Shadow Warrior: Destiny of a Mutant by Larry Townley Read Free Book Online

put all that his father had taught him about living off the land into practice. They reluctantly agreed and allowed him to go on his own. For some reason Will was being drawn towards the Helvellyn Mountains. He, along with his brother and father, had been hunting and camping on various parts of the mountain many times.
    It took the better part of a day to make the twenty-five mile trek into the mountains. Will was so fast he could have run the distance in less than half an hour, but instead he wanted to enjoy the hike into the wilderness. As Will reached one of the valleys he, his father and brother had hunted in before, he made camp and started a fire using a flint rock, dried leaves, small tree branches and brush.
    He was getting hungry and went out hunting for game. Fifteen minutes into his hunt, he heard, and then saw, a large stag a hundred yards or so in front of him. He quietly removed an arrow from his quiver and notched it on the bow‘s string. However, at the last second, he decided to make things more sporting and, at the same time, put his abilities to the test.
    He slung the bow across his back, returned the arrow to its quiver, and decided to kill the stag with his hunting knife instead. He slowly and quietly began his stalk of the stag. The eight-pointer entered an open area of the draw. At that point Will began running towards the stag, which heard Will’s approach and began running as well. Will quickly overtook and killed the large buck with his knife. He gutted and field dressed the animal and then put it on a wooden spit to cook. Afterwards he cleaned the knife and sheathed it. He buried the remains so it would not attract other predators.
    After finishing his meal he lay down on his thin straw mat and went to sleep.
    ***
    On the third night of his camping trip, Will could not sleep and got up to explore the mountain in the inky darkness; only the moon and stars lit the way for him, but his exceptional vision allowed him to almost see as well in the dark as he could in the daylight. Will was soon on a part of the mountain he had never seen before. It was as if he were somehow being drawn to this particular area. An hour into his trek he came upon what appeared to be the entrance of a small cave, the entrance of which was partially covered by brush and vegetation.
    Judging by the density of the scrub surrounding the cave, it was obvious that no one had been in the cave for many years, if at all. He cut the heaviest of the foliage with the large knife he had used to kill the stag. Will then found a small branch on the ground in front of the cave’s entrance tore off a piece of his shirt and wrapped it around the top of the branch. He lit the makeshift torch by using a flint rock to ignite the tip of it, and then went through the entrance, leading with the torch.
    At first glance the cave appeared to be only a few feet deep. However, intuition told Will that there was more to this grotto than met the eye, and although he had never seen this cave before, it looked familiar to him.
    He used the light from the torch and began looking at the edges along the wall and after several seconds he noticed some symbols on the part of the wall near where the wall ended, which were covered in dust. Will brushed and blew away the dust and saw several symbols smoothly carved into the rocks, which were unknown to Will, yet somehow familiar. Will was startled as he recognized the symbols on the wall as being the same ones from his dreams!
    Although he had never seen the symbols before and did not recognize any of them from the languages he could read and write, Will was nonetheless inexplicably able to translate the symbols, which simply read: Enter By Placing Your Hand Over These Symbols.
    As Will placed his hand over the symbols, nothing happened at first. As he was about to remove his hand, the wall suddenly began glowing a mixture of light-green and pale-blue. An opening the size of a door appeared in the wall.
    Will