A heavy sigh escaped the young guy’s lips, as he lazily rested his tired body against the wall inside the stable, taking a very short break from the tough work of changing the horseshoes on just about twenty-two horses. The guy brushed his black hair away from his eyes, looking at the horse, which was looking back at him with its dark, almost black, eyes, not knowing whether or not he actually wanted to hurt it in some way. The horse just looked at him, looking at his completely black lures of hair, which matched his dark brown eyes. Even this guy’s eyes weren’t really as anyone else’s. You see, he had some rather big, dark shadows under his eyes, which actually could make him look like some sort of ailuropoda melanoleuca, or “panda”, as some people call it.

“Tao, are you sure you don’t need a break? You don’t look so well, young man,” a voice suddenly said, shocking the guy just a little bit, making his whole body jolt slightly. However, he just smiled warmly back at the old woman, who was looking at him with concerned eyes.

“I’m fine, don’t worry about it, ma’am,” the guy, Tao, laughed softly just before he went back to work, about to do the shoes on the thirteenth horse.

“Just nine left after this one,” he sighed to himself as he grabbed the horse around its angle, lifting its hoof up, positioning it upside-down on his slightly bent knee, before he started to work on its first horseshoe.

Tao was a very hardworking guy, compared to the other guys around town. Well, the town might be quite small, it was nothing compared to the huge main cities, which were all surrounded by some great city walls to protect its inhabitants against all kinds of threats. No, Tao’s town, called Millshire, was rather small, just about a fifty inhabitants, where almost everyone knew everyone.

Nonetheless, Tao was pretty alone in the little spare time he had, since he wasn’t that popular with the other guys around town, because he never really had the time to be social with them. Oh, and they kept teasing him about his strange eyes.

So instead, Tao just thought that he was way more comfortable doing chores for the older townspeople, maybe even earning a little bit for the food for his sister and him, giving the rest of the money to his father.

Because… To be quite honest…

Tao’s father was incapable of working.

“How’s you and Bao doing lately?” the old woman asked, while Tao was still changing the shoes on her too many horses, if you asked Tao. The woman just smiled at him, “Are you getting enough to eat?”

“Well…” Tao said as he sighed, trying to still focus on his work while he spoke, “We’re doing just fine, don’t worry about it. We have enough money to bread and such, and I go hunting about once a week, so it’s fine.”

“Hunting? Aren’t you afraid that you’ll run into a couple of guards?” the woman asked with wide eyes, being quite fascinated all of a sudden, “You do know, that the Jarl doesn’t like when people go hunting in his land.”

“I doubt that the Jarl can eat all those animals by himself,” Tao laughed softly as he just finished the horseshoes on this horse, before he moved on to the next one. Five to go!

“Just be careful you don’t run into any beasts, or worse. Humans aren’t the strongest nor the most dangerous creatures out there,” the woman warned Tao, actually only wanting the best for the young boy, since she had known him for years. She even knew about his family’s story, about his father. Something Tao didn’t really like talking about, since it just made him so ashamed. He felt like running away from his dad every single day, just running away with Bao, so none of them had to take care of that fat of his.

However, he did know about those dangerous creatures out there, and he knew, that Bao would have to wait. She was only six years old, so he would have to wait some years.

“Well… I did meet a bear once? I outdid it just barely, so in the end Bao got a new blanket,” Tao chuckled lightly, patting the back of the next horse, which had to prepare itself to get a few nails into its hooves.

“There’s creatures out there which are hundred times stronger than a bear, Tao,” the woman sighed, “You’re just lucky that Millshire lies here in the green valleys, and not in the Red Sands or White Mountains.”

“Yeah, I know,” Tao smiled a bit, a small sigh escaping his lips, “I also know, that Bao can’t really handle herself without me… Since, you know. My dad.”

“I know,” the woman smiled warmly, “But I adore you for your patience, all the other young men I know would just have left long ago.” The old woman sat down on a small chair as she watched Tao do the last few horses.

“I’m not the person to just run away from my problems,” Tao assured his elder, “But can I ask, why all these horses need new shoes all of a sudden? They aren’t really getting ridden or anything, I mean?” The young guy turned to look at the old woman, who smiled slightly at him.

“Oh, I’m getting the most of them sold today or tomorrow. Since my husband has become too old to ride them, and our grandchildren don’t have time to take care of the all of them,” she smiled warmly at Tao, “It’s a shame, though… They’re such beautiful creatures.”

“I’m done, ma’am,” Tao said as he walked away from the last horse, smiling at the woman.

“Oh! Thank you, Tao!” she said, standing up once again, “Here, let me just give just a payment, so you and your sister have some food for tonight, too.” The woman started to look in her pockets for a small coinbag, Tao feeling slightly bad at the thought that he had to get money from an older woman, in order to take care of his family. However, he put his sister’s needs before anything else.

“Thank you very much, ma’am,” Tao said politely as he bowed after having received the payment.

“Maybe there’s enough for a new pair of shoes for you, too,” the woman said, just before Tao smiled a last time at her, and left the stable, thanking on his way out, still.

Tao was quite happy about the weather, once he got outside, walking his way home to his father’s house. The sun was shining brightly in the sky, not a small sign of clouds anywhere! It was quite hot, too, since it was never really cold in the green valleys. It was like spring every day all year. It was a strange world they lived in, because for the last years, the seasons seemed to never have changed.

In the White Mountains, it was winter all year, while it in the Red Sands were some kind of sad autumn. It was like that everywhere. The seasons were never-changing.

Tao sighed slightly as he looked at the few houses he had to walk past, in order to get to his father’s house. No one around town was “rich”, so no houses consisted of stones or the like. Everything was built with the use of tree, since it was something they had a lot of in the Green Valleys. You see, not only were there valleys everywhere, but there were quite a lot of forests, too.

The houses in this town, looked kind of alike, so sometimes it might be hard to tell exactly who lived where. Tao had tried a few times, where he had to deliver something to one person, where he accidently delivered it at a completely wrong place. It had been quite embarrassing at times, but he’d learned to live with it.

He was kind of the whole town’s “errand boy”, and he’s been that for six years, doing almost everything for money.

Almost everything.

“Hey! Have you heard?!” Tao heard someone say a bit away, which caught his attention completely. Especially when he saw, that it was one of the few guards from the Green Valley’s main city, Silvae, patrolling their town from time to time.

“There was some kind of strange, flying creature seen some hours away at a watchtower, it was even headed in this direction,” the guard continued, as Tao hid himself behind the corner of one of the wooden houses around them, wanting to hear more of this conversation.

“It was probably some bird, don’t you think?” the other guard said, and Tao could almost hear him roll his eyes with a sigh.

“Yeah, since when do birds roar?” the first guard said again, crossing his arms over his chest, “I’m telling you, it’s something serious!”

“Listen… I’ve figured you’re quite new at guarding… I’ve been in this business for ten years, and I know that we don’t have to believe in everything we’re told, understood?” the other guard said, his voice now sounding quite harsh, demanding, “And now, get back to your duty, soldier!”

“U-Understood,” the first guard muttered with a stuttering voice.

Normally, Tao wouldn’t really care about the guards around town, since he wasn’t a big fan of the empire, or a fan of the high kings, but there was something about this short conversation, that did worry him slightly. Tao was pretty good at knowing when people were trying to pull a prank as well as lying or being unsure at something, and this guard really did seem sure in his statement.

But it’s never easy to know, whether or not it just might have been a bird.

“Psst,” Tao said, as the guard talking about the strange creature walked right past him, gaining his full attention immediately.

“What do you want?” the guard asked as he turned to Tao, looking the young guy up and down shortly, before focusing on his rather unusual face once again.

“I’m sorry, but I might have overheard your conversation… What creature do you think it was?” Tao asked, making the guard’s eyes go slightly wide in surprise. Tao was pretty sure, that he was going to get scolded for listening to conversations like that, but no. Not at all.

“Y-You really believe in it? You don’t just think it’s a bird?” the guard asked. Tao could now see, that the guard was maybe just a few years older than Tao, nothing more than that.

“Well… I don’t see a reason why someone would warn about a single bird, right?” Tao said with a small smile, never really tried to have such a long conversation with a soldier of the empire before. He usually just got a rather sharp, shiny sword pointed at him, whenever he mumbled something while walking past them.

“I guess you’re right,” the guard said, looking a bit away, “But really… If such a creature comes here, it can’t be good… I mean, Millshire doesn’t have many guards around, just like Silvae, neither does it have the strong walls to hold it out…”

“That’s true…” Tao mumbled, sighing slightly as he had now become even more worried about this creature, that someone apparently had seen.

“Soldier, didn’t I tell you to get back to your duty?!” the other guard, who had just walked up to Tao, said. His voice still being harsh and demanding.

“Yes, sir!” the young guard said, the guard Tao had just been talking with, before he ran off in a hurry, not wanting to get into any kind of trouble.

“Now that was just plain rude, I was having a conversation with him,” Tao complained, looking at the strict guard, who actually was old enough to be Tao’s father.

“Tsh… If you have a complaint, then complain to someone who cares,” the guard said, before he kept walking, not caring about Tao, a strange-looking guy from a small town, at all. That was just one of the few reasons, why Tao didn’t like the empire. They were all behaving as if they were on top of the world, which they weren’t.

Tao was pretty sure that the high king of Silvae wasn’t any better, since he was far from the only one disliking the empire. 

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A/N: 

Hi~! ^o^/ 

Thanks to those of you who're reading, and those of you who've subscribed~ 

It's my very first try on a fantasy fanfiction, so I hope it'll be good. ^~^'/ And that you'll keep reading it~ 

Comments are love~! <3