Ambrose floated in a sea of darkness. He remembered he had been in pain, but now all he felt was warm, but somehow less safe.

  Why has all this happened, why me? He thought.

  Why not you? His own thoughts seemed to respond

  I'm no one, I can't even get in to a guild. He thought in reply.

  No thought came in response, instead he felt a sudden, annoying prod on his nose. Ambrose slowly opened his eyes, and was met with a small green face looking over him. As the face noticed that he was awake, it quickly jumped back.

  "Daa, Maa, Mr lord is awake!" The child yelled as she ran off.

  Ambrose laid on the ground, trying to get some bearing of where he was. There was a warmth near him that he assumed was from a fire, and he was staring up at a stone ceiling. He tried to sit up, but the thumping in his head as he did made him give up the attempt. He was laying on something soft but could feel underneath was rock hard. He also knew one important fact. He was not on his land.

  The sound of footsteps caught his attention and he slowly turned his head to the side. Gro-Lag darted round the corner of the cave and looked at him.

  "Lord Ambrose, I'm so glad your awake." The goblin said as he walked up to him.

  Behind him Ambrose could see the child that he had been woken by, peering inquisitively from behind Gro-Lag's legs.

  Gro-Lag followed his gaze to the child. "Oh, of course, I haven't introduced you. This is my daughter Reen-Ge?n-Lüg."

  Ambrose assumed that he was still very out of it, as the sounds that Gro-Lag had made when he assumed he was saying his daughters name sounded mostly incomprehensible to him.

  As Gro-Lag spoke another person walked to the back of the cave.

  "How is he Gro?" they asked.

  A female goblin holding a baby walked up and stood just behind his friend.

  "Perfect timing" Gro-Lag said with a smile. "This is my wife Ros-Ge?n-Lüg and my son Gren-Lag."

  Again, while his son’s name sounded easy enough to pronounce. The sounds he assumed was his wife’s name sounded like something he couldn’t begin to understand how to say.

  "Nice to meet you." Ambrose said with a pained smile. "I am guessing, this is the cave you have been living in?"

  Gro-Lag nodded. "I couldn't wake you, so I moved you here so my wife could see to you."

  At her mention, Gro-Lag's wife moved forward. "You have several broken ribs, and from all the vomit Gro-Lag said was by you, I assume a concussion."

  Ambrose put his hand on his head. "And a fairly big dose of spell fatigue." He said grimacing.

  Gro-Lag and his wife looked at each other and then back to Ambrose. "So, you did heal me?" Said Gro-Lag.

  "I looked over Gro while you were resting. He has some bruises and scrapes, but all of them seem to be at least mostly healed, but what really worried me was the dried blood on his chin." Gro-Lag's wife said, narrowing her eyes slightly.

  The sense of relief that Gro-Lag was ok made Ambrose feel a lot better. "I found you unconscious after the explosion." He said. "I focused on healing your head and you managed to wake up, but when I asked where you thought you was the most injured, you started coughing up blood, so I focused on your chest."

  The female goblin seemed to soften a bit at Ambrose's words. "Well, he is healed enough now, but I think you are going to need a few days rest." She said.

  "Thank you Ros-Ge... Ros-Gean-" Ambrose tried to pronounce the name Gro-Lag had introduced her with, but just couldn't seem to get the sounds right.

  "It's fine, humans always have trouble with female goblin names, I think it's your inferior teeth." she said. "You can call me Ros."

  Ambrose couldn't help but chuckle at the phrase inferior teeth, but appreciated her understanding. "OK, thank you Ros for looking after me, but I gave my word to Gro-lag that we would have somewhere comfortable for his family to stay, and I intend to keep that promise." As he spoke, he pushed himself up into a sitting position, which caused both Gro-lag and Ros to move to catch him if he fell back down.

  He gestured with his hands to show he was fine, and got himself into a comfortable position. "If I can have enough food and water, I should be able to recover enough to heal myself, not enough to be completely fixed, but enough to work."

  Gro-Lag nodded. "As long as you're sure my lord." He asked.

  At the mention of Ambrose's 'title' he saw Ros' expression drop slightly.

  "I have tried to tell him he can just call me Ambrose." He said to her.

  She rolled her eyes. "I know, and trust me I won't be using such silly human titles."

  Gro-Lag shot her a look, but Ambrose just laughed.

  After a good evening meal and a few water skins of water Ambrose was able to channel healing to some of the areas Ros said he was the most injured. That plus a night's rest in the cave meant that by the morning, he felt quite a lot better.

  In the morning he, Gro-lag and his family, made their way back to his land. Once they crossed the border at the south, Ambrose saw the same strange look cross the faces of Ros and Gro-Lag's daughter, that he had seen on Reabeck's.

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  Ros paused for a moment as the strange feeling washed over her, before turning to Ambrose. "I’m still not calling you my lord." she said.

  Once back at the camp they assessed the situation. The explosion had completely destroyed the tree they were trying to cut in half, but luckily it hadn't damaged any of the others that they had brought down.

  Ambrose, through his still aching ribs, started the process of cutting down another tree, while Gro-Lag continued cutting the trees they already had down to size. While Ambrose insisted, she didn't need to; especially since she was carrying baby Gren-Lag, Ros cleaned up some of the mess left from the explosion. Once she had gotten the place looking tidy, she made her way over to Ambrose.

  "What else can I do?" She asked.

  Ambrose stopped swinging and lent on the axe breathing heavily. "I mean we need to start gathering clay but-."

  "Ok." she said quickly and turned back towards the camp center. After looking around for a moment she moved to pick up the cooking pot, but stopped when she saw the remains of Ambrose's attempted at a clay bucket.

  "You humans have some strange looking art." she said, turning her head back slightly.

  Ambrose rubbed the back of his head feeling a bit embarrassed. "It was meant to be a bucket."

  Ros looked back at the misshapen lump of clay. She gave a small huff of a laugh and walked off with the pot.

  Not to long later Ambrose managed to bring down the extra tree they needed and went to Gro-lag for help carrying it over. As he walked over, he looked at the pile of tree they needed to cut, and the pile of trees they had cut. The second pile looking a lot bigger than he thought it would be.

  "Hello Mr lord." Gro-Lag's daughter said as she saw him.

  "Hello darling." He said, as he walked up.

  The little goblin screwed her face up in confusion. "What's darling?" She asked.

  "I'm not too sure to be honest, it's what the adults used to call the little girls at my orphanage." He replied.

  "But my name is Reen-Ge?n-Lüg?" The girl said.

  The name was as much of a foreign sound to him as her mother's, but the first sound reminded him of another name he had heard before.

  Ambrose knelt so he was eye level with the girl before he spoke. "I am really sorry but I can't pronounce your name."

  "Is it because of your tiny teeth?" She asked.

  Ambrose laughed. "Maybe, but your name sounds like the name of a little girl I grew up with, would you mind if I called you Reenie?"

  The girl thought for a moment and then gave a nod. "Ok, I like Reenie."

  It was at that point that Gro-Lag walked over. "What are you two nattering about?" He asked, smiling.

  "I'm Reenie." His daughter said to him, beaming.

  Gro-Lag looked at her confused, and then at Ambrose. After a brief explanation of the agreement they had come to, he moved to the surprising amount of progress his friend had made.

  "How have you managed to get so many cut?" He asked gesturing to the pile of logs. The ones they had where mostly three times longer than the length they needed and so most of them needed to be cut through twice, plus smaller cuts to get them to a uniform enough length.

  Gro-Lag beamed almost as much as his daughter had to him a moment ago. "Let me show you." He said, gesturing for Ambrose to follow.

  As they walked, Ambrose could see that Gro-Lag had moved a rock so that he could balance a log between it and another that was already nearby. Once they reached it the goblin picked up a bone knife and a smaller rock of the ground. He walked to the log and placed the point of the blade over a mark he had made on its bark. He hit the base of the knife with the rock until it was embedded deep into the wood. He then pulled it out, turned the log and repeated until he had done it on all four sides.

  Once the knife was embedded in the fourth side, Gro-lag put down the rock he had been using and picked up a much larger one. He looked at Ambrose, Smiled, and slammed it down onto the log, right on top of the hilt of the blade. The log cracked, and broke at the point he had been cutting.

  Gro-Lag raise his arms in victory and grinned ear to ear. "And I have only cracked one of the bone knifes." He said.

  "Yaaay." Reenie cheered, while clapping for her father.

  Ambrose also gave a small applause, though he did have one question.

  "Gro-Lag, wouldn't this have been a lot easier, with the hunting knife?" He asked, pulling it from its sheaf on his belt.

  Gro-Lag kept his arms in the air and stared blankly at the question. "Most likely." He said. He dropped his arms and shrugged. "We can try using it next time."

  "That next time is now." Ambrose added. I have the last tree we need down, was just coming to ask you to help bring it over."

  Once they have brought the tree over and balanced it on the two rocks, Gro-Lag's new technique, combined with using an actual metal knife made short work of the log.

  Ambrose had to admit he was very relieved at their progress. Considering the delay from Gro-Lag's very effective force rune, they were actually ahead of schedule when it came to the shelter for Gro-lag and his family, though the fact that his family had already arrived at the camp two full days early had somewhat thrown the plan out the window.

  "How's it going with the runes Rea asked for?" Ambrose asked as he and Gro-Lag moved one of the logs they had just cut.

  "I got a little bit behind, but I was able to finish most of them while you were still resting." He replied.

  When they had placed the log down, Ambrose placed his hands on his hips and looked at the woods around him, giving a deep sigh as he did.

  "Everything ok my lord?" Gro-lag asked.

  Ambrose slowly turned to look at him and then back at the woods. "This, all of this, I just can't let it all sink in, it just all seems so mad, and I can’t understand why it has all happened.” He said gesturing to the area around them.

  Gro-Lag looked at him, confused. "I think it quite simple my lord." He replied.

  Ambrose stared at him, expectantly waiting for him to explain his idea of it all.

  "Well." The goblin said after a moment. "From what you said happen and from what the Imp said, you were kind, and that kindness was rewarded."

  "All I did was heal a rabbit?" Ambrose said, with a small laugh.

  Gro-Lag just smiled at him, his exposed gotten teeth almost reaching the bottom of his eyes. "Yes my lord, all you did was heal a rabbit."

  Now they had all the logs cut, they had to turn them up into walls. From what Gro-Lag knew from watching the villagers, they would bore holes through the width of the logs so that they could drive stakes down to hold them together.

  Ambrose hunched over one of the logs that was laying on the ground. He had rolled it out of the pile and was picking at its bark with his hunting knife. "We can carve holes through them using this and the remaining bone knife, but it's not going to be easy." He said.

  Gro-Lag stared at the log, clearly deep in thought. "The people from the town had metals drills that they cranked to make them."

  Ambrose stood and rubbed the back of his head. "Well, we don’t have one of them." He looked at his friend and sighed. "So, we better get started."

  They both spent the next three hours working away carving holes through the wood, they had a number of younger trees around the camp, with trunks about the size of Ambrose's forearm. They were long enough to reach the high of what they hope the cabin walls would be. So they aimed to make holes which would fit them. By the time they both had to take a brake due to how sore their hands where, the amount of progress that they had achieved, made Ambrose think they may have to go for a smaller choice of stake.

  He was about to make his suggestion when he saw Gro-Lag looking at his hands, grimacing as he did. He walked over and could see why; his hands were covered in painful looking blisters.

  "Gro-Lag, why didn’t you say anything?" He asked, annoyed. Ambrose raised his hand and held it over Gro-Lag's palms. Before the goblin could protest, Ambrose's hand glowed slightly, and while the blisters didn't complete heal, the redness around them softened.

  Ambrose slumped backwards so he was sitting on the ground, panting. "There, in an hour or so I will try again and hopefully they should clear up soon." He said.

  Gro-Lag looked at him and signed. "Thank you, my lord. If only we could use your magic to make these holes."

  Ambrose looked at the progress that Gro-Lag had made, leaving about finger deep indent into the log. Just as he was, he heard a small crack, as one of the logs in the fire split.

  "Gro-Lag, I think I have an idea."