Harbinger: Fate's Forsaken: Book One (5 page)

“Are you feeling
all right?”

Roland’s
question brought him back to the present. He wiped at the cold sweat on his
face and nodded.

Roland gave him
a long look, then shrugged. “Well all right. I want you to feel good tonight
because I’ve got a surprise for you.” He leaned forward and his face split into
a wide smile. “I’ve been talking to the elders for weeks now — battling,
really. Bunch of stubborn old coots. Anyways, I think I’ve figured out a way to
get you in.”

“Get me in
where?”

Roland looked at
him incredulously. “The hunters, of course!”

Kael’s stomach
sank to his feet. He felt like he was going to be sick. Whatever Roland had
planned wouldn’t work, not if he didn’t have his bow. Why hadn’t he been
patient and waited one more day to go on the hunt? Why hadn’t he let up and
allowed the deer to get away?

It was all too
gruesome a coincidence, and it made Roland’s words sound like cotton in his
ears. He only caught a few of them:

“… knew you’d be
excited … perfect timing … should go join the boys, now … elders’ll want to
discuss this with the people!”

By the time he
pulled himself out of the daze, it was too late. Roland was already at the
hunters’ table, laughing and shaking hands with them. Across the fire pit,
Brock was standing. He held his arms wide and the Hall suddenly fell silent.

“People of Tinnark,”
he said, resuming his seat. “The elders will now hear anything you might have
to say. Does anyone have anything they’d like the elders to hear?”

And to Kael’s
horror, Roland was the first to step up. “Elders, people of Tinnark. Winter is
almost here,” he said.

A few people
laughed. In the Unforgivable Mountains, winter was always either here or almost
here. In fact, some joked that winter claimed three of the four seasons —
leaving spring, summer and fall to share.

Roland smiled
and let the laughter die down before he continued. “I’m too old to keep up with
the hunters anymore. Trapping is in my blood, but my blood has thinned with
age. If we want to make it through another winter, we need to find a younger
man to take my place. I’ve got a man in mind, and he’s a man that I’ve trained
myself.” He spread his hands wide. “But he hasn’t slain a deer.”

A chorus of
hushed conversations sprung up throughout the Hall. No one joined the hunters
without killing a deer.

Brock raised his
eyebrows, adding to the many wrinkles on his forehead. “Are there none among
the hunters who are fit to take your place?”

Roland shook his
head. “None. Trapping is a game that requires talent as well as skill. Even
winter isn’t long enough for me to train another. But Kael already knows the
trade, and he’s the best I’ve ever seen.”

More whispers
buzzed through the crowd at the mention of his name. He burned as a hundred
faces turned to stare at him.

“Really?”

“
Him
?”

“That scrawny
one?”

“… like a
toothpick.”

Brock cleared
his throat and the Hall fell silent. “I don’t recall ever seeing Kael return
with game. Are you certain he has a talent?”

His face
reddened as people laughed, but Roland was quick to defend him: “The lion
slays, but the vultures do the feasting.”

Brock shifted
uncomfortably and seemed to stare at Roland in order to avoid looking at the
hunter’s table — where Laemoth’s face was like stone and Marc kept his
eyes out of sight.

The elders had
their favorites; there was no doubt about that. Half of what they returned with
wasn’t theirs, but Marc and Laemoth looked the part. The elders would rather
believe it was they who provided for the village — not a half-breed runt.
And Roland knew it.

After a very
tense silence, Brock relented. “We will agree with you. We’ll accept Kael as a
hunter — but only if the other hunters will agree.”

He actually
breathed a sigh of relief. There was no way Marc and Laemoth would let him
join. They would refuse him, he was certain of it. And then he could step up
and ask for a different trade without shame. No one would blame him for
choosing another path if the hunters refused him now.

He would have to
thank Roland for this someday. He couldn’t have planned it better.

It only took a
few minutes of heated bickering at the hunters’ table for one side to win out
over the other. The losers huffed and crossed their arms over their chests as
Marc stood to address the elders.

“No one can trap
like Kael,” he said. “We want our pots to stay full through the winter, and the
hunters can think of no man better for the job.”

The hair on the
back of Kael’s neck stood on end. He knew something was coming. He could see
the smug look on Marc’s face from across the Hall — hear the dark triumph
in his voice. Then it dawned on him.

Marc and Laemoth
noticed his missing bow — they must have. And they knew he would have to
go to the elders eventually and stand before all of Tinnark to ask to be
assigned a trade. So they’d waited.

No
, he thought desperately. He looked at
Marc, searching for any glimpse of mercy in his eyes. But there was none. If
anything, his smile widened.

“But a hunter’s
not a hunter — and a man’s not a man — unless he has his bow,” Marc
said, his mouth twisting in a grin. “So if Kael wants to join the hunters,
that’s fine with us. All we ask is that he bring us his bow.”

“What are you
waiting for? Get your blasted bow,” Amos hissed.

For a few
moments, Kael had been somewhere else. He found himself trapped in the depths
of every curious eye in the room, lost in the thoughts that must be bouncing
around in their heads.

What’s he doing? Why isn’t he moving?
their
faces said.

His mind went
numb and his legs became like lead. Slowly, he managed to turn to Amos. When he
saw Kael’s face, his frustration melted into disbelief. And he groaned aloud.

“Where is your
bow?” Brock said. His voice had more life to it than it’d had in years. He was
standing now, his hands planted on the table in front of him. He watched Kael’s
face grow red, and frowned. “Where is it? Speak, boy!”

“Elders,” Marc
cut in, “I think I know where it is.” He nodded to Laemoth, who pulled a
rucksack out from under his bench and opened it. He sneered at Kael through his
freshly busted lip before he reached in and pulled out the bow.

The string
dangled off the end of Laemoth’s finger and the two broken halves clattered
together as he waved it around for the whole Hall to see. Gasps rang out, Amos
groaned again and dropped his face into his knobby hands. Across the Hall,
Roland looked as if someone had kicked him in the gut.

Brock’s mouth
hung open, but the expression was forced: the O of his lips bent slightly
upwards as he fell back in his seat. “What does this mean?”

His question was
directed at Marc, who was only too happy to oblige. “I left the village early
this morning to track a deer,” he said, holding the grin off his face long
enough to assume a more serious tone. “Along the way, I stumbled upon Kael.
He’d broken his bow and then tried to hide it in the bushes. But I retrieved
it. The good people of Tinnark deserve to know the truth, after all. And Kael
certainly wasn’t going to tell it.” He shook his head amid a fresh wave of
murmurs. “He lied to us, though it pains me to say it.”

Kael leapt from
his bench and stepped out into the aisle. He was no liar — and he was
going make sure the people of Tinnark knew it. He’d filled his lungs with the
first angry words when Roland’s voice cut him short.

“Is that true,
Kael?”

He wasn’t
smiling. His shoulders were slumped forward and his mouth sagged into a
miserable frown. The defeat in Roland’s eyes knocked the fury out of him, and
Kael realized, in one heartbreaking moment, that his wasn’t the only dream that
had died that day. He hadn’t only failed himself, but he’d failed Roland as
well.

And it was that
sorry realization that snuffed his fire out.

“Yes.” The word
came from his mouth louder than he meant it to. It bounced off the ancient pine
beams of the Hall’s roof and filled the air with murmurs. “It’s all true. And
I’m sorry.”

He left. Even
when Brock yelled at him to turn around and face the elders, he didn’t turn
back. There was nothing they could do to him that would be worse than the look
on Roland’s face.

A pair of
torches hung outside the Hall’s front doors. They were meant to serve as
beacons — so that if a fog rolled down from the summit, the villagers
could still find their way to food. Tonight, they would serve a different
purpose: they would lead Kael as far away from Tinnark as his legs could carry
him. He grabbed one of the torches and ran.

The night was
cold and still. With every breath the fresh scent of rain filled his nose. In
the back of his mind, he knew he shouldn’t wander far from the village. He
could freeze to death in less than an hour if the rain fell. Part of him knew
this, but the part that drove his legs pushed him on. It wasn’t long before he
found himself in the middle of the woods.

Night made two
of everything. The torch bounced from the motion of his jog and the trees
danced along with their shadows. Wind raced down from the icy tops of the
mountains. It cut through his skin and made the leaves rattle like dry bones. A
lonesome wolf howled up the trail — his eerie song rode the wind and sent
chills down the back of Kael’s neck.

Still, he
thought he’d rather risk getting eaten than go back to the village. He could
survive in the mountains. He knew how to build a shelter and hunt for food.

Yes, it would be
better if he stayed on his own.

A loud
boom
sounded above him and when he
looked up, a snake of lightening flexed across the sky. That one glance, that
second of distraction, was all the opportunity the mountains needed. Before his
mind could grasp it, he was falling.

He smacked his
knees against the rocks and heard his trousers rip. His torch flew from his
hands and he had to scramble to catch it before it rolled away. Cursing
whatever rock or fallen branch had tripped him, he turned to kick it aside
— and froze.

The thing
jutting onto the path was no root or stone. In fact, it shouldn’t have been in
the forest at all — not this hour of the night. He had to step closer to
be sure, but when the light crossed it, there was no denying what it was: a
pair of human legs stuck out from the brambles.

The boots were
caked in mud and the pants were so dirty he couldn’t tell what color they actually
were. He tried to think if the hunters had mentioned anyone getting lost in the
woods at dinner. He was sure they hadn’t. So if this man wasn’t a Tinnarkian,
he must be a traveler.

Or he must have
been
a traveler … the legs were laying
very still.

“Hello?” Kael
said, and he felt foolish saying it. There was almost no question the man was
dead. “Are you all right?”

When a long
moment passed and the traveler didn’t move, he stepped closer. He pushed the
brambles aside and held them back with his shoulder. “Don’t be alarmed. I’m
just going to —”

And he nearly
dropped his torch.

He’d been
expecting a to see a man — a big fellow with a scraggly beard and
leathered skin. Or one of the wild men from the summit perhaps, or at the very
least someone who’d been dead for a while. But that wasn’t at all what he
found.

A girl. A girl
lay on the ground in front of him. She looked young — close to his own
age. Her hair was the color of a raven’s wing. It fell past her shoulders and
covered the ground near her head in waves. Twigs and leaves were tangled in it,
like she’d been crashing through the forest at full tilt. He followed her red
lips up the straight line of her nose — and arrived directly at the
fist-sized gash on the side of her head.

Days-old blood
covered the wound and matted the hair near it. Brown streaks stained her face:
tracks from where drops of blood had rolled down her pale cheeks while the
wound was still fresh. Kael knew there was no way she could still be alive. No
one lost that much blood and lived.

He’d seen plenty
of death, and learned long ago that there was nothing he could do to stop it.
Still, he thought it was a shame. The girl’s clothes were filthy, but her face
was remarkably beautiful. Why had she been in the woods? Where was she headed?

Something about
her attire seemed strange. He reached out and touched the material of her
leggings with the tip of one finger. It wasn’t leather, of that he was certain.
It felt more like iron, but it wasn’t as cold as iron ought to have been. Then
he scraped some of the dirt away and saw her clothes were made of tiny,
interlocking pieces — almost like chainmail.

What in
Kingdom’s name was a girl doing in armor?

Then his heart
flipped when he saw the weapon strapped to her leg. It was a sword, curved and
sheathed in black. He reached out, prepared to grip the smooth hilt and draw it
from its sheath —

Thunder clapped
above him, startling his hand away. As much as he wanted to look at the sword,
he knew the rain would start falling soon, and he knew he needed to find
somewhere dry to spend the night. He thought briefly about taking it with him,
but Roland always said that to steal a dead man’s weapon would bring no end of
bad luck. And that was the last thing he needed.

He turned to
leave, but couldn’t stop himself from glancing back at the girl one last time.
As the light touched the gentle curve of her neck, he thought he saw something.
He paused for half a breath, staring. Then it happened again — this time
unmistakable: a vein throbbed below her jaw.