She’s just a girl,” Callen said at last, voice rough and certain as they stood at the edge of the forest. “Innocent, or not, we owe her a chance to live. Let’s get her help first then we’ll ask questions.”
Neither Greer nor Harst objected. The three men adjusted the fur cloak that shielded Samantha’s fragile form and pressed forward toward their village Hollow Brook, a human settlement nestled quietly at the foot of the mountain, cloaked in mist and silence.
Few outside the valley even knew it existed.
Massive stone ridges guarded the settlement’s borders, jagged peaks rising like silent watchers against the sky. Trees blanketed the hills in thick, whispering layers. To the untrained eye, Hollow Brook might have seemed abandoned, forgotten. But within its hidden walls lived a people bou
