Prologue: Smokey the Bear on Duty
Three days earlier
Carter Johnson learned a very important lesson: never hike by himself. Thirty-five and single, he was day hiking the Appalachian Trail in the Great Smoky Mountains when he took a tumble over a rock and broke his leg.
“Damn. And I was so close to reaching Clingman’s Dome,” he mumbled to himself. There he was, propped up against a rock with his leg in a very unnatural position. His backpack was next to him, and his hat had rolled down the mountain into the lush greenery below.
Carter searched the area. Nobody was in sight. All he heard were the crows.
They were circling him above, calling, “Caw! Caw!”
“I’m not dead!” Carter yelled at them.
“Not yet,” the crows seemed to call back.
Carter tried moving his leg. Nope. He was going nowhere. The pain was too much. He would have to call a $50,000 medical helicopter for this. Carter opened his mouth, preparing to yell for help, but stopped. Something moved in the greenery where his hat fell. Oh, gosh. It was a bear. Within minutes, the crows would have him for lunch, at least whatever the bear did not eat.
Carter waited. “I’m too young to die!” he yelled at the bear.
However, it wasn’t a bear that appeared over the hill, but a cloaked figure. He said not a word, but merely stared at the wounded man.
Carter stayed positive. “`Sup. Hey, you have my hat!”
Sure enough, the figure held his hat in his right, gloved hand.
Pointing up to the crows, Carter asked, “Are those yours? Can you tell them that I’m still very much alive?”
Again, the figure said nothing. He eased a bit closer to Carter.
“Whoa! Bro, what are you doing?” asked the thirty-five-year-old, single man. He again tried to move. “Ow!” Terrified, he held his arms up to his face.
Strangely, the cloaked figure did not steal his soul. Instead, he kneeled next to Carter and took his glove off his hand.
Carter never got a good look at him. He had his attention focused on the hand that the figure set down on his leg. Only a few seconds later, the skin under the hand glowed up. Carter’s leg moved back to its natural position. He felt no more pain. The figure healed him!
Up above, the crows stopped circling Carter. They were obviously disappointed. Cawing at one another, they took off in flight.
The mysterious, cloaked figure returned Carter’s hat. He gave him a quick bow with his head and started back down the mountain.
All Carter could do was stare. He rested his hand on his leg, which felt brand new. Thank goodness. He wouldn’t have to call a $50,000 helicopter after all. Nevertheless, who was that figure? Where did he come from? Who taught him magic? What was the secret of the Great Smoky Mountains?
***
Down, down the mountain went the cloaked figure, and into a cluster of bushes that were next to a clear, calm, and cool creek. Sipping water from the stream was the figure’s noble steed, a unicorn named Silver Moon. While her body was purely white, her mane and tail were silver. The horn on her head was at least two feet long.
At the sight of her master, she pulled her head out of the stream. She and the figure approached one another. They were obviously happy to see each other again.
The cloaked figure gave her mane a gentle tug. “Let’s go home,” he whispered in a young, male voice.
A group of butterflies fluttered by their heads as they left the stream, and they vanished into the blue sky above.
