Sawkins threw up his arm to push aside a vine dangling in the midst of the path, careful not to touch it with his hands, lest some creeping beast slither upon him. He hated bugshad always hated bugs. He'd known a man once who was been bitten by a poisonous spider that had left him paralyzed from his waist down. Sawkins cringed remembering the last time he'd seen Lord Riley being carried into his mansion by a servant as though he were but a child. Sawkins would rather die. And now his brother forced him to be the first among them to encounter any noxious creature hidden in the foliage.