Myles had kind of expected the boy, or Devlin as he now knew his name to be, to follow after him, and felt surprised when he didn't.

  He did a cursory walk of the camp to look for any other prisoners or threats, but came up empty. It occurred to him he didn’t actually know what the bandits had been planning with all of those people. He supposed he should have asked, but the only individuals left in the camp who might know now were currently unconscious over where the fight had taken place. Myles didn't intend to stick around waiting for them to wake up.

  As Myles walked back towards the front gate, he realized he wasn't totally sure where he was, having slept through most of the journey there. The forest outside of the camp didn’t do much to clue him in. It was true that he had spent some time in a few of the towns along the coast, but he would be lying if he said he had done much to explore or learn about the area.

  Myles frowned when he realized that the only wagon left was the same prison cart that had taken him there.

  He wondered if the victims they had freed had been transported here that way as well. He supposed it made sense that they wouldn't want to ride in it if that was the case. Not that it made much difference to him now.

  Myles had seen plenty of carts be driven in the past. He was sure he could figure it out. It was better than walking.

  Myles checked on the oxen and found that they were still harnessed and attached to the rig. It looked like someone had forgotten the animals there, and he wondered if their escape had been to blame.

  He finished untying the knots that had tied them to a low post and turned to get on the wagon.

  "So. Where are we headed?" Myles almost jumped out of his shoes.

  Devlin was sitting in the driver's seat with a large crate in the spot next to him.

  Myles hadn't even heard him walk over. "What are you doing?" He asked him.

  "Well, we're about to set off, aren't we? I'm getting ready to drive. So where are we headed?" Devlin frowned to himself. "Wait a minute, I'm the captain, so I'm supposed to decide where we go next."

  "No, you're not. And I told you I'm not going with you."

  "Well of course we're going to ride together. Why would you leave here all by yourself when it’s more fun to go together? Besides, everyone knows that you're not supposed to go adventuring without a team. Otherwise how is it supposed to be an adventuring party?"

  Myles thought his eye might start to twitch. "I'm not going adventuring. That's not a thing."

  Devlin just laughed at him.

  He opened his mouth to tell the kid to take a hike only to realize the implications of what he had already noticed. This was the last cart. He swore.

  Myles took a deep breath and let it out through his nose. "Look.” He finally said. “Fine. We can ride together until we get to the next town. I won't just leave you to walk. But then that's it, got it? That’s where we go our separate ways."

  Devlin smiled at him like he had just made his day.

  "Great!” Devlin cheered, standing up in excitement. “I promise you, you're going to remember today as the day you joined the greatest adventure this world has ever known. Now, climb on already!"

  "I'm not joining your team!"

  A few hours later, Myles was questioning how he had found himself in this situation. He wasn't in the driver's seat of his own wagon (he had gotten there first, dammit), he was holding a giant crate of food that had been pillaged from a bandit camp on his lap, and he was actually listening to the prattling of the far too optimistic crazy person in the seat next to him.

  Myles narrowed his eyes when they came to a fork in the road and the boy didn't so much as slow down to consider which way to go.

  "Do you have any idea where you're going?" Myles asked him as they went left.

  "Of course I do. I'm going to travel the world."

  "What?” Myles could already feel a headache forming. “No. I mean, do you even know where we are right now?" Myles had a thought. "Were you walking towards this wagon when you ran into us earlier? Why would you ask for a ride from those guys if they were going back the way you were coming from? Where were you even going in the first place?"

  Devlin just looked at him with an easy smile. "You worry too much, Myles. I was going to find a crew, obviously, and I found you."

  "I'm not-" Myles cut himself off. There was no point in saying it, even if he most certainly was not joining this man's team (whatever that meant).

  "You don't have a plan at all do you?"

  Myles took a minute to look him over with a little more attention to detail. Some things he had already noticed, like the scar on the side of Devlin’s face near his left temple or the dirt around his collar. He wore his long sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and a hint of a gold chain was visible beneath the shirt he wore half buttoned.

  Myles had tried not to let the fact that Devlin was bare foot bother him earlier. He was pretty sure it was an intentional choice because he had some sandals tied to one of the belt loops on his shorts. Myles wasn’t sure whether that made it better or worse.

  But there were other details that stood out. Devlin’s knuckles were dirty and scabbed over enough that it wasn’t obvious, but there were strange markings on his hands that could have been bruising or scarring or something else. His knees and forearms displayed evidence of old injuries as well, but Myles didn't know how much to make of that. He himself had his share of scars from his past. Regardless, even after his assessment, Myles wasn't quite sure what to think.

  "Of course I have a plan." Devlin turned to him as he pulled his feet up onto the bench to cross them. "Next, I need a new sword."

  "What?" Myles blinked at him.

  The kid was a swordsman? Myles scanned him once more from head to toe with that idea in mind. He didn’t see any weapons on him, though there was a belt strapped over his right shoulder. Myles thought back to the fight, but he had only seen him use his hands and feet. He supposed that didn’t necessarily mean anything. Devlin had certainly shown surprising strength. But still, he didn't have what Myles would have considered a swordsman's build.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  "Why didn't you grab one off the bandits we knocked out?"

  Devlin's eyes widened. "I didn't think of that!" He frowned, a pout forming on his face. "Darn it! I could have already had a sword. Everyone knows that the best adventurers have cool swords."

  "You’re not being serious, are you? Do you even know how to use one?"

  Devlin just rolled his eyes. "Of course I know how! Well, that settles it. I'll just have to find one at the next place we go."

  Myles felt a headache coming on again.

  "So, Myles. What are you fighting for?"

  Of all of the questions he was expecting to have to field, that was one that was not on the list. "What are you on about now?"

  "What are you fighting for? You know. Your goal. Your dream. Your destination. You asked where I was going when we ran into each other. Where were you heading?"

  "Look, I told you. I'm just here until we find the next town and then I'll grab a ride back to the port where I was when this all started."

  "No you won't."

  Myles felt his eye twitch. "What do you mean, 'no I won't'? I just said that's what I’m going to do."

  "If you were going to go back there, you would have left with the townspeople."

  Now Myles was just irritated. He scowled deeper. Was this idiot seriously getting smart with him now?

  "That's okay, you know. If you don't know where you're going yet." Devlin turned his head to glance at Myles in the eyes again. "You can travel with me until you figure it out. We're friends after all." He smiled at him and then turned back to the road.

  "What's got you convinced that I'm trying to go somewhere?" He wasn't sure what made him ask the question.

  "You're still fighting, aren't you?"

  Myles didn't even know what to say to that. Luckily, he was saved from answering.

  "Hey! It looks like there are people up ahead." Devlin started waving his arms to get their attention, calling out to say hello.

  "Stop that. You don't even know who they are."

  "You're no fun." Devlin pouted a bit but settled down.

  As they got closer, Myles squinted. They looked like army soldiers. He started to get a bad feeling, but Devlin wasn't slowing down one bit.

  "Hey, Devlin. We should stop."

  Devlin turned to him. "Why?"

  "Because I said so."

  Devlin pursed his lips, but conceded. "Fine, fine, okay. Time to stop, you guys." Devlin yanked on the reins, but the oxen didn't stop. Devlin tried again and still received no reaction. Then he stood up and used his hands to give them each a hard smack on the rear to get their attention.

  "Hey! I said stop!"

  Predictably, rather than stopping, the two beasts grew agitated and broke into a run, pulling the wagon behind them such that it bounced up and down off the ground.

  Myles reached out instinctively to grab Devlin with one arm and the seat with the other to stop him from being sent flying.

  "Do you seriously know nothing about driving a cart?! What the hell is wrong with you?"

  Devlin just grabbed onto his arm as they were thrown around and laughed as they crashed straight into the army roadblock.

  Shouts went up around them and shields were thrown in front of the panicked animals. They were forced into a stop. A second later, Myles and Devlin found themselves surrounded by army soldiers pointing muskets directly at them.

  "Freeze! You're under arrest for theft, kidnapping, crimes against the allied government, and resisting army officers. Don't move another inch or you will be executed on the spot."

  Myles sighed, resigned to his fate, but Devlin didn't appear to be fazed at all as he answered them. "This is all just one big misunderstanding. We haven't kidnapped anyone."

  One of the soldiers pulled the cloth tarp off the back of the wagon revealing the metal bars and the crates inside. "Is this not your transport and are those not your stolen valuables?"

  Devlin gave him a look. "Of course this is our wagon. And that's our treasure. You see, we won it fair and square, so now it's all ours."

  In his head, Myles watched a cart fly off the edge of a cliff in slow motion.

  "Devlin," he asked. "What the hell are you doing?"

  "So you admit to being guilty of the theft and other posted charges? That's all I need to hear. Gentlemen, take them away and lock them up."

  Devlin's eyes narrowed, "You're not locking me anywhere." He turned to Myles. "You trust me, right?"

  He didn't give Myles a chance to respond that he didn't trust him one bit.

  Devlin leapt in the air, dragging Myles with him, and flipped them up onto the roof of the wagon to balance on the metal bars. The chaos was almost immediate.

  Shots rang out at their movement, but quickly stuttered when one went wide. Devlin had kicked the barrel of the gun during his jump and rather than reaching its target, the bullet hit the ground between the feet of the first ox. The animal proceeded to lose its mind, pulling free from its harness and dozing straight through at least a dozen of the soldiers in its rampage.

  Devlin hadn't stopped moving though. He leapt off the side of the wagon at the soldiers on the right. Myles didn't hesitate to take down several of his own in self defense as he was dragged along. He kicked one of their swords to the ground and grabbed the knife off of another. He saw a gun pointing at Devlin and grabbed his collar to yank him out of the way of the shot.

  Myles glanced around trying to come up with any way to get out of this. A bad idea formed in his head.

  Myles threw Devlin over his shoulder and sprinted towards the other ox. He slashed through the harness ties with his knife in one swing. With his other arm, he tossed Devlin at the animal. He didn’t even have time to see if he had managed to grab on, just kicked the beast in the haunches and jumped. He barely managed to grab onto Devlin as it took off, charging away from the soldiers.

  Myles heard a few gunshots from soldiers who had managed to rally in time, but by a stroke of luck, none of them connected. Well, luck or the way Devlin was flying through the air as he clutched the harness ring on the ox, trying to hold on. Myles was having an even worse experience, hanging on by his death grip on Devlin’s forearm.

  In the last twenty four hours, it felt as though Myles' whole world had turned upside down. He was literally running from the army on a bucking cart animal.

  Devlin looked down at him as they swung through the air and grinned. Myles tried to twist around to see behind them. The soldiers were fading into the distance, but he knew that they would be coming after them quickly.

  All of a sudden, the animal they were riding slammed to a stop so quickly that it kicked up a cloud of dirt and Devlin lost his grip.

  Both boys went flying through the air and landed in a heap on the ground. The ox snorted and pawed at the dirt before turning towards the forest and charging into the underbrush.

  "Wait," Devlin called out after it, hand reaching out like he could stop it. "Hey, where are you going?"

  Myles didn't know which part of the last twelve hours was catching up with him, but lying there in the middle of the road, one hand resting on his chest, he started to wheeze. A moment passed and then he was clutching his stomach. He couldn't remember the last time he had laughed so freely.

  Just a day ago he had been thinking to himself that he had sunk to rock bottom, and arguably the situation he was in now was worse. He had been declared a criminal by the army, had fought them instead of trying to explain the situation, and then fled, almost definitely confirming his guilt in their eyes. And yet here he was, laughing on the ground.

  Devlin looked over at him and joined in, his smiling face propped on his hands as he lay on the ground facing him.

  When Myles’ laugh tapered off, he turned to face his supposed partner in crime. He shook his head as he spoke to him. "All right, captain." The title was said with a mocking tone. "How exactly are you planning to get out of this one?"

  Before he could blink, Devlin had moved into a crouch and was pumping his fist in the air. "I knew it! I knew you would be the perfect first member of my team!"

  Myles didn't even get a chance to protest that statement before Devlin was on his feet, pulling him behind as he took off at a run. "Come on! This is going to be great!"

  "What a mess." Myles muttered to himself. Then he spoke to Devlin. "How do you plan to escape the soldiers? Even if we run, they'll catch up with us."

  Devlin grinned at him. "This way." He turned and led them straight into the forest.