The Forest Gods' Reign [Published]

Chapter 3: The Prophecy

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The four of us strode across the empty street, not even bothering to check for cars. We then headed towards the antique shop, which was owned by my own mother and stood between our town's small clothing store and the restaurant ran by Zach and Luke's parents. I pushed open the door, and as a tiny bell rang as we stepped through the wooden doorway, the familiar smell of leather and dust filled my nose. My mother looked up from her desk in the back, and her brown eyes met my gray ones for only a second before she walked into the back of the room. Apparently she didn't feel like she needed to supervise us poking through all of the miscellaneous junk.

On one side of the room was a montage of various old, mismatched furniture, most of which were ancient wooden chests and tables with intricate designs. The left side of the room held more miscellaneous items, such as swords and small metal sculptures, attributed to the fact that my mom and dad had gone through a long phase of a medieval obsession before I was born. There was also a ship in a bottle, along with a large, broken, wooden grandfather clock that had supposedly belonged to Ben Franklin. Where my mother found all of these things was a mystery to everyone, including me and my father.

So, the four of us began picking through the dense pile of stuff on the left side of the room. After a few minutes, we hadn't found much, but Luke decided he liked an old, rusty, black trident, and I frowned, supposing it could be cleaned up somehow. A laughing Zach had just picked up a metal sword that was way too long for him and was swinging it about wildly, when I heard the tiny bell ring, meaning someone else had just walked through the door.

I turned to see who it was and saw a muscular man with caramel-colored hair squeeze through a small opening between two tables, heading to my mother's desk in the back of the room. My mom must have heard the bell because she walked out of the back storage room, and she sat down in the leather chair before greeting the man, "Hello, Robert, how can I help you today?" It was then that I recognized him as the gas stop owner, the father of a girl in my class. Sure enough, I saw his daughter standing in the small walkway behind him, looking quite bored and sending sympathetic glances toward the boys as if she felt sorry for their blatant immaturity.

Her name was Camille, one of the quieter ones in our small class. I didn't know her as well as Zach, Luke and Connor, but she was nice, and we talked often. She had wavy, blond hair usually held up in a tight bun, with hazel eyes almost exactly like Connor's. In fact, the two of them looked so much alike, that people who didn't know them might mistake them for siblings, maybe even twins.

Twins. My eyes lit up as I saw her carefully pick up an antique wooden bow and study it curiously. Instantly I knew who she was. Artemis, the maiden goddess of the moon and the hunt, a daughter of Zeus, and the twin sister of Apollo.

Feeling excited to have found another goddess, I glanced over my shoulder at the guys. Luke was busy inspecting his trident, and Connor was rummaging through some old junk, but I caught Zach's eye and jerked my head toward Camille. He must have understood that I was suspicious of her being a Greek goddess because he nodded and followed me over to her almost immediately.

"Hey, Camille," I started, and she looked up to meet my gaze. "Have you ever been in the woods before?"

She raised her thin eyebrows and challenged, "If I had, do you really think I would still be standing here alive?"

Okay, so she had a point.

"Maybe," I answered honestly, thinking about our godliness, and Zach quickly nodded his head in agreement.

Then I looked down at the bow Camille was still holding and noticed how beautiful it was. The large bow had a design of a flower vine running down it, and it had obviously been refinished sometime recently because the wood was still in very good condition. I also noticed the faded leather quiver full of arrows that sat on a chair next to Camille and asked, gesturing to the bow, "Have you ever shot before?"