Chapter 1

There is nothing like a quiet grove of trees to relax you after a hard day's hunt. Dragons and Ogres and Bears, oh my! The life of a Warrior is a hard one, especially if the Warrior is getting on in years. Seems like I have been doing this forever... I can hardly remember being young, my first kill... picking up my first valuable drop.

My reverie was interrupted by a boy's noisy entrance into my grove. He was randomly swinging a wooden saber (a weapon so ineffective that the Smiths give them away!). Once in a while, he hit a squirrel until it died, then casually pocketed its dropped acorns. I opened my backpack to look for something interesting. There near the bottom was something shiny... a Stardrop! Not a valuable item, but very pretty. I bet this kid has never even seen one before.

A squirrel hopped by me, never suspecting that he was to play a role in a practical joke. Using the simplest magic in the Kingdom, I 'gave' the Stardrop to the squirrel. Now the rodent would carry an extra surprise until someone killed it, and it was heading right for the boy!

"Hello!" I turned toward the voice, seeing a young girl enter the grove. She walked up to the boy, "Are you hunting? Want to form a group? I hear that we can get much larger prey that way."

"Uh... sure," the boy replied, still whacking away at squirrels, rabbits and trees. "What you wanna hunt?"

"Well, first let's see what happens when we try to hunt together," She pulled out a wooden sword (only slightly better than the saber), and moved towards my squirrel.

"Uh oh," I thought.

With the girl hitting it from the front and the boy from behind, the squirrel fell quickly. There, glinting on the ground was the Stardrop, the essence of beauty itself, a twinkling light that has captured more than one soul. Many people, mostly women, get quite captivated by their light, collecting and collecting until the Tavern keepers have to charge them extra, to ward against theft.

The girl moved first, snatching up the jewel.

"Hey!" The boy exclaimed, "That was mine!"

"I don't see your name on it," she replied, walking out of the grove, followed closely by the fuming young lad.

"Heh heh heh," I chuckled, then had a thought. I pulled out a pen and a mostly blank scroll and began to write.

I looked up from my writing to see an unusual sight. A boy, hardly older than the young hunter, was standing in front of me. He was dressed all in red with gold embroidery. It looked like Royal page attire, something I had not seen in years.

"Are you Warrior Gareth?" He asked, bowing politely.

"Yes," I replied, making sure he saw my open scroll and the half-finished poem I was working on.

"The same Gareth they tell stories about?" The young man seemed doubtful. I guess I should wear armor ALL the time? Peasants robes are much more comfortable; besides, the Smith said it might take awhile to get all "the teeth marks out of your Sun tiger mail."

"What stories are they telling about me?" I asked, thinking about the last few years, mostly spent in Taverns, trying to forget the loss of my wife, and the wonderful few months we have shared since her miraculous return, thank the Gods!

"They say you were the hero of the Zibong War... and that you single-handedly stopped an evil mage from destroying both Kingdoms... and that you..." he stopped, embarrassed.

"I what?" This was news to me. Some friends and I had fought in the First Zibong War together, and I did lead a small band of Heroes to kill an Evil Mage, but it didn't really seem like something people would credit ME for.