ISAAC CROUCHED AND RUBBED A CLOD of the soft, wet earth between his fingers. He shared that sensation with the strength of the wind pushing under his wings. His fingers ran knowingly across a recently made track as he dove below the cloud level with his manifestation.

 

He’d tracked this herd of deer through Thelbrook Forest for about two days, and now he was closing in. He straightened his lean figure and fixed his eyes on his new course. He rubbed absently at the leather pendant that dangled from his neck, the diamond and ribbons in the center of the pendant contrasting with his simple attire. He gripped his bow and adjusted the strap of the quiver and small pack slung over his shoulder.

 

Above the treeline, he saw the herd’s path in the dim light and grinned. If he was right, and when tracking, he normally was, then the herd had stopped for the night in a clearing to the north. He knew the place well, though it had been a year or two since a hunt had brought him this way.

 

He’d become one of the Bestowed in that clearing.

 

Even after four years, the excitement still pulsed through him. Nature had granted him one of its highest honors—a manifestation in the form of a hawklet.

 

Now he just needed to perform a few heroic deeds and he could truly count himself among the great champions and legends of time; champions like King Deresk and the Paladins of Valoria. He closed his eyes, imagining standing alongside such heroes. Just the thought caused his heart to beat faster.

 

He opened his eyes and gazed at his hawkform as it glided toward him, likewise gazing at him—a constant mirror. Though it had taken considerable time and practice, he now controlled two bodies without a second thought. He smiled at how far he’d come.

 

A doe jumped from the thicket to his right, the first sighting of his quarry with his humanform. He honed his focus. This kill wasn’t for him. A family in their village had run out of meat during the winter. Isaac had a soft spot for their son, Dy, who was several years his junior. This hunt would go a long way toward providing for them.

 

Thankfully, Isaac had been able to convince his father to let him go. Normally, Father accompanied him on every single hunting trip, but he had projects back in the forge that couldn’t be delayed. Father’s face had gone pale white when Isaac volunteered to go himself.

 

Did his father not think him competent enough? When they went together, Isaac tracked the prey with his hawk and he shot them with his bow. Father mostly helped haul stuff back.

 

Eventually Father conceded to the trip, mostly because he knew how much Dy’s family needed it. But he stressed, over and over again, while Isaac got ready to leave, the importance of being careful, citing Isaac’s inexperience. But how was Isaac supposed to gain experience, let alone become a Paladin, if he never went anywhere?

 

Isaac launched himself into the sky and with his hawkeyes, he could see trees extending in all directions. The snowpack from the fading winter still covered the Cozar Mountains to the north. The doe joined the herd by the trees at the clearing's edge, exactly where he’d anticipated.

 

He positioned himself behind some shrubbery across the clearing. He knelt a good eighty armlengths away from the buck he’d chosen, a long shot for most archers—not Isaac. He smiled as his solid arm pulled the string back to its fullest, the nocked arrow perfectly still. His manifestation wasn’t the only thing that had grown in the past few years.

 

The herd bolted.

 

Isaac cursed and spat in the dirt. Two days of work—gone.

 

Not that he’d give up the hunt. Dy’s family needed this kill, and he needed to show Father that his worries were overkill.

 

What foolish creature would scare its prey like that? Perhaps some desperate mountain cat? A younger male forced out of another hunting ground?

 

He could re-track the herd if he had to. If he could avoid a fight with some predator over his kill, he would. He wouldn’t be able to carry a mountain lion back home as well as a deer, and he wouldn’t kill aimlessly. He knew that much about his responsibility as one of the Bestowed. Each life was important. Besides, mountain lion tasted tough.

 

He leaned forward, pushing aside branches of the bush in front of him. His ears and eyes strained to find the cause of the disturbance. With effort, he could hear something a little to the left of where the herd had been.

 

As he listened, he heard a rustle of leaves and the snapping of dry foliage. Whatever it was, it was much too loud to be a mountain cat…but if it wasn’t a mountain cat then…

 

His thoughts cut short as a large man burst out of the foliage.

 

He ran about as fast as anyone could on such uneven ground, sword jangling awkwardly against his leg. The man’s eyebrows furrowed in worry and determination—and with good reason. Behind him followed the biggest bear Isaac had ever seen.

 

It had a solid black pelt that gleamed in the light of the rising moon. Isaac’s stomach seized. He pulled his bowstring taut as he faced the bear.

 

His terror slipped away as he noticed the even panting breaths huffing out the enormous animal’s mouth and nose. The bear plodded at a steady, loping pace.

 

It wasn’t chasing the man but keeping pace with him.

 

This man was a Manifest.

 

His bear had grown to sizes no natural bear could. Isaac stood crouched in awe as he pondered the noble acts that had earned this man such a reward from nature.

 

The man’s stride broke as an arrow struck his left shoulder, sending him tumbling into the tall grass and out of sight. Isaac checked his own nocked arrow twice to be sure he hadn’t shot the man himself. The shot came from somewhere to his left. Even with his hawkform, he saw no one on the southern edge of the clearing. His eyes flicked back and forth from the fallen stranger to the most logical location of the unknown shooter.

 

He wanted to act, but what could he do? He knew neither of these people, nor their feud. Maybe this man deserved to die. He didn’t believe it, though. You didn’t shoot a guilty man this way.

 

Isaac almost took flight when a movement to his right caught his eye. He stayed motionless in his hiding place as yet another bear, this one brown, tore out of the forest. It roared a challenge as it made its way to where the man fell. This second bear didn’t look near as monstrous as the first, but it was still big by any normal standard.

 

With a roar, the giant black bear smashed into the second bear. They both tumbled, then regained their footing. Their speed, despite being such large beasts, amazed Isaac.

 

Isaac’s hawkform took off covertly, doubling back. He didn’t want to get surprised from behind. That arrow had come from someone and these seemed like shoot first, ask later sort of folks. Despite the real danger of the situation, Isaac couldn’t help but worry about how he’d tell Father about this. He’d never let Isaac out of the house again.

 

Just before the bears reached each other again, the smaller bear reared on its hind legs, preparing to swat with its thundering paw. The large black bear didn’t give the brown bear the opportunity, barreling into it at speed and shoving it upward and back with its paws.

 

This sent the smaller brown bear tumbling until it smashed into a tree on the edge of the clearing. The bear struggled to rise. As the black bear raised its paw to deliver a punishing blow, a second arrow flew past, a hand's width from the black bear’s head. The distraction gave the brown bear enough time to get back on its feet.

 

It bellowed a challenge, blood dripping from its chest. Apparently, the black bear had added some claw in the earlier shove.

 

In hawkform, Isaac neared the source of the arrow, his heartbeat resounding in his ears. He still hadn’t spotted the archer. He kept close to the treeline. The moon had almost reached its full this month, and he would get spotted flying any higher.

 

Despite his tiny victory, the black bear had no options. While trying to protect his wounded humanform, he could turn his back on the archer or on the other bear. Either choice left him completely exposed.

 

The attackers had sprung the trap perfectly.

 

The black bear kept his attention on the immediate danger of the other bear. It seemed to hope that the archer was out of range and he probably was. Even Isaac would have struggled with the distance.

 

Isaac could now see the wounded man crawling his way toward where Isaac hid, the tall meadow grass giving him a small amount of cover. From his neck dangled a small colored necklace that caused Isaac to raise his eyebrows in shock.

 

He’d seen it, or one like it, every single day of his life. The same leather pendant. The same red, blue, and gold ribbons, held together in the middle by a small round diamond.

 

He’d seen it, because it was identical to the one he wore around his own neck.