When Ellis reached the road, he started crying. He was so angry at their decision, at their expected decision… but why wouldn’t they listen!? Why wouldn’t they give him this? All his father had left him was a bow and a legacy, and they just snatched it away! What's next? The bow? His sister? He wiped the tears running down his cheek furiously, cursing them for their foolishness.

  His footsteps slowed when he reached the edge of the forest, a large sign of, “Rass territory!” indicating the danger ahead. It didn’t matter. He was here for a reason, and he would be damned if a small sign would stop him.

  He brought up his status and stared at the Goddess’s name. Alehemet had been engraved into the screen since he was a child, the same as everyone else. She welcomed all her children, no matter how young, weak or monstrous they turned out to be. Alehemet was the kindest of the gods, and he hoped she would understand his decision to try and spread his wings now. He pressed her name in midair and scrolled down the four names that accompanied it…

  His finger hesitated above the god of truth and war's name. Changing his godly parent, the single change he was allowed to make in his life, outside of the choosing was unheard of, but surely Dumiso would understand? He was a god. He would see Ellis’s plight and welcome him into his arms. Swallowing, Ellis pressed the name…

  And nothing happened. Alehemet stayed firmly at the top of his status screen, unmoved as the large block of numbers and text vibrated dangerously at the attempt. Ellis shouted at the status screen, cursing it a fool and begging it to make a different decision.

  The status screen remained steadfast.

  He almost cried again, but shook the tears away. The god of truth clearly wanted an offering. A show of force. Ellis was going to do so anyway, but he resolved himself to finding the biggest, fiercest animal he could to bring back to the village.

  Straightening his back, he strode into the forest, going straight down the road knowing he’d find his destiny at the end of it.

  He picked his pace up to a fast jog, and the longer he ran the denser the forest grew. When he had first entered, Ellis could see for kilometers. Then only hundreds of meters, and now he could see only the road in front of him, even the sun hard to make out through the canopy above him.

  Ten minutes of running through the forest had Ellis’s feet start to complain. But he ignored all the green trees around him to focus on the two figures walking towards him in the distance. The closer he got, the stranger they appeared. His sharp eyes revealed a man and a woman, both tall and wearing traveling packs on their backs.

  The woman had a scar on her lip and a scowl in her eye, dressed like some of the soldiers Ellis had seen in his youth on their way to the northern war. She was not wearing a dress, but pants and a white shirt that must have cost an arm and a leg. The leather jerkin she wore over it matched her pitch black hair that flowed past her shoulders. She looked like what nobility aspired to be, except that her every step reminded him of a cat on a hunt, right as it was about to pounce.

  …And yet the man next to her made her look like a vagrant. He was dressed similarly to the woman, the only difference being the leather braces around his thick forearms. His jaw was strong and his back straight, his arms hung loosely at his sides like the weight of the travelpack on his back was of no concern. His eyes were piercing and lazy, the moment he saw Ellis they had never strayed from him even once. The man’s every stride made the dagger in his boot glint, and the sword at his hip bounced in time with his footsteps. The only thing Ellis took some solace in was that the woman appeared to be unarmed.

  Out in the country, Ellis hadn’t had the opportunity to run into any nobles, let alone royalty, and thus he had imagined many different versions of what a king might look like. The man smiling at Ellis looked like every idle thought, every possible iteration all rolled into one.

  Ellis had stopped running to gawk at the strangers. The woman’s eyes were filled with suspicion when they stopped a little ways away, the man wearing a smile as he approached with a hand outstretched for a handshake, his other hand gripped around the hilt of his sword.

  “Hello!” he said.

  “Uhm… hello… my lord?” Ellis tried, looking at the man's hand like it was about to bite him as he tried to bow.

  The man’s smile touched his eyes for the first time as it grew into a toothy grin. “Me? A lord? Why thank you! Say kid, why are your eyes red? Have you been crying?”

  The man’s hand continued to stay between them, undaunted by Ellis’s apprehension to shake it. Ellis gave it one more look over before tentatively reaching forward. The stranger's hand almost swallowed Ellis’s as he reached forward, gave it two solid shakes before letting go.

  The man kept staring at Ellis, as if expecting something, before he remembered the stranger had asked him if he had been crying. The moment their hands were unclasped Ellis started wiping his eyes, avoiding the two sets locked on him by looking at his shoes.

  “No, some sand got stuck in my eye,” Ellis lied, wiping at his face.

  The woman snorted. “And my shoes are made from ants. Get to it or get lost, boy.”

  “Uhm… well… I wanted to be a hunter… and my village said no. They want me to be some goat herder! The next sixty years of my life decided in five minutes! What about me! What about my father’s legacy! I want— I will be a hunter! Even if it kills me…”

  The woman stopped listening half way through, her gaze wandering off down the road behind Ellis. The man seemed completely enraptured by Ellis’s tale, never taking his eyes off Ellis as he spoke.

  But Ellis knew better. He stopped speaking to get the load off his chest and started speaking to fill the silence. He told the strangers about his outburst, the arguments the entire village had gotten into because of it, and then somehow wound up telling them about Derek’s stupid question. The man wasn’t looking at Ellis, but seemed to be almost… reading something. His eyes kept darting back and forth, though he nodded every few moments like he was listening.

  “I'm out here to prove them wrong! To show I am worth more than what they say… So uh, good day, my lord?” he finished, trying to shimmy past the man to keep on running.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  The man put a hand on Ellis’s shoulder that stopped him in his tracks. A shudder went through him like he was back in the village and someone had just called out a line of black. The man’s other hand grew tighter around the sword’s hilt, which made Ellis gulp down the fear in the back of his throat.

  “You can call me Michael, if you want. That lovely lady is Ameena,” the stranger, Michael, said, nodding at the woman staring off into the distance.

  “What’s your name, o’ aspiring hunter?”

  “Uhh… Ellis, my lo— sorry… Michael. Where did you two come from, if I may ask? Don’t see many folk travel this way.”

  The woman’s eyes snapped towards him, her hand reaching for a long black stick hanging at her hip. It seemed to be made of metal, so Ellis wasn’t sure if stick was the right term. He did not know why, but Michael’s grip on his shoulder grew tighter.

  “Oh, we came from down the road, didn’t you see?” Michael’s grin widened, before he snaked his arm around Ellis’s shoulders and led him a few steps back the way they came. “You know… I am quite moved by your heartbreak, my new friend, so if I may, I’ll offer some assistance. I saw a deer jump across the road right in front of us about a kilometer that a’way.” He pointed with the same hand hanging around Ellis’s shoulders, towards where they had come from. “You bring home something like that? No one would stand in your way! Hell, at least I wouldn’t.”

  He made an abrupt stop, making Ellis stumble forward a step, before Michael grabbed him to twist him around, their faces inches apart.

  “Well Ellis, I have done you a favour, so if I may I would like one in return. Kindness should be repaid with kindness, afterall. You see… Traveling through the woods sucks!” he laughed, and Michael almost bit off Ellis’s nose as he did so. “If you could tell me where you live so that my companion and I could get some rest, I would be very grateful.”

  It was straight down the road, no turns or stops for at least five kilometers. He wouldn’t miss it, no matter how much Ellis wanted him too. Ellis couldn’t think of a lie, so he just stood there, continuously opening and closing his mouth, trying to think of something to say.

  “Ellis? You still with us buddy?”

  “Oh, sorry! I just got distracted by your sword, it looks wonderful,” Ellis tried. The man didn’t even glance down.

  “Why thank you! I can’t wait to see your town, to raise a little guy like yourself must mean it’s a fine place. Speaking of, is there somewhere we can rest when we get there?”

  Unable to delay it any longer, Ellis took a deep breath and turned away from the man, almost surprised Michael had let him turn at all, and pointed from the way he had come.

  “You can rest there my lord, and it's just down the road… but as you know, there’s a festival today. We cannot provide the hospitality you clearly deserve since everyone will be in the church until sun down, so I shall apologize on their behalf,” Ellis replied, every word feeling like a dagger on his lips as he turned back to face the stranger.

  “Oh, I think we will make do. Thank you for telling us,” Michael said, his sword drawn two inches out of its scabbard before Ellis could blink.

  Ellis couldn’t even stumble back, the man’s grip on his shoulder keeping him in place. Michael’s smile was still the same, calm and composed. He never broke eye contact with Ellis, even when the sword almost broke free from its scabbard.

  “Michael!” The woman called over her shoulder, a hundred paces down the road.

  Michael glanced up towards her, his smile dimming for the first time since Ellis had met him. He rolled her eyes at his back, before resheathing the sword and giving Ellis a wink, like he was in on a joke they both shared.

  “I must say, I think I’ve made you quite nervous for some reason, and I apologize profusely. It was never my intent to frighten you. I was drawing the sword to show it off, since you mentioned it earlier… but from your quivering leg, I see that was a bit of a mistake on my part. Anyway, bye.”

  With a final slap on Ellis’s shoulder, the man turned around and jogged after the lady, now quite far off in the distance.

  Ellis stared after them for a long while, watching as Michael joined up with Ameena, their backs turning into specks. With every step they took, Ellis was sure he would bolt after them, guide them to the village and show off its worse parts before sending them on their way.

  But… his entire future lay down the road behind him, why fuss over two strangers? They didn’t seem like the good sort, but if they truly sort out the people of Solrise, they would find them all together. What danger could they pose against two hundred people? Some of whom had levels, and he hated to admit it but Derek was there. While Michael might be stronger, Derek might be able to slow him down… and, again, there were two hundred of them.

  It’s okay, Ellis told himself. There’s no need to worry.

  With a sigh, he forced himself to turn away and start running toward where the man had pointed, wondering all the while why Michael had unnerved him so much. About half way through the kilometer, he figured it out.

  Michael hadn’t blinked during their entire conversation. Not once.

  He found the trail within fifteen minutes, walking back and forth along the road before spotting a faint indent in the grass behind a bush. He followed it, finding sets of tracks more numerous than he expected. He almost thought Michael might not even be that bad, but dismissed it quickly when he thought of the smile he wore.

  Shaking his thoughts away, he followed the trail, ducking to try and get under all the branches that stood in his path. The forest canopy was growing thinner with every step Ellis took, his feet growing in confidence the further he was from the road. He was about to lose hope, seeing only rabbit droppings every dozen meters or so, before he stumbled onto a broken branch that stood about chest height. And that meant only one thing.

  Deer.

  Ellis felt a quiet thrill of exhilaration, smelling the branch and getting used to the animal's scent. Stepping with as much grace that 7 dexterity would allow him, he tried to get a bead on where the animal went, smelling the air while checking the tracks in the dirt.

  He found another broken branch further on, then deer prints, the signs the animal was near making themselves more and more apparent. He found fur caught on one of the trees, the scent of it almost fresh, the tracks and droppings revealing a lone bull that had wandered off from the herd.

  The forest was thin enough now that Ellis could see the sky, a cliff off in the distance with a beautiful waterfall catching the sunlight, the water glistening as it flowed over the sheer rock wall. Ellis smirked, knowing the bull would most likely use that as a water source.

  With all the stealth Ellis could muster, he followed the tracks further just in case, but they pointed towards the sound of rushing water more often than not. Ellis approached the base of the waterfall through the trees, small rainbows appearing just above where the falling water met the small pond that had formed beneath it.

  This is how his father must have felt. This is what the village had robbed from him. This quiet peace. This silent chase. What he would give for his mother and sister to feel this exhilaration even once.

  And Ellis knew, with all his heart, that only a kiss from Ada would compare to seeing that buck standing there, its head lowered and its ears twitching at every sound that could be heard above the roar of the water.

  He watched the deer for a moment, both envy and admiration coursing through him upon the realization this is how the animal felt everyday, this wonderful solitude among the singing birds, smell of pine wood and damp earth.

  Breathing in, Ellis notched an arrow into his father’s bow with an agonizing slowness, watching the animal just as it watched the tree line. He drew the string all the way to his cheek, breathed out, and let the arrow soar.