Chapter 1,part 2

Chapter 1

I am the wild.

I am the wild.

I am the wild.

Is that sugarcane? NO, I must focus.

I am the wild.

I am the wild.

            Oh what is the point? I had been trying to achieve union in this godforsaken forest all day. I had gotten discouraged by hunger at lunch and wandered off to hunt with my bow. Since then, I had been meditating in the blazing heat for a long five hours. I had seen no spirits, no great revolution happened, no mystic gifts were granted. I would be the laughing stalk of the entire Village. I would be the only child of age without a fairy.

            Once a year, the first day of the New Year, all the children who were thirteen, were sent into the forest to be visited by the spirits. The spirits would then bestow the child with a fairy. The fairies didn’t mind being bonded to humans; in fact they praised those who were.

            I had seen many fairies and had been around them my entire life. All of the grown-ups had them and most of the children too. They were small things no taller than the length of my hand. They had two hands and two legs like everyone else, but they had wings. The only other thing in the world with wings was an angel. They all glowed and changed colors from rosy red to turquoise. The color was a symbol of what the bonded human is thinking.

            I was the first and only child of a soldier, and that of a common Village woman. My mother, although she was pretty, was just common. She held no special status, except my father. He was the object of kindness and scorn in the Village. All soldiers were respected, but my father bonded with a common woman.

            He taught me how to use the Yew-iron bow, a special bow made of Yew and reinforced with iron. The dull silver of the iron covered every inch of the bow. The iron was specially tempered and thinned and melted to perfectly flex with the wood. I had ten arrows left with me. These arrows were tipped with a hooked iron spike. Pulling the arrow out would cause more damage than on the way in.

            I stood from my cross-legged position. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Walking through the brush and thickets surrounding the hollow was a boy. He had fairies of every color surrounding him like a magic shield. Then I saw his wings.