The Town of Pendleton

The dog, Nessie, seems to bound happily through the forest while her counterpart seems a little uneasy.

Mercy tracks them for about ten minutes before the brush starts to become thinner and the light filtering through the trees brighter.

Upon the clearing, Nessie and company veer left as Mercy waits patiently before heading straight for the town, fly buzzing along happily.

She has very little to compare it to, but its stature seems large compared to her single roomed barn. There were almost a dozen buildings and a few spaces for livestock to be held while in the town. Beyond this place, in every direction, the silhouette of farms and vast barren fields stretched on for miles.

The buildings themselves weren't necessarily dilapidated, but it seemed as if some storm had blown through and nobody was around to care. They were definitely in need of repair.

Had she stumbled upon an abandoned place? Would she have to go back and track down the boy with the dog?

Just as she had gone to turn towards the direction the boy had gone, she heard a minor crashing noise coming from her right. The building had a large worn-out sign on the front reading "Stevenson's Pub."

A second crash spurred her forward. Who knows what could be causing this, but the most valuable thing to her right now was information.

Dashing through the wide street made only of flattened dirt she felt very vulnerable in the openness. She could definitely be spotted either way the road traveled down. This was definitely the center of the town, evident by many smaller paths branching out from it, and one large one that ran West to her left.

She crouched at the small center of the square. It was made of rough wooden planks forming a small stage of sorts. She peered around the edge hoping to catch a glimpse inside the building.

No such luck.

She decided now was the time to be bold and move forward. Being so wary of everything as to force her into doing nothing would surely lead to starvation or some other slow and painful death.

Peering through the half doors she noticed papers flying up from the floor behind a sort of wooden counter that separated her from some dusty glass bottles with translucent or amber liquids inside.

The fly was going haywire, pushing against Mercy's chest and back out of the building. Mercy was more concerned with the items. Those could be valuable!

She needed something to drink and surely these would provide sustenance.

The unseen person behind the bar started grumbling to themselves.

"Why'd those humans have to take everything that could actually hydrate us," followed by a rather harsh hiccup.

"Maybe I should just take one of these bottles to trade in later," the same high pitched voice continued.

Mercy didn't want to be seen as a potential threat, but neither did she want to be made a target. So she spoke up.

"Uh hello? Is this your home?"

A flurry of action happened all at once.

A screech from the person caused Mercy to jump back, the supposed human that ended up being some smaller, grayish, creature jumped out from behind the counter looking terrified. Then, the aforementioned creature lost its balance and crashed to the floor.

With its back to the curving counter like thing it said: "What is a human doing here so soon? Are there more of you yet?" "Are you all going to kill me?" Each question that rang from the fearful mouth sounded out with more dread than the last.

"I won't harm you if you stay right where you are… are you okay?" Mercy responded, wanting to seem intimidating but also kind.

The creature couldn't stand on its own two feet for some reason, swaying and hiccupping with the neck of one of the smaller looking bottles clutched in its grasp. His knuckles were taut around the container, veins bulging in some sort of crazed mania.

"Why haven't you started screaming or stabbing me yet?" The creature questioned.

"I'll make you a deal. So long as you answer the questions I ask, I promise to neither scream nor stab for the duration of our conversation."

"How can I be certain you won't?"

"You can't be, but I could have done it already. So it seems like this is your only option. My name is Mercy by the way."

The creature still seemed hesitant, but the logic was there. He could see the knife in her hand and the blood staining one of her arms.

"I'm Baye, a Goblin obviously."

Mercy kept a straight face. Should she pretend to know how things worked here? How does one even begin to explain her situation? Maybe honesty could be a good policy for now.

"You were asking why I was here so soon. Why is that?"

Mercy circled clockwise around the room and Baye followed, trying to stay as far away from her as possible. Ensuring that she could still beat her source of information to the door, Mercy starts to scan the building for anything of use.

"Weren't you with the others to the West?"

"I was not, I'm not from around here. What's to the West?"

Mercy picked out a wooden stool that looked light enough to carry fairly easily. Furniture could be considered useful, she guessed. If nothing else it could probably become firewood.

"It's where the humans spend the First Winter. It is supposed to be this massive fortress but I've never seen it."

Mercy was unsure if she liked the cold or not, the prospect of two winters seemed interesting though. That must be why it is still so cold.