The Legend of Cambria Book One-Dawn of the Guardians

Chapter 5-Apple Core

You don't really notice the crunch, crunch of your shoes on the road until there is nothing else to hear. It was dark and still, the in-between time when the night creatures were bedding down in their secret places and the day creatures had not yet woke. After stepping off the bridge, Legend tried not to disturb the quiet stillness. He stood, one hand glued to the bridge and both feet planted on The River Road, trying not to breathe so loudly. He felt sure his pounding heart could be heard by whatever was lurking in the shadows.  

When at last he let go of the bridge railing, he took a gingerly step forward, his tattered shoes making a loud crunching noise on the cold, dirt road. The sound seemed to echo back across the riverbed and he imagined it tumbling down the valley, penetrating the old glass window of his cottage, and landing squarely in his mother's left ear.

For the first ten minutes, he tried to walk softly, delicately placing each footfall so as to avoid any unnecessary attention. But after several painfully slow and nerve wracking minutes, Legend rounded a bend that made looking back at the old River Bridge impossible. There was the slightest glow above the Eastern skyline and it gave him courage. He decided to stomp away briskly, the noise of his footsteps crowding out the noise of his mind.

For the first two hours, the landscape rolled away in the familiar fashion Legend had known his whole life. Gentle hills, tall, dry grasses, and scattered trees which by now were covered in reds and yellows, a sign of the approaching autumn. At the start, Legend could not see the colors of the leaves as they were only varying shades of clumpy grey in the pre-dawn morning. To Legend they seemed to be ominous, shadowy shapes and he had to remind himself they were just trees, not crouching giants.

As the sun spilled over the eastern horizon, so as to not feel alone, Legend began a conversation with himself in the most grown-up voice he could muster.

"Now there's a brave lad," he chirped in his father's tone, "heading off into the wild," he said nobly—"weaponless, friendless, but determined to find a way." It was all said very casually, except that it took great effort to make it sound casual, as he was really a bundle of nerves inside. And of course, though he tried to sound clever and mature like his father, Vincent Bramble would say nothing of the sort. Jane would be up now. She would have found his bed empty. Perhaps she would assume he had gone to Will's and if she went to check, Will might also know by now that he had gone. 

Where was he going anyway? What was he hoping to find? What lay beyond the shadows in the forest that was suddenly crowding the road on either side?

The rolling hills gave way to rocky slopes and the trees started to become taller and more numerous. After another half hour, they became a forest and when Legend looked into the woods, he could only see clearly for a stone's throw away. Beyond that, it became a tangle of branches and bushes, sticks and stones, ferns and mosses.

With the change in scenery came a change in sounds. Whereas the hills had a soundtrack that was mostly a dry, whistling wind that swept cleanly over the landscape, the forest was a jumble of sounds that seemed to come at Legend from all directions. There was still a wind, but now it had to weave its way through pine needles and branches, over boulders and amongst decaying leaves on the forest floor. The air smelled earthy and moist, as though it had tasted everything it had touched.

It was now midmorning. Legend's feet were tired and his stomach was starting to tug at his will to keep walking. For the first time since his pause at the bridge, Legend stopped. The noises around him were louder now that he was still. He looked around, his eyes darting here and there.

There was a low rumble somewhere far away, maybe water tumbling down a cliff? And a crisp rustle that was surely just the wind disturbing fallen leaves. Various hums, hoots, and squawks seemed to be rushing into Legend's ears, all competing to be the most important.