Broken Haven

Chapter 9

"Lucas?" Hans asked as he grabbed for the boy's shoulder. The firm grip surprised Lucas, momentarily startling him, and waking him up from his day dreaming.

"W-what?" Lucas stuttered.

"You said about taming animals, right?"

"God man." Lucas started. "You scared me."

"Sorry about that. I didn't mean to..."

"But yeah, what about it?"

"How do you do it?"

"Well if that's what you want to know, then we better head down to the market." Lucas set off.

Hans smiled and followed Lucas.

"So are there any horses nearby?" Lucas asked, turning back to face Hans while he walked.

"Nah, just goats. Probably too small to ride."

"There must be something we can ride round here. Have a think."

"Er... Ogres?"

"No, no; ride­-­able."

"You'd be surprised."

The pair made their way to a little market stall in front of one of the buildings. Stacked up were apples, carrots, oranges, bananas, pears, and other assortments of colourful fruit and vegetables.

"First you'll need some fruit. Best to buy a few apples."

"Alright." Hans entered the buying interface, clicking about for apples, then buying a few pairs, or should I say... pears? Brilliant.

Off trotted the two animal tamers without much clue of what they'd find, as happens to be the theme of most adventures. Hans figured that they'd only found the Madnight up the mountain, so heading a downwards couldn't do too much harm. The pair travelled for twenty minutes, breaching the cloudy mask that hid the rest of the world from their view. Before them lay a dense forest, a graduation of trees clumping closer and closer on the way downwards seemed to be the cause of this mess.

"We'll be lucky if we find anything in here." Lucas commented. "It's far too thick."

"Well, all up there's goats and ogres, so what do you suggest we do?"

"Keep going?"

"It's a little dangerous to stray too far from Thoramore."

Rustling in the bushes a few metres away promptly halted this conversation, catching the two by surprise and leaving Hans's first instincts to be: 'other humans'.

"Shhh." Hans insisted, slowly creeping to a thick brown tree and peeking round it while keeping in cover. He turned back to face Lucas and shrugged. Another bush began to shake; this time, a little further away. Hans turned back round to see what was there, only to watch as a tail followed a body into a bush. He motioned for Lucas, who sheepishly followed, as Hans picked up speed in front. Clambering round and over the bushes and trees in their way, they followed the sound of rustling leaves and snapping branches. Finally reached a small opening in the forest, Hans jumped to the side, hiding behind a tree just before he entered the little garden in the forest. Lucas soon caught up and picked a tree just opposite Hans to hide behind. Hans peeked, and what he saw next filled him with delight. He turned back to Lucas. "Deer!" He whispered thrillingly. "There's about ten of them! They're all huddled in that little opening. What now?"