Grumdkaim was nothing like what Spike had imagined. A high, thick stone wall surrounded the town, and armed sentries patrolled on top of it. Inside, wooden buildings crowded against each other, pushing onto packed-dirt streets. People, mostly f’lh, milled around in great numbers. Spike took in all he could while Del negotiated with the guards and pulled him along into the town proper. He wanted to stop and investigate every shop they passed, until Del finally snapped and told him that they’d come back out later, but if he kept stopping them now she’d fly him above the canopy and drop him in the smelly moat they’d crossed. It was sufficient threat to gain Spike’s compliance.

Del finally found the inn Tisk had recommended and procured a room for the two of them. There were enough rooms available so that they could have had some privacy, but Del had a feeling that leaving Spike alone for any amount of time was a very bad idea. Something about him fairly screamed trouble.

“So, when can we go back out there? I wanna look around,” Spike whined. Del hadn’t let him look at anything, except the thousands of furry yellow, orange, and red people scurrying around the city.

Del sighed. “I’ve got to meet my contacts here, and you’re not staying anywhere by yourself. We can look around after that, and tomorrow as well. Unless, of course, you have a better idea?” Spike was beginning to get on her nerves.

The blonde knew he’d pushed a bit too far. “Fine. Where’s this contact?”

“I’ve got directions. We need to gather up some things first.” Del retrieved several cloth-wrapped packages from her pack, laying them open on the bed. Spike gasped, running reverent fingers over the weaponry. It was without a doubt the finest craftsmanship he’d ever seen.

“You make these?” He asked, admiring the slender, deadly daggers.

“Mm hmm, some.” Del was busy choosing what to present, making sure the blades were polished mirror-bright. “Ok, if you’ll carry that bundle, we’ll be off.”

The building Spike followed Del to turned out to be some sort of guild. They were greeted by a rough, burly f’lh with dirty orangeish fur. He herded them toward what appeared to be a large meeting room, which was filled with f’lh of varying status. On the walk over, Del had filled Spike in on the basics of f’lh society, including the complex and static social structure. He’d rankled when she first told him to keep his mouth shut. The explanation he’d gotten surprised him. Spike figured she was still angry with him for being a pain in the ass. As it turned out, f’lh women do not customarily participate in trade. They may be excellent artisans and craftspeople, but they leave the exchanging of money to men. While the tradition softened somewhat for outsiders, Spike’s presence could cause Del problems. If he opened his big mouth during the negotiations, chances were he would be expected to finish them and Del would be expected to remain silent. Spike loved haggling, but since he didn’t really know what Del was bargaining for, he decided to play along and keep mum.

Del stood stoically while guildsmen swarmed around the room. There were several merchants ahead of her. She watched one presenting his wares. The weaponry was second class; suitable for training or perhaps light use. One orth in front of her, though, worried the dalhari. His weapons were the equal of hers in terms of strength and durability. Her only advantage was aesthetics—the orth smithy produced singularly ugly metal. But then, customers paid a premium for beauty, and there were rumors that this holding had suffered during the harvest. They might be feeling a bit frugal.

The guildsman in charge of purchasing waved Del forward. Spike followed silently, waiting for his companion’s orders. He was fascinated by the warrior’s guild. Weapons of every shape and size were suspended on the walls. Warriors, young and old, male and female, were piled on almost every available surface, drinking, eating, swearing and generally having a great time. Most ignored the merchants or watched with only vague interest.

“Dalhari,” the f’lh in charge began. “What do you bring today?” Spike had to strain to understand the f’lh, whose command of the trade language was thickly accented.

Del silently laid out the first bundle of goods, which the interested f’lh took up, testing the blades carefully. “Your forge?” Del nodded at the question. “How many masters? How many apprentices?”

“Several,” Del replied quietly. The f’lh laughed brokenly. Dalhari were famous for being tight-lipped about such things.

“Very nice. What else?” The f’lh looked meaningfully at Spike’s burden. At a glance from Del, he shifted the bundle into her hands. Del laid out the larger weapons carefully, waiting for judgment. The f’lh perused the offerings, then spoke, directing his commentary at the human male.

“Ah, equally nice. Pleasing work.” Spike cast his eyes toward Del, biting his lip to keep in his laughter. Del looked as calm as ever, as though the obvious slight didn’t affect her in the least. The f’lh chortled again, and then directed his words back to the dalhari.

“We are interested.” Those words marked the beginning of a furious round of bargaining. Spike split his attention between Del’s maneuverings and the other merchants, who were exhibiting varying levels of disappointment and disgust at having been declined. The blonde tried to follow the negotiations, but was soon lost when they slipped into the native f’lh language.

Something Del said elicited a barrage of angry growls from the surrounding f’lh. The dalhari responded with a single, solid thump on the table with her tail. Spike watched in growing amusement as the stocky warriors jumped, then fell silent, taking a step away from her. After a tense moment, the negotiations resumed.

Just when Spike was about to break his internal promise to stay silent and beg for something to drink, Del clasped hands with the f’lh and presented him with a single dagger. The other wares were quickly bundled in their protective clothes as a smaller f’lh wrote down the details of the negotiation. Del took one copy, folding it carefully and storing it away. Spike took up his bundle as the pair hurried out of the building.

•••

“What’s the rush?” Spike asked, trotting to keep up.

“They’re about to serve dinner,” Del said with obvious disgust.

“And the problem with that would be?” Spike said. Dinner sounded great.

“Trust me, you do not want to partake of dinner there tonight. Or any other night.” The woman’s tone was ominous enough to make Spike pause. Why not? Those warriors had looked like fun.

Del saw confusion and the beginnings of irritation on Spike’s face. She stopped next to an alley, pulling the human off the street. “Spike, hunting has been poor lately around here. Very poor.” She said seriously.

Shit. “Humans?” He asked incredulously. “You said they rarely…how do you know?” Spike asked.

“For one, I could smell it. Also, the guildsman was kind enough to tell me he wasn’t inviting you to eat your kinsmen.”

“Oh. Well, then.” He shifted his burden uncomfortably.

“Yeah, well then. We’ve got hours to kill. Why don’t we drop this stuff off, then you can prowl around the shops we passed.” They agreed and Spike was soon poking around in everything he could find, much to Del’s amusement.

“So, what was that all about?” Spike asked offhandedly. They were eating dinner outside the inn, leaned against a retaining wall.

“What was what about?”

“The negotiation, the pounding tail on table, that what.”

“Oh, I was just asking about the holding. Someone took offense. We still made a deal.” Spike nodded and finished his supper.

“So…you’ve got people working for you?” He asked, remembering the f’lh’s question.

Del glanced over. “The forges? They’re one of my house’s domains. Many people work there, including me.”

“What, you’re the traveling salesman?” Spike snickered. Del’s face did not reflect amusement.

“We all take turns doing this, several going out each time. It’s not my favorite thing to do, no.” She glared at Spike. “You meet the oddest people on the road.”

Spike snorted. “You got that right.” He leered at her. “Odd people.”

“Come on, human.” She pushed off the wall and returned to the inn, leaving Spike to follow.

“Where to next?” Spike asked, rearranging his belongings within the knapsack.

“There’s another f’lh holding about a week into the eastern forest here. After that we have about two weeks to get to a wintering place.”

“Winter sets in that quickly?” Spike asked.

“It does here, as well as higher up the mountains, which is where we have to go. That’s why we’re stuck over here until spring—winter might not start here for another three weeks, but snow has already blocked most of the mountain passes on the near range. The house has a small property in the foothills where we will winter over, if we can reach it before the first snowfall.”

“How likely is that?”

Del sighed, something she was doing a lot lately. “It depends on how fast we go. The terrain levels off briefly after the next holding, and then there are foothills to deal with. We’ll have time to stay here another day, though.” The human needed to rest rather desperately. She hadn’t been completely honest; the chances of them making the valley region before winter were slim to none at their current pace. Something would have to be done, or Del would find herself stuck in less-than-hospitable surroundings for the cold season. Why did she get herself into this kind of stuff? She could easily convince one of her old acquaintances, like Tisk, to take the human in for the winter, or forever. His chances of returning home were abysmal.

“Why don’t we just leave tomorrow? I mean, if time’s that short…I’d rather not get stuck somewhere where I’m considered dinner,” Spike replied. It was the truth; after spending a century as a predator, he was acutely aware of his vulnerability as a human.

The dalhari studied the wall rather intently. “It’s an option. Unfortunately, purchasing mounts is not. There simply isn’t the money for it. We will simply have to make do.” She looked carefully at the human. “And you getting exhausted and hurt will ensure that we’re stuck in unfriendly territory. There are rumors that the region we’re passing through has some maith groups roaming in it.”

Spike raised an eyebrow. “They’re…”

“Fond of humans, and dalhari for that matter.” Del shuddered. She’d love to simply fly over the region, resting in the treetops at night.

“I guess you’re not talking about ‘get to know you’ fondness?” Del nodded. “I’ll be fine starting out tomorrow.”

“Good.” She was relieved, although she’d have to keep a careful eye on him, that he didn’t overexert himself. Del dug through some of the weaponry she hadn’t taken to the trade meeting. “Do you have any experience with swords?”

“Yeah, why?” Spike looked with appreciation on the pair of swords she held. They were longer than the short swords he was accustomed to, slender and slightly curved. The hilts were carved with some sort of animal design.

“You’ll need to stay armed from now on, and I didn’t see any weaponry on you.” She looked at him expectantly. Spike smirked, and then extracted his boot knives. They were all he had with him, but they usually sufficed. She took them, turning the blades over several times. “Not bad, but you’ll want to carry these as well.”

Spike took the swords, testing their balance. “Why didn’t you take these to the negotiations?” They were fine pieces.

Del watched Spike handling the swords. He used a style somewhat different than she was used to, but seemed to have training. Maybe he wouldn’t cut his own head off. “They’re not a style the f’lh would be interested in; those are usually wielded by dalhari.” She reached behind her, extracting a similar pair of swords from the harness she wore.

“Oh. Um, how am I going to carry these?” Del reached into his pack, drawing out a twin harness constructed for humans. “Thanks.” He’d not even seen the item earlier, nor had he seen Tisk give Del a truly evil smirk when she’d requested it.

•••

“So me an’ Angelus worked our way through Paris. Bloody good time for all,” Spike said merrily, recounting his adventures with his Sire before the older vampire had been cursed.

“Sounds like it,” Del said under her breath. The past three days had been quite the adventure, for both of them. Spike had been regaling her with his stories, ones which both amazed her and turned her stomach. Apparently vampires were rather brutal creatures. She was somewhat worried that taking Spike with her would prove to be a mistake. “So, you miss the violence?”

“Dunno. I mean, you’d think I would, but I don’t really. Maybe it’s because I’m human now, instead of a demon. I’ve got a soul, and the idea of torturing people just doesn’t hold the same appeal. Besides, I haven’t been able to do any of that for a couple of years now, at least not to humans,” He admitted.

“Why not?” It didn’t sound like vampires would willingly give up their favorite pastime.

Spike scowled. “Bloody military. Stupid blokes put this chip in my head. Kept me from hurting humans, or feeding.”

“Chip?”

“It’s complicated technology. Cruel stuff, I couldn’t defend myself. If I even tried to hurt a human, I got a migraine.” A thought occurred to Spike. Did the chip work now? He wondered. Did it work on the species in this dimension?

Del remained quiet. She didn’t understand the technology, but she did know about magicks that did the same thing, rendering a person defenseless. “Does it still work?”

“I don’t know. It never kept me from hurting anything but humans, and we’ve not run across any for me to try it out on.” He thought for a few minutes on what they’d been talking about for the last few days. “It feels different, being human again.” Del looked over at him, curious.

“What do you mean, different?”

Spike remained silent, gathering his thoughts. “The demon, what made me a vampire, it was what craved the bloodshed and all that. Now that it’s gone, I’m more like I was before I got turned. Not exactly, since I’ve lived a long time, but more like that.”

Del was surprised. Dalhari and a couple other species, siv and pakra, could turn humans into their own species. But when that did happen, which was rare, those people remained fundamentally who they always were. “It’s strange to me, that you would be so changed. When humans are turned into other species, they stay the same people.”

“Maybe it’s because vampires are dead—the body is dead, anyway, and the demon lives inside it.” He fell silent.

“So you’re not going to go about causing ‘bloody chaos’ any time soon?” Del asked lightly.

Spike laughed. “I don’t think so. I doubt it would increase my chances of surviving.” Del joined him in laughter.

A few minutes later, Del stopped suddenly. Something was tickling her nose, a familiar scent. She cast her head side to side, looking for what caught her attention.

“What?” Spike asked. He knew what she was doing; he’d done the same thing as a vampire. Something was out there.

Del cursed softly. “Maith.” These were the maith she’d heard about; rogue bands driven from their holdings far to the south.

Spike shivered. Del had told him stories about the most brutal of the land’s species. She’d also said that it was unlikely they’d run into any, since they typically lived further south. “I thought you—“ He was cut off with a wave of her hand. She motioned him closer as she started back down the path they were on.

The maith were just beyond a bend in the path. Spike followed Del’s lead as they walked past the group, who were crouched just off the path, underneath the brush growing there. The maith were tall, at least a head taller than Spike, heavily muscled, and hairy. One twisted his mouth in a grim parody of a smile and Spike saw a double row of sharp, shark-like teeth. A tremor of fear raced down his spine. He did not want to be anywhere near these people.

Del kept up the brisk pace for almost an hour, neither of them speaking as they hurried along. Eventually she stopped, resting against a tree. Spike took the opportunity to rest as well, settling down on the ground a few feet away.

“Thought you said there weren’t any of them around here.” He said, catching his breath.

Del looked up at the sky. Why me? This trip had started out easy enough. A few trade negotiations, keeping up friendships with neighboring holds. Then Spike appeared out of nowhere, literally. And now a rogue band of maith, too close for her comfort. “Remember, I heard rumors from the warriors’ guild that some roving bands had been spotted in the forest. This isn’t their home, however. The closest maith holding is hundreds of miles south.”

“So…” Spike began. “What does this mean?”

The blue-skinned woman looked down at Spike. “It means we get as far from here as possible while I think of something.”

Spike stood quickly. “Would they—“

“Yes, they would. They outnumber us five to one, and they started following us almost immediately. Maith like humans, and consider dalhari a rare treat.” Del stood and resumed their rapid pace along the trail. Spike asked no more questions, reserving his breath.

The pair walked and jogged until Spike almost passed out. Del looked over her shoulder at him, and then stopped. Having one of them unconscious was a death sentence. “Spike?”

Spike looked over at Del, panting slightly. He knew he was nearly through—there was no way he could keep up this pace. “Yeah?”

“We’ll rest close by for the night.” She walked over to the human, stopping a couple of feet away.

“Where? Those things aren’t far away, and they can track us, no matter where we go.” He said, having recovered his breath.