Modern Ranger

PROLOGUE:

The trees in Samsa Forest hide many things.

A fifteen-year-old girl, for example.

She has a tall and slim build, with long, blonde hair that reaches her hips. From head to toe she wears mottled green and grey clothing, which blends in with the trees and bush around her. Her left hand holds a pale brown longbow, and you can see the colourful ends of arrows poking out from the quiver that is slung on her back.

If you look closely at Bree, for that is her name, you can notice her intense grey eyes, and the way her jaw is set in grim determination.

But here's the thing; it is highly unlikely that you would see her like this at all.

For Bree keeps her true, tomboy-ish self hidden. An orphan from the age of two, Bree doesn't particularly trust anyone. She was abandoned by her parents on the streets, a small toddler left to die. An elderly woman had found the child playing with a pocketknife in front of a shop, giggling and opening and closing the knife.

The woman had phoned the authorities, telling them about the small child who needed to be found by her parents or sent to an orphanage.

The police took her to the station and sent out notices about a child that had been found, and for her parents to come and pick her up.

No-one ever came.

The orphanage took her in. The lady who managed the orphanage, Ms Wosky, had tried to take the dangerous pocketknife off the child, but she just cried. At closer inspection, Ms Wosky noticed what the pocketknife's brand was. Bree. And so that is the name that she gave the child.

Now, twelve years later, Bree still has that knife. She keeps it in what is supposed to be an Ipod holder, wrapped around the bottom of her leg and secured there with Velcro straps. The handmade scabbard is concealed by Bree's baggy cargo pants, so it is not noticeable.

So, yeah, Bree has trust issues. As she once thought, how can you trust anyone if you can't even trust your own parents to love you?

So Bree pretends to be someone else. In public she is a quiet yet cheerful girl, always cracking jokes and fluttering her eyelashes at the boys.

In reality? Eww! She'd rather hunt like she's doing now, or kick around a soccer ball with the boys instead of flirting with them.

Sometimes Bree thinks she was born into the wrong era. Yeah, video games and Ipads are pretty cool, but Bree likes the idea of knights, kings, queens, barons of fiefs and, most of all, Rangers.

Even though Rangers weren't even real, Bree wishes she could be one. Their legendary skill with the bow, the unseen movement practise and the secretivity all appealed to her.

Bree had trained like the Rangers in John Flanagan's books since she was six years old. Little does she know it, but Bree is very good.

But someone else knows.

_____________________

Hey!

This is going to cover this chapter as well as the whole book;

I do not own the characters from the Rangers Apprentice series or the Brotherband Chronicles. I do not take credit for it.
I only own the character Bree and the plot line. Please don't copy it.

See ya,
Bree.