Their confusion at the unexpected encounter didn’t last long before Nenya swiftly jumped into action. Roughly pulling Myra behind her, she held her knife in a forehand grip keeping the point aimed at the stranger. The cloaked youth simply watched her actions with a faint, and in her opinion infuriating, smile of amusement.

“Who are you!” she snarled.

The young man tilted his head and blinked in confusion, seemingly unconcerned by the weapon in her hands.

“I do believe that I have already introduced myself, dear maiden.” He answered in his strangely formal manner.

“Was he some kind of noble?”

Then he confused her further by uttering a string of gibberish, of which she recognised only his name, while repeating his actions from the earlier greeting.

“Ya, he’s just a crazy person.”

Said crazy person was beginning to contemplate introducing himself in yet another language when, to Nenya’s surprise, the awkward standoff was broken by Myra of all people. Despite her habitual timidity, the girl chose to berate her friend, hissing to her.

“Nenya! You’re being rude to a druid! Introduce yourself properly.”

“Myra! Don’t get swept along by this strange guy-EEE!”

Interrupting her friend with a sharp pinch to her side, Myra shoved her way forward and curtseyed to the increasingly bemused looking youth.

“Pleased to meet you good sir, I’m Myra Binnon and my friend here is called Nenya Eynon.” She said with a blush, continuing with, “Please pay her behaviour no mind, she means well. Aunty says she’s half-wild most of the time and the last hour has been… a trial for us both.”

“Myra!” Nenya exclaimed in frustration before catching the look in her friend’s eye.

“Of all the times to become besotted by a man!” She complained internally.

Myrelin nodded gamely as he replied, “Don’t worry, I was raised in the wilds myself. It builds character.”

“Then how are you speaking like a noble?” Nenya interjected with obvious suspicion.

Myrelin looked confused, “A noble?” He questioned, “Fair maidens, this is just how my mother taught me to speak to a lady. The books I've learnt from also indicated this to be the proper manner of addressing another.”

“Your mother did a fine job.” Myra admired with a light titter.

“Why thank you.” He said with a smile.

Nenya clutched at her hair at the sheer ridiculousness of the situation.

“He just said he was raised in the wilds! Only nobles or rich merchants talk that way or can afford to buy books about something as pointless as fancy manners!”

Eventually, Nenya decided to keep her doubts to herself about the obvious lie. Swiftly, she moved on to more pertinent matters.

“So, you were saying that that big brute outside is yours?” She asked.

“An acquaintance of mine.” He corrected. “We have an understanding on some matters.”

Continuing, he said, “I discovered your plight and asked him for help.”

“Could you ask him not to eat us?”

Myrelin nodded, “That shouldn’t be a problem unless you want a share of his kill.”

Her expression turned faintly nauseous at the thought, “T-that’s f-fine, we’re don’t want any.”

The morbriosca had thankfully dragged the two corpses out of sight by the time they left the hollow. A trail smeared with blood led away from them through the trees and out of sight. Unfortunately, Nenya’s sharp ears could still hear the faint sounds of snapping bones and enthusiastic mastication. Repressing a shudder, she turned to the druid.

“Well, thanks I guess, though we had the matter well in hand.” She told him half-heartedly.

“I need to get my friend and I to safety. Our village is under attack by those raiders.” She finished.

“Raiders?” He frowned, “So far inland?”

“Have you been living under a rock?” Nenya almost asked him but instead replied with, “High King Vertigan allowed them to settle land on the coast, now they’ve been raiding small villages like us for food and thralls.”

“Aunty said that it might not have been the villagers that are doing it but other groups that didn’t want to settle down.” Myra corrected.

Nenya harrumphed, saying.

“It’s the same thing in the end though. They had to get those hunting dogs and supplies from somewhere if they’re able to raid this far inland. I bet I also know where they were planning on selling anyone they captured.”

A thought struck her then and she hesitantly continued.

“Hey listen, my Ma wanted me and Myra out of the fighting but if we had help... I know this is asking much but do you think you can use your magery can help us?”

Seeing Myrelin frown, she pleaded, “You don’t need to fight, just… There’s going to be injured people and people like us being hunted. Any help at all would be appreciated.”

Clutching the neck of her tunic, she looked at her feet whispering as she felt Myra hug her, “We don’t have much but we’ll repay you however we can, so please…”

Her eyes had become blurry with unshed tears as the thread of hope that had formed in her heart and the lack of immediate danger caused her discipline to falter. Her last sight of her only remaining family had been of them turning to join fight for her village. The fate of her mother and Aunt bore heavily on her thoughts.

The hand on her shoulder startled her into looking up. Against her will, seeing Myrelin’s face up close caused her to flush.

“Close.”

The impish smile that curled his lips didn’t help matters at all.

“Too close.”

And what was up with his eyes, his pupils and irises were glistening pools of bluish-black that reminded her of a starry night sky.

“He’s too close.”

Boys shouldn’t have eyelashes so long.

“He’s way too close!”

The druid was saying something but Nenya didn’t hear. All it did was draw her attention to the shape of his lips and that caused her stomach to flutter and her thoughts to roil further. Now that she got a good, close look at him in the light, she realised that he was perhaps the prettiest man she’d ever seen. Myra’s earlier behaviour suddenly made a lot more sense.

So, she slugged him.

“Nenya!” Myra shouted at her from her the side in outrage.

The blow landed beautifully and laid out the dazed druid on his back.

Nenya blocked her friend’s words out, turned around and crouched, covering her heavily blushing face as she struggled to calm her beating heart.

The kindly girl, Myra, was fussing over him.

“Myrelin are you alright?”

He waved her off when she tried to use healing magic on him. He had his own ways of healing and training to use them when disoriented was good practice for such a minor injury.

“Nenya, why’d you have to hit him in the face!”

It would help if he ever had to use his magic under more desperate circumstances.

“Have you ever seen a village boy this cute? Have you ever seen any boy this cute?”

Also, he could use this opportunity to think about what had gone wrong.

“Hueil has this big hairy mole on the end of his nose that wriggles whenever he smiles at me!”

He’d made a mistake, that much was obvious. One brought about through not having enough experience dealing with people other than Mother.

“And you were the one asking him for help!”

Mother was perfect but she couldn’t be with him always. Actually, she could but he’d wanted to write his own fate and that meant going out into the world and unavoidably, meeting new people.

“He even has all his teeth. All his teeth Nenya!”

He supposed he could have stayed in the woods with Myre-bird but that would be boring. He wanted to have an adventure.

“Stop crouching down there looking like a toad, come over here and look pretty. Maybe we can salvage this when he comes around and get him to help us.”

It had occurred to Myrelin that there were gaps in his lessons that couldn’t be covered by reading from books, even one as comprehensive as the Book of Gods, Beasts and Men. The flaw of course, lay not in a lack of relevant content but in his ability to apply the knowledge he held. It was why he’d been made to study the actual plants he’d learnt about in the Book of Nature. Dealing with people, as he was coming to realise, was a far trickier affair than his readings made it seem.

He touched his jaw and winced.

“And painful.”

“So, very painful.”

He'd need to invest in a personal passive barrier spell.

“What a pain.”

“Less painful than being punched in the face though.”

His books did cover situations like this however. Of the possible scenarios it was most likely that his approach had been far too intimate. If so, he knew just what to do once he got up. He’d just smooth things over and tell the two girls about what Myre-bird had shown him happening over at their village. He already knew just what to say. He’d just rest for a moment and let things calm down.

Of course, he pondered, his limited experience meant that he could still be misreading the situation. In which case if the fiery one called him a pig when he got up and demanded he lick her boots he’d need to use this time to plot his escape.

Much the same if she slapped him on his ass and demanded he go get her a beer…

Back to the wilds with him if that happened. His pure heart wasn’t ready for something like that. Those kinds of stories always gave him chills and not entirely the good kind either.

“Why can’t women be more like Mother?”