For once, however, he was not alone in the cavern. It was warmer than it usually was, heat emanating from the back which shouldn't have been there. As he looked for the source of the strange heat he saw the animal that stalked from the depths of the cave. It was like a dog, but its features were sharper and leaner. A fox?  But foxes weren’t supposed to be midnight blue with crimson eyes.

And they weren’t supposed to talk.

“Hello dear nephew.”

Wren's mind raced. There were too many strange things happening today. 

“Nephew?  Honored spirit, my grandparents are all mortal beings.”

It replied in a singsong voice.

“I am the mountain’s daughter, born and raised. 

 Your blood makes kin till end of days.”

Wren was terrified.  Going to the Nemean school would have given him an opportunity to have a tiny chance of learning magic, and today he had seen not one but two people use it, one of whom he had known all his life and the other a complete stranger.  And then he had a being from legend talk to him, pure magic made manifest.

Then From the Darkness Deep it Came.

Vicious Teeth and Eyes Untamed.

Its Mouth a Grin it's Body long

And now it Spoke in Manic Song

"Just now you see the truth of me.

A spirit who stole a Fox's husk

And in my eyes are prophecy

Visions from the God of Dusk

Today you met a stranger stranger

Than any you have seen or read

They will put your friend in mortal danger

Kings and Queens will want his head”

A spirit, a creature not seen since Beowulf roamed the land.  A creature known to never lie, but always hide to truth.  The tricksters of an age when humanity lived in fear.

Why was one here?  And talking to him?  He was no hero or king. Based on old tales - which at this point was all he had to go off of - that meant he was getting tricked.  He hadn’t sought the spirit out, which meant it was unlikely he was going to end up a fable to teach young children about being patient and content.  

It’s not a coincidence. The Old Mountain was said to be the father of all the other mountains and everyone who lived in them, and she claimed to be his child.  She and the girl - for who else could the stranger stranger be - were connected. 

It clicked then. The warning, the trick, the game that was being played. Wren was trapped by the truth of the spirit’s words.

“They will put your friend in mortal danger.”  There was no ambiguity in those words, and only one way to read them. 

Gale would come close to death because of his new friend. The second he realized that, his brain buzzed with ideas to stop him from leaving, to keep him safe. But after today he wouldn’t trust Wren as much as his mysterious companion, and if that was the case he would have to confront the stranger.

“Why should I go to fight her? Why do you want me to do so?  Who is she?”

“You will go to fight a Monster,

Who will endanger your first friend

The reason’s simple boorish honor

You prevent an early end.”

It was a statement of what he would do based on thousands of years of experience.  It was an analysis of his personality from a being he had only known for a few minutes.

Whatever it was, it was correct, and it knew.  With a chittering laugh it bounded out of the cave, and Wren prepared to fight a mage to save his friend.

*    *    *

Gale clearly hadn’t told his parents about the morning’s fight, because when Wren asked them where he was they gave him a hug and welcomed him inside for dinner.  They knew about his dad, but they never let a shadow of it appear on their faces.  It still hurt anyway, and once they let him know that while they didn’t know exactly where he was but said he had been practicing a lot in the shed he politely left. 

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

The shed was empty, but had clearly been lived in.  Gale must have managed to lie to his parents for once in his life, for if he had told them he moved everything outside their shed for a girl they would have been cross.

There was a small mat on the floor, with a child’s blanket next to it. Both were probably old hand me downs that weren’t being used at the moment but kept around in case Glen got another sibling. A small square had been demarcated, and the grass in it was tread on far more than the rest of the area. 

Wren sighed.  Craai was right, he really shouldn’t be as harsh as he was on Glen.  He put in a lot of effort, but where Wren and Craai had begged Old Boya to use the village’s little money to get spear manuals Gale had pushed for stories.  They all read every book that was purchased - there were too few not to - but Wren had not poured over every little detail of each tale like Glen had.

It was that fascination that worried him now.  Strange things were afoot, and both of them were caught up in something outlandish even by storybook standards.  Natural magic casters and spirits? Wren knew any of Gale’s worry for his personal safety would have long been overshadowed by sheer interest.

It would make the job of convincing him to stay probably require force.  And even though earlier that day Wren had beaten him up in the spar, the thought of doing it to deny him his dreams made Wren feel even worse somehow.

Wren only stayed awake due to a strange mixture of anticipation and impatience.  If he weren’t exhausted in body and mind 

The entrance was not dramatic.  Two people snuck into the shed, breathed out a sigh of relief, ignited the fire next to him with a fingersnap and giggle, and then froze when they saw him.

The girl was the first to react.  

“What are you doing here?”

Wren raised his hands off his spear.  “I didn’t introduce myself earlier. I’m Wren, born here, seen 16 years, good with a spear.”

Gale jumped in. “Oh he’s more than good, he’s the best spearmen in Koushan!  Maybe even The Little Teeth in a few years, I mean he’s not fully grown and he beat a Nemean school student!  Were you waiting for us Wren?  See I told you he was a nice person, I mean I’ve never seen him wait for-”

Wren glared at him before continuing.  “Where and when were you born?”

“Not even gonna ask my name? And how old do I look, genius?” She replied.

Avoiding the question.  Wren’s eyes narrowed.  “Answer.”

“Why do you want to know?” She answered.

“Not merchant’s kid, not from here, not a runaway. You came here from the south.”

“You say that as if it were an explanation, but all I got was more things that need explaining.  How do you know I’m not any of those?”

Gale chimed in. “Not from here it’s somewhat obvious, apologies.  This town is sufficiently small enough for everyone to know everyone.  If you were a merchant’s kid you would have a Trader’s tongue accent to your Teethtongue, but that’s not the accent you have.  If you were a runaway from another village, your hair wouldn’t be that color.”

“No child of the mountain’s hair is anything but black or gray.  You don’t know, you’re not from Little Teeth or any of the Teeth. You came from Bile.”

“Bile?”

“The Warped Woods are a term that originated in the south of the continent and came into Teethtongue through the trader’s tongue. The original term in Teethtongue is a reference to the history of our people: when Old Mountain vanished he used his teeth to shelter his children and rent his stomach open across the then plentiful woods where their enemies lived.  The bile of a god made the woods hostile to humans, forcing any army who wanted to attack his children before he returned to travel through a hundred hundred mountains.” Gale explained. 

Wren’s eyes never wavered from the girl through the story.  She had never heard of it before, which meant she never asked how the Teeth got their name.

“You’re from far.  Came through the Bile.”

“Selene, he’s implying that’s an ill portent. Legends and tales never have anything good coming from the woods, whether you’re north, south, east, or west of it.”  Selene glared daggers at Gale, who took a second before clamping his mouth.

“He wouldn’t tell you that if you grew near the woods. How far are you from home, Selene?”

“I’m nineteen, and you’re right, I’m far from the city I was born.  Through circumstances I can’t understand or explain I was sent to the woods two months ago and learned magic.”

Unexpected.  Wren had been fairly certain that she was a spirit or monster.  Spirits couldn’t lie, and spirits weren’t nineteen.  Furthermore - 

“She’s not any sort of monster.  Monsters couldn’t have taught me magic!” Gale chimed in.

Wren weighed his options.  This changed things. The spirit had been far more explicit than most in the tales, and so he had fully expected to fight Selene and find out she was a monster. 

“I saw a spirit, Gale.”

The room went silent for a few seconds. Gale stared at him, disbelief mounting with excitement.

“When did you last sleep, Wren?”

“Do you think I would imagine a spirit, Gale?”

He looked at Gale, and the doubt in Gale’s eyes didn’t change in the slightest. 

“It inhabited the body of a fox.  It claimed to be a child of the mountain and it knew I met a stranger.”

Gale’s eyes sharpened. “What did it say?”

“You will go to fight a monster,”

Selene’s eyes threatened to fall from their sockets.  Glen looked at her, a trace of fear touching his face.

“Who will endanger your first friend”

Glen back to Wren.  Wren stared at his eyes, daring him to look away.

“The reason’s simple boorish honor

You prevent an early end”

Wren got up and walked towards Selene.  “You're not the monster.  But you know something.”

“Monsters are hunting me.”

It was then they heard the howls.  The Sun had set in the mountains, and the crescent moon was peaking into the sky.  From the South and East high baying howls resounded, a symphony of terror.  This wasn't a small pack of arctic wolves, twenty hunters who would terrorize any stray animals but who were no match for a pack of hunters. This was an army laying siege.

A loud horn was the answer, a summons for all the humans of Koushan to gather at the top of the mountain. It was there they would fight the first monster raid recorded in centuries, and certainly the first to go undetected by the time it hit the mountains. The slowly steeper hills that separated the Teeth from the Bile had scouts, who should have seen anything on this scale.

“To the mountaintop.”

“Make sure everyone goes up.  Help the elderly.” Wren ordered.

There was no argument.