Fynnarin woke to the bitter taste of medicine on his tongue and the crackling warmth of a hearth fire. His eyes fluttered open to the familiar sight of rough-hewn timber beams stretching across a low ceiling. The healer's hut. He'd been here often enough, usually bringing in injured hunters or sick children. Rarely as a patient himself.
"So the beast awakens," came a dry, rasping voice from his left.
He turned his head, wincing at the stiffness in his neck, to find Mirwen the village healer watching him with sharp eyes that belied her seventy winters. Her wrinkled hands continued to grind herbs in a mortar, never pausing even as she assessed him with the precision of a hawk eyeing prey.
"How long?" Fynnarin croaked, his throat parched.
"Three days," Mirwen replied, setting aside her work and pouring water from a clay pitcher. "You've been dancing between worlds. The fever nearly took you."
She helped him sit up enough to drink. Every muscle in his body protested the movement. The water tasted sweeter than any mead he'd ever sampled.
"The children?" he asked when he could speak again. "The crystal..."
A rare smile cracked across Mirwen's weathered face. "All recovering. The crystal you brought—" She paused, studying him with renewed intensity. "A freely given foxin crystal is potent beyond measure, especially one from the forehead emblem. I've stretched it further than I thought possible."
Memory returned in fragments. The hunt. The bear. The transformation that had overtaken him. And finally, the foxin's gift and mysterious words.
"How did I survive?" he asked, though part of him feared the answer.
Mirwen's expression grew guarded. "Your wounds were deep, but not fatal. The cold nearly did what the bear could not." She hesitated. "The crystal helped. It seemed... attuned to you, somehow. I've never seen one respond to a human that way."
Not fully human, Fynnarin thought but didn't say.
"The others have questions," she continued, turning back to her herbs. "Jormund and Henrik saw enough to start whispers. No one survives a mountain bear attack, let alone kills one bare-handed."
Fear coiled in Fynnarin's stomach. Thornvale's tolerance for the unusual had limits. His mixed heritage already set him apart; unexplained abilities would only widen the gap.
"What did you tell them?"
"That you're either the luckiest fool in Aldermere or blessed by powers beyond our understanding." Mirwen fixed him with a stern gaze. "Neither explanation satisfied them, but they're grateful enough for the meat and medicine not to press—for now."
She began binding fresh herbs into a poultice. "Rest. Heal. When you're strong enough, we'll speak of what really happened in those woods."
Fynnarin wanted to ask how she knew there was more to the story, but exhaustion dragged him back toward sleep. As consciousness slipped away, he thought he heard that same whisper: Balance must be restored.
Dreams came to him in vivid bursts: running on four legs through moonlit forests; tearing into prey with teeth that were not human; swimming through rushing waters with the strength of ten men. Each time he woke gasping, drenched in sweat despite the winter chill, the foxin crystal pulsing faintly beneath his bandages where Mirwen had placed it against his worst wounds.
On the fourth day, his strength began to return. By the sixth, he could stand without assistance. On the seventh, Mirwen declared him fit enough to return to his own dwelling—a small cabin at the edge of the village that he'd built with his own hands three summers past.
"You'll need to redress the wounds daily," she instructed, pressing a bundle of herbs into his hands. "And this tea, morning and night, until the moon completes its cycle."
"Thank you," Fynnarin said, meaning it. Mirwen had always treated him with more kindness than most. Perhaps because she, too, knew what it meant to stand apart—the unmarried healer, suspected by some of trafficking with forest spirits.
"One more thing," she said as he prepared to leave. From a shelf lined with clay pots and bundles of dried plants, she retrieved a small leather-bound book, its spine cracked with age. "This belonged to my grandmother's grandmother. I think you should read it."
Fynnarin accepted the book with confusion. "I'm no scholar, Mirwen. The trapper's marks are all I know how to read."
Her eyes crinkled. "You'll manage this one, I think. Some knowledge finds its reader when the time is right."
He tucked the book into his tunic, unsure what to make of her cryptic words but unwilling to refuse the gift. With a final nod of thanks, he stepped out into the weak winter sunlight.
Thornvale seemed unchanged during his absence—smoke rising from chimneys, children darting between buildings on errands, the rhythmic clang of Jormund's hammer at the forge. Yet as Fynnarin made his way through the village, he sensed subtle differences. Conversations paused as he passed. Glances followed him, some curious, others wary.
The whispers had begun.
Near the well, he encountered Henrik's wife Linna, her rounded belly announcing the spring arrival of their third child. She offered him a genuine smile as she rested her water bucket.
She gave him a warm smile, her eyes—the deep brown of fertile earth—filled with genuine gratitude. "The Architects must have been watching over you that day in the forest."
"Perhaps," he replied, adjusting the bucket in his hands. "Or simply hunter's luck."
"Whatever the case," she said as she accepted the water from him, "your bravery has served us all. My child will be born into a village with full stores of meat and medicine because of you."
Before he could respond, she slipped inside, leaving him with an unexpected sense of gratitude for her words.
The feeling was short-lived. As he approached his cabin, he spotted a figure waiting by his door—Alderman Tomas, Thornvale's elected leader. A stern man of fifty with iron-gray hair and little patience for anything outside his understanding of the natural order.
"Fynnarin," the alderman greeted him, his voice as cold as the mountain winds. "Good to see you recovered."
"Alderman." Fynnarin inclined his head respectfully. "Did you need something?"
Tomas studied him, pale eyes narrowed. "Strange tales coming from your hunt. A bear killed without proper weapons. A foxin crystal freely given. Magic, some are saying."
"As I told Linna, people exaggerate. The arrow wounded it more gravely than I realized."
"Perhaps." The alderman didn't sound convinced. "These are uncertain times, boy. War in the lowlands. Strange happenings across Aldermere. Things stirring that should remain dormant."
"I'm just a hunter doing my duty to the village," Fynnarin said evenly.
"See that you remember that duty." Tomas stepped closer, lowering his voice. "Your mother was welcomed here despite her... heritage... because she had skills we needed. You've been tolerated for the same reason. Don't give people reason to reconsider that tolerance."
The threat hung in the air between them. Fynnarin felt a flare of the same heat that had overtaken him in the forest, but he clamped down on it hard. Losing control now would only prove Tomas right.
"Is there anything else, Alderman?"
After a long moment, Tomas stepped back. "The hunting party retrieved the bear. Fine work, whatever methods you used. The meat and hide will serve us well." His voice softened a fraction. "Rest. Recover. When you're able, the winter hunts must continue."
With that, he departed, leaving Fynnarin to enter his cabin alone, unsettled by the confrontation.
Inside, everything was as he'd left it—simple furnishings he'd crafted himself, furs on the bed for warmth, hunting tools arranged neatly on the walls. Yet it felt smaller somehow, as though the outside world had grown larger and more threatening during his absence.
He sank onto a wooden chair, wincing as the movement pulled at his healing wounds. From inside his tunic, he extracted the book Mirwen had given him and placed it on the table. Its leather cover was unmarked except for a symbol pressed into the center—a circle containing a stylized animal figure that seemed to shift between wolf, bear, and human depending on how the light struck it.
Curious despite his fatigue, Fynnarin opened to the first page. To his surprise, though the markings were clearly written, he could understand them as easily as spoken words. The text seemed to twist and reshape itself as he focused on it, becoming legible though he'd never learned proper letters.
The Treatise of Shifting Forms: A Record of the Wild-Blooded and Their Gifts.
He slammed the book closed, heart pounding. Wild-Blooded. He'd heard the term once, whispered by his mother when she thought he was asleep. She'd been arguing with his father, the night before the man left them both forever.
"He's showing signs already," his father had said. "The Wild-Blood runs strong in him."
"He can learn to control it," his mother had pleaded. "You did."
"I ran from it, Lyra. There's a difference. And even that wasn't enough."
A sharp knock at his door startled Fynnarin from memory. He hastily shoved the book under a pile of furs before calling, "Enter."
The door swung open to reveal Kitra, a woman his age who worked as Jormund's apprentice at the forge. Her dark hair was tied back in a practical braid, soot still smudging her strong features from the day's work. They'd grown up together, sharing the bond of outsiders—he for his mixed blood, she for choosing a man's trade.
"So you're not dead," she said by way of greeting, kicking the door closed behind her to keep out the chill. She carried a covered pot that filled the cabin with the aroma of hearty stew.
"Disappointed?" he replied, grateful for her lack of ceremony.
"Relieved. The next best hunter in the village is Old Jarin, and his eyesight is worse than his aim." She set the pot on his table and began ladling stew into a wooden bowl. "Jormund sent this. Said you'd need your strength back."
"My thanks to him." Fynnarin accepted the bowl, suddenly realizing how hungry he was. The stew was rich with root vegetables and chunks of preserved venison from autumn's hunting.
Kitra watched him eat for a moment before settling onto the chair opposite him. "So. Going to tell me what really happened out there?"
He paused mid-bite. "What makes you think anything unusual happened?"
She rolled her eyes. "We've known each other since we were children stealing berries from the summer bushes. I can tell when you're hiding something."
"It's complicated," he hedged.
"I forge steel for a living, Fynn. I understand complicated things." She leaned forward. "Half the village thinks you've been blessed by the Architects. The other half thinks you've made some unholy pact with forest demons. I'd rather hear the truth from you."
The weight of isolation he'd carried since the hunt lightened slightly at her words. If anyone in Thornvale might understand, it would be Kitra.
"I'm not entirely sure what happened myself," he admitted. "Something... changed in me when the bear attacked. It was like becoming something more than human, but also less. More instinct than thought."
"The Wild-Blood," she said simply.
He nearly dropped his spoon. "How do you—"
"My grandmother was from the eastern forests too," she explained with a shrug. "Like Linna's. There were stories about people who carried the blood of ancient beasts. Warriors who could take on animal aspects in times of need."
"Do you believe such tales?"
"I believe what I see. And I see you sitting here after surviving something that should have killed you." Her expression grew serious. "War is coming to the mountains, Fynn. Refugees passed through the lower valley last week while you were healing. They say the Royal Army is pushing back the rebels, driving them into the highlands."
This was troubling news. Thornvale had always existed at the fringes of the kingdom of Aldermere, largely ignored by lowland politics. If conflict reached the mountains...
"All the more reason to keep quiet about... whatever this is," he said, gesturing vaguely at himself.
"Or all the more reason to understand it," Kitra countered. "Power like that could protect Thornvale if needed."
The foxin's words echoed in his mind: Balance must be restored. Was this what it meant? Was he meant to be some kind of protector?
"I don't know how to control it," he confessed. "It just... happened."
Kitra's eyes gleamed with the same determination she brought to the forge. "Then we'll figure it out. Together."
Before he could respond, a horn sounded from the village center—three long blasts, the signal for an emergency gathering. They exchanged concerned glances and rose simultaneously.
"Can you make it?" she asked, eyeing his still-healing wounds.
"I'll manage."
They hurried outside to find the village already gathering in the central square. Torches illuminated the dusk as Alderman Tomas stood on the raised platform used for announcements and celebrations. His face was grave as he waited for the last stragglers to arrive.
"People of Thornvale," he began once the murmuring crowd fell silent. "Word has reached us that a detachment of the Royal Army will arrive tomorrow, led by Magistrate Caldwell himself."
Uneasy whispers spread through the gathering. The magistrate was the king's representative in the region, rarely seen in remote villages except to collect taxes or enforce royal decrees.
"They come seeking those with magical abilities," Tomas continued, his gaze sweeping the crowd but lingering briefly on Fynnarin. "The war against the rebels has turned in the king's favor, but at great cost. Now they seek to replenish their ranks of battlemages and healers."
"They can't force our people to fight in their war!" someone called out.
Tomas held up his hands for quiet. "The king's new decree states that all citizens with magical aptitude must be registered and assessed for service. Those deemed valuable will be conscripted."
Fresh outrage rippled through the crowd. Fynnarin felt Kitra's hand closed around his wrist in silent warning.
"What defines 'magical aptitude'?" asked Mirwen from the edge of the gathering, her voice carrying despite its softness.
"Healing beyond normal means. Communion with creatures or plants. Unusual strength or speed. Weather-working." Tomas's eyes found Fynnarin again. "Transformative abilities."
Cold dread settled in Fynnarin's stomach. If what had happened in the forest qualified as magic—and how could it not?—then he would be among those the magistrate sought.
"We must prepare to receive the magistrate with all courtesy," Tomas concluded. "Have your best ready to offer hospitality. Anyone with... concerns... about this visit should speak with me privately."
As the crowd began to disperse, Fynnarin felt multiple eyes turn his way. The whispers about his bear encounter had spread further than he'd realized.
"This is bad," Kitra muttered. "Very bad."
Mirwen appeared beside them, moving with surprising stealth for her age. "Come," she said without preamble. "Both of you. Now."
She led them swiftly away from the crowd toward her hut on the village's eastern edge. Once inside with the door firmly barred, she turned to Fynnarin with uncharacteristic urgency.
"Have you opened the book?" she demanded.
"Yes, but I've barely begun to—"
"There's no time." She moved to a woven rug on the floor and pulled it aside, revealing a trapdoor. "The magistrate doesn't come to register magic-users. He comes to eliminate threats and collect assets. Those deemed too powerful or uncontrollable are never seen again. Those with useful abilities become tools of the crown, their wills bound by alchemical means."
"How do you know this?" Kitra asked, watching as Mirwen unlocked the trapdoor with a key she wore around her neck.
"Because I was nearly taken myself, forty years ago during the last conflict." The old woman's eyes flashed with remembered fear. "I escaped with the help of others like me and made my way to Thornvale, where I could heal in peace."
She swung the trapdoor open, revealing a small cellar containing bundles of herbs, jars of preserved ingredients, and—surprisingly—a packed traveling sack and walking staff.
"I've kept this ready for decades," Mirwen explained, seeing their surprise. "The Wild-Blooded have always been especially prized by the crown. Their abilities in battle are... formidable."
Fynnarin's mind reeled. "You want me to run?"
"I want you to live, boy. And to understand what you are." She thrust the traveling pack at him. "There's a network of those like us. Safe places. Teachers. The book contains directions coded in ways only the Wild-Blooded can read."
"I can't just abandon Thornvale," Fynnarin protested. "Not with war coming. Not with the magistrate's arrival possibly bringing trouble to everyone."
"Your presence will bring them more trouble," Mirwen countered. "The moment Caldwell sees you, he'll know what you are. The signs are clear to those who know to look."
"Then I'll hide until they leave," he suggested. "The deeper hunting cabins—"
"They'll bring trackers. Specially trained hounds that can smell magic." Mirwen shook her head. "You must be far from here by dawn."
"I'm going with him," Kitra announced firmly.
Both turned to stare at her. She crossed her arms, jaw set in stubborn determination.
"He'll need help," she said. "And I've no desire to stay and forge weapons for the king's wars."
"Two are more conspicuous than one," Mirwen warned.
"Two survive better than one," Kitra retorted.
The old healer studied her for a moment, then nodded reluctantly. "There's wisdom in that. I've only provisions for one, but—"
"I have my own supplies," Kitra said. "I'll need less than an hour to gather them."
Fynnarin felt overwhelmed by the rapid shift in his circumstances. Yesterday, he'd been a respected hunter beginning to recover from injuries. Now he was apparently a fugitive from royal decree, possessor of magical abilities he barely understood, and about to flee the only home he'd ever known.
"The children still need medicine," he said, grasping at reasons to stay despite the logic of Mirwen's warnings. "The village needs meat for winter."
"I've stretched the crystal's power through every remedy," Mirwen assured him. "The foxin's forehead crystal has remarkable potency. The sick will recover. As for meat, the bear you killed will feed them for weeks. You've discharged your duty to Thornvale admirably." Her voice softened. "But now you have a duty to yourself, to understand what you are before others define it for you."
The foxin crystal, still secured against his healing wounds, seemed to pulse in agreement. Balance must be restored, whispered that strange voice at the edges of his consciousness.
"Where would we go?" he asked finally.
Relief flashed across Mirwen's weathered features. "East, into the deeper mountains, then north along the Riftway. The book will reveal more as you need it." She pressed the key to the trapdoor into his palm. "Return here at midnight. Use the tunnel beneath—it emerges in the woods beyond the village boundary. I dug it decades ago for exactly this purpose."
"You won't come with us?" Kitra asked.
Mirwen shook her head. "My running days are done. Besides, the village will need a healer with uncertain times ahead." She smiled grimly. "And I know how to appear harmless to men like Caldwell. Just an old woman with herb-lore, nothing more."
As they prepared to leave separately to avoid suspicion, Mirwen caught Fynnarin's arm. "The Wild-Blood is a gift, boy, not a curse. But like any gift, it requires understanding and respect." Her eyes, suddenly fierce, bore into his. "Find others like you. Learn. Then decide what kind of power you wish to become in this changing world."
The gravity of her words followed him as he slipped back to his cabin in the gathering darkness. There, he collected only what was essential—his hunting knife, a spare set of clothes, dried meat and hard bread that would travel well. His father's bow, the weapon that had defined his role in Thornvale for so long, he reluctantly left behind. It would be too recognizable if anyone pursued them.
As he packed, his gaze kept returning to the book hidden among the furs. Finally, he retrieved it, running his fingers over the shifting animal symbol on its cover. Whatever destiny awaited him beyond Thornvale's boundaries, this ancient text seemed key to understanding it.
The creak of his door announced Kitra's arrival. She too had packed lightly—a small rucksack, a smithing hammer at her belt, sturdy clothes suited for hard travel.
"Still certain?" he asked her. "This isn't your burden to bear."
Her dark eyes flashed. "I make my own choices, Fynnarin. Always have." She adjusted her pack. "Besides, I've wanted to see beyond these mountains since we were children. This is just good motivation."
Despite everything, he found himself smiling. Kitra's practical determination had always been a steadying force in his life.
"We should rest while we can," she suggested. "It'll be a hard journey once we start."
They settled in to wait for midnight, speaking little, each lost in thoughts of what they were leaving behind and what uncertain future awaited them. Outside, snow began to fall, soft flakes that would cover their tracks once they fled—a small mercy from the winter they had both learned to navigate since childhood.
As the hour grew late, Fynnarin felt the foxin crystal warm against his skin. He carefully removed it from beneath his bandages and studied it in the firelight. The small blue crystal gleamed with inner light, the delicate pattern of the forehead emblem still visible on its surface despite being separated from its source.
"A parting gift," he murmured, placing it on the table. "For Mirwen. For the children who might still need it."
Kitra nodded approval. "A worthy final act as Thornvale's hunter."
When midnight approached, they doused the fire and made their final preparations. At Fynnarin's suggestion, they left a brief note for Jormund, thanking him for his years of friendship and asking him to ensure Fynnarin's cabin and possessions were distributed to those in need.
They slipped out into the silent, snow-covered night, keeping to shadows as they made their way to Mirwen's hut. The village slept, unaware that two of its members were about to vanish into the wilderness.
The healer was waiting, her expression solemn as she unlocked the trapdoor once more. "The tunnel is narrow but passable," she instructed. "Follow it straight for three hundred paces, then upward. You'll emerge in a thicket east of the village boundary stones."
"Thank you," Fynnarin said, the words inadequate for all she had done. He pressed the foxin crystal into her hands. "For those who might still need healing."
Tears shimmered in the old woman's eyes. "Go with the blessings of the ancient powers, Wild-Blood. May you find your true nature and the strength to embrace it."
They descended into the earth, the smell of soil and roots surrounding them as Mirwen closed the trapdoor above. The tunnel was as she had described—narrow, requiring them to crouch as they followed its course by touch alone in perfect darkness.
After what seemed an eternity of careful movement, they found the upward path and emerged among snow-covered bushes, the cold night air a relief after the close confines of the tunnel. Above them, stars glittered between patches of clouds, and the waning moon cast just enough light to illuminate their path.
Fynnarin paused, looking back toward Thornvale. From this distance, only the faintest lights were visible through the gently falling snow. The village that had been his entire world for twenty years now seemed small, fragile—a brief moment of civilization in the vast wilderness that stretched around them.
"Second thoughts?" Kitra asked softly beside him.
He shook his head. "No. Just... saying goodbye."
"Not forever," she reminded him. "Once you understand this gift of yours, once the magistrate's interest fades... we could return."
"Perhaps." Though even as he said it, Fynnarin sensed that nothing would ever be the same again. The path ahead would transform him as surely as the bear attack had begun to.
The Wild-Blood. The foxin's gift. The mysterious book. All pieces of a puzzle he was only beginning to understand.
"Which way?" Kitra asked, practical as always.
Fynnarin reached into his pack and withdrew the ancient text. In the faint moonlight, the symbol on its cover seemed to shift and dance before his eyes. As he held it, a certainty filled him—not from the book itself, but from something awakening within his blood.
"East," he said with newfound confidence, turning toward the deeper mountains. "Into the high passes. There's a place there... a gathering of those like me."
"How do you know?"
He smiled faintly. "The same way I know how to track in fresh snow, or which berries are safe to eat. Some knowledge simply feels right."
With that, they set off into the wilderness, leaving behind the safety of all they had known. The snow continued to fall, gradually obscuring their tracks until it seemed they had never passed that way at all—two more secrets carried away by the winter night.
Behind them, Thornvale slept, unaware that the balance Fynnarin's mysterious voices spoke of had already begun to shift. Ahead lay a world of ancient powers reawakening, a kingdom in conflict, and the untamed potential of the Wild-Blood flowing through Fynnarin's veins.
Balance must be restored, whispered the night. And somewhere in the darkness, something answered.