Father of The Wild Hunt

“Keep pace, boy.” Master Elara’s voice cut through my discomfort, sharp as a winter wind. Despite her sixty summers, she moved across the dunes with the surety of a mountain cat, her silver-streaked auburn braids undisturbed by the desert breeze. The wooden and gold beads woven into them clicked softly with each step, a rhythm older than my own heartbeat after twenty summers under her tutelage.

The sun was merciless, a white-hot eye glaring down as we trudged over another dune. My earth magic had faded to a threadbare whisper after ten days away from my Heart’s soil. The desert was not cruel, only indifferent—its voice too foreign for me to understand. Where my grove’s loamy earth had cradled each footprint with memory, here the sand swallowed all without hesitation, forgetting me with each step.

“Yes, Master.” I adjusted the pack on my shoulders, feeling the weight of ceremonial herbs and sacred stones collected from our grove. My twenty-ninth summer had come and gone, yet in my Master’s presence, I was still a sapling requiring guidance. My fingers brushed the gold torc at my throat—a nervous habit since my twentieth naming day. She’d never explained its origin, only that it was my inheritance. The metal held memories of earth magic older than my own.

Master paused, turning to face me with eyes, the deep green of ancient forest pools. Something flickered in their depths when she looked at me, gone too quick to name.

“This is not a journey for wandering, Riordan.” Her eyes hardened. “Al-Quamar’s dragon-descended rulers don’t take kindly to outsiders. Our King’s interest in their bloodline makes this blessing... delicate.” Her gaze swept over my tall frame, lingering on the faint vine-like markings visible on my forearms, markings that normally glowed with gentle light when I worked earth magic. Now they lay dormant, faded like old scars. Then a shadow crossed her face as she turned away. “Blood feuds have long memories.”

I nodded, though my mind caught on the layers beneath her words. Court gossip spoke of our King’s pursuit of a dragon noble, how he sought to strengthen ancient ties through marriage. The Al-Quamar royal family was a branch of her bloodline—a fact that made this blessing both honor and subtle threat.

“Be on guard and mindful of your words,” she continued. “We are here only to give our blessing. Nothing more.”

The unspoken message was obvious. We were servants of the Fae, sent to perform a task. Not guests. Not equals. I had never ventured so far from the Unseelie Court’s lands before. This blessing of a dragon-descended queen’s pregnancy was a rare honor—and a test, though Master Elara had said as little.

“I understand,” I replied, though something in me bristled at the reminder of our servitude. The wild magic in my blood—the same magic that had saved my ancestors when they were stolen into the Faerie realm as children—rebelled against chains, even gilded ones. I kept my expression neutral, having long ago learned to hide such thoughts from her perceptive gaze.

She studied me a moment longer, her age settling more heavily around her shoulders with the brief crease of her brow. “Good. Now look there.” She pointed toward the horizon.

I raised my eyes and caught my first glimpse of Al-Quamar rising from the golden sands. Its white walls soared impossibly high, shimmering with protective wards that bent the very air around them. Towers spiraled toward the sky, capped with domes of burnished copper that caught the sun’s glare like dragon eyes. Even at this distance, I could sense the magic embedded in those walls—ancient and powerful, not so unfamiliar as the grove-born magic of my home.

Something stirred within me then, a sense of possibility I had never felt within the bounds of my grove. As if this journey, for all its discomfort and strangeness, might lead to something more than duty fulfilled and orders obeyed. More than the careful dance between druid and Fae, between servant and master, between those who had been taken and those who had taken them.

Master Elara must have sensed my thoughts, for her lips pursed in disapproval. “Whatever you’re thinking, set it aside. Your purpose here is singular. You represent not only yourself but most importantly, the Court. Do not embarrass us.”

I bowed my head in acknowledgment, though I could not entirely suppress the rebellious thought that bloomed like a weed through stone: *Perhaps there are paths beyond the ones laid out for us by the Fae.*

The city called to me with whispers I couldn’t yet understand. And for the first time in my life, I wondered what it might be like to choose my own path.

“Come,” Master Elara said, already moving forward. “We must reach the gates by sunset if we wish for proper reception.”

I followed, my eyes never leaving the gleaming white walls ahead. Whatever awaited me in Al-Quamar, I sensed it would change everything.

🜃 Welcome to Father of the Wild Hunt.

This is where it begins—beneath a merciless sun, with sand in my boots and doubt in my chest.

If something about this first step lingered with you… I’d like to hear it.

Leave a comment. Share a line. Let me know if the wind stirred anything while you walked beside me.

New chapters arrive every Friday.

And the path only gets stranger from here.