Myxie Frostwhisper had packed her travel bag three times this week. Each time she unpacked it. She wanted to leave the village and become an adventurer, to climb the ranks and one day open her own guild here. But the trails were not safe. Something had been killing on them for a month. She pulled her fur cloak tight and stepped off the cabin porch. The wide timber walls behind her still held last night's warmth. Ahead, the snow told the story her neighbors feared. Deep coils pressed the drifts flat. Beside the coils lay a hunter's pack, torn open, its owner gone. Myxie followed the trail. She carried her pale longbow, its curves smooth under her fingers, its surface carved with fine lines. Her father had left it to her. She had shot rabbits with it, nothing worse. Her hands shook, but she kept walking. No one else would clear the path. If she wanted a life beyond this village, it started here. The coils led to a frozen stream. There the predator waited. It was a serpent longer than three men, its scales white as the snow around it. Pale purple eyes fixed on her. A stinger tipped its tail, curved like a hook. It rose, fangs bared. Myxie drew an arrow. The serpent struck. She threw herself sideways and the stinger split the ice where she had stood. She rolled up and loosed. The arrow glanced off its scales and spun away. The serpent coiled to strike again. She backed toward a fallen log and forced her breathing to slow. Scales guarded the body. But the eyes did not. She waited as the serpent reared, its head high, its throat open. She nocked another arrow and held. The serpent lunged. Myxie released. The arrow took its left eye. The serpent thrashed and slammed the ice, its tail whipping wild. She scrambled behind the log and drew again. When the head swung back toward her, she fired into the open mouth. The serpent shuddered, dropped, and went still. Myxie stood over it, shaking. She had killed the thing that trapped her village. The trails were clear now. She could finally leave. Then she saw the stinger. A thick, clear fluid dripped from its point and hissed against the snow, melting a hole straight through. She had grazed her forearm rolling from the first strike. She had not felt it in the fight. Now she looked. A thin cut ran across her skin, and the edges had turned pale purple. Myxie pressed her hand over the wound. Her fingers were already growing numb. The village had no healer. She turned and ran for the cabin, and for whoever might know how to draw poison from a body.