Host A Hero

1-Katrina

There's something nerve wracking about waiting for a man-eating wolf to hunt you down—savage, hungry, and drooling for the chance to sink its fangs into your warm flesh. The suspense made Katrina waspish, worried as she was that the wolf wouldn't find her at all. Then her hard work trying to attract it would all be for nothing.

"I'm still not sure that leaving a trail of food to lure the wolf to you is the best way to go about this," her minstrel, Laird, said dubiously, his large belly jiggling as he trotted behind her, glancing nervously up and down the dark city street. "It seems kind of...well..."

"Childish?" Katrina snapped back, daring him to say it.

"Um...amateur?" was the slightly safer reply.

"Amateur! I'll have you know that Marco the Marvelous himself used this technique to catch that vampire last year, and no one complained about him being amateur." She pulled another bit of meat out of her sack and placed it strategically on the deserted roadway. "You would know that if you ever read the fan mags. Honestly, Laird, if you really are set on striking it big in the music world, I'd think you'd pay more attention to pop culture."

"I think the fact that I'm here instead of tucked safely in bed with a package of cookies and my teddy bear is proof enough that I'm serious about my career. Anyways, haven't you thought to wonder why a man-eating wolf in a city full of people would bother to follow a trail of leftovers when it could snag...well, a man?"

"If he wants a man then it's a good thing I've brought the biggest piece of bait in town."

Laird's breath caught, and Katrina immediately regretted her flare of temper. He had agreed to help her, after all, even though hunting bloodthirsty creatures was far out of his element. She tried to ease the peevishness from her voice.

"Look, I'd be happy to go hunt down its lair out in Brexley Forest—if that weren't completely insane. Man-eating wolves are nothing compared to that nightmare of a forest. Besides, with so many sightings in town, I might as well hunt here. And unless you want me dangling you on a string, a bag of meat is all I've got to work with."

"I know," Laird said gloomily, and the lantern in his hand sagged. "It just seems like such a waste." His stomach gurgled loudly.

"Oh for heaven's sake, Laird! Here you're going on about technique when all you really care about is the food!"

"Well that's your mother's pot roast—her best dish!" he said by way of defense. "You're just dumping it on the ground. And I know I saw a steak go down somewhere back there. A whole steak!"

"Once we get this trail back to the diner I promise I'll give you the rest of the sack."

"And the week of free meals?" he asked as though afraid she'd forget her other promise.

"As we agreed." She stuffed a hunk of leftover meatloaf in his hands. "See if that won't appease your appetite. And be silent, will you? I don't need you scaring off the wolf."

"Oh he won't be the one scared off, I guarantee that," he burbled over his treat.

She regretted bringing Laird at all—not that she preferred being alone on the streets so late at night with a man-eating wolf on the prowl, but the portly minstrel was hardly a comforting presence. He talked too much when he was nervous, his obesity slowed them down, and if something did go wrong he wouldn't be any use to her. But the truth was she couldn't get along very well without him, not if she wanted to get into the Host A Hero tournament.

Host A Hero was a huge tournament-style event put on annually by KFLY 1430, a popular radio station broadcasting across multiple kingdoms. Every year they selected a different city for the tournament, inviting local businesses to enter and sponsor a hero to compete in the tournament's four quests on their behalf. Mostly you saw the same popular heroes year after year, like Marco the Marvelous or Cloghorn Cassidy, but sometimes businesses introduced new personalities whose hero careers then rocketed from oblivion to punch-drunk fame.