. It was odd to me, having grown up with stories of the proclivities of the Greek gods. They really pushed that in school, as if it was super important.

  “In the mythology of Earth, there were these different pantheons of gods that were really messed up. This one god really had a thing for mortal women and would sneak around, changing shape, whatever he could to hide what he was doing from his wife. The moral of most of the stories of these gods was that they were petty and embodied much of the worst of humanity.”

  Her eyes went wide. “So that’s why you, and the majority of Earthborn, are leery of the Gods here. Because you don’t have good ones back on Earth!”

  “Something like that,” I replied. “And the religions we have are so rife with politics and greed that the whole thing is even worse.”

  “I think I understand now,” Arilyn said with a smile. “The Gods here are a lot like people, though they attempt to hold themselves to higher standards, to demonstrate a better way to all of us. Sure, there are dalliances, some great love stories between gods and mortals, but nothing ever came of them. Except for Missana’s affairs. There are a hundred stories about her epic love, and most of them contradict each other. Some say her lover was a bard of such raw talent and beauty, while other stories claim he was a carpenter or a soldier.”

  “You’ve traveled with the Storyteller, and you work for her daughter. What do you think?” I asked.

  She shook her head. “I’ve heard them all from Missana, and she swears up and down that they are all true. The Goddess of Knowledge doesn’t even know.”

  “I don’t know who sired me, either. Mother never told us,” Vessa added. She felt sad in my mind. I passed it on to Arilyn.

  Arilyn looked sadly at the baby dragon. “It’s not unusual, Vessa. I’m sorry you’re going through that.”

  Vessa meeped sadly. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to go through.”

  “Vessa, I get it,” I replied. “I lost everything when I was brought here, and I am still dealing with it. But you know what?”

  “What?” Vessa asked.

  “I also gained quite a bit. I’ve met some wonderful people, made some good friends, and now I have you in my life,” I said. “Think of everything you’ve seen and done since you joined us. All the people you now have in your life.”

  Vessa thought about it for a moment. “I still miss my mother, my brothers and sisters.”

  “And you should,” I said. “We always miss the people we lose, but we get stronger. And the pain from missing them, well, it’s balanced with the good memories.”

  It was odd how so much of what I told her had felt like bullshit when my therapist had told me. Now it was pretty obvious. I felt like I had finally made some actual progress in my grief over losing my Dad, progress that I hadn’t even noticed. I wondered if it had anything to do with taking control of my life and situation, even if I still felt way out of my depth.

  We stopped for lunch by the roadside. It had gotten hot, and we found a nice place to stop under some magnificent shade trees. I ate quietly, meditating on the events of yesterday and today. My head whirled with all the violence of the battle with the gnolls, followed by the bizarre testing. It was almost too much, learning that the gnolls I had faced had families and lives before I… killed them.

  It wasn’t even me humanizing monsters. I saw some of their children and met their wives. This was the worst part of it: seeing the consequences of my actions, the joyous laughter of the playing gnoll children trailing off as they looked around confused. Their eyes searched for their fathers who weren’t home.

  I didn’t want to open my stat sheet. I knew what I would see. There’s going to be a full bar of experience energy for my killing all those gnolls. The meeting with the gnoll Matrons and getting their approval might have gotten me some, too. But not as much as I got for killing gnolls.

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  But I had the time, and not dealing with it could put myself and the fate of all the Earthborn at risk. Taking a deep breath in through my nose, I opened up my stat sheet.

  I was right. There really was enough experience energy to level. I wish this were easier, like when I had enough experience energy to level up, it would tell me. Maybe an alert that said something like “level up!” I knew it was wishful thinking, hoping for a better user interface, but I might as well wish for a deluxe double butterburger with bacon and jalapenos or a smothered burrito.

  With a sigh, I focused on the experience energy and accepted it. My level rose to 16, and my intelligence and wisdom went up to 41 and 38 respectively, but then I noticed endurance went up one as well, from 25 to 26. That wasn’t normal, but I decided to just go with it. I put one point into dexterity to bring it up to 24. I hoped it would help keep me on my feet better.

  Then I put another point into intelligence, bringing it up to 42, and one more into wisdom, pushing it up to 39. I was excited to see what my mana pool and mana regeneration rate would go up to. My health had gone up to 454, a nice jump of seven points. My mana pool was now a very respectable 571, and my mana regeneration was…

  ‘Finn the Mage has stumbled upon a horrible, yet constant truth of the System. One that many before him have experienced, some at a greater frequency than Finn ever will. There are Glitches in the System. Some are small, involving experience energy not being appropriately attributed to everyone within a party, while others are quite large. I won’t go into those. Some glitches are too horrible to discuss. This one, fortunately, is somewhere between the two. Two integers in an equation, specifically the equation for mana regeneration, were interchanged. And thus, Finn the Mage’s mana regeneration was calculated at a higher rate than it should have been. The issue has fortunately been corrected, and Finn’s mana regeneration rate is now as it should be. We apologize for the inconvenience.’

  There was a certain amount of glee in the Voice’s delivery of this information. Like it relished in my reduction of ability. It hurt to see my mana regen reduced from a gorgeous 20 mana per minute to 6.248 mana points per minute. At the same time, I had been given an unfair advantage, and as useful as that had been, I had a hard time using something like that to my advantage. There was something inside of me that refused to cheat. It still pained me to be reduced in power like that.

  “Finn, what’s got you making pained noises over there?” Harper asked. “Did you sit on an anthill? I know it’s funny, but you can move, you know!”

  Opening my eyes, I looked in her direction. “I leveled up,” I muttered.

  “Good for you. What’s the problem?”

  “There was a glitch with my last level up and my mana regen was too high,” I replied.

  Arilyn gasped. “A glitch? I’m so sorry, Finn.” She looked at me with sympathy. “I’ve read about that happening to people sometimes. It used to be much more common.”

  “Yeah,” I replied. “The voice mentioned that. We should probably get moving.”

  Vessa was sunning herself close to me in an errant sunbeam that had somehow made it through the tree’s thick canopy. She looked up when I stood and let me scoop her up. “What’s the plan? More riding in the sun until evening?” she asked in my head.

  “That’s the plan. We’re still a few days away from the mountains.”

  “Oh, good. I’ve got to store up as much of this lovely sunlight before we hit the dark area you were talking about!”

  “You know the Shadow Lands aren’t always dark, right? It’s just the shadow of those high peaks blocking the sun for part of the day,” I said wryly.

  “Finn, blocking the sun is dark. I’ve spent most of my life in the dark, not knowing how wonderful the sun is. I need to hoard as much as possible.”

  Her determination made me laugh, and I carried her over to Rocks, setting her in front of the saddle before mounting up. “That’s not how it works, Vessa!”

  “Says you!”

  We didn’t see any sign of civilization that evening, so we made camp as the sun dipped farther down behind the mountains. Harper took first watch, and it had seemed only moments before she was shaking me awake.

  “Wake up, Finn,” she whispered cheerfully. “It’s your watch.”

  I muttered something childish, and she chuckled as she moved to her bedroll. Carefully, I moved the sleeping dragon from my chest and carefully put her down on the bedroll before moving away from the low light of the fire. The moon rose, and I looked around to find a suitable spot to keep an eye out for trouble.

  I sat down on a stump near the road and settled in for a long four hours. Not long after, I heard a light footstep behind me and made to stand up. A hand came down on my shoulder.

  “It’s just me,” Arilyn said. “Just woke up.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry if I woke you,” I said as she took a couple of steps forward, stretching and yawning.

  “Nope, it’s okay. Mind if I keep you company?” she said and plopped herself down in my lap, sitting so she could look me in the eye.

  “I don’t mind one iota,” I replied.

  She giggled. “I don’t know if I’ve heard that word in a while. It means what? Something small, right?”

  “Something like that. You know, I think this is the first time since we left Alsiger that we’ve had a moment to ourselves.”

  “I think you’re right,” Arilyn said with that mischievous smile of hers. “Not for lack of trying. If those uptight gnolls hadn’t stopped us…”

  My neck and face were suddenly warm. “Arilyn, I was drunk. Morcus was worried about my honor,” I said with mock affront.

  She snorted and slapped her hand over her mouth, trying to cover up her laughter. “You are a git, Finnegan Walsh.”

  “Maybe, but you like me,” I replied with a grin. “Guess that makes me your git.”

  She got really quiet at that point, searching my face. “You really mean that, don’t you? You aren’t just saying that?”

  “I really like you, Arilyn. And I don’t want to—”

  Her lips met mine, stopping me from talking. There was no need. Everything in that moment that needed to be said was being said, just not in words. I held her tightly in my arms as her arms went under mine, embracing me just as closely.

  Where we were going, we didn’t need words.