The Northerner's Call

Chapter 1

The sweet, moon-soaked wind howled through the entrance to the small cave, but it did not touch her underneath the animal skins. Her right hand bundled a fistful near her face and secured the warmth over her head. She could not see under the skins, but the ground around her shook with the arrival of beasts.

The girl closed her eyes, muttering a prayer beneath her breath, over and over again until the beasts arrived at her feet. They breathed around her roughly, sniffing and breathing in her scent.

"Leave," she whispered; half mantra, half prayer. "Please leave."

The beasts whimpered and touched their noses to her covers. She kicked her feet out, pushing them away with as much might as she could muster. She was but a girl in a den of something evil and she could only pray the end would come sweet and swift.

The beasts grumbled a low sound and she tucked into herself further. Their numbers were unknown to her, blind of her own making. Two, three, twenty, a hundred; the girl did not know. She hoped for more than one, for the taking to go quickly.

She had realized the beasts left her small den. Their heady steps no longer shook the ground, but she did not abandon the warmth and nescient safety of the animal skins.

Somewhere close, men's voices bellowed through the trees. She wished for the beasts to come back instead.

They called to her, but she did not call out. She lay immobile under the heap of fur.

"Too small to be a boy," one noted.

"I will go."

Six footsteps of one man moved towards her, stopping at the end of her feet.

"Girl," he addressed her, hunching over in the curved walls of the den. His voice was deep and strong, and she knew he was a man, not a boy. "Uncover yerself."

She did not. Her hands shook with fear as he ordered her again to remove the skins from her body. When she did not, he took a fistful near her leg and pulled harshly, revealing her face and chest.

She fisted a blade in her hand, five inches in length, pointed towards him. It had been made for her, a sure fit in her palm, but it appeared foreign for her to use it. She watched the large man, half bent at the waist and knees, reach for it.

"Give me the blade, narrae, before ya hurt yerself." His accent was thick, and it chilled her to know she was no longer close to her village.

She would not give it up.

"I don't want ya to injure, narrae," he said the word again, slipping smooth from his lips. "We won't hurt ya."

"Leave," she hissed. He was startled by her voice, sharp and harsh for such a slight girl.

"I cannot," he shook his head, reaching his hand out further.

She glanced towards the entrance of the cave, feet away and safer than being cornered in the dark. As he pressed his hand out, she sliced through his palm with alarming accuracy. He cursed and held the hand to his chest.

She scurried from the ground, eager to leave the den. The skins were forgotten, and she ran quickly towards edges of rocks and trees, though when she was faced with a hunting party of twenty men, she stopped short.

The man from the cave wove his arm around her stomach, pulling her towards his chest. Her back hit the leather plating and sheaths of weapons on his body. Her breath came quicker and shorter as she bucked against him.

"Shh," he hushed towards her ear. "I said we will not hurt ya."

"Let me go," she pleaded, hot tears streaming angry red streaks down her olive cheeks.