Fun Fact: Sharyas is actually a name I found with a halfling name generator. Sharyas was originally going to be a halfling before I considered adding a non-canon race to the mix. She then went from halfling to a mix of both halfling and kitsune, before I dropped the idea for a full-blooded kitsune that's present in the story today. Also, another shout out to everyone reading the book. You're the true heroes here. Thank you so much for your support! (On a further note:) Sorry about another late chapter. Good news and bad news. Good news, my Internet is finally fixed! Bad news, I'm on vacation. So don't be too insulted by no chapter being uploaded this Friday, I'm taking time off. Hey, stay tuned next Friday for my new chapter.

He walked over to where Sharyas tottered against a tree. He sat down next to her. "Are you sure you're okay?"

She looked away. "I'm fine."

"Are you ignoring me for some specific reason or just because?"

"Can't you just leave me alone?"

Ascanor shrugged and backed off. He moved over to the side of the clearing and sat down. He hadn't noticed the fatigue of the Trap Bomb spell until now. He shook the dizziness from his head and took a swig of water from his skin. Ereven sat down next to the tiefling with a rattle of his armor. "So, you've done it again."

"Done what?"

"You've come into a fight you don't need to involve yourself in and you fight with us. Why?"

Ascanor thought about it. "I...well...I guess I can say I've never really had friends before."

He laughed. "Seriously?"

Ascanor nodded.

"Oh, sorry. That's got to be hard."

"You numb to it after a while. I've only ever had my father. Well, as well as the staff in the manor, but they've never been any fun."

"Hold on, manor? You're wealthy?"

"No, my father is."

"Oh. You don't have any siblings?"

"No, tieflings are slaughtered should they be born hideous."

"Gods! That sounds awful."

"Yeah, I'm supposed to consider myself lucky." He sat silent for a moment. "Why are you being nice to me?"

"What?"

"Why are you treating me this way all of a sudden?"

"When you got poisoned I had time to think while we rested and well...I guess I've realized you're not as bad as I thought. I will never trust anything that's evil, but you've proved yourself to not be evil at all, so I guess you deserve another chance. No offense, but I expected you to stab us in the back. But then you went and got stabbed by that snake, and you still managed to kill the rest before they could attack us. And I guess that even though you broke our weapons, I guess had you not we would have used them against you. I guess what I'm trying to say is you're not an enemy I'd want."

"You mean it?"

"Of course." His attitude turned stormy as he held his axe to the tiefling's throat. "But you listen and you listen good. If you ever, ever abuse this trust, I'm going to kill you, chase you down into the Nine Hells, and do it again. When we're done here, you're going to leave me and my friends alone. Forever. Am I clear?"

Ascanor, paled to a bright pink, nodded.

Ereven smiled and held out his hand. "Good. Welcome to our little gang."

Ascanor grasped it and shook it proudly. "I'm honored. This may sound weird, but may I ask you a question?"

"I see nothing wrong with that."

"Do the others still hate me? Sharyas is acting so...weird today. "

"She's got a real right to. Just because our minds were possessed, doesn't mean they weren't there. I heard the way you talked to her. You spat on her today, and how dare you do such a thing."

Ascanor hung his head. "You all have real reasons to hate me I take it."

He shook his head. "I wouldn't blame yourself. Alandil's just always like that. Some days you've got to look out for yourself, because he may not be. I wouldn't let that bother you. And Sharyas? That's just her. She's hard to interpret. She gets this way when she uses her kitsune powers."

"She doesn't like to?"

"Beats me. Like I said, she's hard to interpret. I let her go on her own devices and things always work out. But mark my words, don't you dare ever say things like that to her again." He clapped Ascanor on the back, knocking the wind out of him with his armored hand. "We've got your back if you've got ours."

Ascanor smiled and leaned back against the tree. "Good to hear." He closed his eyes.

"You okay?"

"Tired. Haven't practiced that spell much, takes a lot out of me."

"I've never seen anything like that. Where did you find it?"

"I made it."

"You can make spells?"

"My dad is a...collector of sorts. He's got many old books, rare books. There's a lot of lost knowledge hidden in his stash. That's also where he got this." He pulled out the carving. "And also why I'm here."

Ereven nodded. "What's so important about the temple?"

"It's a site of my heritage. Well, of the first tieflings. I hold no desire to relate myself to them. It's got an interesting and rather expensive relic hidden within."

"Yes that's quite similar to what I've read." Ascanor hadn't heard Alandil come up to them. "I've read text of this temple. No one knows much, but they found it mere weeks ago. It's just a shame it's been sealed up by time. You see, they got through most of the rubble when they found traces of the hydra and they backed out. It'd taken up residence within. So, now you know our job just as much as we know yours."

"You guys, you really mean everything you say?"

"Of course."

Ascanor smiled. "Let's get going."

Together they slipped down into the water. Ascanor sloshed along the bank so as to not soak himself, meanwhile Ereven forced his way through the center. Ascanor didn't know if the warrior's armor was waterproof or if Ereven even cared. The water only rose to his chest, so he wouldn't drown. Ascanor palmed the carving, closing his eyes. He could see the plane in front of him, devoid of all but a small speck of light to his forward-left. They were on the right track, but the temple was still downstream. Who knew what lay ahead. He opened his eyes, the destination imprinted on his mind. He drew his knife for good measure.

Alandil looked back at the rasp of the sheath. "Something the matter?"

He smiled. "Just for good measure."

Alandil matched his smile, but said nothing as he turned back around. Sharyas nimbly skipped along the rocks next to him, her flowing gown devoid of water though it dipped in the water with every step. Ascanor pursed his lips. Perhaps it was a spell, and a useful one at that. He desired to learn it, but remembered the cold shoulder he'd been given earlier before he dropped the idea. He desired to talk to the kitsune for some strange reason, yet he also desired to not make relations worse than they already were. He focused on his steps, on taking one after the other, as they slowly grew closer to the dot in his mind.

The party began to pass an overgrown sandbar at the edge of a bend when Ascanor held up a hand to stop. He bent down, sticking a hand into the silty stream bottom. Alandil came over peeking over Ascanor's hunched figure. "What is it?"

Ascanor dug around in the muck, gritty pieces of sand rubbing underneath his claws. At last, he found what he'd sensed and pulled it out with a wet pop. Alandil squinted at the broken, flat rock the tiefling held. "I do not see anything special."

"Watch." Ascanor held the stone underneath the water and scrubbed off the lichen and mud until faint, but visible lines of writing appeared. He held it up proudly. "It's a tablet from the temple."

"How can you be so sure?"

"It's giving off the same essence as the carving, only it's fainter. This has been in the water for centuries, and has lost most of its source. I get mostly a sense of it belonging here, but I can feel the same sense towards the temple. It's over there, on the left."

Ereven followed the tiefling's extended finger. "On the other shore? Why did we come all the way out here if we were already on the side where it was?"

"Didn't you read any maps before you came?"

Alandil looked away in embarrassment. "We were not given access to resources where we were hired."

"Well, you're welcome to approach the temple from that side, if you care to scale a hundred foot cliff."

Ereven grunted and continued to struggle through the water. "This better be worth it."

They continued on another several hundred feet before Ascanor held up his hand. "We're here."

They looked around. Ereven shrugged. "I don't see anything."

"What do you mean you can't see anything? It's right there!" He pointed to a curve in the left bank, mere yards before the river sloped deeper than its previous incline down into a waterfall. Alandil took a step back. "Now is not the time for games Ascanor. The current is too great here. If we slip, we're going over the edge."

"I'm not playing anything! It's right there in front of our-wait." He stood in thought. "Yes, it's quite possible. Everybody onto the shore." Ascanor gleefully skipped across the rocks onto the sandy shore. He began to run his fingers along the ground. Alandil watched with amusement. "You're quite full of surprises, I'll give you that. But I must ask what are you doing?"

"It's simple, something I've read about before. It's a one of a kind spell, used to conceal something from everyone but the creator. It uses a rune circle and a small drop of the creator's blood to bind the spell to it."

The elf nodded. "Quite fascinating, but you can see it. Is the spell deteriorating?"

"No, that's the thing. I'm a tiefling, born of the blood of the first tieflings, the creators of the temple and this spell."

"Ah! I see. The blood of the creators runs through your veins!"

"Precisely. Now I just need to find the magical nodes containing the spell and disrupt them, so as to drop the spell. Ah, here we go." He snapped his fingers, creating sparks between them. Smoke puffed between his fingers as a stone structure wavered in front of him like a desert mirage. Ascanor smiled as the temple materialized into full view. "Here we go."

A small forest of stone pillars sprouted around their feet, the crumbling segments draped with vines and crusty lichen. The columns led back threefold before a final pair upholding a bowing stone ceiling that led deeper into the cliff. Ascanor smiled, recognizing the twisting, unique architecture of his people that brought visions of home, and with it a small twang of homesickness.

Alandil stumbled backwards, astounded. "Amazing! Millions could pass this everyday without even noticing it. Your kind could harvest this entire place without anyone knowing."

Ascanor nodded grimly and stuck his head into tunnel entrance. "Yet they only got back so far. The rubble stopped them."

Ereven groaned. "And we've got to clear it out." He clanked onto the ground. "I've got to oil my armor."

"Maybe if you didn't wear it in water you wouldn't have that problem." Sharyas muttered, her eyes trained on the woods around them.

Alandil nodded. "We shall rest. It's getting late in the day, night will come early. We should be rested in case anything comes upon us. We've already fought twice in the past half day."

Ascanor slumped against a tree, already beginning to nod off. The sun laid its warmth on his form, drawing him deeper and deeper into the pit of exhaustion. Despite what his new comrades said, he wasn't strong. He just put in too much energy. The aches of the day slowly faded as sleep finally came.

Ascanor stood in a room devoid of all light. His eyes shifted to darkvision, but he could only make out a faint, grey curve of the room. The darkness swirling like a living entity, a foggy murk that clouded the center of his vision, but left the peripheral unhindered. His tail slapped against the floor in thought, echoing across the room like it'd been made of stone. If it was, it'd been crafted with a finesse he'd never laid eyes upon. And on a more dreadful note, he couldn't see an exit. Something began to crackle behind him

"Don't fail me again." Echoed around the room.

"Father?"

"You've done so too many times already. Dare I mention the Sword Coast incident?"

"Father I told you that's not my fault!" Ascanor huddled on the ground, desperately trying to block out the voice.

"Don't fail me again. Again. Again. Again. A-"

Ascanor silently bolted awake without a movement. Already the trauma had begun to fade from the nightmare. He opened his eyes, instantly in darkvision at the response to the lack of light. Somehow, it'd already become night. His back was turned to something crackling, like a person breaking many sticks. Based on the flickering orange glow and shadows, someone had made a fire. Ascanor's ear twitched, catching a hushed argument from across the camp. He strained, trying to listen over the fire.

"-treating people that way!" The silvery voice could only belong to Alandil. "Do you think you're going to welcome new people acting like that? We're barely winning fights as we are now. We need stronger people!"

"Well what else am I supposed to do? Ereven doesn't even want him." The snappy response came from Sharyas. " And he's got a good reason too. The tiefling doesn't even want anything to do with us or with me!" She sighed. "I thought he'd be special but he's just another selfish-" she uttered something guttural in an unknown tongue.

"That he may be, but give him a chance. He saved our lives and yours too."

"And that makes him a good person?"

"He didn't have to help us. He listened to you. I think he may care about you too. And you also need to quit this fight against yourself. Have you considered accepting what you have instead of fighting it?"

"You know I can't do that! I can't be like them!"

"And what you are now is any better?"

Ascanor shifted, huddling closer to himself. A sudden gust of wind blurred their words, as well as knocking the fire out. Alandil muttered something in the elven tongue and moved over to the smoldering pit to relight it, but Ascanor had already dropped back off into sleep.