Raindelta Skyanchor Westthicket Mythpath (English Edition) epub

The village of Raindelta was the kind of place you could easily miss if you weren't paying attention. Tucked between two winding rivers, the homes were scattered like small dots along the edge of a vast, uncharted forest, which the villagers called the Westthicket. The air always smelled faintly of pine and damp earth, and there was a soft, constant patter of water trickling over rocks somewhere just beyond the trees. It was quiet here. Peaceful. The kind of place where people lived out their entire lives without ever really venturing beyond the safety of their small community. For Aeris, though, that was not enough.
Aeris had never quite fit in with the simple rhythms of Raindelta life. She had always been different, with a hunger for something more—something beyond the horizon that she could barely describe. The villagers, kind as they were, didn't understand it. To them, the world was a series of simple truths: work the fields, tend to the animals, grow old beside the river. But for Aeris, the world was an uncharted map, filled with mysteries and untold adventures.
The sky above Raindelta was an unbroken stretch of blue most days, but tonight, as Aeris stood on the edge of the village, something felt different. The usual calm of the evening was disturbed by a strange, almost magnetic pull—a call that hummed in the air, like the distant whisper of an unseen force. Aeris turned her head to the north, where the darkened silhouette of the Westthicket stood tall and imposing. It had always been a place of myth, a place where the brave—or foolish—ventured in search of treasure, or sometimes never returned at all. The elders spoke of it in hushed tones, warning children not to wander too far. But Aeris, despite the warnings, had always felt an inexplicable connection to that wild, untamed place. It was as if it called to her in the night, like a voice reaching through the fog of time.
"Tomorrow," she whispered to herself, though she wasn’t entirely sure if it was the voice in her mind or something else, something deeper that was speaking through her.
The village was quiet now, its simple thatched-roof cottages glowing warmly in the fading light of the evening. A handful of villagers were gathered at the inn, singing a quiet song in celebration of a recent harvest. But Aeris felt no warmth in the sound. It only served to remind her of the life she had outgrown.
Her thoughts were interrupted by a sudden flash of movement in the sky. She glanced up, and for a brief moment, the clouds parted to reveal the silver light of the moon, casting an ethereal glow over the land. It was then that she saw it—a figure, barely visible, flying above the treetops to the north. It wasn’t a bird, nor was it any creature she had ever seen before. It seemed more like a shadow, drifting with an almost deliberate purpose. Aeris's breath caught in her throat. For a moment, she thought it might be a figment of her imagination, but the figure was real—of that, she was sure.
Suddenly, the ground beneath her seemed to tremble, faintly but unmistakably, as if something deep within the earth had shifted. The sky above darkened for a split second, and Aeris felt a strange sensation in her chest, as if her heart had skipped a beat. She placed her hand over her heart, feeling the rapid thumping beneath her fingers.