J waited for the demon heart to appear from the melted remains and plucked it from the ground. Audie let him take claim over it, even though she’d slain it herself. Mouse clicked his tongue. If he’d known it was up for grabs, he could’ve easily gotten to it first.

  But he didn’t, and so he lost out.

  “Let’s move. Onto the next area then.” Audie ushered Telania ahead, and she took the lead.

  They didn’t walk more than another few minutes before Telania pushed aside a bare bush and shoveled a little fallen snow out of the way, revealing another hole. Like the first, it was narrow in width and limited who could go down.

  “Should I check this one, too?” Mouse asked, readying to hop down.

  Audie shook her head. “No need. I’ll take it as similar to the first.” Then, she turned back to Telania. “Where’s the third?

  “A little closer to the wall, this way.”

  Mouse looked out beyond the snow and bare trees to the fir pines which shrouded much of their view of the Winolin’s wall. The brush grew denser as they moved, and Loser complained much of the way of getting snow in his boots.

  As if Mouse himself wasn’t drenched in wet, frozen mud. His hands and feet chilled, though thankfully his own heat kept the worst of it at bay. At the third hole, Audie and the other three mercenaries muttered above it.

  Something in the snow caught Mouse’s attention, and he stepped a few paces away, squatting beneath a fir tree. In the snow, imprints of a three taloned creature lay only near the tree’s base. It snowed not long ago, and while the tree would protect prints better than bare ones, the wind should’ve swept snow over it by now.

  It was a fresh print.

  “I found something,” Mouse called, and Audie quickened to him.

  “A track?”

  “Looks like a small demon, by the size.” Mouse placed a hand beside it, the print reaching about two-thirds the length of his hand. “I don’t see any more. Likely ran up the tree.”

  Audie studied the area, checking for any signs of movement. Mouse already did the same, of course, and found nothing. Not that he was going to stop the guildmaster from doing whatever she wanted. He stood, stepping past the hole and beyond a little more brush. No tracks.

  “Okay, whether this track is from the demon I killed or not, be on your guard. There have been too many sightings here to be careless. Fan out, and look for—”

  Crunches perked Mouse’s ears. Far to his left. He took off, sliding his sword from his sheath and taking chase. Audie and another mercenary, Loser, perhaps, called after him, but he ignored their voices.

  Mouse swept around tall trees and any brush in his path. Surely, his steps echoed to whatever he’d heard, but if he was fast enough, they wouldn’t be able to react. He hopped over a line of bushes to find his target.

  A large demon, arms dangling to the ground, mouth widened across its body, stood just ahead. Its mouth dropped upon spotting him, the jaw dropping into the snow.

  A Howler.

  Mouse rushed forward as the demon breathed in, slamming his sword into the thing’s mouth and piercing its hardened flesh at the back of its throat. It screamed a bellow of clicks. Mouse’s head pounded, vibrations ripping through him and shredding his thoughts.

  Mouse gritted, red dripping from his ears for the second time that day. He sliced outwards, tearing through the demon’s mouth and out its cheek. But the demon pushed forward in the same direction of his sword, preventing lethal damage, and whipped back and away from Mouse.

  Before it could howl again, Mouse darted back to it. But the demon reacted, slinging one of its long arms out and hooking its claws into Mouse’s arm. He pulled back, but the demon did not let go.

  A smile spread over its disgusting, broken mouth, and shivers ran across Mouse’s spine.

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  Audie dashed in front of him, slicing down on the arm and severing it from the demon. It clicked in a frenzy. Audie turned to him, and Mouse rushed past her.

  He kicked up to a tree, gaining height over the demon, and slashed over the demon’s head, splitting down the center and through one of its eyes. The demon managed a squeal before the force of his sword cut through enough to kill it.

  The demon dropped to the ground, blue pooling and staining the snow in an instant. He breathed, pain setting into his arm and head, and he blinked back darkness as it tried taking him. The ground swayed, and though he stumbled, he did not fall.

  Audie appeared in front of him, her eyes scrunched in what Mouse could only assume was annoyance. “How’s your head?”

  Ah, so not annoyance, but worry.

  He didn’t need shit like that from a human.

  A rustle drew him to a tree behind Audie. He whipped around her, glimpsing a shadow in the tree’s bark, and slammed the tip of his blade into it. Clicks, and a demon shook from its camouflage, dropping limp, pinned to the tree.

  “Another scout.” He spat at it, leaning against the tree as his head squeezed in pain. When it released him, he pulled off the tree and shook the pain off. “With how many demons we’ve seen today, I doubt that’s all of them. Though I don’t hear anymore.”

  “You… heard these two? From so far away?” Audie looked from the dead Howler, melting into the snow, to the scout. “Quite the hearing you have.”

  “Yeah, I get that a lot.” Mouse turned away as Telania and the other mercenaries finally appeared, taking a look at the carnage.

  “I see your skills with the Ravenguild weren’t a fluke. You’ve taken down two of these large demons today?” J whistled, poking at the Howler.

  “Hey, that’s my heart,” Mouse snapped at him, staking his claim. “Both of them were my kills.”

  J raised his hands in surrender, a quirk of a smile spreading across his dumb face. “Got it.”

  “But you are reckless.” Audie scowled Mouse, shaking her head. “Running off to fight a Howler. Alone, at that. What if you’d gotten severely injured?”

  He shrugged. What did injury matter? As long as he survived, he’d heal.

  Audie sighed, pressing a few fingers to her temple and rubbing it, as if she were the one the Howler gave a migraine to. “I am responsible if you are injured. So please at least take that into consideration. I will not be pleased if I have more paperwork because of you.”

  “Sounds like your job sucks.” Mouse picked up his two hearts, wondering if the tiny pebble of the scout’s could even sell for anything.

  “Yes, it does,” Audie spoke in monotone, “so don’t make it worse.”

  “No promises.” Taiga always said not to make promises he didn’t intend to keep.

  Audie sighed before nodding. “I did this to myself, I suppose.”

  “How about,” Loser cut in, “we compromise? Just let us know when you hear something, so we can check it out with you.”

  It seemed doable. Mouse nodded. “What was your name?”

  “Loisen?” Loser—ah, Loisen, said, rocking his head to the side.

  “I’ll try to remember that.” He was not a terrible human.

  “Thanks, I think.”

  Mouse turned back towards the wall. “The Howler came from that direction.” He pointed towards the bushes he’d seen the demon walk through.

  “You think something’s over there?” J asked, scratching his head.

  What an idiot.

  “Well, did you think it was preparing for a fun little tea party, then? It came from somewhere. And we should figure out where.”

  Audie looked towards the wall, maybe a hundred meters out. “I have a bad feeling about this.”

  “We’re too close to the wall for this to be a coincidence.” Telania stepped beside Audie, nodding.

  Mouse considered saying something, but remained silent under Telania’s gaze. He wasn’t afraid of a fight, but rather how far his temper would take him while unchecked. After a few moments, he walked through the brush and towards the direction the Howler came from.

  It was easy to find its tracks, large imprints in the snow unmistakable for anything else that could walk the woods. Mouse pressed on, the other mercenaries and Audie close behind. Beyond the deepest brush, where the snow piled a little higher and even animal steered clear from, stood the southeastern wall of Winolin.

  Unlike the checkpoints and towny parts of the wall, this section was unkempt, dead ivy vines sprawled across it in hoards, discoloration in some parts likely the home of moss in the summertime. The wall drew as tall as it did the rest of the way around Winolin, but it was older, un-maintenanced for years, and worn beyond its capacity.

  “Someone seems to be shirking their duties in the guard.” Loisen sighed, shaking his head at the sight of the wall.

  Audie cursed under her breath. “I’ll need to have a meeting with the governor for this. And the Captain of the guards. Unbelievable.”

  Mouse followed the tracks to the north, pushing an overgrown bush out of the way.

  “So, the demons are climbing over?” J asked.

  “No.” Mouse waved them over and pointed ahead of the bush. “They dug beneath it.”

  Just ahead of them, dirt and snow piled high to both sides of a crumbled section of wall. The tunnel looked a couple meters high and a few more wide, giving even a Howler the space it needed to move freely from within Winolin to outside. And whatever else that decided to come with it.