Bearclaw Valley bear with me

The dark potential in the story of Santiago Gabriel Arcos was all but lost; Ico would never know what brought him strolling dominantly into packlands, or what strange world lay behind that drawling accent, or what traumas had informed that brazen attitude. That story had vanished like so many droplets into an ocean, but another story was unfolding before Ico's very eyes — the tale of the riverside bloodshed, of how the warriors of Ursus had chased a devil from their midst.

Fields! Lookout! he heard himself yell, but Santiago was a quicker fighter than Ico was a herald. Almost flat on the hill's grass now so he could watch as carefully as possible without being hit by blood and spit, the boy cursed himself for not noticing Santiago's movements in time to save the ear of the shadowed golden knight. Fields...