The Samsquen Beastiary

Remember the Bells

The fire crackled low, the kind that doesn't promise warmth so much as it bargains for it. Smoke coiled upward, chasing the stars through the pine boughs. I stirred the embers with a stick that used to be a spear shaft and watched the sparks drift like lost fireflies.

"See, that's the thing about beasts," I said.
The squirrel on the log didn't answer. It just blinked, tail flicking, crumbs of my dried bread clutched in its paws like treasure.

"They don't kill for glory. Don't write songs about it afterward. They kill because the world says eat or be eaten." I leaned back against my pack, the leather creaking. "Most men like to think they're better than that. I stopped pretending a long time ago."

I gazed up at the stars. "Beasts are easier to understand anyway. Nothing beats the simple things like this." I gestured at the forest around me. The squirrel twitched, staring like it understood. Maybe it did. Out here, everything listens eventually.

"My name's Samsquen Thornegrip," I said. "Just a Thuumar who's seen more things that'll kill a man in a day than most do in their life."

It sniffed at the air, tail flicking. I tossed another crumb.
"Don't look at me like that. I ain't proud of it."

The squirrel chittered, maybe agreeing. Maybe asking for more crumbs. Hard to tell with the chatty ones.

"Every creature's got a truth. Some whisper it in the dark. Some carve it into you." I tossed another scrap its way. "That's why I write it down. Not for them. For me. Because the day I stop remembering what they teach me—"

The wind shifted. The trees hushed because they were listening.

"—that's the day I join 'em."

The fire spat, and the squirrel vanished into the brush. I stared at the empty space it left behind and sighed.
"Guess that makes two of us."

I exhaled and reached for my journal, the one bound in old hide and bad memories. The ink glowed faintly blue when it touched the page.

Morning came thin and gray, the kind that seeps through every seam of your coat. The fire had given up sometime before dawn. I kicked dirt over what was left, shouldered my pack, and listened.

Nothing. No birds, no river chatter, no branch-crack gossip between trees. Just quiet—the wrong kind. Forests breathe. This one was holding it in.

The path north cut through damp ferns and soft mud. Fresh tracks. Deer mostly, a boar or two. Hooves that sank deep and lifted clean, stride long enough to make a horse blush. Whatever made them wasn't running. It walked like it owned the ground.

Note to self: Green Zone, Verdant Wilds. Hoof radius four inches, stride eight feet. Territory marker? Confidence that big gets you killed or praised. Maybe both.

By midday I smelled smoke. Fernvale sat where the river forked—thatch roofs, a sawmill, and enough stillness to make a hunter nervous. From the ridge, it looked almost painted.
Fields combed straight, fences without sag, and chimneys letting out the same thin threads of smoke. All rising at the same lazy angle like they'd rehearsed it.

Closer, I saw why it felt off. The colors were wrong. Greens too even, wood too clean, river too clear. Life without the noise of living. The air carried the scent of wheat and yeast, but it hung flat—no spice of sweat, no dogs barking, no children bickering in the distance.

The main road was tidy enough to shame a king's court. Cart tracks etched into perfect grooves, wheel ruts polished smooth as stone. Every house looked like its neighbor had copied it from memory and gotten most of it right but not all. Same shape, same door hinges, same crooked weathervanes that all pointed west though the wind came from the east.