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Prince Erik, The Healer
The forest had always been a place of secret murmurs, a living tapestry of scent and sound that most in the kingdom chose to ignore. To Prince Erik, however, the Whispering Woods had become a second home—a realm where the ordinary rules of the palace dissolved into the rhythm of wind, bark, and bone. It had begun when he was twelve, the year his father, King Aric, sent him down a winding path to meet the old seer and healer known as Elsinka. Elsinka was not a woman of great stature, nor was she cloaked in the usual trappings of power. She was a head full of silver hair, a…
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Prince Erik, The Woodsman
The first winter in the mountains was a bitter teacher. Prince Erik of Hrafnnes, aged ten, stood knee-deep in a drift of snow so pure it hurt his eyes, his small fingers too numb to properly work the knots in the rabbit snares Sigurd had shown him. The old forester’s voice, when it came, was not unkind, but it was as immutable as the granite peaks around them. “The cold does not care that you are a prince, boy. It only cares that you are slow.” Erik’s lips were chapped, his stomach a hollow, aching thing. He had missed the evening’s catch. Supper had been a husk of tough bark-bread…
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Principe Erik, El Cazador
El primer invierno en las montañas fue una dura lección. El príncipe Erik de Hrafnnes, de diez años, estaba hundido hasta las rodillas en un montón de nieve tan pura que le dolía la vista; sus deditos estaban demasiado entumecidos para deshacer los nudos de las trampas para conejos que Sigurd le había mostrado. La voz del viejo guardabosques, cuando llegó, no fue cruel, pero fue tan inmutable como los picos de granito que los rodeaban. «Al frío no le importa que seas príncipe, muchacho. Solo le importa que seas lento». Erik tenía los labios agrietados y el estómago vacío y dolorido. Se había perdido la pesca de la noche.…
