Chapter 1
A silent landscape, empty but for the huge castle that stood on top of a small hill in the centre of a narrow belt of land. There were a few villages dotted nearby. There was also a large plain of grassland extending to the north until it met a large forest that was just outside of its borders. This bit of land was known as Berkeslade, and the castle was occupied by the influential fae leader, Delilah Grove. She had curly light brown hair that sat just above her shoulders, and it bounced as she moved. Her eyes were also brown, but shone brightly, and they matched her olive skin perfectly. As Delilah was a fae leader, she stood at an impressive six foot, which was taller than majority of faes and humans, and she had the body of an athlete. She was happily married to the commander of the castle’s powerful defensive army, Ryder. He had deep brown hair which slicked back flawlessly. His green eyes made the perfect contrast to his olive skin and made his hair look darker. He was built more like a warrior with muscles in all the right places, but they were not as defined as the elite warriors they had as he didn’t train as much as he used to. Ryder assisted Delilah with the running of Berkeslade now, so there were others who did the physical training of the warriors. He stood tall and proud at 6 foot 3.
Ryder was currently on a scouting mission to see if rumours of an ogre causing trouble to nearby farmsteads were true. Delilah and Ryder were immensely proud of Berkeslade and of the surrounding villages so did all they could to help and protect them. He thought it was just hysterical old farmers believing old campfire stories as there had not been any such trouble for years, and Berkeslade was blissfully free of dangerous creatures. He had been gone a while now and Delilah was back at the castle growing anxious.
She had a good reason to be anxious as unbeknownst to her, Ryder was ambushed by a huge creature; undoubtedly an ogre had really been troubling these parts, but it was completely unexpected as he had believed they were just rumours. He was on horseback and so could relatively easily evade many of its attacks but nonetheless he had trouble piercings its flesh with his vast sword. Just as he thought he would be overcome; he heard a huge monstrous roar coming from the sky and thankfully the ogre turned and ran towards the north. This brought back memories of villagers telling him they had seen goblins moving to the north of the forest, which he disregarded as fireside tales of old, and he grew concerned that the ogre was doing more than stealing animals from the farm.
Ryder was snapped back into reality as the terrifying beast, which had scared off the ogre, approached him. He was in shock. He had never actually faced worse threats than a stray wolf in his time and he could not understand how something like this could possibly be alive in these parts after so many years. He suddenly felt his energy deplete as if some black magic had robbed him of strength and he fell from his horse to the ground. The large shadow approached him from the sky and soon covered his small figure. Luckily for Ryder, it did not land as it was distracted by a small flying figure that skilfully fired arrows at it.
Delilah was the small figure and she fought against the shadow, which she realised was a black dragon, seemingly with red scales in random places, although it was hard to tell as night was drawing closer. Her arrows had insignificant effect against its thickly armoured skin, and she had to fly skilfully to evade its plumes of fire. She managed to keep it away from Ryder, however, she was still wondering how they were both going to get out of here safely. If she had the time to look down, she would have seen Ryder’s horse returning to him with a new rider.
Ryder managed to raise his head and saw Axel, the farmhand for the castle who was brave at heart, but his combat experience was mainly wrestling with shearing a sheep. Axel was also tall but not as tall as the leaders and had mousy brown hair which appeared ruffled underneath a straw hat. He was wearing a pair of light blue dungarees so had obviously just finished working on the farm as he had hay sticking out of his pockets. Axel too, had muscles in the right places but that would have been from the heavy lifting needed from working on a farm. He pulled an energy filled cupcake (which his mother makes) from his pocket and threw it to Ryder, who ate it in one bite, giving him just enough energy to get to his feet. Axel’s brown eyes sparkled, and a smile appeared on his face as he threw him a bow and some arrows. Ryder swiftly prepared the weapon, with the new strength from the almost magical food coursing through him. Delilah was getting desperate as the dragon got closer and closer and just as it seemed her life would be ended by the terrible beast, an arrow hit its neck causing it to whirl around in the air and cry out in pain. As another arrow flew at it, it decided to give up before it lost an eye and flew away towards the north, in the same direction that the ogre had fled to. Frightened by how much violence had taken place in the night, Delilah flew down to the ground to ask what was going on.
“I was attacked by the ogre we heard rumours of and suddenly it fled and the beast in the sky arrived. I hope the dragon was just passing by. We should talk to our warriors and see if they have any ideas. The ogre was not in league with it at least as it fled when it approached.”
“I still feel scared, let’s go home and start investigating. We may need come up with a plan in case this happens again.”
“Very well.” Ryder said before placing a firm kiss on her lips. She responded fiercely and Axel turned away from them to be respectful. They jumped on Ryder’s horse and trotted away together. Axel sighed and began to walk back to the castle picking up Ryder’s bow that lay discarded on the ground. He arrived back safely, and the couple were nowhere to be seen, but not surprisingly their bedroom door was shut. He smirked and moved to his own chambers further down the corridor. Even though Axel worked on the farmlands, he had his own room within the castle as it was large enough to house over a hundred people. Delilah and Ryder were fair rulers and allowed anyone that wanted to live in the castle, the opportunity to do so. All they had to do in return was help with the upkeep of the castle and the rest would be provided for them.
