Kyne made her return around the time Ryne made it to the town, and she led Ryne to a dilapidated house on the town’s outskirts. Not bothering to knock on the half-rotted door, Ryne pushed his way into the one-room house, finding a figure lying on the bed inside.
“Oh, Ryne. Long time no see,” the house’s resident greeted him, his single eye scrutinizing the new arrival.
“What’s wrong, Ash?” Ryne replied, raising his hand in greeting as he trudged into the house and walked up to the bed.
Ash, a weary-looking man of forty-something years, struggled up into a seated position with a wry grin.
“Come on, at least say hello. I made a bit of a mistake and messed up my leg. I’ve been dying of boredom waiting for someone to come get me, so I was playing with the bird whistle, and lo and behold, this one came and answered. I gave it a letter to see if anyone would come visit, but I never expected it would be you.”
Ryne sighed. “Don’t waste the bird’s time just because you’re bored.”
The bird whistle was a special tool of the People of the Forest. It made a high-pitched sound that birds could pick up on, but it was beyond a person’s range of hearing. Blowing a specific tune on that whistle called the mail birds that worked for the People of the Forest. Normally, the mail birds were taught that sound when they were still babies, and naturally Ryne had made sure Kyne knew the signal as well, so Kyne, who’d happened to be in the area entirely by chance, had responded to it. The nut Kyne had been carrying had been too large for her mail tube, so she had carried it in her beak instead and ended up luring Ryne to this place.
“So, how’s your leg?” Ryne deflated a little at the thought he had been brought here just by someone else’s boredom, but he nevertheless wanted to know about Ash’s condition.
“Emergency treatment’s already done,” Ash replied, peeling back the covering on his leg. His entire right leg was braced with wooden slats, fixed in place. “I got distracted harvesting some rare herbs I came across and ended up walking right off a cliff. Man, I panicked for real.” He laughed heartily, slapping his shaved head.
Ryne could only sigh again. “Of all things. How are the nerves?”
“I don’t feel anything, so I’m not sure it’ll ever heal. I’ll be a great experiment for the village, I’m sure,” Ash described his inevitable future with a grim expression. “But more importantly, I hear they’re looking for you. What did you do this time?” he asked, looking inquisitively into Ryne’s eyes.
“No clue. I don’t remember doing anything of note.” But considering the timing of it all, Ryne had only bad feelings about it.
“I guess you’re one of the harder guys to track down, though. You don’t even make your regular reports, do you?”
“No point.” The main purpose of those regular reports was to confirm that they were still alive and well, but Ryne rarely ever bothered. He had finally taken a hold of true freedom, and at no small cost to himself. Why would he throw that away?
“Suit yourself. Anyways, the message for you is that Miranda is waiting for you in Redford’s capital, so contact her as soon as possible. My work here is done.”
Ryne’s eyes widened a little, surprised that a person he had been thinking about just a few days ago had come up again already.
“Miranda’s in the capital?” Ryne sighed again. The timing was just too perfect. It couldn’t mean anything good.
“Changing topics a bit, have you seen Old Man Nel recently?”
“What? Of course not—we study entirely different things. Why do you ask?”
Nel was one of the more eccentric of the elders of the People of the Forest. Ryne’s research focused on surgery, so he was typically wandering from battlefield to battlefield, but the old man studied diseases and infections.
“Apparently, he rushed out of the village saying, ‘I feel a plague coming,’ and headed this way.”
“Thanks for the wonderful news. I’m sure it won’t disturb me at all,” Ryne said bitterly.
Even though he was almost seventy, Nel was a renowned troublemaker, constantly leaving the village for whatever strange thing took his fancy that season. The thought of having to deal with him elicited one more heavy sigh out of Ryne.
Ugh, this is going to be a pain.
In truth, once someone left the village, it was pretty rare for them to come across other members of the tribe. But now Ryne was set up to meet Ash, Miranda, and potentially even Nel in quick succession.
He couldn’t help but feel like fate was pulling at his strings, and there was only one place he could imagine he was being drawn to. But when he recalled the innocent, cheerful smile the girl had worn during their last meeting, he couldn’t bring himself to fight that fate.
As Ash saw him off with a sympathetic smile, Ryne started toward the capital.
Once he reached Redford’s capital, Ryne managed to meet up with Miranda, who gave him quite the earful for keeping in touch with Leyas behind her back. It was a tedious lecture to listen to, but the fact of the matter was he had kept a relationship with his sister on his own, so he let Miranda speak her piece without comment.
Then Nel, who had watched the whole exchange with a wide grin, brought up the story of the so-called plague that was breaking out in the area, dragging Ryne into getting involved with it. He was only then able to finally reunite with Misha.
After all he had been through to get there, even if none of it was her fault, he couldn’t help being a bit harsh in the way he spoke to her. At the same time, he thought of Nel, sneaking his way into the team of doctors working in the capital. How would the king and his retainers respond to this crisis? And how would Nel take those reactions?
In the end, with Misha pushing him from behind in an attempt to hurry him along, he couldn’t fight the curious smile peeking through on his face.