Jorin was quite surprised when Baron Brock introduced the boy from the town square along with one of his friends as the scouts. Jorin wasn’t that oblivious as to not know about the child labor in his own kingdom, but it was surprising none the less that a noble made use of it. While not forbidden by law, child labor was frowned upon by the nobility, as it was usually a sign of a failing house. Especially the employ of children in a military context was rarely seen and not only by the nobles, most agreed that it was a bad practice, some for morale reasons and some considered it a waste of resources, as training them in their youth and having a good soldier later on would be a better use.

But Baron Brock was clearly thinking about growing his fortune and there was no denying that a child was much cheaper than employing a proper scout or the local hunters.

After briefing the two children on the goal of their expedition they rode out. Jorin took the boy, Garet, on his horse while Vares took his friend, Ilda. As they rode out the citizens in the town square watched in awe as a member of the imperial family let a ‘lowly orphan’ ride with him.

While it hadn't been the goal of taking Garet on his horse it had been a predicted upside of it.

They stopped at the edge of the treeline, which gave view to very ordinary looking cave entrance. Jorin turned around and whispered to Garet behind him. “It looks like any other cave entrance, how’d you figure out that this is where they are coming from?”

“There is a new pack of wolves leaving this cave every day.” Garet whispered back. “We’ve watched the cave for two days before coming back to notify the Baron about our findings.”

“You two will have to wait outside, while we go in and take care of them. You stayed safe while scouting this place so I trust you to know how to stay out of harm’s way.”

Ilda nodded “Yeah, we’ll just climb up on one of the trees.” But Garet seemed to be of a different opinion. “No I want to go in as well.”

“We don’t have enough men to spare somebody to babysit you two.” Vares cut in.

“I don’t need anybody to protect me, I can protect myself!” Garet exclaimed and drew a dagger from his belt that had been previously obscured by his shirt that was most likely made for an adult.

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Vares wanted to argue back but Jorin held him back. “Vares is right, I don’t have the men to have them guarding you.” Before Garet could start up again, Jorin held up his finger. “But, times are changing. If you want to come with, you will be treated like every other soldier.”

Jorin saw the determined look in the boys eyes, stood up and gestured his men to follow him to the cave entrance.

Where the cave had looked completely dark from the trees it was illuminated by a light blue shimmer as veins of shining blue crystals ran through the walls and ceiling. Jorin took the lead with Vares and Gord on each side of him, the others followed behind, with Myra in the back covering their escape route. The cave started as a relatively narrow tunnel but as they got in further it started widening until the tunnel gave way to a big cave. The ceiling was a good dozen meter above the lights from the furthest wall suggested the cave to be as big as a big village or small town. The stone floor was replaced with grass and trees and bushes filled their sight; a small forest seemed to grow underneath the mountain but unlike the forest outside it was deathly quiet.

They started to make their way through the bushes and after a while Jorin started wondering if there we actually any wolves there, when he saw a shadow out of the corner of his eyes.

He whirled around to the left where he’d seen the shadow in the bushes when something lunged at him from his right. He tried thrust his sword towards it but it was too fast and the sword too unhandy for him to react fast enough. Something heavy landed on him throwing him on the ground, his head snapped back and hit the floor taking his vision for a second. He tried grasp the head of the monster that was just approaching his neck and to his surprise it offered no resistance.

The weight suddenly lifted of his torso as one of his soldiers rolled the wolf of him. He could now see an arrow embedded in the beasts flank, piercing the heart. The soldier pulled him up by his hand, while the rest of his squad had formed a protective circle around him, ready to strike any foe that might pounce from the bushes.

“Thank you.” Jorin said, barely louder than a whisper, before picking up his sword. “We’ll head for the center of the cave, maybe that’s where their den is. Stay in formation, it seems like they have already spotted us.”

They continued making their way through the forest, spotting one of the wolves in the bushes every few minutes tracking them. After a while the forest gave way to a small hill, the tree line ending roughly 20 meters before.

On top of the hill stood a big tree, its leaves giving of a silver shimmer with two fruits hanging from its highest branches. They were easy to make out as one of them shone in a bright silver light and the other in an orange, almost golden light.

Before exiting the tree line, he signaled his men to stop. “Chances are that as soon as we exit the trees they are going to surround us and pounce. We are going to form a diamond formation, those of you armed with sword and shield will form the outer line while those with spears will form the inner line. When we start moving, we’ll make our way up the hill as fast as possible while staying in formation.”