Strength of the Shepherd (Chapter One)

“For Rath’s sake,” Macthal cursed, invoking the god of the Pale, and all his forsaken glory. The deer broke through thirty feet ahead of him. It was no child. It was no normal deer either. It was almost an elk’s size, like from the wood’s more northern reaching arms, but with the graceful lines of a white tailed stag. Its pelt was bone white, save for a wicked and ragged gash on its right flank, whose red stain widened even as it splashed into the water and tried not to fall from a long jump over some particularly gnarled roots.