CHAPTER 4: FIRST CONTRACT
The guild hall in Branch 17 smelled of wet wool, cheap ale, and the sour note of fear that never quite aired out. Kael sat on a bench near the contract board, green E-minus strip still knotted around his arm like it might fly off if he breathed wrong.
Three days after the trial, 29 recruits had limped back in. Two never did. One lost three fingers to a dusk-lily's sap and spent the night screaming until the healer knocked him out with poppy. The guild burned the fingers anyway; policy.
Kael's wounds were gone. Not scarred; gone. The skin on his side looked like it had never met a bone knife. People noticed. They always notice when something refuses to stay broken.
A heavy hand landed on his shoulder. "Varin. Party forming. Low E contract. You breathing?"
The hand belonged to Torven, a broad, red-haired man with an E+ badge and a beard that looked like it had lost a fight with a hedge. Behind him stood the rest of the pickup group the guild loved to throw together when no one else wanted the job.
- Torven: shield-bearer, loud, drank like drainage.
- Lysa: skinny archer with a chipped longbow and a permanent squint.
- Dren: quiet knife-fighter who kept counting coins in his head out loud when nervous.
- Kael: .....Well.....He is present....I suppose...
Torven grinned down at him. "We're four bodies. Contract says four minimum. You're the fourth."
Kael read the posted sheet over Torven's shoulder.
Contract 17-E-44
Task: Clear feral goblin nest in the old mill ruins west of Crow's Fork. Estimated count 12–18.Bonus for every ear over fifteen.
Reward: 22 silver base + 3 per extra ear.
Danger: Low E.
[Note: Bring fire or regret it.]
Kael had exactly eight copper in his pouch and a stomach that had been running on half-rations since the trial. He nodded.
They left at dawn.
The mill ruins sat four hours west, half-swallowed by vines and river mist. The wheel was long gone; the stones were blackened from an old fire. Goblin stink rolled out of the broken doorway like spoiled meat.
Torven took point with his shield up. Lysa nocked an arrow. Dren slipped left, knives low. Kael walked last, belt knife in one hand, a cheap iron hatchet he'd bought off a failed recruit in the other.
Inside, the air was thick enough to chew. Goblins had nested in the old grain pits—twelve, maybe fourteen—plus two bigger ones with iron spikes welded to clubs. The big ones saw Torven first and charged.
Torven caught the first spike on his shield; the impact drove him back two steps and split the top board. Lysa put an arrow through the goblin's eye. Dren danced in, opened the second big one from groin to sternum. The smaller goblins swarmed.
Kael met the wave head-on.
First goblin leapt high, rusty cleaver raised. Kael stepped inside the swing, took the blade across his left forearm (deliberately). Edge bit half an inch, then stopped like it hit oak. The shock traveled up the goblin's arm instead of his. Kael buried the hatchet in its collarbone.
Second goblin stabbed low. Kael twisted, let the point rake his thigh. Same story: skin parted, then refused to part farther. He punched the goblin in the throat, felt cartilage collapse under knuckles that suddenly knew exactly how hard to hit.
Third one tried to run. Kael chased. Ten strides later his lungs stopped burning; the gait that had felt clumsy that morning now flowed like he'd run this exact corridor a thousand times. He caught the goblin by the scruff, slammed it face-first into stone.
The fight lasted maybe ninety seconds. When the last body stopped twitching, Torven was bleeding from a split scalp, Lysa had an arrow left, and Dren was wiping his knives on a goblin rag.
They stared at Kael.
He stood in the middle of the pit, breathing slow, shirt soaked red but no new blood pumping. The cut on his forearm had already closed to a thin pink seam. The thigh slice sealed while they watched.
Torven found his voice first. "What in the cold hells are you?"
Kael shrugged. "New."
They collected twenty-one ears. Torven kept glancing at Kael like he expected him to sprout wings.
On the walk back, Kael tested limits quietly.
He jogged ahead, then sprinted fifty paces. Lungs adapted mid-stride; the burn never came. He leapt a fallen log he'd have stumbled over yesterday and landed like the ground had been waiting for him. Balance, spring, foot placement; everything locked in smoother than the last time.
He let Torven's shield bash glance off his shoulder on purpose. The bruise that should have bloomed never showed. Bone density ticking up. Muscle fibers learning how to absorb force instead of transmit it.
By the time the guild post came into view, the morning's fatigue was a memory. He felt like he could walk back to the mill and do it again cleaner.
They dropped the sack of ears on the counter. The clerk counted twenty-one, raised an eyebrow at the blood still drying on Kael's shirt but not dripping anymore.
"Bonus comes to sixty-three silver total," the clerk said. "Split four ways?"
Torven opened his mouth, closed it, then did something Kael didn't expect.
"Five ways," Torven said. "Kid earned a double share. Saved my skull twice."
Lysa and Dren didn't argue.
Kael walked out with thirty-one silver in a pouch that had been empty four days ago. Enough for real boots, a gambeson, and a sword that wasn't a rusted joke.
That night he sat on the dormitory roof with a whetstone and the new short sword he'd bought before the ink dried on the contract. He ran the stone down the edge, slow, deliberate. Same angle, same pressure, same whisper of steel on stone.
Again. Again. Again.
Each pass felt cleaner. The muscle memory etched itself deeper, faster than it had any right to. By the hundredth stroke the blade sang instead of rasped. His wrist didn't tire. The angle never drifted.
He smiled into the dark.
Somewhere below, Torven was telling the common room that the new kid was either blessed by the gods or cursed by them, and nobody had decided which was worse.
Kael kept sharpening.
Tomorrow there would be another contract. Another fight. Another dozen things to bleed for, run through, swing at, survive.
The guild still had him tagged E—. That was fine.
The cloth on his arm could stay green a long, long time.
He had repetition on his side, and repetition, it turned out, was patient.