Chapter Three: The Huntress
Before Scythica now stood a creature of formidable size and temperament—a wild boar, its hide thick with bristled fur, its tusks gleaming like curved daggers in the dappled forest light. The beast was rooting contentedly at the base of an ancient oak, snuffling through layers of dead leaves in search of tender roots and buried acorns. If he could somehow capture it, his food problems would be solved for at least a week. The thought made his stomach growl audibly.
All I need is to get close enough. Quietly. Carefully.
Scythica gripped his dagger—the only weapon he possessed—and began to crawl through the underbrush, using every scrap of stealth he had learned during his years of hunting rabbits on that cursed island. The grass was tall, the shadows were long, and the boar seemed utterly oblivious. He crept forward, inch by agonizing inch, his heart pounding against his ribs like a war drum.
Just a few more steps. A single, precise strike to the throat, and—
CRASH.
The boar's head snapped up, its small, dark eyes locking onto his position with terrifying intelligence. Before Scythica could even process what was happening, the beast had charged—not toward him, but toward the massive oak tree beside it. Its skull connected with the trunk with a sound like thunder, and the tree, thicker than a man's waist, shattered at the point of impact. Splinters exploded outward like shrapnel, and the massive trunk toppled to the ground with a ground-shaking groan.
Scythica froze. His mind, which had been so focused on the prospect of roasted meat, now screamed a single, primal warning:
Quietly leave. Quietly. Leave.
He retreated with considerably more speed than he had approached, scrambling backward through the brush until he was safely hidden behind a thicket of thorny bushes. His dagger trembled in his grip, and his breath came in ragged gasps. What kind of monster boar is that?! He had seen wild pigs on the island, certainly—but nothing like this demonic creature that could shatter ancient oaks with its skull.
My life is worth more than dinner. I'll catch rabbits instead. Rabbits are safe. Rabbits don't destroy trees.
From across the clearing, the white stallion looked up from its grazing, its ears twitching with mild curiosity as it observed Scythica clutching his small dagger and hyperventilating against a tree trunk. The horse's expression, as much as a horse could have one, seemed to ask: Are you quite alright?
"Fine! I'm fine!" Scythica forced a strained smile, his voice an octave higher than usual. "Just... taking a break. You keep eating. Enjoy your grass. Don't mind me."
He slumped against the tree, his legs giving out beneath him, and began absently drawing meaningless patterns in the dirt with the tip of his dagger. Three days had passed since his departure from the island. The seafood Poseidon had so generously provided was long gone, consumed during the first desperate hours of his journey. And now, to make matters worse, he had maintained his daily ritual of offering sacrifices to the gods—a habit so deeply ingrained that he felt an almost physical discomfort when he failed to perform it. He had given away the last of his provisions to Poseidon, Aphrodite, Athena, and a dozen other deities he was too afraid to offend.
Which left him hungry. Perilously, dangerously hungry.
The bandits he had encountered—the ones whose remains now fertilized the soil somewhere behind him—had carried plenty of gold. Their purses were heavy with coins, their weapons well-made. But not a single scrap of food. No dried meat, no hard bread, no wine. Just gleaming metal that could not be eaten, no matter how desperately he wished otherwise.
If only there were a spell to turn gold into food, he thought miserably, patting the bulging leather pouch at his belt. I'd be a king.
His stomach growled again, a deep, mournful sound that echoed through the clearing. He glanced at the stallion, who was still calmly cropping grass with the unhurried contentment of a creature that had never known hunger.
Could I... eat grass?
The thought was absurd. Ludicrous. Desperate.
But people have survived on stranger things in times of need... right?
The stallion must have sensed his distress, for it paused its grazing, blinked its luminous eyes, and stepped aside with what could only be described as an offer: a patch of particularly lush, verdant grass, invitingly green in the afternoon sun.
Scythica stared at the grass. Then at the horse. Then back at the grass. His mouth watered—not with anticipation, but with the hollow ache of genuine starvation.
It's just... it's just grass. How bad could it be?
He reached out a trembling hand.
CRASH.
The sound came from directly behind him. Scythica reacted on pure instinct—years of survival training flooding his muscles with adrenaline as he rolled sideways, dagger drawn, eyes wide and scanning for threats. The white stallion remained completely unbothered, ambling over to stand protectively beside its rider while continuing its ceaseless grazing.
The boar burst from the undergrowth like a battering ram, tusks lowered, murder in its tiny black eyes. It was the same beast—the tree-shattering monster—and it had apparently decided that the strange pale creature was a more interesting target than the fallen oak.
"OH, COME ON!" Scythica screamed, throwing himself into another desperate roll as the boar thundered past, missing him by the width of a hair.
The stallion lifted one elegant hoof and brought it down with surgical precision on the boar's skull.
CRUNCH.
The sound was wet and final. The boar's head, which had moments ago demolished an ancient tree, was now firmly embedded in the earth, its massive body twitching in the throes of death. Its legs kicked convulsively, then stilled. The horse regarded its handiwork with the same disinterest it would a particularly unremarkable patch of dirt, then flicked its tail and nudged the carcass toward Scythica.
There. Your food. Now leave me to my grass.
Scythica gaped at the fallen beast, then at the horse, then back at the beast. "I don't know what just happened, but—good horse! Excellent horse! Very good!"
The stallion snorted and resumed its grazing.
Approaching the twitching carcass with caution, Scythica nudged it with his foot. When it failed to move or react, he let out a long, shuddering breath of relief. And then he noticed something peculiar: embedded in the boar's neck, precisely where the jugular would be, was an arrow. The shaft was smooth and expertly crafted, fletched with feathers of a deep, iridescent blue. The shot had been perfect—absolutely, impossibly perfect—severing the artery with a single clean strike.
Someone shot this boar before the horse finished it. Someone is out there. Watching.
Scythica's grip tightened on his dagger. "I know you're there," he called out, keeping his voice as calm and non-threatening as possible. "I'm not trying to steal your kill. Why don't we talk this out like reasonable people?"
He turned toward the nearest tree, the one from which the arrow's trajectory seemed to have originated. He waited. The forest was silent.
"You're looking in the wrong direction."
The voice came from behind him—soft, yet edged with steel. A second arrow thudded into the ground at his feet, close enough that he could see the fletching brush against his sandal. A warning shot. Nothing more.
Scythica raised his hands slowly, turning to face the speaker. "I assure you, I haven't done anything. If you have a complaint, perhaps you should address it to—" He gestured vaguely at the white stallion. "—the horse. He's the one who finished it."
There was a pause. A sharp intake of breath. Then: "Tch."
A figure dropped from the branches above, landing with the silence of a falling leaf. She was young—perhaps his own age—with hair the color of autumn leaves and a fierce, untamed beauty that made his heart stutter for entirely different reasons. But it was her eyes that caught him: sharp as a hawk's, golden-brown and gleaming with a predator's intelligence. And her forehead—the locks of hair that fell across it were a brilliant, vibrant green, an impossible shade that seemed to pulse with an inner light.
That green hair. Those eyes. The bow. It can't be—
"Can I have my kill back?" the huntress demanded, her voice carrying the barest hint of a growl. She kept her bow trained on him, but there was no malice in her stance, only wariness. "I tracked that boar for half a day. I wounded it. It's mine by right."
Scythica blinked, realizing he had been staring. "Ah. About that—" He shook himself, forcing his brain to function. "I mean, yes, of course. The kill is yours. I was just—well, I was about to die of starvation, so I might have considered negotiating, but—"
The huntress's eyes narrowed. She took a step closer, and Scythica caught a hint of something floral on the breeze that carried her scent. Her arrow remained nocked, but her aim had drifted slightly, no longer pointed directly at his chest.
"Negotiate?" she repeated, skeptical.
"Yes! I'll pay you!" He fumbled for his leather pouch, which clinked with the weight of stolen gold. "The boar's meat is all I really need. I'll give you coin for it—more than a fair price. Just please don't shoot me."
For a long moment, she simply stared at him. Then, slowly, her bow lowered. Her expression shifted from suspicion to something approaching embarrassment. "I... apologize. I assumed you were like the others."
"The others?" Scythica tilted his head.
"Men who see a woman alone in the woods and think she needs... protection," she said the word with utter contempt. "Men who believe they can offer coin for more than just game."
Scythica understood immediately. The sharp-shooting, the wariness, the way she had positioned herself to watch his every move—this was a woman who had been hunted far more often than she had hunted game. His chest tightened with something that might have been sympathy, but he pushed it down.
"No risk of that from me," he said, and his voice carried absolute conviction. "None whatsoever. I would never—" He stopped, swallowing hard. "I have a strict policy. Absolutely no involvement with beautiful women. Or anything beautiful, really. It's a survival strategy."
The huntress raised an eyebrow. "That's... a very strange thing to say."
"Not in this world, it isn't."
And it was true. Scythica had learned—through painstaking observation and careful study of Greek mythology—that beautiful women were, without exception, the most dangerous creatures on the planet. Not because of anything they did, but because of what happened around them. The great heroes had all fallen to the charms of lovely maidens or the machinations of jealous goddesses. The Trojan War had been fought over a beautiful face. Countless kingdoms had crumbled because someone couldn't keep their hands to themselves.
And more importantly—there was Zeus. The King of Olympus himself, who had never met a beautiful woman he didn't want to bed. The father of half the demigods in Greek mythology. If Scythica ever found himself with a beautiful wife, he would be living in constant terror of divine cuckoldry. And if Zeus succeeded, Scythica would be stuck raising a demigod stepchild—a position that historically ended in a bloody and creative death for the mortal father.
No. Absolutely not. I am not going to be a cautionary tale for future generations.
So when he looked at this huntress—this fierce, beautiful girl with her autumn hair and predator's eyes and that unmistakable patch of green on her forehead—his brain went into overdrive. This wasn't just any beautiful woman. This was Atalanta. The legendary huntress of Greek myth. The one who had been raised by bears, who had sworn virginity to Artemis, who raced suitors and killed them when they lost.
Dangerous. Extremely dangerous. Connected to Artemis. Connected to the moon. Do not. I repeat, DO NOT get involved.
He forced a smile. "Let's just focus on the boar, shall we? You tracked it, you wounded it, my horse finished it. How about we split the spoils? I'll take the meat, you take the hide and the tusks—they're probably worth something, and I'm too hungry to haggle properly."
Atalanta studied him with those sharp, amber eyes. Then, slowly, something softened in her expression—a flicker of something that might have been respect, or at least confusion at his odd behavior. "You're a strange one," she said. "But... fine. I accept."
She stepped forward to examine the boar's carcass, and as she passed him, Scythica felt the weight of her gaze. He held his breath, careful not to make eye contact. The Greek myths were filled with stories of divine punishment for mortals who looked too long upon something they shouldn't. And Atalanta, with her connection to the huntress goddess and her terrifying speed, was definitely in that category.
Focus on the meat. Focus on survival. No beautiful women. No heroes. No gods. Just find Prometheus, get some advice, and find a quiet corner of the world to live out the rest of your life in peace.
The white stallion snorted, as if laughing at him.
Scythica ignored it. He had a boar to carve and a journey to plan. And if his hands trembled just a little as he knelt beside the carcass, well—that was just hunger.
It was definitely just hunger.