Unexpected but not surprising. A terrible thing but not that bad, considering. The worst pat of a pretty good run. Those were the kinds of sentiments the citizens of Goldknob shared after the kobakra raided town, knocking in barn walls and making off with kids, lambs, and calves. Kobakras were known to take children if there weren’t livestock young to take instead, so while it was bad it could have been much worse.

The main reaction to the raid was a flurry of activity repairing fences and barns and talking about The Incident, as it was almost immediately euphemised. Some of the younger set worried that the kobakra would return, as it had not taken all the prey that was available, but the older and the better-traveled assured them that was not going to happen. Kobakras, they explained with a confidence that belied the hearsay they were repeating, were repelled by their point of origin and as such always traveled in the same direction. It had made a trail from the southeast corner of town to the northwest, so it would continue northwest from there.

Some citizens wanted to warn the next town in the kobakra’s path, but that was more easily said than done. Goldknob was inside one of The Ripples: long low valleys between rough boulder-strewn ridges connecting the highlands far to the southwest and the sea far to the northeast. It maintained active commerce with the towns up and down the valley from it, but the kobakra had come down one ridge and up the other, a direction few traveled. Pulling out dusty maps and consulting a few who had traveled more widely, they determined that the most likely next stop for the kobakra was Woodkettle, some twenty leagues distant and at least ten days away by road, as few and far between were the roads that crossed the ridges and gullies of The Ripples in that direction. They could send word, but it would inevitably arrive too late.

It was dawn of the next day when Oisha and Fyodor visited their next-door neighbors Catalina and Diego. The four had been neighbors and friends for more than three decades, and Diego anticipated the topic they would broach before they said anything. He had been expecting the visit the previous day, but understood that they were trying other things first. Catalina had not been expecting the visit at all, probably, though it’s not clear if anyone would have been able to tell if she had. She was pretty inscrutable.

What about our Dmitri and your Sofia? was Oisha’s opening remark. Dmitri was Oisha and Fyodor’s second of three children and Sofia was Catalina and Diego’s seventh of eleven. The two had married (the only wedding between the two families) and moved to Woodkettle some years back.

They’ll be fine, said Diego confidently.

They might be, but what about little Tina? asked Fyodor. Tina was Sofia and Dmitri’s only child, just about to turn three.

Exactly! Poor little Tina! said Oisha. You know the kobakra will be hungry enough to take some children when it arrives there, and that Woodkettle has hardly any livestock. Tina is sure to be snatched if we don’t do something to protect her!

Sofia and Dimitri are Large, said Diego. They’re more than able to protect their own. He didn’t just mean they were generically big people: Sofia and Dmitri were Larges, a specific version of being. Well, Sofia was technically a PLT, not a pure Large, but they were both of them significantly taller and several times heavier and stronger than most beings.

Oisha was having none of this. Our Dmitri may be Large, she said, intentionally omitting Sofia who was a Poly and thus not truly Large in Oisha’s estimation, but that doesn’t mean he’s a fighter.

Nor are we, observed Diego.

But we are aware of the threat! We have a duty, said Oisha.

Well, said Diego, we did OK without advance warning, and we can only trust they will too. It’s not as if we have any hope of reaching them before the kobakra does, if it is even going that way.

Oisha latched onto this last item. Is it going that way? she asked. Diego was a hunter—not professionally, just as a hobby, but accomplished and with some reputation as a skilled tracker. He’d been part of the group who investigated the trail the kobakra left through town, but Oisha realized she’d not actually asked if he agreed with the rumor as to the monster’s trajectory.

It’s a great distance and hard to tell from here, said Diego. It could easily wander quite widely before reaching another settlement.

Oisha was about to take comfort in this, but Fyodor had an ear for things carefully left unsaid, a useful trait in his job in the pub which was ostensibly to serve but in truth mostly to listen. It could do many things, Fyodor agreed, but if you had to guess, from what you saw, where do you think it is going?

If it was an ordinary beast I’d say it was anyone’s guess, said Diego. The odds of going that far in a straight line? Basically zero.

But a kobakra? pressed Fyodor.

The rumors say that kobakras travel in very straight paths, only diverging when attracted by an unusually-large population of young. Just rumors, you understand, no one here has first-hand knowledge. But if those rumors are true I’d guess its destination will be Woodkettle. Unless it happens to be diverted by multiple pups, calves, cubs, kits, and leverets all off its trajectory in the same direction.

And the odds of that? prompted Fyodor.

Ah, this time of year, over the land it’s traveling? Low. Quite low.

So all in all, you think it is going to Woodkettle?

Yes. Assuming the rumors of kobakra behavior are correct.

Right! said Oisha, frustrated by the round-about process of getting this information and feeling a need for decision. That’s why we need to go warn them!

Again, how? asked Diego. It’s got at least a day’s head start, with legs many times as long as ours; we could never catch it up, nor can horses traverse that terrain without throwing a shoe, and the road is far too long and indirect.

What about by barrel? asked Oisha. She meant, of course, barrels of flight.

Yes, we thought that perhaps we could go by barrel, agreed Fyodor, looking meaningfully at Catalina and Diego’s shed. Diego was a general cooper, trained in the maintenance and repair of barrels of all types including the gleam barrels that flight was stored in, and his shed had several such barrels in it at any given time.

Diego scoffed. It’s over twenty leagues, he said. Barrels can’t go that far, not without stopping for a refill.

At this point Catalina offered her first contribution to the conversation, in the form of a non-committal nasal hum. To the other three, accustomed as they were to her ways, that hum said that’s not entirely true as effectively as if she’d used words.

Catalina, you do distance barrel races, said Oisha, stating something everyone there knew in hopes of buttering up Catalina to give the response she wanted. Could you fly to Woodkettle on a barrel?

Catalina raised her eyebrows in evident surprise that her friend of more than thirty years would even think such a thing. No, she said simply.

No? repeated Oisha, her voice showing her confusion at this word contradicting the previous hum.

No, repeated Catalina. Flying low and slow over clear, flat ground with a choke bung, Smalls like us could possibly make it. Smalls, like Larges, were a version of being, notably smaller than other versions, and the version they all belonged too. Well, Catalina was technically a PSG, but close enough. But The Ripples aren’t flat, and we’d need to go open bung to overtake a kobakra with a head start, meaning we’d be fortunate to make it half way, she continued, which is why we’ll need three barrels, each,

Ah, said the others together, understanding. The three-barrel approach involved riding one barrel while towing a second barrel behind you to carry a third unopened barrel. When the two opened barrels ran out of flight you dumped them, opened up the third, and continued. It wasn’t a common practice, but not unheard of either and reclaimed dumped barrels were a major source of the collection in Diego’s shed.

That’s quite an expensive way to go, said Diego. Dumping what, eight barrels in the middle of The Ripples where we would be hard-put to reclaim them?

It’s for Tina!” said Oisha with passion.

We can afford it, said Catalina with a shrug. Easily. We’ve got enough barrels already, there in the shed.

It’ll be like a little adventure, said Fyodor, with some cunning. He knew Diego still fantasized about being one of the great adventurers they heard about in the bards tales.

Whether it was one of those three arguments that won over Diego or simply the sense of being the only voice of reason, Diego relented. I guess we’re going, then, he said. But not empty-handed. It’s a messenger mission, absolutely, but you never know what we’ll encounter on the way: it’s not tame land, and where there’s one monster others tend to emerge.

Oisha grinned and went to give Diego a hug of gratitude, but saw him shrink back and so contented herself with a verbal Thanks, Diego, I knew we could count on you. Fyodor was going to express doubt with Diego’s comment about danger, but Oisha was so happy withe outcome he decided against that; after all, Diego wouldn’t agree to go if it was all that dangerous, right? And so the two couples separated to make their respective preparations.

Oisha collected her training gear from the grandmothers’ fitness and self-defense class she taught, which didn’t take long, and then began filling a gift basket for Tina and provisions for the trip. She was happy to be busy and delighted to have won over Diego, but still quite worried; she kept up a steady chatter, some happy and some concerned, as she worked.

Fyodor listened attentively to Oisha, offering agreeing comments when she was expressing excitement and comforting ones when she voiced concerns. He packed his blackthorn club, ornamental saber from winning the bouncer’s bout some twenty years previosuly, and boiled leather training armor. He didn’t have any clear use for this gear in mind, but Diego said bring weapons and those were the weapons he had.

Diego collected his bow and arrows, tent, fire starter, map, chalk, pencils, canteens, and trail rations in addition to pulling out twelve serviceable barrels of flight from the shed. He grumbled throughout, about the fools errand and how the other couple were hardly ready for overland travel and what a shame to lose so many barrels and it’s not like Sofia actually needed them; but the grumbles were half-hearted as he was secretly kind of excited abut the prospect of a grand adventure.

Catalina carefully selected several crystals and fitted them into various custom-made leather holders about her body. As a Poly-Small-Gleam she could channel a little magic, but not so easily as a full Gleam; the crystals, with their innate magic, were a great help to her. She periodically gave a gentle chuckle to Diego’s more extreme complaints, but made no other comments. As she had relatively little preparation to do and was always quite efficient in doing it she was ready long before the others, so she visited briefly with each of their neighbors and told them they were going away for a bit, though not where they were going.

And thus it was that four ordinary Smalls in their fifties mounted barrels so wide they could barely grip with their legs, towing two more barrels each, and took off northwest on the trail of the kobakra, hoping to reached Woodkettle before it did.