Hunter

by Joanna White

  “Meat!” I shouted when I saw him walk through the tree-line, holding up his catches.

  He smiled and nodded. “Finally.”

  “How are we going to cook it, though? I don’t think we should risk the Hunters seeing the smoke from a fire,” I told him.

  “I was thinking the same thing,” he said, eyebrows furrowed. He seemed deep in thought.

  “We could try to risk it. It shouldn’t take but an hour or so for the meat to cook. Maybe they won’t see.”

  “They don’t miss anything. I could walk a few miles down the river. Start the fire, cook the meat, then come back up here. If they see it, they’ll see the extinguished fire and think we moved on,” he explained.

  “Jared, I don’t like that idea.” I shook my head at him in protest.

  He shrugged. “We don’t have much a choice. Plus, I can handle myself against them. Trust me. I’ll be long gone before they find the fire.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “I still don’t like it. But you’re going to do it whether I want you to or not. Right?”

  “To get your strength back, you’re going to need better nutrition than just fruit.”

  I slowly nodded, hating how right he was. “Promise you’ll come back?”

  “Always.” He smiled at me.

  I darted toward him and slipped my arms around his waist. He seemed surprised at first, as if he didn’t understand what the gesture meant. Every muscle in his body became extremely rigid. After a few seconds, he relaxed and wrapped his arms around me. He kissed the top of my head and released me, walking back toward the rapids again.

  I couldn’t help but fear that would be the last time I saw him.

  Sitting there, lost in my thoughts and alone, left me to worry about Jared. What if the Hunters found him? Would I see him again? To distract myself, I filled the canteens with water and gathered some more fruit. After that, I didn’t know what to do, so I walked around the edge of the lake until my legs wouldn’t go any farther. I made it back to the spot where our supplies were, and lay down, staring at the moon. It had to have been about three hours that Jared had been gone. What if something had happened to him?

  How would I ever know for sure?

  I stood and walked down the rapids and stopped when I reached the place where the poison had killed a bunch of prisoners. My stomach twisted, and the stench made me throw up, but I grabbed one of their swords and put it in my belt. I found two daggers and slipped one in my belt and the other in my boot.

  The tragic thing was that I had been able to find a better pair of boots from a dead body during our travels with Sine and Lehlax. So, I hadn’t had to go without a shoe for very long. They often found supplies from dead prisoners and used it for themselves. I had been uncomfortable with the idea at first, and heartbroken, not to mention extremely guilty, but Lehlax had said, “They’re not going to need it anymore. You might as well use it to help you live as long as you can.”

  Voices murmured from nearby. I crouched down behind a tree and listened, hoping to hear Jared’s voice among them. Unfortunately, I was too far away to understand exactly what they were saying, but I could tell they weren’t voices that I recognized.

  I cursed. They were probably Hunters. Staying behind the trees, I edged closer until I could hear what the voices were saying.

  “Yes, Lehlax there is strength in numbers, but it also makes it easier for the Hunters to pick us off,” one of the voices said.

  “That’s true, but not if we keep moving. The Hunters will never be able to track all of us. And they have other prisoners here, too. They can’t just focus on a few of us for too long,” a different voice answered back.

  I recognized it immediately. Slipping out from behind the tree, I stood in front of the group of people. Lehlax and Sine were there, along with a handful of other men that I didn’t recognize.

  “Dalex!” Lehlax shouted.

  “You’re alive!” Sine pointed out.

  “Yeah. Alive and well.” I flashed them both a wide grin.

  “When we last left you, you were bleeding out and dying,” Lehlax said. “I guess Jared saved your life.”

  “He did.” I felt my cheeks slightly heat up at the memory of all the time Jared had spent tending to my wounds.

  “Wait, Dalex isn’t your real name, is it?” Sine asked.

  “No, it’s Averella.”

  “So,” one of the other men said. “This is the famous woman prisoner everyone keeps hearing about.” His arms were crossed, twice the size of my own, and his shoulders—well all of him, really—were burly. He had angry eyes that glared at everyone.

  “Yeah, I guess that’s me. How did you hear about it?” I asked, making my tone match his.

  He scoffed. “Please, sweetheart, everyone in the prison knows about you and how the Hunters almost killed you, but somehow you managed to escape—something no other prisoner has been able to do. Not to mention, with them completely focused on you, it gives the rest of us a good chance. At least until they lose interest or until they finally kill you.” He grinned at the last sentence.

  I glared at him. “Glad to know I’m such a big thing. Look, Lehlax, Jared took me to the—um, to someplace where I can rest and recuperate without the Hunters attacking. He went to cook some meat he found. He followed the river a little so that when the Hunters saw the fire it wouldn’t attract them to… the place we’re staying,” I explained. “He hasn’t come back in about three hours and I’m worried about him.”

  The burly prisoner laughed. “Isn’t that cute? Is lover girl concerned for her boyfriend?” He scoffed.

  I couldn’t take it anymore. Punching him in the jaw, I brought my knee up and drove it up against his crotch. He doubled over in pain but glared at me. When he caught his breath, he lunged toward me.

  The other guy grabbed him and held him back, while Sine stepped in between us both.

  “Hey, guys! Stop it; we can’t fight amongst ourselves. That will only make it easier for the Hunters to kill us all,” Sine said.

  I nodded, crossing my arms.

  “You got that, Wes?” Sine asked the burly man.

  He nodded and shoved himself out of the other man’s grip.

  “We’ll go to the river and see if we can’t find Jared. You look better than when we last saw you, but you don’t look ready to encounter the Hunters yet. So, you should wait here with Quinn, okay?”

  I nodded. As long as I didn’t have to wait here with Wes.

  Wes stalked off through the trees in the opposite direction of the river. “I’ll keep watch,” he grumbled.

  “Let’s go,” Lehlax told Sine. They both dashed through the trees toward the river.

  I glanced at the other man, Quinn. He wasn’t burly like Wes, but he did have some muscle. He wore a shirt that had the sleeves cut off, along with the typical leather pants and boots all the prisoners wore. He had a full beard and long shaggy hair that were both red.

  “Don’t worry about Wes. He’s always angry about something,” Quinn told me.

  “Thanks. I thought maybe he hated me for some reason, but I have no idea what I did to him.”

  “You didn’t. If anything, he’s just jealous because you’ve outsmarted the Hunters. He knows if they ever caught up to him, he wouldn’t stand a chance. He might be able to put up a good fight, but it wouldn’t last long.” Quinn shrugged and twirled a dagger in the air.

  “He seems like… he could be a Hunter.” I clicked my tongue, looking in the direction Wes had gone.

  “He’s always had really strong emotions. He’s always angry, but he’s not as tough as he looks, and he’s a good fighter. If he gets anyone on the ground, they don’t stand a chance. I’ve always thought he could have Hunter potential, and he fears it too. I think he knows if they find him, he’ll become one of them.” Quinn didn’t look away from my eyes, even as he continued throwing and catching the dagger.

  “That would be a horrible thing to fear,” I murmured.

  “Yeah, it
would.”

  I sat down on a nearby log and leaned back against a tree.

  Quinn laughed. “It’s not exactly a couch, but it’ll do,” he joked.

  I chuckled as he sat down beside me.

  “So, what in the world made you want to come here?” he asked.

  “I came for my brother. He was taken a couple of days before me and I wanted to try to protect him. He’s too sick to fight.”

  “Wow,” he murmured.

  “Yeah.”

  “Have you found him?” Quinn ran his fingers through his beard and shot me a sideways glance.

  “No, not yet. I hope I can, but it kind of seems pointless now,” I told him honestly.

  “It’s not pointless. You already found someone you love right?” He smiled an encouraging smile.

  “What?” I blinked several times, not sure what he was referring to.

  “That guy that Lehlax and Sine went after. You seemed so concerned about his safety. There was something in your eyes. The same thing I would see in my mother at the thought of my father being taken,” he murmured. “A concern that only someone in love can have.”

  Looking through the trees, I became lost in my thoughts. I didn’t know what loving someone besides family was like. Swallowing as my thoughts drifted to the possibilities of losing Sine or Lehlax, the moment we lost Wexx flashed in my mind.

  I thought about losing Jared.

  I winced.

  Did I love him? I was close to it, I knew that much.

  “Averella? You seemed lost in your thoughts there for a minute.” Quinn’s scratchy voice yanked me back to reality.

  “Yeah, I was just thinking about what you said. Thanks, Quinn.” I smiled at him, hoping he knew how sincere I was.

  He nodded, flipping the dagger again.

  “What about you? Did you leave anyone behind?”

  “My wife and I had been married only a year and a half and we just had a little girl.” He took a deep breath, glaring at the ground.

  “Oh...” I murmured sadly.

  “She’s cute. Or, at least, she was last time I saw her,” he said.

  “How long have you been here?” I asked him.

  “Seven years.” There was a deep sadness in his eyes that I couldn’t understand.

  He missed his daughter’s first steps, her first words… so many wonderful things about her.

  Suddenly, leaves and branches crunched far to the left. Instantly, we both leapt to our feet. Quinn reached for his bow, nocking an arrow as I grabbed my sword. He nodded his head toward a tree, and I assumed he wanted me to hide behind it.

  I hesitated and glared at him.

  “It’s not because you’re a girl, it’s because you’re still recovering; now get back!” he whispered.

  My glare stayed firmly in place but I slipped behind the tree anyway.

  “What’s going on?” a voice behind me asked, scaring me. I jumped up from my crouch, and had the sword up, almost slicing Wes’ neck.

  “Watch it!” he yelled.

  “Hush!” I told him, nodding my head toward Quinn. He gestured to the trees in front of us. Wes just strolled over by him.

  The waiting seemed to last forever. We heard thuds and grunts, followed by cries and lots of cursing. Then, the trees rustled, and Sine burst through them.

  “Go!” he shouted. I nodded and darted toward Quinn. “I told her to run away, not run to them!” Sine’s voice rose from behind me. No matter what happened, I had to find Jared.

  “Typical woman,” someone muttered loudly. It was probably Wes. I smiled.

  Less than a minute later, I was closing in on all the noise, or at least where it had been coming from. It was eerily quiet as I slid behind a tree and hid.

  “We will find you, Jared! Wherever you go, wherever you hide, wherever you run, we will find you! You and that woman!” a voice screamed. It sounded close—too close. Something about his tone sent chills into my bones.

  Despite the threat in the voice, it meant that they probably lost Jared again. Which hopefully meant that he was okay. I shuffled forward to the next tree and crouched back down. The voices were getting even closer. Leaves rustled to my right. Clenching my sword tightly, I turned, eying the tree, every part of me on high alert.

  I couldn’t see anything, but that didn’t mean they weren’t there. Then, rustling echoed from higher up in the tree. It looked like something had been thrown at it… a pebble, maybe? I frowned and stayed in a low crouch, keeping my sword up and ready. Another pebble sailed through the air and landed to my right.

  An acorn.

  I blinked, and Jared was right in front of me, which cause me to yelp. As soon I realized it was just him, I placed a hand over my mouth.

  He gestured to the trees to our left. I nodded to let him know I understood: that was where the Hunters were. I looked at him, searching for any injuries. His left shoulder was bleeding pretty badly, and he had a gash on his head, but his eyes were focused, and he didn’t seem to be worried. He had a dagger in his left hand, with his Inquiri blade in his right.

  Gesturing to our right, he put a finger to his lips. I nodded and watched him to wait for him to tell me it was time. He glared through the trees intensely. After a few seconds, he gently nudged my back. I started walking in a low crouch to my right, Jared right on my heels.

  We walked that way for about fifty yards until we reached the spot where Wes, Quinn, and I had been. Wes looked up when he heard us approach. We emerged from the trees on his left, and he had been looking straight ahead.

  “Well, there are the lover-birds now,” he snapped.

  I shot him a glare and Jared just gave him a confused look.

  “Do I know you?” he asked as if he was telling Wes to shut up.

  Seconds later, Sine and Quinn burst through the trees.

  “Great, you’re back. Come on, we need to go. Lehlax is right behind us,” Sine said in a rush. We all nodded and dashed toward the right, this time staying straight instead of heading toward the river.

  “We’ll find the river once we’re far enough away from the Hunters to lose them,” Jared said as we ran.

  We all nodded.

  “Glad you guys finally found each other,” Lehlax said, coming up to my left.

  I gave him a short, stressed smile, but said nothing more. Wes grumbled but decided to come with us.

  Halfway to the lake, we reached the river and met up with a handful of other prisoners that knew Sine and Quinn. One of them looked a lot like Wes, but I didn’t bother asking about it. His name, I found out, was Duncan, and he was one of two other prisoners that were picking at the dead bodies at the river, where we first found out it was poisoned.

  The other two came and stood by Quinn and Sine. I almost gagged at the smell and winced at the memory that I’d had to pick weapons and boots from one of the bodies, but they were doing it for other reasons.

  Not that any of us had anything worth much in here, but they still searched. We took only to survive; they did it for pleasure.

  Lehlax shot them all dark looks, especially when Wes went over there laughing and joking with them, but he didn’t say anything to them. I guess he didn’t think it was his place to.

  One of the other men with Wes and Duncan was called Axe. I didn’t know how he got that name, and I didn’t really want to know. Runx was another one but they all kept to themselves.

  “So, who is going with us?” Lehlax asked.

  “I definitely am,” Quinn said.

  “I might as well. Strength in numbers ‘n all,” said a stocky man who spit something out of his mouth. I didn’t know how he found any, but he looked like he was chewing some kind of tobacco.

  I raised an eyebrow at him.

  “Okay, Zane. How about you, Ierea?” Lehlax asked.

  Another man, who was dark-skinned, with long black hair that dangled down in matted locks, shrugged. “Be easy pickin’s but meh go wit ja.”

  I had a hard time understanding, but I was pr
etty sure that meant he was coming.

  “Any of you?” Lehlax asked.

  “Ierea is right. It will give the Hunters an advantage. They will pick us off easier,” Runx, a pale, skinny, and creepy man that somehow and oddly reminded me of a snake, pointed out.

  “We’ll be going someplace they won’t check, at least not for a little while,” Sine spoke up.

  “Oh yeah? Where’s that?” Axe asked. He was the only man I’d seen who carried with him a woodcutter's ax, ironically. Where he got it from, I had no idea. He was dark-skinned, though not as dark as Ierea. His muscles were all huge and he had a cocky grin.

  “The lake,” I replied.

  They all murmured and whispered amongst themselves.

  “I know what you have heard about it, and the rumors are true, except one thing’s changed: there have been people who have been there and survived,” Sine said.

  “Dis’s not true!” Ierea shouted.

  “Mere rumors, young Sine,” Runx said.

  “No. Sine, Jared, Averella, and I were the survivors. The reason why no one has ever returned from there before is because there are creatures that kill whoever shows up. Those creatures are mermaids. They sing, which attracts men, and then they take their life energy,” Lehlax explained.

  Despite the wary and hateful looks, they all listened.

  “It makes more sense to me now, knowing the truth. Since Averella is a woman, the mermaids didn’t put her in a trance and she saved us,” Sine told them.

  Wes snorted.

  I clenched my fists and started to take a step forward, but I felt Jared’s hand squeezing my arm. I stayed put but glared at Wes.

  “She did, and, besides, we think as long as you stay out of the water, you’ll be fine,” Sine said. “Anyone who’s not scared of a few fish can come with us and relax for about a week. Anyone else who’s a coward, feel free to take off on your own.”

  Jared smirked, and I smiled. We all left and within an hour, we had reached the lake. Once there, we went our separate ways; some went hunting, others to gather fruit, some to fetch more water, some to sleep just inside the tree line, and a couple went to go watch for Hunters at the start of the rapids.

  Jared went to teach me to hunt. There were extra weapons that we all shared amongst the group, which we kept in a pile near the tree line. Jared grabbed a bow and arrow and we both walked off. We stayed in the trees by the rapids, though we couldn’t see them, we could still hear the water flowing.