A lonely dirt path wound through a forest, the only sign of civilisation for miles around. A man and a woman hurried down it, their cloaks wrapped tight around their shoulders for warmth. It was the dead of night, and the woods were pitch black. The man held a lit torch in his hand, and the light from its flame seemed to be swallowed up by the oppressive night. He was tall and cut an imposing figure, clad in thick armour with a huge war hammer slung across his back. His companion looked tiny next to him. She was a slender woman who wore a pale blue travelling cloak and a matching pointed hat.

  “I’ll need a new torch soon,” the man warned.

  Abner Harwick had spoken to break the eerie silence more than anything else. The woman was agitated, jumping at every shadow, which was beginning to affect him.

  “Something is amiss,” the woman remarked, scarcely able to keep her voice from shaking. “I sense foul magic in the air.”

  “You’re the expert,” Abner conceded.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” the woman demanded. She placed her hands indignantly on her hips, and it appeared that her fear had been forgotten for the moment in the face of a perceived slight.

  Abner suppressed a sigh, having momentarily forgotten how touchy she was when she thought her credentials were being questioned. Her name was Genevieve Hovarth, and she had employed Abner to accompany her to a town called Hargeisa to investigate reports of strange goings on in the nearby forest.

  “I was just pointing out that as an esteemed scholar from the Society of Sorcery, you would be the most qualified to recognise magic,” Abner said as diplomatically as he could.

  “Yes, and there is definitely the taint of foul magic all around us,” Gen snapped. “You would have to be a fool not to…”

  She paused and looked around frantically. “Where’s Brynn?”

  Abner sighed audibly this time. “She slipped into the shadows a moment ago. Planning another of her tests, I expect.”

  Brynn Enburn was the third member and final member of their group. She had come with Gen from the Society of Sorcery, and as far as Abner could tell, she was meant to be Gen’s bodyguard and resented Abner’s presence on this expedition. She insisted he call her the ‘Silent Blade’ and had plagued him with ‘tests’ to demonstrate to Gen how incapable he was.

  An apologetic look crossed Gen’s face, and she smiled sheepishly. “I’ll give her a good talking to, don’t you worry.”

  Abner nodded noncommittally. It wouldn’t be the first time Gen had given the heavyset woman a talking to about how she was treating him, and he was sure it wouldn’t be the last. Before he could reply, Abner’s instincts screamed danger. A moment later, he saw why. A tree had fallen almost perpendicularly across the road.

  “Bandit ambush,” he warned. He unslung his hammer and wondered why they couldn’t be more creative when creating their roadblocks. Well, whatever worked, he supposed.

  Gen turned pale and looked around frantically. “Are you sure?”

  “Put your weapons down and hand over your valuables,” a voice ordered out of the darkness.

  “Reasonably sure,” Abner replied before hurling his torch towards the sound of the voice.

  The torch illuminated a man, and Abner’s heart sank. His skin was abnormally pale, and he was rail thin with sunken cheeks and eyes.

  “Vampires,” Abner cursed, feeling the still healing wound in his midsection throb.

  He mouthed a quick prayer to Voldrus, the God of Light, and the head of his hammer shimmered with glowing gold light that drove back the darkness far better than the torch could, revealing several gaunt, pale figures gathered around the fallen tree. Had they stumbled across another coven? Nothing for it now but to fight things out. That suited Abner fine.

  In the corner of his eye, he saw something fly out of the darkness. He felt the faint report of an arrow glancing off his armour and hoped that none had been aimed at Gen, but knew he could ill afford to look out for her if they were fighting a coven of vampires. She had often said she could look after herself, and now, it was time to put her claims to the test.

  The man’s eyes widened, as though surprised Abner was charging before leaping down from the tree. Abner swung at him while he was in mid air, catching him in the side. To Abner’s surprise, the man didn’t turn to ash, but his body went limp as it was smashed to the side. The other pale figures were stunned by the ferocity of Abner’s blow. The boy paused to look for his next target.

  “Harwick, get down!” Gen cried.

  Abner turned, and his eyes went wide when he saw a whirling ball of fire floating above Gen’s open palm.

  “No!” he gasped, but it was too late.

  The young woman hurled the fireball towards the trunk. Abner hurled himself to the ground, and it exploded in an enormous conflagration that momentarily turned night into day, revealing more people amongst the trees. Just how large was this coven? Abner soon had other things to worry about. The surrounding trees quickly caught fire, and judging by how thick the undergrowth was, the worry was now that the whole forest would quickly turn into a conflagration.

  “It’s the witch!” one of the ambushers cried. “The witch has come!”

  “Run for your lives!” another shrieked as the figures fell over one another in their haste to retreat into the woods.

  “Wait, no!” Gen called after them. “If there’s a witch, I would like to find her!”

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  Abner picked himself up and took in his surroundings. The ambushers had disappeared into the night, and he saw the broad shouldered silhouette of Brynn standing over the bodies of three archers with bows and arrows still clutched in their hands. He hadn’t even heard them die. Perhaps ‘Silent Blade’ was a well deserved moniker after all.

  He turned his attention back to the woods and was surprised to see the fires around them were quickly dying out, as though suppressed by the heavy atmosphere, before being extinguished altogether. They had been saved from a dangerous situation, but Abner felt a chill go down his spine all the same.

  “Do you call that looking after Gen?” Brynn demanded, appearing suddenly beside Abner.

  Abner looked the tall, broad shouldered woman in the eye. She had a broad face and nose, and deep brown eyes. “I seem to recall that you were the bodyguard while I’m the muscle.”

  Brynn’s face flushed. “Now listen here!”

  “Now’s not the time,” Gen said. “We need to find this town. It is clear that she is nearby.”

  “I agree,” Abner said, turning his back on Brynn before walking away. “And Gen, if I may make a suggestion?”

  The sorceress was instantly on guard. “What is it?”

  “Let’s have no more fireballs in the middle of a forest, please,” he said.

  Gen’s face turned red, and she stared at her feet for a moment before looking up at Abner and blinking. “Say, how did you make your hammer glow like that earlier?”

  Abner fell silent for a moment before shrugging. “It just happens from time to time.”

  “Here, let me see it,” she insisted.

  Before he could answer, she grabbed Abner’s hammer by the shaft and pulled it close so that she could examine its head.

  “Is it an enchantment?” she asked excitedly.

  Around them, the fires were dwindling into smouldering embers, and it was almost pitch dark again. Gently, he pulled his hammer free from Gen’s grasp and cleared his throat to hide his embarrassment.

  “Perhaps this can wait for another time,” he suggested, handing Gen an unlit torch.

  “You’d better not forget,” she warned.

  Gen muttered an incantation, and the tip of the torch burst into flames. She handed it back to Abner, who was about to walk away, but turned his gaze to the man he had killed. He walked over and looked at the body for a moment before drawing his dagger and plunging it into the dead man’s heart.

  Brynn stuck her tongue out to make a look of distaste. “What are you doing?”

  “Making sure,” Abner muttered. He looked down at the dagger and felt a shaft of ice pierce his heart when he was reminded who had given it to him.

  Gen appeared beside Abner and observed the body curiously. “Making sure of what?”

  “That he wasn’t a vampire.”

  Brynn burst out in laughter, and Abner scowled when he saw the heavyset woman doubled over, clutching her stomach.

  “Gen, the boy thinks vampires are real!” she gasped with tears streaming down her face.

  Abner glared at Gen, who was struggling to stop herself from smiling. He was about to launch into a tirade before realising it was futile. “Are we going, or are you planning to spend the night here?”

  “That might not be such a bad idea,” Brynn said, suddenly turning serious.

  “What do you mean?” Gen asked.

  “The people who ambushed us were withdrawing in the direction of the town,” Brynn replied.

  Gen gave her bodyguard a blank look. “And?”

  Abner swallowed an exasperated sigh and blurted. “She means the people who ambushed us could well be the good people of Hargesia.”

  Gen stared at him blankly before turning pale and turning to Brynn. “What do we do?”

  “We could spend the night out here,” she suggested. “Approach the town in the light of day.”

  “But that would mean spending the night out here,” Abner pointed out, gesturing at the twisted trees and long shadows.

  The women looked at him, and he arched an eyebrow.

  “I’m sure the reason they attacked us before was that your badge wasn’t polished enough,” Abner said dryly.

  Gen was busy polishing her already gleaming silver badge that was cast in the shape of a bolt of lightning above an open book, the sign of her position in the Society of Sorcery, or so she claimed. She paused and glared at him.

  “I’ll have you know that this is a very prestigious emblem,” she snarled.

  “Many have worked their whole lives and not received one,” Brynn chimed in. “You don’t know what an honour it is for her to earn one, and at her age as well.”

  Abner blinked and glanced at the lights of a modestly sized town ahead of them. “Do you think they are going to be impressed?”

  “If they have any awareness of the outside world, they will,” Gen asserted while Brynn nodded beside her.

  Abner took a deep breath and held his hands up. “Fine, if you say so.”

  He reached for his hammer, and Gen placed a hand on his chest before shaking her head. “We’re here to help these people, remember?”

  Abenr took a deep breath and nodded, reminded that one of the main reasons he had taken this job was because of his desire to help those in need, and it appeared there was a whole town of them just up the road… if it wasn’t too late for them, that was.

  “Fine,” Abner sighed.

  As they approached the town, a thought occurred to Abner. “Say, how many of these sorts of excursions have you been on?”

  “Five,” Gen declared proudly.

  Abner let out an impressed whistle. “And did any of them involve any sort of… violence?”

  “Oh, no,” Gen said breezily. “Four were research expeditions, and one ended up being a wild goose chase. Why do you ask?”

  “No reason,” Abner sighed.

  As they approached the town, Abner was alarmed to see a group of people gathered on the road ahead of them, blocking access to the town. They carried torches that revealed the concerned looks on their faces. That could only mean trouble. Perhaps they were better off approaching the town by day after all.

  “Good evening!” Gen called out cheerfully before Abner could voice his reservations.

  Abner groaned inwardly when the townspeople’s faces turned hostile upon seeing them. They looked to number around a dozen in all, five men and seven women. All of them wore tattered clothing, and all of them were unsettlingly pale and gaunt.

  “My name is Genevieve Hovarth, and I am here on behalf of the Society of Sorcery,” she continued, as though noticing nothing amiss with the people she was speaking to. “Is the town elder among you?”

  The townspeople stared at her for an unsettlingly long time with unblinking eyes and expressionless faces. In the corner of his eye, Abner saw Brynn reach for her weapon and moved to do the same.

  “Torrance is in his house,” one of the women said, gesturing over her shoulder vaguely. “You can go see him. He’ll be up at this hour.”

  The townspeople parted ways, continuing to stare at Gen with unblinking eyes. The young woman bounced past them with a cheerful smile.

  “Thank you.”

  “What are we doing here?” Abner hissed to Brynn. “You need to talk some sense into her.”

  A sigh escaped Brynn’s lips. It was one of a long suffering companion, and she shook her head. “She won’t listen when she’s like that.”

  “So what do we do now?” Abner said and took an involuntary step back when he realised the townspeople were now staring at them.

  Brynn shrugged. “I can’t leave her alone.”

  Before Abner could say another word, the heavyset woman walked past the townspeople and caught up with Gen. Now, the townspeople were staring at Abner.

  “Excuse me,” the boy muttered as he walked past them.

  “I think we’re making a huge mistake,” he whispered when he caught up to the others. He glanced over his shoulder and saw that the townspeople were now blocking the road again and watching them as they walked through the town.

  “Nonsense,” Gen declared gaily. “You’re worrying too much.”

  Abner looked around nervously. The town was deserted, and the buildings they walked past were mostly built from wood and were in various states of disrepair. Their windows were darkened, but he could see shadows within and could feel numerous eyes on them.

  “That must be the mayor’s house,” Brynn said, pointing at a large two storey building at the top of a hill to their right.

  “Let’s go,” Gen said. “He might still have supper on the table.”