“Do tell,” Ethwin said, avoiding an unwanted memory. “What terror rains from the sky?”

The elite group of soldiers, each expert marksmen, each loyal members of the Forest Ally, stared wordlessly at Foren.

Two figures slipped through a thick line of hooded men, holding longbows of their own. Ethwin watched Darc and Hath enter the room and stand next to their older brother. Ethwin smiled proudly at his three sons. Each, in full light of dawn, bore a striking resemblance to their mother Queen Myna. Each stood as living reflections of her memory, revealed within sparkling blue eyes, high-set cheeks and stately brows cropped by lustrous manes of long black hair.

Ethwin’s middle son, Prince Darc, reached out and placed a hand on his father’s axe.

“Ease thy restless heart,” Darc said softly. “Vengeance remains, upheld for eternity. We must enter the courtyard.”

“Why all the calamity? What comes this way?”

“Cannot confirm,” Darc said. “Broken word of a… a shadow.” The prince turned to the open doorway. “Follow quick, father, we must see firsthand.”
“A shadow?” Ethwin rubbed his maple beard. “One so menacing to merit—”

Ethwin’s words were lost in a blare of trumpets that resounded above the four-cornered castle. Barefooted, still dressed in long underclothes, Ethwin followed his three sons and the Forest Ally down the turning stairs of the tower. The king and his men descended the castle turret and leaned over a lower rampart to survey the courtyard below. The grey bulk of the keep eclipsed their view, urging them to race down the last flight of steps into the south yard below.