Berserker's Soft Wood Short Bow of Stamina

Berserker's Soft Wood Short Bow of Stamina hung from a peg on the back wall, its limbs slender and patient as a drawn bowcat. The soft wood, pale as dawn, bore the grain like a map of weathered trails, and the lamination of the grip was wrapped in oiled leather that smelled of rain-sunk campfires. The riser bore a slim brass plate where runes—narrow and precise—underglow in amber when light hits them just so. The string sang faintly when brushed, a promise of speed and endurance. It felt as if the bow had learned to bend with the archer's hand, forgiving in the heat of pursuit. In a world that prizes haste and patience in equal measure, such a weapon feels almost alive, as if the wood remembers every storm it has endured and every quarry it has lent a shot to. Draw it and the weight is forward, not heavy, but precise. The short form favors rapid shots and close-quarters skirmishes, where a full-length bow would feel clumsy and loud. Archers who shoulder this model tend to move with a hunter's ease, stepping between shadows, keeping stamina for the long chase. The name 'of Stamina' is no boast but a credential: it's said to lend the bearer a steadier breath and a keener focus when the heart drives the aim. Hunters speak of it as a companion on caravan routes, where vigilance must be constant and the distance to escape closes in as dusk thickens. The arrow's flight is clean, true, the kind of arc that folds neatly into a second and a third shot before the campfire grows cold. I first encountered it at Saddlebag Exchange, where merchants hawk wares and stories in the same breath. The clerk measured the bow with care, letting his fingers trace the carved runes the way a cartographer reads coastline. The tag read in neat, stubborn figures: 1 gold and 20 silver. A small price for a weapon that might outlive any traveler's memory, he murmured, eyes glinting with the arithmetic of risk and reward. We talked of the road—how such a bow could turn a mute hillside into a chorus of warning—and I traded not just coin but a quiet piece of the road from my own pack: a faded map and a moth-eaten cloak, enough to seal the bargain. The bow was mine, the exchange a bookmark in a journey I hadn't quite finished. Lore lingers in its teeth. Some whisper that it was tempered under a berserker's boot, the wood soaked in storm and gritted with the edge of a brutal dawn. Others claim it was carved by a smith who learned endurance from an old war, etching the Stamina rune to remind the wielder to breathe between the shots. That blend of brutal efficiency and patient craft makes the bow more than a tool; it is a hinge between road and skirmish, memory and moment, a reminder that sometimes the longest road is the stretch before the next shot.