Lothian crouched down in the tall grass, very cautious to not make any sound. He could sense the moist in the air as it soaked his skin in dripping pearls. The sunlight slipped through the open canopy above. His muscles were tense and his brow knitted as he sharpened his gaze. He held a small pebble in his hand, clenched, and then shot up from the grass and swung down hard.
Success flashed in the young man’s sapphire eyes. The blurry trajectory was followed by a surprised cry and a low thud. He smiled and ran over to the thicket a few meters away, grabbing his successful game. He twisted the rabbi's neck to make sure it was dead. No use to let it suffer more, he thought. He straightened his back and looked right and left before choosing the direction to the right.
It did not take long until the young man got back to the depths of the forest – back to his favourite resting place during hot summers, back to his apple tree. Having escaped the burning sun, the young boy sat under the tree in the shadow. He rolled over to his back and allowed for the shadows, with their cold tendrils, to cleanse away the sweat of his delicate brow and muscular torso.
The young man was almost stark naked, wearing only a piece of black pricked boar leather which was kept in place by two strands of sinew. Without it, leaves and bushes and twigs would get in the way and hurt him quite a bit, had he discovered, which is why he killed a boar and plucked its leather.
Just as Lothian had gotten himself at peace with the world, about to take a nap before preparing his newly fetched lunch, a growl greeted his ears from behind the trees. The young man grinned and opened his eyes. Rulah.
The growl was followed by the dazzling figure of a golden bear, lazily trudging over to him. As the bear advanced, fallen, bright-red apples became nothing of their former selves, squashed beyond recognition from to the bear’s huge weight. Rulah, the golden bear, was just within the reach of an arm as he tilted his head, looking at Lothian and let out two whimpers.
Lothian snorted smilingly, curling his lips as he produced a deep sound from his throat, whereafter he ignored the golden bear.
There was not much to do at that point of the day except to wait for the sun to retreat back into its valley behind the sky, and so the young man often spent his time doing absolutely nothing until the afternoon where the temperature did not take such a toll on him.
The golden bear frowned from the displeasure of being ignored. He tore a handful of moss from the ground and threw it at the young boy who sat in the shadow of the tree.
Lothian skilfully leant to the side and dodged the piece of moss, looking at his friend with a thoughtful gaze, as if saying: Do that once, I won’t mind, do it twice, and you will regret it.
Seconds later, Rulah showed his teeth in a smile as he aimed another patch of moss at Lothian.
Dodging again, the young boy raised his eyebrows and stared at the golden bear for a moment before lunging out toward him, wanting to grab his furry ears and squeeze really tight.
Rulah clumsily rolled out of reach, followed by an irritated Lothian. As they began to brawl, and punches and paws fought, they gathered more and more momentum. Eventually, they came a bit close to the round-formed pond in the middle of the groove and therefore fell inside with a loud plop.
Lothian hastily swam up to the surface and gasped for air, his eyes widening when he felt a tight pull to his ankle, once again submerged under the water as the pull drew him down.
Ten minutes after, two completely drenched figures made their way up from the quite pleasant water, collapsing in exhaustion onto the soft forest ground.
Both were quite battered up, but anyone with a discerning eye could easily figure out who was in the losing end. The young boy’s lip was cracked and his cheek was bruised, along with a deep gash of about a half centimetre that stretched from his upper torso, diagonally, down to his belly button.
“My win. Again.”
“Shut up.”
The two of them finally talked to each other, voicing out in the beast tongue– the language of the forest.
The golden bear laughed. “Either way, I did not come here only to beat you.”
“Go on”
“I heard that intruders have come to the forest and are attacking from the east,” Rulah explained as his chest heaved up and down, his fur as wet as it could possibly be. “They look a bit like you, my father said, and he also told me not to tell you. Don’t know why, though.”
“You said they look like me?” Lothian asked Rulah with a frown. He sat up, grabbing a stone from the ground and throwing it across the pond’s surface. The small rock skid several times before dying down, sinking to the bottom. “You mean, walking like me and eating like me and fighting like me? Two legs and two arms, upright? Is that what you mean?”
“Not sure. Father didn’t explain in detail.” The golden bear shrugged his shoulders.
“Oh.” The young boy said in a disappointed voice.
“Do want to go?”
“We are not allowed, are we?”
“Who cares!” The golden laughed.
Lothian stared blankly for some time before rising up. He nodded curtly to the golden bear, who, in return, smiled and shook his whole body to remove some of the water.
Clouds of ash-colored smoke rose to the sky and the sounds of battle were heard by Lothian and Rulah as they walked through the thick terrain toward the outer region of the forest.
This part of the forest, the middle region, was less dense than the depths, which made it easily for them to travel. Adding on that, they had during their childhood explored most of the forest, and so they knew how to get by with using the general direction along with a pair of key areas.
The young boy whose eyes were like gleaming sapphires turned his head to look at his friend, the golden bear, who walked beside him with slow, heavy steps. His fingers twitched and he clenched his hand into a fist. His meaning was clear: A fight was taking place at the place from where the smoke rose, and he would not coward back in fear, especially if it concerned the life of his beloved ones. He would protect them with his own fists, as he was raised to do by his mother.
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Seeing the young boy act like this, the golden bear growled in agreement. There was no question that Raluh would follow his playmate into battle. Even if it were them against a hundred, the golden bear would always be by Lothian’s side. No matter what. The growl turned into a roar, and a quick nod between the two of them made them both clear on what needed to be done.
The golden bear was unusually fast for his large figure, but could still barely keep up with the young man who ran on his two legs, darting through the forest. The smoke in the sky grew bigger and bigger as they closed in, and screams and roars and whimpers could be heard. There was even some foreign sound that could be heard, which caused Lothian to widen his eyes, his heartbeat quickening. These foreign sounds were not the product of anyone in the forest, and they closely resembled what the young boy could do with his voice, making him restless.
He bit his lip, shook his head and continued onward.
Not before long, they arrived at a large groove where there was much to no bushes or trees at all. The groove was a twenty meter, spacious piece of land where very much was dried out, perhaps only one or two plants across the barren ground.
Lothian remembered this groove as the land of death; a place where creatures of the forest were vigilant to enter because of the legend that concerned it. The legend of the one-eyed vulture king who had once killed a thousand of desert hyenas here. It transformed everything into a huge wasteland, the bodies of the dead hyenas becoming the soil of the land, and the blood flowing through their veins turning into the poison that cursed it as a land of death where nothing would ever grow.
As of this moment, the land of death was filled with movement. Flames licked the edges of the groove where trees still grew, and if not taken care off, would be able to cause much damage to the forest- much like what happened over three hundred years ago when the orcs had acted out with their boundless greed, uprotting the foundations of the forest. It was a miracle it survived, and that it now had regrown back to its former state.
A party stood in the middle of the cursed patch of earth, surrounded by Serena’s forces. There were about ten creatures facing off against the forest’s dispatch, all of them very much resembling Lothian.
The young boy was somehow conflicted as he saw the dispatch gang up on on the creatures that resembled him. Lothian could see the golden bear chieftain, Kureja, as well as his mother.
The golden bear was incredible dazzling to behold, clad in its golden, shining fur. His mother was also truly mighty looking. She stood not tallest nor strongest, yet carried an unbelievable aura of pure might, one which told enemies that if they were to attack, she would stomp them down.
One of the unrecognisable creatures opened his mouth and spoke in a language that Lothian could not understand but still felt a rare familiarity toward, raising the wooden staff in his hands into the air. In the next moment, a gigantic fireball spewed out from thin air, hurling toward Serena.
Serena snorted, and patted the ground, just as lightly as she always did. A milky white shield blocked enshrouded her body just as the fireball would hit her, resulting in flames exploding.
The golden bear roared as he noticed how the insignificant creature had attacked his queen with a fireball, and so he unleashed a burning red light from his claws, slashing downward. The slash transformed into a flying claw of fire that mutilated the man who spoke.
Lothian felt a tinge of pain in his heart and could not help but to yelp loudly. Though he was quite the distance from his mother and the golden bear, they both turned their head toward him, surprise filling their eyes.
Serena froze but quickly woke from her stupor. She belled without emotion and thrust her hind leg to the ground, signalling the forces –consisting of a myriad of magical beasts– to finish the job.
The odd group of the creatures in the encirclement screamed and yelled desperately, trying to run away, but was swiftly pounced upon by the forest dispatch, soon but a fleeting memory, and a new nutrition for the curse of the barren land.
“Mother!” The young boy yelled as the fight was over. He rushed over to the white deer who stood quietly, seemingly thinking about something very deeply.
“Lothian. Did I not tell you to stay out of these sort of things!” The white deer said in a scolding tone, thought everyone could clearly sense how relieved she was that he didn’t get hurt or had gotten here earlier when the forest dispatch had yet to arrive. “What if you got hurt?”
“But mother!” Lothian said. “I also want to protect the forest!” He truly yearned for protecting the forest and all its inhabitants who had raised him as a boy. Although he was quite weak in comparison to the stronger and older magical creatures of the forest, he was still quite able since he had learned a bit of his mother’s light magic and certainly was not to be trifled with.
Serena’s gaze softened. “Lothian…”
Suddenly, a treant – a four or five meter tall walking tree with silver coloured bark – paved path through the dispatch. As came closer to the white deer, he lowered his head and bowed down on one leg. “Queen, there’s still an intruder who survived the attack. What should we do with him? He’s currently unconscious and will die if left unattended."
The white deer frowned. She took a glance at her son and stomped the ground in hesitation.
“Queen, your orders…?” the treant reminded her.
“Let him live. Bring him to the prison cells in the grand tree.”
“As you command.” the treant nodded curtly and then left in a hurry.