"Very good! Now I'm going to attack you from the left and I want you to either block the tackle or dodge it properly. Understood?"

I nodded. While Aidan shifted his weight to the left side, I made myself ready to dodge towards the opposite direction, and while his foot moved a tiny bit forward, I let myself drop to the side – only to get hit by Aidan's greatsword. I stumbled to the ground confused, but got up again just the next moment. Aidan had switched sides in the last heartbeat and attacked from the right, where I wanted to evade his move. He laughed.

"Exactly what I expected. You rely too much on what I say! Stop using your brain and start to feel. You have to sense what your opponent will do next! If you start thinking, you're long dead before reaching anything. Brains are for labs, but out here you have to believe in your instinct. Once again!"

This time Aidan didn't announce a direction, but because he had just attacked from the right, I made the conclusion that his next move would come from the other side. But Aidan again chose the right side, and again I met the broadside of his weapon, but this time I managed to keep on my feet. It couldn't go on like that! I felt anger rising inside of me. Aidan had hit me with more than one painful stroke already this training session, but I still wasn't able to foresee his attacks. I would never become a good warrior if I kept on like that!

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. Back during the training with Narru, I had already managed to listen to my instinct. But I wouldn't let someone badger me for a whole week until I was able to counter. Stop using your brain and start to feel…

Piece by piece I blanked out everything that wasn't important in that moment. The loud noises of Lion's Arch, the sea in my back and the rush of my blood faded to one consistent noise, rising and ebbing away with the rhythm of my heart. The shape of the town, the cliffs and the water around me faded until I only saw Aidan in front of me, getting ready for his next move. You can do this. Focus, listen to your instinct!

In the blink of an eye I noticed dozens of different signs. The flicker in Aidan's eyes towards the side he wanted to attack. The obvious posture to the other side with which he wanted to lead me astray again. The low-key scrape of his foot in the sand, as he shifted his whole weight. This time I wouldn't let him beat me up and I wouldn't dodge. I wanted to prove to the world, and most of all to me, that the many training sessions hadn't been for nothing. That I indeed was worth of something, no matter what others would think of me.

So I took a deep breath, tasted the salty ocean in the air together with the slightly moldy scent of the aged wood. Holding the hammer tight with both hands, I waited for Aidan to start his attack while trying to recognize every even so tiny movement of his body so I could foresee where he wanted to attack next. Aidan quickly inhaled a breath and in the next moment, his greatsword was rushing towards me with full speed. But this time I had guessed right, ducked down under the sword and used the sway that had been left in Aidan's move to throw him out of balance with a hard punch on his shoulder. It worked because Aidan hadn't counted on it, and while he tumbled for a second with surprise and let down his guard, I turned around with attitude and smashed my hammer against his back with a loud cry to finally down him.

But the Norn wouldn't let himself be defeated that easily; even though he had been surprised by my first counter attack, he had regained his senses quickly and hit back. He turned around with a pain-distorted face, lunged heavily while I was still gathering my balance from my last move, and let his weapon fall down right above my head. The helmet I wore would soften the hit if I wouldn't be able to move aside, but I wanted to prove that I could achieve more. It wasn't possible to dodge to the side, as there wasn't enough time left. Thus Aidan wouldn't strike my head but my legs instead as soon as I tried to roll, and those were way less secured than my head. Therefore I had only one more option, and with all the strength I had left, I heaved the hammer above my head so he collided with the sword with a loud CLONG!

The noise hurt my ears, and the power of the impact moved painfully up my arms into my back, but I saw my chance. Now it all depended on who of us would regain position faster. Aidan took a moment to get his balance back after the weapon had twisted his wrists, and while I couldn't get a good hold onto the hammer's shaft myself, I dropped the weapon and rammed the top of my helmet into Aidan's stomach as hard as I could. With a cry, we both fell to the ground and Aidan had problems catching his breath while I sat in the grass right beside him, panting heavily and massaging my hurting shoulders.

Until now, Aidan had always held back with his attacks, but this time I had the feeling that he went one step further. Which I took for a good sign, because I was sure I slowly had reached the next step of my training, and it filled me with pride.

Aidan sat up while still panting and wiped away the sweat from his forehead, then he nodded towards me with acknowledgement. "Shorty, that was…not bad at all. You seem to…really have learned something lately. If you ask me…I think it is time to…let you fight other opponents too."

I swallowed. Other opponents? "What are you talking about?"

Aidan laughed. "Letting you confront a minotaur or ogre might be a bit too early, but I thought about devourers, wolves…something small like that."

"Pah. Small!? You have to be kidding me! Kekk has lost his leg because of such a small wolf."

"But your friend didn't have a full-scale training in the weeks before the fight, I suppose?"

I remained silent and shook my head. This was all I had wanted the whole time: for Aidan to increase the training intensity. But something about the thought made me hesitate, because while I was slowly getting better with Aidan's techniques, it was a completely different thing to face a wild animal...on the other side, Aidan would intervene for sure if something went wrong, so it wouldn't be too bad, right?

At least you know where to get good replacements if you lose a body part.

I quickly threw a glance towards the sky. We still had some time left until sunset, so the training wasn't over yet. Did Aidan intend to let me fight other enemies today?

He got up, shook the dust off his armor and signed me to follow him. I didn't ask where he was going, but as we passed the area with all the city portals, I got curious. Wolves could be found all around Tyria, so where did Aidan intend to bring me?

In fact, he brought me to the main gate of Lion's Arch, which I had seen multiple times by now, but never stepped through. Lion's Arch basically had three main entry possibilities: using the portals, by the harbor or through the massive city gate leading to the Gendarran fields. There was another way through a cave that was close to the Priory, but it was rarely used by travelers. The city gate seemed to be the target now because we went past the Lionguards, and as we left behind the huge construct I took the opportunity and paused right on the bridge to take a look at Lion's Arch from the outside.

While the city wall was the only thing I could see, there were still a few houses sitting on top of it, but the wall itself was so massive that it would definitely hold against the biggest attack coming from the land side. The enormous gate, elaborately designed into the form of a lion, seemed to roar, "Stay out if you have starting trouble in mind!"

The city was only vulnerable through air and water, which was probably still stuck inside the people's minds. But after the city had been flooded completely dozens of years ago and had been totally destroyed, they had rebuild it piece by piece. And after the first attacks of Zhaitan, the harbor defenses had been upgraded and the stronghold on Claw Island had been built. I could only shake my head about the fact that I still had access to that completely random information, but everything else important was still hidden inside my head.

Aidan impatiently moved his feet and I finally turned away from the imposing wall and followed him to the west, as he seemed to know exactly where to lead us. While we walked, I thought about how pleasant it was to avoid traveling through the portals for once. I wasn't only annoyed by the never ending monitoring, but they also were quite expensive to use and the travel itself was not always comfortable. Exiting Lion's Arch through the main gate had no inconveniences at all: only those entering the city were being controlled.

We left a well-trodden path that we had followed quite awhile and were now heading towards a decent grove that had grown close to the swamp, which I could easily smell from here. I hoped that Aidan wouldn't get closer to the stinking area, and I already craved the salty air of Lion's Arch, even the damp jungle air of Maguuma. The presence of the sea was still noticeable here in Gendarran, but the air was filled with many different scents; the moldy swamp, and still the sweet touch of fresh snow. This was because the fields of Gendarran lay between Maguuma on one side with the Shiverpeaks on the other, and they were the connecting piece between the free city of Lion's Arch and the main capital of the humans.

"What exactly are we looking for?" I asked Aidan after he had paused near a group of young saplings, searching for something on the forest edge, and the answer came faster than I had hoped for, in the shape of howling wolves not far away.

"You really want me to fight a wolf!?" I again had to think about Kekk, who had lost his leg during a wolf attack. But I didn't know how incapable he had been of fighting back then…

Aidan snorted, but he didn't turn his eyes from the forest edge, where a grey wolf was appearing between the trees' shadows and coming right towards us while wailing with daunting howls.

"To fight one wolf would have been too easy! The challenge with wolves is that they call for aid as soon as they feel threatened. But since the inhabitants of Kryta have too many problems with these animals already, no one will cause problems if we cull a few of them – or rather if you do."

I stared at the wolf in horror, while two more appeared behind the angry animal, and as I quickly turned around to declare Aidan a complete maniac, I realized that he was gone without a trace. So that douchebag really dared to leave me alone with three wolves…

I quickly grabbed my hammer and shifted my weight so I had balanced posture and could build up good momentum. The first time and even then three of them…this Norn really wanted to see me dead!

But Aidan knew when someone was ready for a real fight and when they were not. He had been training me for weeks now, and there was a reason he had gotten harder and more relentless with each time. While my progress was only subtly developing I hadn't recognized it myself, and because Aidan had moved one step further every time I got stronger, I didn't feel much better than I had at the beginning. But now that the wolves were launching at me all at once, I felt the impact of my training more than ever.

My head turned off every thought and made room for all my senses. Even though I was nervous, I could feel my pulse slowing down and could feel my sense of hearing intensify while everything around me blurred and disappeared until I only saw my enemies in front of me. It was as if someone had flipped a switch and replaced me for someone who had years of practice already when it came to fighting.

In slow motion I could see the wolves' movements and saw that the biggest of them would get to me first. Judging the look in his eyes, I quickly knew where it wanted to attack. In a flowing movement I turned around my upper body without losing grip on my feet, and I swung the hammer to the front just in the moment that the wolf was gaping his mouth open wide to rip out my throat. The stone of my weapon met the beast's gullet with full might, and with a painful cry it was thrown clear away, where it remained stunned for a while.

The other two animals had placed themselves to my left and right side in the meantime. My counter had slightly unsettled them, but the fact that I had hurt their Alpha made them angry.

Sweat was dripping off my forehead and onto my neck. I knew that I would only be able to fight off one wolf; but I still had to hold back the others enough so they wouldn't hurt me too badly.

I decided to go for the wolf on my left and before the animal could react, I rammed my hammer into its skull so hard that a disgusting cracking noise sounded, causing an ice cold wave to run down my spine. The beautiful fur of the wolf was nothing more than a mixture of crushed bones and brain mass, and I was sure that if I had eaten something before my training, I wouldn't have been able to keep it down now.

But there was no time for such thoughts, as the other wolf had bitten down into my pauldrons and the Alpha was starting to move again with a threatening growl.

I didn't feel any pain from the bite because I wore a sturdy leather shirt under the mithril plates of my armor. It had slowed the fangs of the beast quite a bit so it would probably leave nothing more but a scratch. But the beast still clung to my arm and refused to let go, the tingling in my joints told me that I wouldn't be able to hold the weight for much longer.

I grabbed the hammer with the wolf-laden arm as well as I could, then lifted my left hand and clawed my fingers into its ears before pulling with all my might. While the wolf yelped in pain and released its teeth, I freed my shoulder with a jolt and rammed it into the animal's nose at the same time as hard as I could. My position didn't allow me to perform a massive hit and it wasn't enough to down the wolf.

I could feel my stomach turning around at the foreboding of what was about to happen, but I still grabbed the shaft of my weapon with both hands and thrust it into the chest of the wolf with no hesitation. I obviously had met the right point, as the wolf only flinched one more time and then lay on the ground with no more movement, a painful expression on its face that made me retch.

The Alpha was still alive though, and it had regained its strength – while being angrier than ever. Some blood was dripping off its maw, and it readied itself for a jump.

This time I couldn't react fast enough, and the wolf dragged me to the ground and held me there, his front paws heavily on my chest. Saliva seeped out between his teeth, mixed with blood that covered my throat.

Wouldn't that be the perfect moment for Aidan to come out of his hiding spot and help me?

It was hard to breathe under all the weight and even harder to ignore the terrible smell coming out of the wolf's maw. I only had a few heartbeats left until the beast would make quick work of my bare and unsecured throat. But I wouldn't die. Not today, and not because of this wolf.

I gathered all my strength for the last time, pushed the hammer aside. Clinging to the wolf's body with both hands, I rolled myself so the animal was now laying on the ground. It growled one more time, not expecting such a counter from me. But I had already reached for my weapon again and was pushing the hammer onto the wolf's throat as hard as I could.

The beast struggled beneath my grip, and I had a hard time holding onto the hammer. Its claws scratched my whole armor and even found places to cut through my skin, one time a paw even scratched my face, but I ignored the burning pain on my cheek.

It took forever until the struggles eased and the animal finally lay still. I waited even longer to make sure the Alpha wouldn't move anymore until I let go and rolled to the side. Sitting in the grass I held onto my hammer with shaking hands. The metallic taste of blood inside my mouth suddenly mixed with something salty, and only then I realized that I was crying.

My eyes fell upon the three dead wolves lying around me, upon my dirty weapon and then on myself. A dreadful cry of lament escaped my mouth as soon as I had regained my senses and grasped what I had just done.

I had killed.

Horror shook me and I stared at the dead wolf that had received a blow right into the heart. The stomach was clearly visible and I could see a few rosy teats. It had been a female, and she had been suckling. I had been the one who killed her, and I had taken away a mother from her children.

A cold spread inside my body and the shaking in my hands grew stronger. Would there be someone to take care of the remaining pups? Or would they starve miserably and become eaten by other predators now that their mother was gone?

I got up with a jump and staggered back a few steps when I bumped into something that felt like a tree at first, but it was warm and eased behind me. Aidan.

What have I done? What did you force me to do?

Aidan put his hands onto my shoulders and squeezed them, but I could hardly feel the touch.

"Well done, shorty! Don't worry about your armor; you'll find armor smiths around every corner who will repair it in the blink of an eye. And about the wolves…they will be eaten as soon as we turn around."

His words hurt like a thousand needles and they spread through my veins like venom.

"That's all? Nothing more you have to say?" I whispered hardly audible, my voice breaking and so cold that it even surprised myself.

Aidan let go of me and placed himself in front of me so he could look into my face. His eyes widened with surprise as he saw the expression in my eyes, but he couldn't hide the confusion about my reaction.

"Hey, what's the matter? You finished those beasts off, and you did even better than I had expected! There really is a warrior hiding inside of you, we just have to tease it out of you. Besides, what's the difference between this and Jormag's servants that you had killed back in the Shiverpeaks?"

I snorted and the Norn cocked his head as if he was frantically trying to get what he had done wrong.

"You have forced me to kill, Aidan. I'm not talking about some dragon's servants, because they have already been long dead inside. I am talking about living, breathing creatures that still had a place inside this world", I muttered.

There was something else inside my voice. Despite? Anger? I had already raised my weapon before, even before I fought Jormag's servants. It had been a Krait, back at the attack of the lab in Splintered Coast, but in my opinion, I found them to be on the same tier as dragon minions.

"This wolf had pups that needed to be fed. And now she will never return to her pack – maybe I'm not only responsible for the deaths of these three, but also for all her pups! And you worry about my armor!?"

Aidan lifted his arms soothingly. "Hey, calm down, Szallejh. Take a deep breath. If I had known that you would care so much about that matter, I would've let you fight something different. But just think it through! These wolves are no civilized citizens of Tyria. They have caused more than enough problems already, and they were the death of more than one person. They kill everything that crosses their way – cattle and even children! Don't you think such predators deserve to die? You have killed those three, but there's a chance you have saved the lives of many humans living here in Kryta! Isn't that worth it?"

I followed Aidan's instructions and took a deep breath. And another. And another. Until I was sure that my hands wouldn't shake and my voice wouldn't break anymore. Maybe Aidan was right and the wolves had been a plague for the people living here. But did that entitle me to just finish off their lives like that?

"Still. It's brutal. And it hurts."

"It's just wolves, by the Bear's spirit!" Aidan still wore an expression of disbelief on his face. He couldn't and didn't want to understand why the death of those animals was touching me so deeply. And that made me angry.

"Just wolves!? They're living beings, Aidan, inhabitants of Tyria like you and me! What gives us the right to judge who is allowed to live and who is not?" Who had given me the right to kill the Krait? Did Krait have family too?

Aidan shook his head, but before he could say something, I turned around and almost ran back to Lion's Arch. While running there, I attached the hammer on my back once more.

Aidan called my name and hurried to catch up with me. "Wait! You've done the right thing. Sooner or later you will understand."

"The training is done for today." I shouted without looking at him. He had followed up to me with ease, but that didn't stop me from ignoring him as much as possible. "I'm going home now."

What I urgently needed now was a hot shower to get rid of all the dirt on my skin, the visible as well as the invisible.

"Hey! What about dinner? Kesh can't wait to see you again tonight."

As I didn't answer his question, Aidan sighed and slowed down his pace, as if he had understood that it wouldn't be of any use to follow me now.

"Think it through. You know where to find us."

I didn't turn around, and all the way from the Gendarran fields to the cleaning rooms in Rata Sum I didn't lift my eyes from the floor a single time. When I entered the PeDACUR and the hot water ran down my bruised body, I started to shake again. My armor had been cleaned already and I would bring it to an armor smith the next day to fix it.

All the blood had been washed off my body but it still felt as if some kind of dirt was covering me, and no waters in this world could get it off.

This hadn't been the first time that someone told me I would make a good warrior some day if I trained enough. But being a warrior sooner or later meant to kill, and if it felt like that every time, then I didn't know if being a warrior truly was the way I wanted to follow. It had felt different, back in the Shiverpeaks. At that time, Narru and Nahraija had been with me, and our enemies had already been dead inside. We had just released them.

Those wolves had been something different though. I didn't want to do that ever again.

But would it make a difference, now that I was already stained?

I allowed myself plenty of time, irritating the other Asura, but that evening I didn't care. When I had remained under the stream of water so long that my skin was already wrinkling and I felt slightly dizzy from all the steam, I finally finished the program and strolled back to my room to get myself some proper clothes.

But I didn't want to stay inside the room for the rest of the evening; there was only one person I wanted to see right now.

Zojja already had lots of experience with killing. She had faced Kralkatorrik and had sent Zhaitan to kingdom come, and even though she couldn't always comprehend my thoughts and feelings, I at least knew that she would listen to me and would try to understand.

On the way to her lab I heard Aidan's voice inside my head again and again. It's just wolves! Just wolves. But it was not just that for me! I hadn't caused pain to someone ever before in my life, except for spiders and flies. How could he expect me to just accept the death of three living beings, after I had caused their deaths? Was he really so ruthless that he didn't care about ending a life because it wasn't worth it?

He was right to some point, because the wolves didn't really live peacefully amongst the humans in Kryta. And I acted as if they were not animals, but humans that I had killed. Still it touched me, and I didn't want to accept the fact that everyone saw their deaths as something self-evident.

Upon entering the lab, I almost directly bumped into Zojja, who had just been reprimanding one of her assistants again. Her face changed when she saw me, and with a quick hand movement she shooed the assistant back to their work place. She was about to say something, but without a word I threw my arms around her and buried my face in her shoulder. The hug hadn't been planned, but I just had felt the urge to do that, and Zojja knew. While she inhaled sharply, she hesitantly patted my back until I removed my arms again.

"Huh, that was…unexpected! What happened?" She asked bluntly as always while leading us towards her area. I heaved myself on the stone table and pushed aside some notes to have more space, while I told Zojja about the training and everything going on in my head since then.

She started to work on her console while I spoke, but I knew well-enough that she was listening. And somehow I found it comforting to not stare into someone's face. There was a long silence after I had finished talking, and my eyes followed the quick movements of Zojja's fingers on the display like in trance.

Then finally, she sighed and slowed down her work a bit.

"What you feel is completely normal. The first time is always difficult, even more if you have never had any contact with death beforehand. It took me some time too until I could process the first blood on my own hands. But I have fought in many fights already, and more than one has died by my hand. This feeling will dull with time, believe me. It's just important that you realize deep inside that what you did was right. Bear in mind that you haven't killed innocent children, but rather predators. It doesn't satisfy me to end one's life, and never should. But as long as I'm aware that it's the right thing to do, it's not that hard anymore. You will feel the same, sooner or later."

I was glad to get such an answer from Zojja without any mockery, but that she was so sure about me getting into such a situation again caused my stomach to hurt.

"You have never fought before you came to Tyria, have you?"

I nodded, even though Zojja probably couldn't see that. "There's no war where I come from. At least not in my country. And we have people who solve such conflicts for us…before I came here, I didn't even know how to properly hold a weapon! And now I am expected to just kill someone. That's wrong, and it's happening too fast!" I shook my head to let go ofthat thought.

"That's not true. No one expects you to just kill someone. But in contrast to your home, Tyria is facing war. Against the dragons, the bandits, centaurs, Charr. We are in need for skilled fighters, every single one of them. And we don't need warriors who spare their enemies for a guilty conscience, losing their own lives in the process. Do you get what I'm telling you?"

I hummed in agreement, but did I truly understand? I wanted to believe that there was some quest waiting for me in Tyria and that there had been a reason I came here, but to go to war as a warrior for this land was not the answer I had wanted to hear when I had asked for my destination.

"Believe me; most citizens of Tyria don't want to fight for the rest of their life as well. But this land doesn't have another chance, because if we don't fight, there will be no one else. And that will mean death for all of us. As you see, it's either fighting and dying in a battle, or hiding and dying anyway."

At least I hadn't given up hope yet that I could return to my old life soon enough.

We remained silent for a while and I let my legs dangle while I thought about what Zojja had said. What would Narru think about her daughter who was already giving up after three wolves?

As if Zojja had heard my thoughts, she ended her program and watched me from the side.

"Hey, maybe you should busy yourself with other thoughts so you stop spreading the gloom. A message arrived for you this morning, from Narru. It was the simplest way to reach you, that's why she chose this way over my console. Maybe you want to read through her message."

Zojja opened the letter and made place where I could read it. She took the opportunity to argue with her assistant again and to continue from where I had interrupted them. I cut out their voices with a faint chuckle and focused on what Narru had written.

Szallejh,

It has been quite awhile since we have last met. Aidan sends me reports of your training progress regularly and I'm proud of you. But I definitely wouldn't be sad about seeing you in person again, because I imagine there's a lot to talk about. No one has doubts anymore that Tequatl will make its final move soon, and that's why we will stay on the Splintered Coast to be ready when it comes. Only when that is done will we leave the lab of the United Arcanists, and I can't tell yet where we will be stationed next. But until then, you know where to find me.

I hope you're getting along in Rata Sum and my sister isn't bullying you around too much. Please get in touch as soon as you received this message.

Your mother

The last words made me smile. Narru had felt strange for sure, as well as I did now while reading her message. But those words chased away some of the cold inside my bones. After all her expectations, she had not only acknowledged me as her daughter, but she obviously tried to get into her role as a mother as well.

Since Zojja was still busy with her assistant and hadn't forbidden me to touch the console, I opened a new window to answer Narru. I too hesitated at first to greet her with Mother, but it felt right.

Once again I was thankful that I had been welcomed by so many people here. And in the same moment I felt guilt that I had left Aidan like that. What would he say if I didn't come to dinner? Would he understand or would I hurt him? And Kesh…as terrifying and weird as she could be, there had been a part of me that wanted to meet her again tonight.

Zojja returned while I had just sent away my answer, and we switched places so she could continue her work. But I restlessly stepped from one foot to another; wanting to travel to Lion's Arch and apologize to Aidan for my behavior.

My aunt seemed to feel that, because she sighed and stood with her hands on her hips.

"Your visits in my lab have become rarer since the last time – and shorter. While I should be glad that you don't bother me too much, I seem to miss your presence somehow. And now you want to leave again, am I right?"

I hesitated at the honesty concerning Zojja's feelings, but I felt flattered at the same time thatnot only did she accept my ongoing presence around her, but she also approved of it sometimes.

With a shrug, I pulled myself off the table. "My friends are waiting for me and I don't want to disappoint them. But if you want, I can visit you more often the next time." I gave her a wink and Zojja rolled her eyes as though she regretted her words. But then she gave me a quick smile, and I said my goodbye with a wave before hurrying out of the lab.

It was late already and Kesh and Aidan were probably already eating dinner, if they were still there at all.

The gate control couldn't go fast enough, before I was finally running through the city of Lion's Arch. With a racing heart, I cleared two steps at a time while running up the tower to our standard restaurant. I could see both Kesh and Aidan seated at our favorite table.

In front of Kesh sat a bowl that was still half filled with shrimps. Aidan was holding what was most likely his tenth beer for the night, but he smiled when he recognized me and called over towards my direction.

Kesh greeted me with a rough hug, her fur tickling my nose and causing me to sneeze. Then she offered me some shrimp which I politely declined.

"Good that you decided to come anyway. I was almost sure you wouldn't get here today."

"Pah!" Kesh hit her paw on the table. "While Baersson was crying like a baby, I didn't have a single doubt about you. I know you, little rat!"

"Hey, I didn't…" Aidan begun, but then he just grumbled and returned his attention to the beer.

I took a seat next to Kesh and declined as a waiter wanted to take my order. There was no chance I could possibly eat something today, because I still saw the image of the wolves behind my eyes from time to time.

"Thanks for trusting in me, Kesh. Aidan…I wanted to apologize. It's possible that I slightly overreacted earlier. You were right, maybe I did Kryta a favor, but it was still…hard for me."

Arrhakesh didn't ask further. Either Aidan had already told her about what had happened, or she was just the attentive listener again and was connecting the details herself – that was what I appreciated about her a lot. Kesh didn't ask questions if you didn't want to answer them, no matter the context.

"It's okay, shorty. I just didn't think you would react that way. But I understand – I guess." He watched me from the rim of his mug. "But let's not talk about this now, okay? I'll think of something nice for next week – something that won't kill the two of us. Does that sound like a plan for you?"

I nodded and examined Arrhakesh with fascination while she swallowed her shrimp piece by piece. With pure pleasure she ate all of them tail first, so they would have experienced as much of their end as possible if they had still been alive…

But that was just Kesh, and surprisingly enough it didn't bother me as much anymore as it had when I first met her. Meanwhile I had learned that she wouldn't eat me like one of those poor shrimps, and I was almost sure that she would leave my body in peace if I died one day. Almost.

Both stared at me with questioning eyes, and I giggled. "Ah, it's nothing. I just enjoy having friends like you."

Pride sparked inside Arrhakesh's eyes as soon as she realized what I had said. She gave me a thankful smile and swallowed down some of the shrimps with whatever stuff she was drinking.

"Friends? You can bet your life on it, little rat!"

Aidan stretched himself over the table too and disheveled my hair with his huge hand. "I'm glad you finally came to accept it."

While I watched Kesh with how she slowly consumed her shrimp, and Aidan continued emptying one beer after another, all of the remaining cold suddenly left my body and I was just glad to not be alone in this foreign world.

A.N.:

A huuuuge thanks to Sayna and Zappy who will proofread my chapters from now on! You're a great help, both of you