Tristana seriously doubted that the young boy would be able to hold up his own in a fight. She also didn't ever want to have him get into a fight since he might get harmed. He was just a kid after all. She wondered if the boy had ever encountered anybody besides Tristana. It was certainly possible but if that was the case then why was he alone now? Would people really just leave a child alone like this? That's why Tristana didn't believe that Fenriz had met anybody besides her. But there was something else. The boy seemed to be very uncomfortable. But Tristana couldn't think of why that might be. So she decided to ignore it. If Fenriz was uncomfortable about something then he would just simply have to have to tell her what it is. Then he began to speak up. 

"Yes?" Tristana asked. 

The boy then paused as if he had thought of something. Then he pointed to the direction that they were already headed. Then she suddenly understood what the matter was. Fenriz must have been scared! After all this was a very dark forest with monsters no doubt everywhere. He must have been frightened. Suddenly his earlier attitude made sense. But before she could ask or talk about it he had spoken. Apparently he was still curious about Zanar. 

"Well he was tall and had a strange aura around him. Zanar had wavy dark hair and piercing blue eyes. Yet he was very kind and understanding. I went to go see him since he's also the god of tracking. So he can track anybody down. Since he is best at it." Tristana explained, "I doubt that he will invite me when his kid is born. After all I only met him once. I may consider him a friend but that doesn't mean he thinks the same of me. Besides I've never met his wife. I can't be attending the ceremony for her child if she doesn't even know me. Perhaps if there was a huge celebration that everyone could attend then I would do my best to be there. But they seem more like the type who'd rather have a private celebration. So I doubt we will get to go."

She then realized that she may have just crushed Fenriz's hopes to go. But it was the truth. Besides she didn't want Fenriz to think she was best friends with a god or anything. That wasn't true at all. In fact she doubted that any god or goddess would ever want to be friends with her. It was just that she considered the god as a friend but that didn't mean that Zanar saw her as a friend. Zanar probably just saw her as a regular mortal. And that was fine. Tristana wasn't going to go off bragging that she had met a god or that she was best friends with one. That would be wrong and would be using him. Which she never ever wanted to do. Suddenly Fenriz seemed tired. Tristana then realized that he might have been up all night. After all it was morning and it seemed that he was tired as if it was evening. 

"Yes, of course we can!" Tristana said turning around seeing him at the base of the tree, "In fact let's rest here for the day." 

She didn't know why exactly he had stayed up or why he was really tired but she decided to let that be. Tristana then quickly found a small clearing of grass right next to the path where there was room enough to set up a tent. So that's exactly what she did. The tent was medium sized and big enough for two people. The tent was hard to set up since she hadn't ever set one up before. Tristana failed the first time trying to set it up. And the second time. And the third time. And the fourth time. The fifth time she failed. Tristana managed to figure it out on the sixth time. But the boy was probably already asleep. Tristana wasn't sure though. Then Tristana realized that they would probably need some food and a fire to keep warm by. So many things that she hadn't thought about. 

Silence fell over him as she responded to his questions, a silence accompanied by a wide array of emotions. First and foremost being disappointment, of course. The last time he had heard about a god having a child, he ended up chasing a magical rabbit, one that he lamented never getting even so much as a glimpse of. Perhaps he was setting his expectations a bit too high, something that was obviously not a new pastime for the boy, but he could only imagine what he might be missing out on when this Zanar's kid was born.

Perhaps more so than that, however, Fenriz felt curious. According to Tristana he was capable of tracking anyone down. He could only wonder if that extended to vampires as well. How one went about contacting a god was beyond him, but if there was even a possibility that it might reunite him with his parents, he was determined to find a way.

But the prevailing, overwhelming feeling that he felt the most was simply exhausted. Somewhere deep down the usual Fenriz lurked, wishing nothing more than to continue his tirade of questions about Zanar, Tristana herself, and anything else he had on his mind. But that Fenriz was buried beneath one that was fighting a battle just to keep his eyes open, one that he was winning for now, though that certainly was not going to stay the same for long. Perhaps it was the anxiousness of being lost in the forest, combined with the excitement of making a new friend that gave him the adrenaline to progress this far, but that energy had begun to wane significantly.

Tristana's repeatedly attempts to set the tent up amused the boy, prompting a childish giggle with each failed try. Fighting for consciousness, it never quite occurred to him to offer a hand until she had finally succeeded in the task. Though even his his sleepy state this caused another layer of guilt to take over him, as once more she was proving to be a way better friend than he was.

Perhaps his more delirious state made him feel a bit more bold, or perhaps it was the guilt that finally got to him, but he couldn't help but feel that it was well beyond time to talk about it.

With greater effort than it might have taken normally, he lifted himself from the base of the tree and seated himself just outside the tent. Of course the interior was inviting, seemingly taunting and teasing him to come inside and sleep, but he was determined to keep eyes open at least until he had spoken his mind.

"Miss Tristana, I think there's something you should know" he started. Again the desire to back out and unceremoniously drop the issue rose up in him. More images of the worst case scenarios of letting this information go began to swirl around in his head. But this time he was able to power through his own mental torments "I… uh…."

He took another pause, delicately piecing the sentence together in his mind, or at least as well as his fatigued brain would allow. He interlocked his fingers, thumbs fidgeting nervously. as he started speaking once again "Have you ever heard of vampires? We uh… drink blood. B-but we have to, to stay alive. You don't have to worry about me though. I should be okay for a few days. A lot of people don't like us. Miss Raziel says its because a lot of vampires do a bunch of bad stuff… or something like that"

"B-but i'm not like that! I promise" Fen blurted out, evidently trying to convince his new friend to remain as such "But if we do find my parents, you should know that they're vampires, too. But they're not the bad kind, either"

Fenriz rarely had a functioning filter when he spoke regularly, but in his exhaustion that filter had completely vanished. If Tristana didn't know about vampires previously, had no reason to hate vampires before, Fen had just inadvertently explained why a lot of people tended to. He wanted to plead his case further, wanted to explain how despite their reputation, none of the vampires he had met were bad people. But this last outburst had proven taxing on the remaining energy he had left, and the war against sleep had begun to tip in sleeps favor. If her opinion on him were to change, and she did intend to rid the world of one more vampire, there would be very little the boy could do about it, as his eyes began to droop. 

Tristana then heard the boy speak and went over to him so she could hear him better. She sat down next to him at the outside of the tent on the grass.



"Yes, what is it?" She asked curiously.



The boy then continued on explaining vampires and that he was one. Tristana listened to him as he spoke. So he was a vampire. Still Tristana’s view of him was unchanged. He was still a little boy who needed help finding his parents. He had already proven that he wasn’t evil, or at least to Tristana he had. She could tell he was exhausted and slightly delirious. His filter was obviously gone but then he spoke more then fell asleep before Tristana could even respond. She sighed and stood up. Tristana then used one of her spells to give her some extra strength for a short time. Once she caste the spell she reached to Fenriz and picked him up off the ground. Then Tristana carried him into the tent and laid him on the floor.



“Thank you for telling me.” Tristana said, “I don’t care that you are a vampire. You’re still a sweet kid and that’s all that really matters.” 



She knew it was probably silly to speak out loud like that. Especially since he probably couldn’t hear her due to being a sleep. Tristana grabbed her backpack, opened it, then began searching through it’s contents. First she pulled out a thick gray woolen blanket and placed it over the child so he wouldn’t get cold. She searched for a pillow in her backpack but was unable to find one. So instead she took her bag and went out to a soft grassy area and filled the bag with as much grass as she could stuff in the bag. Then she returned and gently lifted Fenriz’s head and placed the bag stuffed with grass underneath his head to act as a pillow.  Tristana then set out a dagger from her stuff near but not too close to Fenriz in case he might hurt himself. Next she performed a spell on Fenriz, a spell called Arch Protection. The spell would protect the boy from magical and physical attacks. This way in case anything happened to come upon the tent there would be better protection. That’s why she set out the dagger. If anything came in and the boy woke up he would have something to defend himself with. Then she opened her bag and pulled out some ink with some parchment paper. She wrote a little note for Fenriz.



-Dear Fenriz



Don’t worry! I have only gone out to hunt for food and find some supplies for building a fire. If you don’t believe me take a look at my bag. My stuff is all there and I can’t go anywhere without my stuff. Anyway I cast the arch protection spell on you so that you will be more protected if anything were to happen. I also left you a dagger just in case. But I shouldn’t be gone that long so don’t worry. Also don’t worry about the whole vampire thing. I don’t mind you’re a vampire at all. Thank you for telling me.- 



Finally Tristana was ready. She took her bow, arrows, another bag, two canteens, and her map. She didn’t want to get lost after all. Not to mention Tristana didn’t want to leave Fenriz completely alone. She then began to hunt. It took her a long while to actually find something since she wasn’t that good at tracking. Eventually she had found a wounded deer. Tristana knew she was lucky especially since she was still really close to the path. So she was a silent as she could have been as she raised her bow and tried to shoot an arrow at the deer. Even though the deer was not able to walk she still somehow missed. The deer seemed alerted and frightened but it apparently had damaged it’s front left leg somehow. It was unable to run away. So Tristana approached it carefully. She managed to walk over to the frightened deer and saw how much it was in pain. The deer’s leg had been broken and was bent in ways it shouldn’t have been. Even Tristana knew that was not much that could be done for the deer. Even if she was able to heal the injury with her magic the deer would still limp everywhere. Which would result in it dying anyway to another creature. Tristana quickly took out an arrow and stabbed it in the chest where she assumed the heart would be.



Then she stabbed it again in the chest just to make the process quickly. The deer died and quickly Tristana went to work. First she opened one of her canteens and tried to fill it with as much blood as she could manage from the deer. Then once it was filled she took the meat from the deer then put the meat in her bag then gave thanks to the deer for dying so that she and Fenriz could eat. Finally she began heading back. Along the way she picked up some wood and timber that she could find so she could make a small fire back at camp. She arrived at the tent and began to clear the ground until there was just dirt. No grass or leaves. Then she made a circle out of large stones. Finally she put some leaves in the circle of stones with some sticks. Then she leaned the wood she found into a circular pyramid that made it look like a good campfire. Tristana supposed she could have used her fire magic but she was worn out a bit by the magic she used today. So instead she just used a tinderbox and lit the campfire up. She quickly made sure that the surrounding area would get caught on fire then gently blew on the little flame so it might get bigger. Next Tristana went over to her stuff and took out a small pot. She poured some water into it from her canteen then put the deer meat in the pot. It wouldn’t be the best food but it would work. Cooked deer meat. Hopefully it wouldn’t burn. Tristana then entered the tent and crumpled up the little note she left since it wasn’t useful anymore. Then she got the canteen filled with deer blood and gentle tried to wake Fenriz up. It was midday now. 

Fenriz would actually end up awakening twice during Tristana's absence.

The first rest could barely be called that, as he flailed around violently during his slumber. Images and flashbacks of that night, the night his vampire side had fully awakened within himself, the mangled corpses of the family he had unwillingly murdered, plagued his dreams as he tossed and tumbled against the makeshift bed Tristana had created for him. Visions of his allies, Raziel, Frey, and even Tristana herself, all with backs turned as they faded from his life tormented the small boy until he was unable to remain sleeping any longer. Jolting to an upright position, he took several deep breaths before surveying the situation.

The last thing he could recall, he was explaining his biggest secret to Tristana, just outside of the tent. The fact that he was able to do so assuaged one of his biggest fears, as if she did hate his kind, she didn't hate them enough to end his life. Strangely enough, he had seemingly moved from just outside the tent to in it. Figuring this was his companion's doing, Fenriz sought to thank her. Panic soon set in as he realized she wasn't there. His head swiveled twice as he looked around the tent for his missing friend, momentarily believing his nightmare had become reality. In his alarmed-yet-delirious state, the boy overlooked the note the first time, but caught it the second.

Skimming over the note left the boy with mixed feelings. Certainly, a part of him was overjoyed. A proverbial weight had been lifted from his shoulders now that he no longer had to stress about keeping his vampirisim from Tristana. Of the few people he considered friends, each and every one of them knew what he was, and each and every one of them stood by him regardless. Although he had referred to her as such verbally, it now felt like he truly could consider her a friend.

And much like one might do for a friend, he felt a considerable amount of concern for the girl, out there all by her lonesome. As she had pointed out herself, many of her possessions were with him. What if among them was something she needed? Who was going to read her the map, if not him and his vampire eyes? Or what if some other creature of the dark was out there right now, waiting for their chance to strike? In his head, he wanted to lift himself up, and march into the forest, intent on assisting the woman in any way he could manage. This is what he wanted to do, but reality had other plans. His restless sleep left his eyelids still feeling heavy, and almost as soon as he had put the note down, he was back asleep, though this time dozing much more peacefully. No longer haunted by his vampiric nightmares, dream Fenriz simply wished for his friend's safe return.

The second time he awoke, it was to the scent of something cooking over a campfire. As the aroma seeped into his nose, his eyes slowly peeled open, revealing a seemingly unharmed Tristana in the tent with him. Still considerably groggy, the child pulled himself up to a seated position, wiping the blur from his eyes just to make sure he wasn't imagining things. Once he reopened his eyes and the woman was still there, he started beaming brightly.

"Miss Tristana!" he exclaimed "Are you okay? Did you get hurt? Where did you go? And what are you making?"

Though still somewhat tired, it was evident the vampire was at least feeling a bit more himself, as he peppered Tristana with questions. But they all came from a pure heart. A heart that was not only jubilant that she was uninjured, but relieved that she was willing to accept him as he was.

"I would've come helped you, if you had asked, you know" he lied. Certainly he would have, were he capable, but they both knew why he didn't accompany her.

"Oh, and I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner" he ended, staring into the ground feeling somewhat ashamed.

Tristana noticed how groggy Fenriz seemed to be. It seemed that he stayed awake during the night and slept during the day. She didn’t know much about vampires so she wasn’t sure but perhaps it had to do with him being a vampire? Maybe that’s how they all were. Tristana didn’t have the time to ponder it because Fenriz started asking a whole bunch of questions. She realized that he was concerned about her wellbeing when she was gone. Which she found incredibly sweet. After all the boy barely knew her for a day yet had shown her so much concern. It truly touched Tristana’s heart. At the same time she also felt a little guilty for leaving him alone. She was glad she wrote that note so that he wouldn’t panic when she was gone. But at the same time Tristana wished she didn’t have to leave him by himself. After all he was just a boy, vampire or not. Children at his age shouldn’t be alone. Especially in the dark woods filled with monsters. However there wasn’t much Tristana could do. There was nobody else to watch the boy and she had to get food for the both of them. He was too tired to come with her so she had to leave him at the tent.

“I am unharmed.” Tristana explained, “I’m perfectly fine. There’s no need to worry. I simply went out to go hunting so that we could have some food. That’s what is cooking on the fire. It’s dinner. Or at least for me it is.”

She then listened to him as he explained that he could have helped her. But she seriously doubted that he really had the energy to then or now. Tristana then watched as he looked ashamed.

“I thought it would be better for you to be asleep so you would have energy later.” Tristana said, “I can understand why you didn’t tell me. You didn’t know whether or not you could trust me. Which is a good thing. It would be unwise to trust everybody you come across. But now there’s no secrets between us. And I am glad you told me. Now I can figure out how to properly take care of you until we find your parents. Now, I have something for you.”

Tristana then opened a canteen full of deer blood.

“I know it’s not human blood but it’s still blood.” Tristana stated, “Will you be able to eat this?”

She sincerely hope vampires were able to drink other blood than human blood. They should be able to. Especially since blood was merely a functioning liquid in the body. All animals held blood and humans along with many other beings were still technically animals. Tristana found it interesting that vampires had to drink it. What was it in blood that made it so important for vampires to digest it? How was the vampire digestive system different from a human digestive system? After all humans couldn’t drink blood easily. Tristana was curious about other parts of a vampire body. What was different about them body wise? She was naturally always wanting to know more. But when it came to healing and how the body worked, it fascinated her. However she had to remember that it was probably not a good idea to talk about that sort of thing with a child. Tristana really hoped that the animal blood would work until she could figure out some sort of plan to make sure he didn’t need food any more. She wondered if her magic would be able to summon human blood without harming anybody. Perhaps the spell conjure food would work? After all it was conjuring food technically. Tristana guessed that vampires also had some sort of magical item that could provide them with free blood. It was no doubt rare. But it had to exist. Magic and vampires had both, or so she assumed, probably lived in the world a while. They had to encounter each other. It wouldn’t have made sense if they didn’t . And logically vampires would want to focus on using magic to get food. That’s what she would have done in their position anyway. All she would have to do is figure out where to get it.

Though he was certainly glad that she understood, he couldn't help but feel a bit of lingering remorse for holding on to his secret for so long. All of these wild scenarios that he imagined in his head seemed so silly in hindsight, but as Tristana had pointed out herself, he had to be careful. Were he not as cautious and skeptical of other people as he already was, it was likely that he wouldn't be alive to have this conversation with her on this day. All he really could do was silently offer his appreciation at her incredible understanding.

His head tilted at the mention of a gift. For a moment he couldn’t help but wonder with wide-eyed excitement as to what she might have found during her brief adventure. Was it some sort of rare treasure? Or maybe some sort of interesting animal! To his mind, the possibilities were seemingly endless, right up until the moment she opened the lid to her canteen.

The scent was immediately identifiable to the boy. So much of in such close proximity filled his nostrils with an pungent, unpleasant yet familiar odor. Instinctively he threw both of his hands over his nose in an attempt to relieve it from the stinging sensation. Fen’s eyes then shifted from the canteen itself to the one holding it, his face turning red though this was a bit hard to see due to his hands still covering most of his face. Seldom did he let people know about his vampire blood. Never would he have imagined he would end up having to explain any parts of it to someone. But he had already kept far too many secrets from someone that was only trying her best to help him out.

“I can’t Miss Tristana” he started, mentally trying to put together a reasonable explanation of what being a vampire was like, despite not fully understanding it himself “Animal blood actually just makes me feel sick. I’m not really sure why but it only works if it comes from… people”

Even to the childishly unobservant Fenriz, it wasn’t hard to tell that Tristana was genuinely doing her best to provide assistance to him. But this only made him feel worse in having to explain it.

“But you don’t have to worry about me!” he chimed in, freeing one hand from his face for added emphasis “I’ll be okay for now. I can go several days without taking blood from people, I promise”

That much was true. Perhaps it was out of sheer willpower, perhaps he just hated feeding that much, but one thing the boy almost priced himself on was the length of time he could go without doing it. He wasn’t sure exactly how much longer he had, just that it was a while. A small stroke of unintentional foresight, feeding before entering the forest.

Fen picked himself up, his legs a bit shaky as he put the rest of his body weight on them, but he managed to remain standing, and take a few steps toward Tristana. The guilty look on his face likely giving away what he was about to say next.

“Thank you Miss Tristana for all your help so far. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about it before you left” as he shifted his gaze, electing to stare out of the tent “I don’t actually know a lot about this vampire thing myself. I just know that we can’t really go out during the daytime. Other vampires I’ve met say we’ll die if we do. And if we don’t drink blood… people blood… really bad things can happen”

He then fell into a momentary silence. Though he would likely answer if asked, the “bad things” was clearly something he didn’t want to talk about. It never was.

But even his contemplative silences didn’t last for long. He stepped out of the tent, greeted once more by the night-like shade the Viren’s towering trees provided. For someone who’s very life depended on knowing exactly what time of day it was somewhat unnerving having no idea. But so long as it was dark, he supposed that was enough for now. And for now, he was content to take a seat around the campfire.

“Miss Tristana, how long do you think it’ll take to make it out of here? And where are we headed once we do?”

When Tristana was told about vampires only being able to drink human blood she was slightly embarrassed. She had forgotten the fact that she herself was extremely inexperienced with the rest of the world and that she would have to learn new things like this. Quickly she closed up the canteen and swallowed her embarrassment. 

"Oh! I'm sorry." Tristana said quickly after closing up the canteen, "Let me just pour this out real quick." 

She then went outside of the tent for a few seconds and poured out the blood into the grass. Then she closed up the canteen and silently reminded herself to go wash out the canteen later. Then she returned to the tent. Tristana listened to Fenriz as he talked about being a vampire and how little he knew of what it meant. And although he reassured her about the blood drinking and how he didn't need it right away, she still was nervous. Not because it was drinking blood! She just simply didn't want a child to starve himself like that. It didn't seem healthy. She herself knew that children needed food in order to grow up. After all Tristana knew what it was like to be young and starving. It wasn't pleasant to say the least. Tristana would have to help find a way to make sure the boy was fed without resorting to violence. She knew that it wasn't right to hurt someone just for their blood. Perhaps there would be people who would be willing to offer a bit of their own blood until Tristana could find a more permanent resolution. Tristana listened as Fenriz asked a question. 

"Well, I don't think it will take us more than a day to get out. We are very close to the edge of the forest. I'd say a half day and we will be out. Or rather half night. Once we are out I think we should head to a ship of some sort. After all the best way to find out where you came from is to go back the way you came. Am I correct in assuming you ended up in this forest directly after getting off the ship? It's very important that I know this so that I can find which way you came from." Tristana explained. 

There were many options of which ships that he might have come from. But she wanted to figure out primarily where he had traveled. There were three main possibilities. First, he could have come from some sort of island and sailed to the forest. Second, he could have come from Canelux and just sailed to another part of the land. Third, Fenriz could have come from Pavpora and sailed to Canelux. Tristana was liking the third option best. First of all it would explain why the boy seemed to know so little of this land. However it was obvious that the boy didn't come from anywhere far inland. So it was doubtful that he came from the middle of the Canelux or Pavpora. This was because in his story he didn't seem to travel too far before he got on a ship. Which meant that wherever he lived, it was close to water. But it wasn't a city otherwise the little vampire would have been noticed for being a vampire and for getting on the ship. This may not have seemed important but actually it just narrowed down a lot of options that Tristana had. Wherever he came from it wasn't inland it wasn't a large city, and it was able to hold vampires. That was a good place to start.