Even though the horse ran even, graceful strides, every hoofbeat sent a jolt of pain up my leg from my shattered toes. An onlooker might have thought I had ridden a horse all my life as I guided the creature through the trees and over obstacles. Of course, that couldn’t be further from the truth. The NPC horse knew the way. I was a passive rider. Pulling the reins did nothing except help me to hold on.

Douglas rode ahead of us. He was the only person that knew the way to the well. I watched his face, looking for some trace of the madness that I suspected lay underneath his foolish angst. Invoking the power of the Unknowable Host came with a cost, after all. It had driven Hesper to sacrifice his wife and attempt to do the same to his son.

Douglas continued to invoke that power time and time again even as every wish turned back on him.

As I watched, I saw his hand hover over to his right ear several times. He was picking at the wax plug—the only thing standing between us and the Cloven Women's spell. I couldn’t tell him to stop; he wouldn’t be able to hear me. Instead, I just watched as he touched it, rubbed it, and fidgeted with it every moment he could get one of his hands off the reins.

Shadows danced alongside us as we rode. The Cloven Women weren’t attacking directly, but still, we kept our weapons at the ready. Truthfully, I wasn’t sure if I was coordinated enough to use my pitchfork while riding a horse. Luckily, the threat of it kept them at bay for a time.

Douglas held out his hand, directing us to follow him through a tight footpath that weaved between some large trees. The horses followed him without missing a beat.

I could hear very little but hoofbeats and heartbeats echoing inside my ears. Everything outside was muffled.

I saw a hand waving in the corner of my eye. I ducked down, believing it to be the hand of one of the Cloven Women, but I soon saw that Anna was trying to get my attention. I looked over at her. She mimed that she had seen Douglas messing with his earplugs. She was mouthing something. I couldn’t tell what.

I could see the creatures moving behind us to the left and right. The horses were faster than them, but only just.

We broke from the footpath into a clearing. Ahead, we saw a cobblestone path leading up to a well sticking out of the earth. A large rock lay leaning against the side of the well, that was probably what had been used to seal it before Douglas moved it.

Someone had spent a lot of time creating a stone pathway, a bench, and a flowerbed around the well. All of it had become overgrown and run down with time, but I imagined that Douglas’ great-grandfather had really devoted himself to this place. It was his temple.

We were a hundred yards out from the well when Douglas reached up to his right ear and rubbed it for the twentieth time. This time, the wax plug lodged within it came dislodged and fell from his ear down to the earth.

His horse slowed down almost immediately. He mindlessly dismounted before his horse even came to a stop. He fell to the ground undeterred. Anna was yelling something that I couldn’t make out.

Douglas looked at us, then past us. He started walking forward, then running.

“Stop him!” I yelled.

Anna reached out to him to no avail. The horses turned toward him but steering them toward an unscripted goal was a fool’s errand. Horse riding likely required a special trope. Luckily, we had someone with a trope that could do the trick.

Kimberly handled her horse with grace and skill. She must have used her Convenient Backstory ability. I wasn’t able to hear her do it. She had rerouted her path so that she rode right past Douglas, she swung the end of the crude spear she was holding like a club and crushed Douglas’ nose with it. He stumbled backward onto the ground.

I jumped off my horse and fell forward onto him. I quickly removed the stopper from my ear and shoved it into his. The pain in my foot was immense. At this point, getting him back to that well was too important. I wasn’t sure if someone other than him could undo his wish. I’m not sure anyone else would want to, with the effect it had on people who tried.

Suddenly, I heard the sounds of the night again. I quickly put my finger in my ear to ward off the spell of the Cloven Women.

Douglas was dazed. He stood up and Anna beckoned him forward back to his horse.

All around us, I could see a dozen or more of the Cloven Women arriving at the tree line.

“Hurry!” I screamed as I scrambled back to my horse. My injured foot was useless. Stepping on it sent a shock through my body. I fell down to the ground before I could make it.

Fighting against the Hobbled status required Grit, a stat I had woefully neglected.

As the others rode off toward the well, I struggled to even stand. My foot had swelled, and my joints were stiff and unbending.

My horse took off toward the well as soon as it saw the other horses going. I was alone, failing to stand in the middle of a clearing. I could hear the others screaming as they realized I had been left behind.

The Cloven Women started running toward me.

I tried crawling away, but I knew if they got to me, that was pointless. My pitchfork had fallen somewhere when I jumped off my horse. I only had one hand. The other had to block out the sound of the monsters’ whispers.

It didn’t really matter. They were beyond whispering. They weren't even trying to project their human form. They were pure monsters now.

I really only had one thing going for me: I was not the lowest Plot Armor male near the Cloven Women. Normally, I could count on being targeted because of my halved PA. It was even lower than normal now as my Hustle had been cut by being Hobbled. Still, with Douglas nearby, a level 3 NPC, the monsters would technically target him first.

Of course, that didn’t mean they would ignore me. That would be too much to hope for.

The first Cloven Woman to reach me was small. She kicked me as she passed by, which dislocated my shoulder on contact. The second creature picked me up and threw me. I couldn’t do anything to stop her.

I could hear someone yelling my name. I think one of them, maybe Dina, was trying to get to me.

Something hit my face. A hoof? It could have killed me if it tried.

My nose was broken. I wasn’t sure how long this could go on. Whenever the Mutilated status clicked on, my Plot Armor would drop even further, perhaps even enough to lower me below Douglas and permit a kill.

I was Incapacitated by the blow as I lay on my back. I blinked rapidly to try to wake up my senses to the world around me.

I could hear them running over me. Most of their hooves dodged gracefully around me. Others stepped on me—my legs, my chest, my stomach. Still, they wanted Douglas. One made a purpose to stomp on my dislocated arm as she passed by with the herd, snapping it like a twig.

I lay there unmoving.

My mind drifted into a dazed dream as I waited for the story to end. The needle on the Plot Cycle was nearly to The End. I don’t know how long I lay there.

The Final Battle, a race to the well, was over. Whether I lived or not, we would beat the storyline. After all, the Cloven Women would not attack my remaining teammates.

I heard something walking up near my head.

A Cloven Woman?

One of my friends?

No.

I opened my eyes.

It was a deer.

I turned my head and looked up toward the well. My friends were running toward me. Around them, a dozen or so deer pranced off into the forest. The Cloven Women were gone.

I could hardly move. I had some broken ribs, I could tell.

“Riley!” Anna screamed as she got to me. She was crying. I must have looked pretty bad. I had taken a hoof to the face.

She stopped down beside me.

I looked up at her. One of my eyes was swollen shut.

“It worked?” I mumbled. I realized as I tried to speak that I was missing teeth.

“They disappeared,” Douglas answered from somewhere I couldn’t see. “Riley, I… did not know this would happen. I did not ask for this.”

He started to cry for a moment while repeating that he didn’t know this would happen.

Off-Screen.

The Final Battle was over, yet the storyline did not end. We waited for a while hoping to see the needle move forward but it didn't. Eventually, Douglas remounted his horse he went and found wherever it was that mine had run off to and brought it back so that I could be lifted up onto it. Apparently, we weren't going to get the easy way out. We had to go back to the Akers Plot.

The ride back was a lot slower than the ride there. It was still dark outside but sunrise must have been just around the corner.

On-Screen.

While riding through the thick forest, we heard someone talking.

“Who is that?” Anna whispered.

I wasn't sure. It was a man's voice.

“Not a bad place to build,” a man said defiantly. "Plenty of lumber here."

“Quiet down,” another voice said. “What are you trying to attract those monsters?”

We rode along until we spotted the source of the voices. Beyond the thick brush, there was a small opening where the decrepit remains of a covered wagon sat thick with moss. A group of men lay underneath it in hiding. They had stacked up sticks and other debris to try and hide themselves, but I could hear them. What's more, I could see them on the red wallpaper as I stared at them.

They were NPCs. Nothing special. Only one of them had a name: Cooky.

I assume it was a nickname.

As we rode by, the men stopped whispering to each other.

“Who's under there,” Douglas cried out.

The men didn't answer for a moment.

“Refugees,” a voice said. “Only refugees.”

I couldn’t see Douglas’ face, but from the sound of his voice, I could tell he wasn't happy. “What are you doing on our land?” he asked.

“No disrespect,” the voice said. “We have come from the Lord's Glory. There are monsters about. When we heard them start to attack, we fled. Please, do you know if the Lord's Glory survived?”

“This isn't your land,” Douglas said. “You shouldn't be here.”

“We fled for our lives,” the men pleaded.

“I told him this would happen,” Douglas said as he turned to me. “They would use this as an excuse to take our land. He’ll have to listen now.”

Douglas was obsessed.

Anna and Kimberly stayed quiet. Their characters were trying to flee the cult so they must not have felt led to try and help its members.

“Let's go,” I said to the best of my ability. “I need to get back.”

“And just leave them here?”

“Yes!” I said. It was difficult to talk, let alone talk loudly.

I could hear Douglas mumbling to himself. Soon he urged his horse forward quickly. I thought about saying something to the refugees hiding underneath the old wagon, but my mouth hurt and I just didn't care. The storyline was over. The others must have had the same idea.

Kimberly nudged her horse to move forward. The other horses followed.

Off-Screen.

When we arrived back at the Akers Plot, we noticed that Douglas was not there. Neither was Theodore for that matter. Douglas had ridden in this direction. I had assumed he was coming here. NPCs started caring for the horses and one of them began tending to my wounds. The storyline just wouldn’t end.

We sat together, all of us, while the NPCs around us worked on repairing the damage from the attack. They had survived. The Cloven Women had followed us.

On-Screen.

Douglas arrived on horseback.

Something about him had changed. I couldn’t see what though, but then, I was not at my sharpest. My mind and body ached with pain as I laid back on a bale of hay.

He sat down near us.

Off-Screen.

There was a scene change. I could tell because all the NPCs stopped what they were doing and the sun began rising in the sky. The NPCs moved into their new places.

About fifteen minutes later, we were On-Screen again.

“I took care of it, brother,” Douglas said proudly.

“Took care of what?” I asked.

He came close and stood over me.

“I went back to the well. I told Grandfather about the trespassers in the wood. That they even said they were planning to rebuild there. He didn’t care. So, I went back.”

“What did you do?”

He started to laugh, a nervous, crazed laugh.

“I asked the well to curse any trespasser who entered without permission,” he said. “To make them wish they had never come.”

Of course, he did.

“Someone had to protect this land, this family,” he said as he held out his hand. There was a bloody cut on his palm. It hadn’t been there before. “I think I figured out what it wants—”

An NPC approached and cleared his throat. He was one of Akers’ cousins. I didn’t catch his name.

“Have either of you seen Grandfather?” he asked.

We said that we hadn’t.

“That’s strange.” He said. “He went to help some displaced settlers from the Lord’s Glory.”

The NPC looked west and scratched his head.

“He said they were in the western wood. I’ll have to go find him," he said, as the needle on the Plot Cycle clicked over to The End, "It's not like him to get lost. He was supposed to be back hours ago.”