"Yeah, congratulations silver-crowned falcon", Cecile teased him.

Rina poked her in the back. "Don't make fun of him. It's a rarely acquired beast name, something to be proud of. By the way," she adressed Arick, "you're wearing that wrongly."

"What do you mean wrong?"

"There are two parts." She hoisted the cloak off his shoulders and seperated it into a lower and upper part. The lower one was longer, reaching below his knees, but near his back it was shaped like an M. "This was created to accomodate for your wings." She put the two longer limbs underneath both his wings and connected them in front of his chest. "And this goes on top." The upper part was shorter, a reverse triangle shaped part to cover the area where his wings connected to his back, and a hood.

"I am guessing this is not a common piece of clothing around here."

Cecile snorted. "Her mother is a tailor, she 'borrowed' me to create that. She wanted to know what would work."

"Thank her for me, please", he told Rina, "And thank you for showing me this."

"My pleasure", she responded happily.

"What a strange ceremony though", remarked Mirus.

"How so?" Aiden asked, motioning the others to take a seat as well.

"I mean, it barely took half an hour, and the only thing that happened was Arick receiving that cloak and elder Daren proclaiming his beast name."

"Isn't that fine? Much better than those overly lenghty and needlessly ceremonial ones from back home."

Arick smiled wryly. "Do you remember that hour long speech during graduation? We had to wear those heavy formal garbs while sitting under the hot midday sun."

"Sounds troublesome", Alcaeus chuckled.

"It was", concurred Mirus, "That old man liked hearing his own voice too much, if you ask me. He was a great teacher though, all the stories he could tell. Did you know he was almost 450 years old?"

This little piece of information shocked the hunters present.

"450?!" Lyall shouted, his eyes wide.

"I heard demons live longer than humans, but that's more than I expected." Alcaeus managed to stay relatively calm in comparison.

"Grandfather isn't even a fifth of that age", wispered Aiden absent-mindedly.

Cecile watched them with a raised eyebrow. "You didn't know? Under normal circumstances a demon can easily become 300 years old."

"How were we supposed to know? Before being forced to leave the village, we had only ever heard vague rumours about demons. And the only thing the army deemed necessary to tell us was that you were the enemy, evil creatures that needed to be killed."

Alcaeus' response caused a scowl to appear on Cecile's face, while Mirus sighed.

"Did you believe them?" asked Arick.

"Believe them?" Lyall scoffed, "They practically kidnapped us!"

"If it wasn't for Jyl, and you, we might still be searching for a way to escape", added Solon.

"Did you know?" Rina asked, drawing Arick's attention, "Jyl chose to come along that day. If she had wanted to, she could have just stayed hidden among the treetops."

"It was stupid of her, but also something she'd do regardless of anyone's opinion." A sigh escaped Lyall.

"She let herself fall from that branch, scaring the captain half to death", Alcaeus snickered, " "If you are taking them, you are taking me too", she said."

"I don't know if I should praise her bravery, or call her foolish", commented Cecile.

Lyall nodded wholeheartedly. "Exactly! We could have taken care of ourselves, she was needed far more in the village."

"The huntress said something like that too when we first met. Is it because of the war, perhaps?"

The six hunters looked at each other, as if deciding who would answer. Aiden was the one who finally opened his mouth to speak.

"Partially, but the main reason has to do with where we live."

"The Great Forest? I was not under the impression you are having trouble with the beasts."

"Not with the ones around here, no. However, there are far more dangerous ones deeper in, those that even our best hunters cannot easily deal with.

Usually they stay within their territories and don't bother us, but during especially harsh winters some head out in search for food."

"It doesn't happen very often, and usually we can hold them off well enough that they don't deem us worth the trouble", Alcaeus continued, "However, almost fifteen years ago we were attacked by a pack of starving horned lions. They managed to sneak into the village under the cover of darkness. You see, the majority of beasts hunt during the day, so we weren't expecting them.

The village lost a lot of good people that night."