Then Turan asked what brought someone like him to such an isolated village.
The man replied that he was there because of a request. They were looking for someone to deal with a monster. And then he revealed that he was a mage.
Hearing that, Turan asked whether he was the mage the elder had mentioned. The man confirmed it, but he also showed some confusion. He said he could sense the presence of a monster somewhere in the region, and yet he could not find it. What was even stranger, he added, was that Turan seemed so calm despite knowing about the situation. Anyone else would be afraid, especially someone living alone out here. But this boy seemed more irritated than frightened.
So the man asked him directly who he really was.
At that moment Turan remembered a conversation with his mother, when he had asked her why nobody could know he was a mage.
She had explained that there were cruel nobles in the world. She compared the nobles to shepherds and the knights to dogs — animals that could be treated like family or discarded the moment it became convenient. She did not want him to have that kind of life. That was why he had to promise never to reveal his powers, and especially never to reveal them to other mages. If they found out, they might separate the two of them, and turn him into someone subordinate to them.
Turan had always known that. To keep the secret, he might one day have to kill someone, if it came to that.
The traveler broke the silence, asking why he was not answering, and joking that otherwise the joke would lose its humor.
Turan simply replied that he did not have much of a sense of humor.
The man apologized, saying he might have misunderstood things, and Turan commented that it was the first time he had ever heard a joke from a mage. The traveler found his reaction amusing and decided to introduce himself properly. His name was Keoran, and he was a wanderer.
Turan introduced himself as the shepherd of the hill.
Later, during dinner, Turan mentioned that he would turn eighteen that year, and Keoran revealed that he was seventy-five, explaining that mages aged more slowly than ordinary people.
Turan asked how he had become a wanderer. Keoran explained that he had served the Badal Arabian family for sixty years before deciding to leave, because he wanted to spend the rest of his life traveling without being tied to one place.
The two of them ended up having a light, carefree conversation, which surprised Turan. He had never imagined it could be so pleasant to talk with someone like that.
By the end of the day, as the sun was setting, Keoran said he would be leaving, and placed a silver coin on the table to pay for the food and the lodging.
Turan thanked him and wished him a good hunt, but Keoran replied that there was no need to act as if they would never see each other again, since he still intended to wander around this region for a while.
The next morning Turan was in a good mood while he tended his sheep, thinking that it had been the first time he had ever met another mage — and more than that, the first time he had had a comfortable conversation with anyone. He was even surprised at himself for opening up like that. It had been better than any interaction he had ever had with the other adults in the village.
Over time Keoran came back to the house on the hill a few times, and that made Turan begin to question his own beliefs. He had always thought that knights were like emotionless dogs serving arrogant nobles. Perhaps Keoran was an exception.
Even so, he did not know how to tell the man that there were no more monsters on the hill.
Meanwhile Keoran went on searching for the creature, following traces and signs of battle, even though he could no longer sense the monster's presence anywhere.
On one of those days he found clear signs of a fight, but no active presence, which led him to suspect that the monster had already been killed — perhaps by another mage sent by the village chief. That would not be a problem, as far as he was concerned. What mattered was the safety of the place.
Then he noticed something strange approaching.
It was the same giant leopard. But its face was disfigured now, and the energy coming off it was completely different, and Keoran realized that what stood in front of him was a monster spectre.