A Quest of Heroes (Book #1 in the Sorcerer's Ring)

engulfed in darkness, the light blocked by the towering pines above. It
was colder in here, too, and as he crossed the threshold, he felt a chill. It
wasn’t just from the dark, or the cold—it was from something else. Something he
could not name. It was a sense of…being watched.
    Thor looked up at the ancient
branches, gnarled, thicker than he, swaying and creaking in the breeze. He had
barely gone fifty paces into the wood when he began to hear odd animal noises.
He turned and could hardly see the opening from which he’d entered; he felt
already as if there were no way out. He hesitated.
    Darkwood had always sat on the
periphery of the town and on the periphery of Thor’s consciousness, something
deep and mysterious. Every herder who ever lost a sheep to the wood had never
dared venture after it. Even his father. The tales about this place were too
dark, too persistent.
    But there was something different
about today that made Thor no longer care, that made him throw caution to the
wind. A part of him wanted to push the boundaries, to get as far away from home
as possible, and to allow life to take him where it may.
    He ventured farther, then paused,
unsure which way to go. He noticed markings, bent branches where his sheep must
have gone, and turned in that direction. After some time, he turned again.
    Before another hour had passed,
he was hopelessly lost. He tried to remember the direction from which he
came—but was no longer sure. An uneasy feeling settled in his stomach, but he
figured the only way out was forward, so he continued on.
    In the distance, Thor spotted a
shaft of sunlight, and made for it. He found himself before a small clearing,
and stopped at its edge, rooted: he could not believe what he saw before him.
    Standing there, his back to Thor,
dressed in a long, blue satin robe, was a man. No—not a man, Thor could sense
it from here. He was something else. A druid, maybe. He stood tall and
straight, head covered by a hood, perfectly still, as if he did not have a care
in the world.
    Thor stood there, not knowing
what to do. He had heard of druids, but had never encountered one. From the
markings on his robe, the elaborate gold trim, this was no mere druid: those
were royal markings. Of the King’s court. Thor could not understand it. What
was a royal druid doing here?
    After what felt like an eternity,
the druid slowly turned and faced him, and as he did, Thor recognized the face.
It took his breath away. It was one of the most famous faces in the kingdom:
the King’s personal druid. Argon, counselor to kings of the Western Kingdom for
centuries. What he was doing here, far from the royal court, in the center of
Darkwood, was a mystery. Thor wondered if he were imagining it.
    “Your eyes do not deceive you,”
Argon said, staring directly at Thor.
    His voice was deep, ancient, as
if spoken by the trees themselves. His large, translucent eyes seemed to bore
right through Thor, summing him up. He felt an intense energy radiating from
him—as if he were standing opposite the sun.
    Thor immediately took a knee and
bowed his head.
    “My liege,” he said. “I’m sorry
to have disturbed you.”
    Disrespect toward a King’s
counselor would result in imprisonment or death. It had been ingrained in Thor
since the time he was born.
    “Stand up, child,” Argon said.
“If I wanted you to kneel, I would have told you.”
    Slowly, Thor stood and looked at
him. Argon took several steps closer. He stood there and stared, until Thor
began to feel uncomfortable.
    “You have your mother’s eyes,”
Argon said.
    Thor was taken aback. He had
never met his mother, and had never met anyone, aside from his father, who knew
her. He had been told she died in childbirth, something for which Thor always
felt a sense of guilt. He had always suspected that that was why his family
hated him.
    “I think you’re mistaking me for
someone else,” Thor said. “I don’t have a mother.”
    “Don’t you?” Argon asked with a
smile. “Were you born by man alone?”
    “I meant to say, sire, that my
mother died in birth. I think you mistake me.”
    “You are Thorgrin, of the Clan
McLeod. The youngest of four brothers. The one not picked.”
    Thor’s eyes opened wide. He
hardly knew what to make of this. That someone of Argon’s stature should know
who he was—it was more than he could comprehend. He didn’t even imagine that he
was known to anyone outside his village.
    “How…do you know