The Immeasureable Distance

The forest was dark even in the middle of the day. Even when the sun was at full height the trees above covered the sky completely. The little streams of light that some how managed to slip past the canopy only made the trees and underbrush more ominous, casting shadows where shadows should not be.

I had been trained in the art if stealth since I was a little boy. As I stalked through the forest on the vaguely marked trail I remembered the old master whose name I never took the time to learn. I remembered the stick he would smack me with if I made so much as a whisper or if my footsteps could be heard at all.

Needless to say, clumsy Freddy was my polar opposite.

"Your 'brother' is announcing to the entire forest we're here," Kadin said softly, letting a small puff of smoke curl out of his nostrils.

I stopped on the trail and closed my eyes listening to Freddy's heavy footstep and the many branches and twigs he crushed beneath them. Flinching, I opened my eyes and turned to face him. He instantly stopped and looked at me wide eyed.

"What did you stop for?" he whispered, although it sounded as if he were shouting. I swear his voice echoed across the wall of trees.

"Shh, twit!" Kadin hissed, and I put my hand on my dragons side. 

"What Kadin is trying to say is, you need to be quieter," I informed Freddy, my own voice skillfully muted. "We don't need to broadcast to the entire forest we're here."

"Sorry, I didn't realize..." he began just as loudly as before, but was stopped by Keenan blowing a cloud of smoke in his face. 

"Just shut up, please," my dragon growled, and we turned back to the path...

To find a person staring before us, blocking the way. 

At first I wasn't sure what to make of it. There was a person where there hadn't been one before, their bow at full draw, arrow poured at my head. Clearing my throat, I carefully ducked to the side to get out of the arrow's path. Unfortunately, it followed me.

"Harken, stranger!" I said to them, but no sign of response came. "We are just peaceful, um, travelers that wish to pass through this here forest,um, peacefully?" I explained, my voice cracking up at the end, making my statement sound like a question.

"Nobody ever just 'passes through' the forest," they said, and something struck me about the voice, something very odd.

"Well, there's always a first for everything?" My voice once again went to high, making my statement a question once again. Damn arrow pointing in my face, it was making my masculinity flee faster than peasants from dragons.

"Nobody ever just 'passes through'," they rephrased, "with a dragon."

"Oh, um, well," I cleared my throat and gestured towards Keenan. "He is a friendly dragon and kind sir if you would allow us passage through..."

"I am not a sir!" the thunderous voice roared, and suddenly I realized why the voice had sounded so...weird. It was the voice of a woman. Slightly deep and gravely, but a woman's voice none the less.

Which was weird in two ways. One was because I had not been expecting to find a woman in the great forest by herself, and two...

Well, when I said she had blocked the trail I hadn't been kidding. She was wide and tall, her body containing the stature of a man. Although her face had delicate feminine features somewhere underneath the grime and dirt which covered it, I had taken her for a man at first glance due to the meaty hands, unkempt hair and unlady-like body type.

Also the arrow pointed at me gave me the impression that I was dealing with a great warrior.

Not a woman.

"Forgive me," I said, quickly giving Kadin a glance, at which point I noticed the slight smirk that rested upon his dragon mouth. We both knew I had to get us out of this situation. So I turned in the charm. "I didn't expect to find a woman of your beauty in these woods and..."

She cut me off by letting loose her arrow and narrowly missing my head. I stared at her opened mouthed and shocked, unable to form words at first. "You just shot at me!" 

"Yeah, what of it? For one, you're on my turf, and two, you just called me man," she told me, reaching for another arrow. 

Before she could knock another arrow and shoot at me again, I quickly rushed, despite her being much, much larger than me, and grabbed hold of her bow. Then, Kadin stepped between the two of us, forcing her to go through a dragon, unarmed, to get to me.

"I'm sorry if you think I'm intruding on your land, but I'll have you know that the forest is public ground," I told her, shouting around Kadin's massive thigh, noticing that Freddy was hunkered around the other one. "Also, I only called you a man because you look like  one! No offense!" I added the last part quickly so she didn't think was being rude.

Unfortunately, she still though I had been rude, despite my very appropriate no offense. "Don't test me!" she said, "just because I don't have a weapon doesn't mean..."

And then suddenly she was hit with a large stone in the head, causing her to crumply limply to the ground. For a moment I couldn't quote comprehend what had just happened, but then I turned to Freddy, who had several more stones in his hand, opposite arm in the throwing position.

"Sorry Oliver, I had to do something. She was going to kill us!"

"I know, and I don't think she's dead," I walked over to her massive form and felt her thick wrist for a pulse. "Yep, not dead."

"What do we do now?" Freddy asked, and Keenan butted in a reply.

"We take her with us, of course. It's ancient dragon law. If you injure someone to the point where they cannot make rational decisions on their own, for example being knocked out, you must protect them until they are able to function on their own once more." 

"So she has to come with us?" I asked dryly, not quite believing what Kadin was telling me. 

"Precisely, and she may even be useful, if she knows the lands around here," Kadin lowered himself. "put her on my back," he instructed me.

It took both Freddy and I all our strength to lift our massive maiden onto Kadin back, and when we finally continued once again in the trail, I was sore and irritable. 

"I swear," I yelled across the forest to the tree, not caring anymore how stealthy I was. "If she ever shoots at me again, I will personally throw the next stone."