“C'mon old girl.” He urged the aged ewe up the slope of the hill, as he scratched her behind her long, drooping ears, “You can make it.”

Dolly held a special place above all of the over two hundred other rams and ewes he kept. She had been with him since she was a young lamb. In fact, she was the first lamb that he managed to bring into the world without the assistance of his father when he was four years old. His father had been busy seeing to a ram that had injured itself pretty badly locking horns with another those fourteen years ago. Johnathan had been given clear instructions on what to do, and when, but it was still something he had had been proud of at the time. She was the only lamb that the ewe had birthed that day, and, going against his father's warnings to name any of his animals, he named the lamb Dolly, because the bright white of her skin reminded him of the porcelain dolls he had seen on display on a nearby merchant's shelves. Her wool had the same, almost luminescent white, and would sell for the highest price when shearing season came.

Often times, during the coldest parts of winter, he would wake to finder her curled next to his sleeping roll soaking up the heat of the last embers dying to the cold wind, or draped over his lower half, keeping the both of them warm. Whenever he moved the herd, she'd always stay close by his side be it at the head of the herd to look for dangers, in the middle so that he'd be ready to answer any calls of distress, or at the back to protect the rear if he hard heard the yipping of wolves in the distance at some point during the day. She was either with him, or playing with some of the other ewes nearby.

“We're almost there.” He walked a bit ahead of the ewe to flatten the long stalks of sword grass in front of her as they neared the top of their hardest climb of the day.

Dolly's swollen belly sagged against the ground as she slowly, yet surely, pulled herself up the incline. Throughout her entire life, she had only give birth once, and that was the lamb that had been taken away by the night hawk that he had taken down that one night. Since then, no matter what, she refused to be mated with any of the rams, and kept closer to him. It was a shame, his father had said. To lose the lineage of an ewe that made such beautiful wool. So to see her get pregnant at an age where most other of her species would be dead was a surprise. A pleasant surprise, to be sure. At least that alabaster wool would continue on to the next generation, he told himself as she struggled along and a pang shot through his heart.

She bleated as she neared the top, her agate eyes held on the shepherd as she finished the ascent and came to a rest at the top of the hill.

“Okay, girl. Let's take a breather.” He stretched out his back and looked over the moving herd of ram that slowly ate as they moved through the Sea.

His older cousin, Arthur, waved at him from the center of the herd. He had come to Johnathan with a letter from his uncle, asking if he could give twenty one heads of ram to Arthur in his stead as he had lost near half of his herd after he had injured his leg when an adolescent ram had snuck behind him and playfully butted him on the back of his knee, causing him to tumble down the rocky side of a hill he had been standing on to watch over his sheep as they grazed, (a common injury among shepherds, though some would deny it), and couldn't make it to his Rest in time for the Winter Solstice. Normally, the children of Shepherds would inherit half their parent's flock when they turned twenty, though Johnathan had to inherit his sooner . Arthur had come to learn to bond with a few of Johnathan's sheep before taking them into his care after the equinox.

The vastness of the lands he traveled overtook him in that moment. Beyond his right shoulder, where the newly risen sun bled through the gray covering of clouds that hugged the sky, were the white capped peaks of the Boreals, in who's foothills rested the city of Deep Iron. If he squinted, he would be able to spot the black lines of smoke lifting from the countless chimneys in the city working over time to keep its occupants warm during these dying days of winter. The grass bowed towards him as the wind roared down the stony mountain side and swept into the valley and over the Sea. Grass seedlings fluttered past as if they were on invisible wings towards the Anchored Forests that bordered the Sea of Grass to the west. 

His normal route took him nowhere near the edge of the woods, but even from here, and through the haze of distance, and the perpetual fog that he had heard rested between the trees of the forest he was able to see the shadowed silhouette of the Anchor Tree towering above the distant landscape. Other than the wind through the endless grass, the clouds and the slowly meandering herd nothing else moved and a divine smallness washed over him. He breathed the moment in greedily — the chill of lingering winter nipping at his nostrils. Dolly nudged his leg as she leaned her head into it. He scratched the spot she could never reach, just behind her curled horns and she mewled happily. The wind rushed past and pulled at his loose fitting gray wool robe, and nearly swept the wide brimmed, grass woven hat off of his head.

“Excuse me!” A voice like that of a warbling sparrow called out from the stillness from the western slope of the hill and shook him back to reality.

His gray eyes scanned the slope. There was nothing but the stillness. He looked down the eastern slope. Perhaps the wind carried the sound around him as it had done at some points. He placed a hand to shade his eyes from the harsh rays of the sun magnified as it filtered through the gray covering the sky. Nothing.

“H-hello?” He called back in a loud, clear voice.

His hand wandered to the wrapped leather hilt of the black dagger that hung beneath the top layer of his clothing. About a year back he had heard chatter from one of the merchants who had traveled through the deserts of his homeland about some creature that called out to him in a human like voice when he was younger and more naïve than he was at the time. It had killed both of his horses by the time his guards were able to put it down. He closed to the ewe to protect her from whatever came out of the grass. 

“Over here!” The same voice called out.

His head on a swivel immediately turned in the direction of it. It was behind him now.

Down the slope, the grass rustled but still he saw no one. The wind that had been blowing across the Sea from east to west began to swirl around the hill top. He pushed the aged ewe behind him and lowered his stance.

“Show yourself!” He called, “If you are friend, show yourself!”

“Hold up! I'm...” the warbling voice wavered; labored breaths interjecting themselves between every word spoke. “Steep....climb.”

He widened his stance and watched carefully as the patch of rustling grass inched nearer and nearer to the top of the hill. As it neared the edge of the hill the first thing that he noticed were to eyes shining through the tall grass like two slivers of sky inlaid in a snowy field peeking out from a dark green hood as the owner of the warbling voice stepped full into view of the shepherd. A tiny figure that who's chin barely hovered above the grass that came up to his waist. It wore a verdant hood that seemed to be woven from the feathers of some great bird, pulled down nearly over its eyes, with purple and gold thread sewn along the outside edge in a criss-cross fashion. A similarly green cloak cascaded down its back and disappeared into grass clustered around its waist.

The hooded figure raised its head. Around those sapphire eyes was a small, round, vanilla colored face that seemed to produce its own light. Freckles danced across it, starting at one temple and slowly climbing the small hill of her nose and descending until it reached the other, like countless footsteps over a snowy plain.

“I'm...friendly. Please...don't...attack. Sorry.” She managed to sputter out, heaving breaths interjecting themselves between every word.

Johnathan raised his hand off of the hilt of the dagger and the wind that had been coalescing around the hill top began once more to blow from the mountains to the forests.

“What's a child doing out here?” He asked. “Did you get separated from your parents?” He managed to peel himself way from the nearly ethereal thing in front of him to scan the horizon behind her.

Dolly approached the figure — her nose outstretched to sniff the air around it, her stub of a bushy tail wagging.

“How rude! I'm not a child!” The figure looked up at him, sandy blonde eyebrows drawn into a glare. “I'm a Fae-kin!” She said proudly, “And I'm nearly twenty, just so you know.” She caught her breath and straightened herself out.

“Faking? What are you faking?”

“No.” She said, as she shook her head. “Not faking. Fae.” She paused to make the space between the words apparent, “Kin.”

The word was familiar and it took a second for it to connect to a memory. A memory of when he and his father first went to Deep Iron together when he was five. At the large wooden gates that led into the city his father caught him staring at a man with bulbous, eyes with dark, wide, slotted pupils that seemed to pop out of the top of his massive head that seemed mismatched to his round, yet small body. Warts covered large parts of his body, and scraggly black hair like strands of dried straw fell down the side of his head around a central bald spot. His mouth had stretched from ear to ear He held a little wooden plate with the copper in the center.

“Don't stare too hard at him, John.” His father had chastised him, placing a firm hand on his shoulder. “It's not his fault he's the way he is.”

“What is he?” He had asked.

“A Fae-kin.” His father had answered. “A result of the...” His father had paused to find the right words, “ of the union of a fairy and a person.”

“What's a fairy?” He had asked.

“A nature spirit with the intelligence of a person. Sometimes they fall in love with people, and,” he motioned to the toad man, “This is the result of the union. Be kind to him.” His father had said, fetching four of the silver coins they had gotten from selling their goods the day before, “Auriel expects her followers to be kind.” The silver coins clattered in the toad man's plate.

“Gods bless you.” The toad fae-kin croaked. His slotted eyes shook the young Johnathan as they rolled around to look at the boy. 

The memory played out in his mind in a second. That was the last time that they had seen the toad man at the gates of Deep Iron.