Galen fingered the silver crescent he wore above his heart and studied the woods. The pendant was his good luck charm and the only thing he had from a mother he'd never known.
The man he called his father had found him as an infant, abandoned in the forest. Not this forest, which was tame and well-patrolled, but far north along the border of Sakkara, near the Wild Green. Harrald was a soldier and a man of the Guard but, being kind-hearted and having no family of his own, he had taken Galen in and raised him as a son for the last seventeen years.
Galen often wondered if his strange origins accounted for his love of the woods and his affinity for the things that grew there. He had a knack for finding plants and fungi with medicinal properties and for preparing poultices, tinctures, and salves. After an injury forced Harrald to retire from the Guard, Galen had supported them both with the money he made from his remedies.
Many of the best ingredients grew deep in the forest, but Harrald didn't like him spending so much time so close to the edge of the Wild Green and often warned him against the myriad dangers lurking there.
"You must be careful, Galen," he would say. "You are not like other boys."
Galen resented such words, and all they did was encourage him to spend more time in the woods. He didn't need to be reminded he was different: the evidence was all around.
Most people in Thryn fit a mould. They were tall and robust, with blue or green eyes, light skin, and blonde or red hair. Galen had a more delicate build, wavy black hair, dark eyes, and skin that turned a toasted golden-brown in the sun, darkening to bronze by summer's end. When he was younger, no one much remarked upon his difference; but once his peers grew muscle and gained height, while he did not, it became harder to ignore.
Neither did he share the typical Thrynian talents for weapons and warfare, and was quickly eliminated from the pool of trainees for the Guard. A friend said he looked more like a Pyrran pillow-slave than a soldier, anyway, and he'd had to ask another friend what that meant.
He didn't mind. He much preferred healing to causing harm, and the peace of the forest to the clash of steel. In these sentiments, however, he did not have much company in Thryn, where service in the Guard was the highest honor for men and women alike.
Still, a healer was highly valued, too, in a place where injuries were not uncommon.
A soft breeze shifted through the dense summer foliage, bringing the sweet, rich scent of green shadowed places and living things. A spot of color caught Galen's eye, and his heart lifted with excitement: a growth of fungi sprouting from the side of a fallen log.
Kneeling by the spot, he examined the mushrooms more closely. Fungi could be powerful medicine or deadly poison, depending on the type. This one looked promising, and Galen carefully collected the soft caps for further study, packing them into a small woven basket with a lid. Storing this back in his knapsack, he stood and stepped on a twig.
The tiny snap it made was much too loud, and Galen realized the forest had gone still.
Swearing under his breath, he crouched back beside the log, straining his senses for a sign. Songbirds were the forest's early warning system, falling silent when a threat drew near. But whether this threat was a danger to people, or only birds, remained to be seen.
It might be nothing but a hawk wheeling overhead; it might be a mountain cat, or it might be something worse. Galen had heard stories of bandits roaming the woods. Supposedly, the Guard had wiped them out long ago, but it had been long since the guard came out this close to the Wild Green.
Long minutes passed. Spots of sunlight grew hot on his neck and bare arms, and midges buzzed about his face. He probably should have gone home hours ago—herbs were best picked when fresh with morning dew, anyway—but he'd been enjoying his solitary walk and wandered farther than he'd intended.
He was about to turn around and slink back the way he came when, quite nearby, a call echoed through the trees.
It was not a birdcall, but human—the whoop of a hunter signaling to his comrades. An answering whoop with a slightly different inflection answered from some ways off.
Galen froze. They could be bandits, and a boy like him would not fare well among such men. On the other hand, they might be Guards from the village. Either way, getting mistaken for a deer and shot seemed a poor option.
He took a breath to give an answering call, revealing his presence, when a cold blade slid across his throat, and a large hand covered his mouth.
A whisper brushed against his ear.
"Not a sound."
Whoever held him, held him hard and close, crushing him against a much larger body—a body belonging to someone who could move as silently as a cat.
Another call echoed through the trees, and Galen felt a second thrill of terror. Not only was he at a stranger's mercy, but the stranger seemed to fear the hunters, too, and Galen didn't know which he ought to fear more.
The stranger's hand was cutting off his airways, and he struggled just a little, trying to breathe. The man lifted his hand, but pressed the blade harder against his skin.
"A word, and you die. Understand?"
Galen nodded very slightly.
With one smooth motion, the man lifted him and tumbled them both over the side of the fallen log, where the mushrooms had grown, landing with a soft thump in the thick loam on the other side.
Galen squeaked involuntarily. The man had landed on top of him and pressed him into the lumpy ground. His wrist was bent beneath him at a painful angle, a stick poked his stomach, and his pendant dug into his collarbone. Still, he lay without moving, hardly daring to breathe.
Finally, another call came from a greater distance, rising on an eerie note and breaking off suddenly. It made the hair on Galen's neck stand up as he realized it wasn't like the call of any hunter he'd heard before. A second call answered it from further still, and then silence returned. A few minutes later, a bird chirped, and the forest came to life again as if at a signal.
Slow as a flower opening in the sun, the stranger relaxed and sat up. Galen remained as he was, afraid to move.
"That can't be comfortable," a smooth, low voice said. "If you don't scream and bring those trackers back, I won't hurt you."
Galen carefully raised himself to his knees, cradling a sprained wrist against his chest.
"Who are you?" he asked, addressing the stranger's shoes, which were soft-soled boots, perfect for sneaking.
"If I told you, I'd have to kill you."
Hearing a hint of humor in the man's tone, Galen looked up. Then he stared.
The man looked like no one he'd ever seen before. He had raven-black hair pulled back in a braid, pale skin, and eyes that flashed between dark gray and silver in the dappled light. He looked between twenty-five and thirty, and his features had an elegance Galen imagined belonged to nobility: dark, even brows, sharp cheekbones, a strong, slim jaw, and a long, slightly arched nose. He was handsome—borderline beautiful.
His clothes were another matter. Besides the boots, he wore soft suede trousers, a fitted leather jacket with many pockets and straps, and a belt with pouches and several scabbards attached. He looked like a spy—or a thief.
Then Galen realized the man was staring at him with as much wonder, if not more. Or, more precisely, he was staring at his pendant.
"What is your name?" he asked, his eyes narrowing and his voice going soft. Galen sensed danger in it.
"Galen," answered he.
"How old are you?"
"S-Seventeen."
"And where did you get that?" He pointed at the silver crescent with the tip of his knife.
Galen swallowed. "It was my mother's."
"She gave it to you?"
"I was... found with it. There was a note."
"A note. What note?"
This seemed like a strange interrogation, and a strange time to be interrogated; but, Galen reasoned, he wasn't the one holding the knife.
"It said, Galen, his mother's. That's all."
The man rubbed his jaw, eying Galen as if wrestling with some difficult choice. Finally, he nodded and held out his hand. "Now's not the time. I'll take it, then."
Galen grasped the pendant and shook his head. "Please. It's all I have."
The man raised a brow. "Surely, I deserve some reward for saving you."
"S-Saving me!" Galen gasped, but the man held a finger to his lips in warning and beckoned impatiently with his waiting hand.
Glaring and swallowing the sting of anger and fear at the back of his throat, Galen lifted the pendant over his head and dropped it in the man's hand.
The man tucked it in his vest, sheathed his knife, got to his feet, and dusted himself off. Galen noted that, though fit and strong, he had a more slender frame than a Thrynian.
"Go home," he said. "And go quickly. Believe me—you don't want trackers on your tail. Don't tell anyone about me, if you know what's good for you."
With that, he turned and strode away, and vanished among the trees in the direction of the Wild Green.
Galen looked after him, thinking that, in all likelihood, he'd never see his mother's pendant or the handsome stranger who'd taken it again.