TCOT Prologue

     "Hey Shad, wait up." I asked breathlessly. I tried to keep up with my thirteen-year-old brother while he plodded through the dense, cold, dark Eluryh Forest for no apparent reason. Since Shad wasn't responding, I packed together a snowball and pelted Shad with it.
     Shad whipped around. "Johnathan! What are you doing you here?" He wiped the snow out of his red hair. "Eluryh Forest is no place for a nine-year-old, especially during winter."
     I laughed. "I'm following you!" Shad cocked an eyebrow suspiciously.
     "Umm...Why?"
     "I want to be like you!"
     Shad smiled, and then got down to my height. "You need to go back to Mom to tell her were I'm going."
     I was confused. "Where are you going?" I asked. I shuffled my feet around in the snow, mixing it in with the dirt, making it brown.
     "I'm going to... become a doctor, Johnny. I have to travel someplace far. Usually I'd go to college later, but... since I got out of school early, I get to go to college early."
     "So, does that mean I can go early too?"
     Shad laughed. He ruffled my brown hair. "I want you to go to college once you graduate high school." He sighed. "I'm not going to see you again."
     A sudden realization came over me. I quivered, tears brimming my eyes. "Shad... please... don't go..."
     Shad closed his green eyes for a little bit, like he was thinking. When he opened them, he took a small metal medallion out of his backpack. "I want you to have this." He placed the medallion in my hand.
     The circular medallion was a light bronze color. Its main design was an eight pointed-star with a wolf in the middle of the star. On the back was the letter "G". A small bronze chain made it a necklace. Dad said this medallion had importance to the family, but I didn't understand why...
     "Good-bye, Johnny. Keep it safe." And with that, Shad slowly turned and walked away. He soon faded into the shadows, leaving me to stand in the snowy Eluryh Forest alone.
     After awhile, I accepted the fact that Shad was never coming back. I turned around, pocketed the medallion, and slowly walked back the direction I came, the snow crunching under my feet.