Chapter 14: Common, Not Safe

  By the end of the second week, Laurent stopped counting days. Out here, days didn’t matter. Light did. Weather did. Whether he woke sore or injured mattered more than any number the calendar thought it was.

  He had settled into a rhythm. Wake before full light. Eat little. Move slow. Harvest what he knew. Mark what he didn’t. Leave before the forest noticed him for too long. Common routes. Common herbs. People in the city said common the way they said safe. Laurent had already learned better.

  He was working a shallow slope when it happened. The plant was familiar—thin leaves, dull green, faint warmth at the stem. He had harvested it twice already without issue. Laurent knelt, checked his surroundings, then reached in.

  His fingers brushed leaves aside.

  For half a second, nothing reacted.

  Then the grass tightened.

  Not movement—tension. A coil snapping into shape beneath it.

  The ground shifted. A blur cut upward from the undergrowth.

  Too fast to track.

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  Too close to avoid.

  Pain flared, sharp and immediate, as something snapped against his forearm. He hissed and pulled back instinctively, rolling sideways as a second strike hit where his hand had been a moment before.

  The second snap struck empty air where his wrist had been. Dry leaves scattered. The sound was not loud—but it was precise. A warning. Not pursuit.

  A snake-like creature uncoiled from the grass, thicker than his wrist, patterned in broken browns and yellows that vanished the moment it stilled. Laurent backed away slowly, keeping the log between them, heart hammering. The creature did not chase.

  It rose just high enough to hold space, body weaving slightly, not advancing, not retreating. It was not hunting him.

  It was correcting intrusion.

  His arm throbbed. Blood welled where the fangs had grazed—not deep, but real. Only then did his mind catch up: not venomous, but aggressive. Territorial.

  Laurent didn’t fight. He stayed still, letting the creature forget he existed, until it slipped back into the undergrowth as if it had never been there. Only then did he sit, hands shaking as he wrapped the wound. The bite wasn’t life-threatening. The book had said as much: clean it, bind it, watch for swelling.

  Still, the lesson landed hard. Common did not mean forgiving. He rested the remainder of the day, moved camp early, and stayed alert.

  He had expected fever.

  The wound to pulse hot by night, the skin to swell and throb.

  It didn’t.

  By morning, the bite had sealed cleaner than it should have. No heat. No spreading discoloration.

  He waited for weakness.

  Instead, he felt hungry.

  Not the dull, manageable kind.

  Sharper.

  When he returned to the collection point days later, his bundle was lighter than planned—but intact. Properly harvested. Acceptable quality. The clerk weighed it, nodded once, and counted out the coin. Enough. Not comfort. Not security. But enough to keep the path open.

  As Laurent stepped back onto the road toward the city, arm still bandaged, he understood something the academy had never bothered to explain: survival wasn’t about being strong. It was about making fewer mistakes than the world required to kill you. And for now—that was something he could do.