by Tyler Krings
He signaled for her to feign sleep, and she shook her head vehemently. He sighed and pointed to a tree a few meters off. Hushed voices reached their ears, and Ana rushed off with a handful of clothes and disappeared behind the tree’s trunk. Jon pulled on his trousers and secured his belt—no time for anything else. He loosened his belt knife and hid behind another tree nearer to the camp. Their small cookfire had doused itself early in the morning, but the smoke would have drifted upward for some time, a clear marker on a clear night. Jon allowed himself a moment to curse his stupidity, then closed his eyes to focus on the quarry. He was suddenly very grateful they had not brought the horses.
“They was here,” someone whispered. “Man and woman, I swears.”
A grunt.
“They fuckers?”
“Ohs yah. Al’night.”
“Yous lookin’?
“’Course.”
Their accents placed them as southern Murkers from the sound; the raiders came north in groups to rape and rob, never more than a few. The presence of the Imperials did little to deter them, as they did not take roads and kept to the forests. Murkers usually targeted only a few farmsteads at a time, and recent times had seen a decline in their presence, most likely due to in-fighting. With his sword still at the farm, Jon drew his knife and waited. Their footsteps were light but easy to track. They passed his tree in a hurry, making for the camp.
“Theys not here,” said one.
“They hadn’t gone nowhere. I’d have seent it.”
Jon moved from the tree, and silent as night placed his blade against the neck of the first and slit his throat. The man in broken leather smelled of sweat and piss, and his blood had the rot of infection. The man gurgled and fell as the others turned: two with large clubs and the third carrying a short sword edged in rust. Jon threw his knife into the eye of the nearest and rushed the second. The raider swung his club with a shout as Jon dodged the first and second swing before intercepting the third. He moved outside the Murker’s reach and delivered a sharp blow to the raider’s elbow, cracking it unnaturally. Jon caught the club as it fell from the Murker’s hand and cracked it against the man’s head. The man fell limp and hit the ground hard.
The last Murker charged, swinging and stabbing wildly with his sword. Jon dived over the corpse with the knife in the eye and plucked it. He rolled into a crouch and threw. The blade went through the Murker’s hand and pinned it to a tree. The raider shouted in pain and dropped to his knees.
Jon strode to him and crouched at eye level. “Far from home. None to hear you scream.”
The Murker stopped his wails and brought his eyes to Jon. “Easy prey…not so easy.”
“Easy prey,” Jon considered. “Who told you this?”
The forest became darker. Jon looked from the man and found the fog had come lower to the ground, masking the moss. What sunlight there had been suddenly dampened, as though covered by a lantern shade. Low lying branches bent and pulled away from the ground and all matter of creatures went silent.
“Jon!” Ana was suddenly beside him. “We need to run, now!”
As she pulled on his arm, Jon spied a darkened figure several dozen meters away. The fog seemed to stream off him. He carried a great bow, and glowing eyes burned in boar mask under a dark hood. In one motion he drew and let fly. Jon barely had time to gather Ana in his arms and dive to the ground before the arrow sunk into the man pinned to the tree.
“What the fuck is that?!” he gasped.
“No time!” Ana launched herself up and pulled him along. They began at a sprint in the general direction of their homestead, though they were days away. Arrows flew rapidly, piercing trees and marking spaces they had been only seconds before. They ran across the creek and made their jagged path into denser foliage. The forest seemed to act against them, trees appeared suddenly in their path, and every turn they made immediately required another. Seemingly caught in a maze, Ana stopped, considered, and sprinted through a web of vines and vegetation barreling her way to the other side. They skidded to a halt when they found the gorge. The forest continued on the other side, across hundreds of meters down and wide, and the river at the bottom of the gorge raged and twisted for leagues until it snaked out of sight.
“I can fight him if I can get close enough,” said Jon.
“No, you can’t,” she said. “We need to fly.”
“Old man said that was a bad idea.”
“The old man’s not here!” The fog followed them out of the forest and grasped intangibly at their heels.
“She’s right, Jon. Your options are limited.” Jon saw the spirit perched on the ledge of the gorge, looking down into its depths. Jon followed his gaze.
He took Ana into his arms. “I have another option.” Before she could protest, he jumped.
The Hunt cursed himself as he watched them leap into the gorge. Arienaethin had bent the flight of his arrows. He was sure of it. She’s protecting the boy. He grunted. The forest moved for him, allowing easy passage to the edge of the gorge. As insignificant as it was impressive, the Hunt acknowledged that he had underestimated the Lady of the Wind, and the manchild seemed also to have some passing martial prowess.
“This won’t end well for you, Erlwhen.” The Hunt turned and found a man of umber brown skin and a white beard dressed in green garb assessing him from a high branch. He knew that voice.
“What are you doing here?” the Hunt growled.
The spirit gestured. “Tending my garden.”
“You’re supposed to be dead.”
“And much of me is.”
The Hunt bristled in annoyance. “Are they a part of your garden? Have you finally thrown in with the Rebellion?”
“Which side burned the forest? It was yours, wasn’t it?”
“It was war.”
“It was unnecessary.”
“War often is.”
The spirit jumped from his perch and landed standing in front of the Hunt. “Pursuing them will not end well, old friend.”
The Hunt stared. “If you get in my way, it is you I will hunt next.”
The woodland spirit smiled sadly. He nodded slowly, acknowledging something unto himself, “Then goodbye, old friend.” The spirit turned; his leaving marked only by the slow fall of autumn leaves.
The Hunt bristled in frustration. This was not going well.
10
The Hunt
The fall was far. Very far. Ana was not one for fear, and heights surely did not bother her, but suddenly facing an abrupt end to her short mortal life left her shaking. She could not fly with Jon’s arms wrapped around her, and even if she were free, carrying added weight would not help. Nor could she compel enough of the Wind to make a whirlwind to catch them in the time they had before they hit the ground. These thoughts came fast as she and Jon plummeted to the river below. The only sure certainty that remained to her was that she was about to come to a sure and sudden death. She involuntarily wrapped her arms around Jon very tightly.
You can’t fly, said the Wind.
Thanks for noticing, she replied.
Perhaps you could float? The Wind might have been jesting, but the idea suddenly occurred to her that while she could not halt their descent, perhaps she could slow it. She released her hands from Jon’s back and twisted around in his grasp so that she was facing the river. She held out her hands and willed the Wind to flow toward her. It resisted. Her human form still too unfamiliar. Now angry, she pulled.
Oh, you could have just asked, the Wind said.
The Wind came at them with a gallant force, pushing against their combined weight, encouraging them to fight gravity. The torrent filled her ears, but their descent slowed with the river only seconds away. They hit the water with a mighty crash and the current ripped them from each other. She fought and tumbled in an angry frenzy, her breath all but gone until her face broke the surface. She coughed and gagged on the freezing water and pulled in a small amount of air before the river took her again.
She collided with a rock, scraping her leg on its sharp edge, and she cried out in pain, only to have water fill her lungs. She flailed desperately but willed herself to find the surface. Underwater, she found the voice of the Wind silent. She panicked as dark circles flooded her vision and the last of her strength faded.
“I love you,” he said.
“And I you,” she replied. They stared hand in hand at the valley below the Heavenly Palace. As always, something urged to step from the balcony and fly. As always, something else compelled her not to.
“So, what’s next?” she asked. “Anu is ours, and you are mine. What else could we possibly want?”
“My work is nearly finished,” said the Lord of Fate. “At least for a time. There are one or two ends to tie up. Perhaps…no, let us just enjoy ourselves for now.” He leaned into her and kissed her cheek.
She woke with a gasp in the dark. Her back ached and her chest felt as though a giant had sat on her. An orange glow revealed an uneven ceiling; dark shapes flitted back and forth, and pointed rocks glared angrily upon her. Water dripped somewhere in the distance and echoed in the stone halls. The roar of the river was muted but still present. She sat up slowly, cognizant of the pain, and groaned.
Jon appeared before her and placed a hand on her back to give her support. “Easy. You’ve had a busy day,” he said softly.
“Where are we?” Her voice was harsh as it had been when she came down from Anu.
“Cave I found.” He looked up to the bats on the ceiling and gave them a dissatisfied look. “I figured maybe we could recoup here until that thing stops looking for us.”
“He’ll never stop,” she said. She grunted as she tried to rise. “He is the Lord of the Hunt. This is his expertise.”
“Surely he didn’t follow us all the way down the river,” he replied.
“He’ll follow us to our grav—AH!” The pain in her leg radiated up her back, and she nearly fell.
“Easy! You’ll undo the stitching,” said Jon. He helped her back down to the hard stone floor. Her boots were gone, her leg was wrapped in his shirt, and blood had seeped through the cloth along the long gash down her calf. She gently pulled back the top of the makeshift bandage. Somehow, he had taken twine and stitched together her bloodied leg, though the sight was ghastly. She looked away from it as she replaced the cloth.
“We may have lost him if the river carried us far enough,” she said. “But finding things is what he does.”
Jon stood and started pacing by the fire. “This…just got complicated.”
His crumpled face and wrinkled brow made her laugh out loud. Doing so made her body hurt, but she could do little to help herself. His eyes flicked to her, but his frown remained in place. “I’m glad you find this funny.”
“I’m sorry.” She tried her best to stop. “But…your wife is a goddess who fell from the sky, we’re being tracked by the Lord of the Hunt himself, we just fell from a league high gorge, and now your life is complicated?”
“Well…” he struggled. “I suppose it’s kind of funny. In the ‘I’m going to die soon’ way. How did he know where to find us?”
“I feel this is redundant, but the Lord of the Hunt hunts pretty well,” she said.
“Thanks, smart ass.”
“Regretting our marriage?”
He smiled. “I regret leaving my sword at home.”
“It wouldn’t have done you any good.”
“I don’t know, I’m pretty good with it.”
“My, they do make men foolish. You can’t fight the Hunt as you would a man. We have to be smart. They are Lords for a reason.”
“Are you telling me that no Lord has ever died by a man’s hand?”
“That is exactly what I am telling you.”
“Then how about you explain the blood on your leg? Or the cuts on your face? Bleeding things die. Plain and simple.”
She raised a hand to her face and felt the scratches along her cheek. “I am different. My body is human. His is not. Lords in human skin are not something that is a common occurrence.”
“All right,” he replied, “so it’ll be difficult. How do we do it?”
She extended her hand. The Aden along her arm lit, and a silver spear of light extended from her palm.
“Whoa…how long has that been there?”
“Since my conception. Galeblade is my answer when compassion and reason have failed. All Lords and Ladies carry with them a weapon of their choosing, made of will and light.”
“And that light stick will get the job done?”
She paused and looked at him. She did not know if she should be appalled or humored. The thought of taking a life grieved her, as did the lives of those she had already taken. Her “light stick” had been her closest friend and most reliable ally through the ages, Jon’s off-hand remark could only be attributed to honest ignorance.
“Yes,” she finally answered. “My…light stick will get the job done.”
“That’s something then. The more immediate issue is getting off the river.”
“Do you have a plan?”
“A bumbling one. I don’t know if he will come at us here. If it were me, I’d wait for us to be on dry land again. Easier to track that way. The cliffs are the problem. We can’t climb them in our current condition, or even if we were perfectly healthy—it would take too long. We will have to float downriver. Doing so means he loses our scent, and maybe then we can sneak by him.”
“We’re going to float downriver?”
“Aye,” he answered. “I’ll gather enough wood for a raft to carry us as far as we need. There’s a port some ways downstream, a little trading post. We find ourselves a horse, and we’re home free, give or take maybe a day or two more to get home.”
“And what’s to stop the Hunt from finding us in the meantime?”
Jon grinned. “A bit of luck? That’s all we have, so if it doesn’t work, we’re fucked.”
Night came before Jon was finished gathering enough floating debris to make a raft. He tore strips from her cloak and his trousers to bind the stray pieces together. Even if the day had been warm, she would not have noticed. She scooted closer to the small fire to fight the cool dampness of her skin. As her self-assigned job, she kept it going, setting aside a small pile of sticks Jon brought her to keep dry. The mouth of the cave opened into the river itself, and a large pool swirled at the entrance.
Jon surfaced from the pool after his last trip into the river; a soaked log as tall as he in his arms. He shook himself from the cold mountain water and lay his prize by the half-finished raft. Rubbing his hands, he gathered himself before the fire and shivered.
“That’s all we can do tonight,” he said.
“You’ve done quite a bit,” she replied. She took one the remaining strips of her cloak they had and began to rewrap her leg. The blood had clotted along her calf, the sharp pain barely fading. “Do you think it will hold?” she asked.
“I’ve done what I can, but no, it probably won’t hold. Hopefully it’s enough to get us out of the gorge at least.”
She nodded. She wrapped her leg as the he shown her, keeping it tight without cutting off the blood flow. She winced.
“Here.” Her future husband came to her and took the cloth from her hands.
“I can manage just fine, thanks,” she said.
“Quit,” he said sternly. “You could do it yourself, but this way will be a lot less painful.” Gently, he continued her work with ease and much faster than she was able. Eyeing the damage to her leg, she reflected on Jon’s remarks regarding bleeding things dying. Gods very rarely, if at all, found themselves in situations such as hers. How fragile these forms are. Had she been turned the wrong way, it could have been her head, and then where would she be? A single misstep from the Judges’ door. At least, that was how it stood for mortals. But what of her? If gods required judgment, she did not think she would find herself again in Anu. Fate’s anger was too dire and far too long lasting to forgive o
ne such as her—not that she would ever ask for it. But then, had not Maerko suggested that Fate wished her to be his queen?
“Deep thoughts?” Jon asked as he finished with her leg and, satisfied it would hold, added a stick to the fire.
“Yes,” she answered truthfully.
“Care to share?”
She eyed the fire and took a breath. “Not really.”
Jon nodded and left her in a silence. She changed her mind. “I was thinking about my… mortality? My leg…and whatever else can happen.”
“We’ll make it. The river’s not that rough,” he said.
“That’s not what I meant.”
“I know what you meant. Death is scary.” His face darkened, and he looked elsewhere.
“That’s putting it mildly,” she answered. “And after…what’s next? Anu or Lamen? Do I return to the Ether as the Wizened would have us believe, or do I simply…fade away?”
“Men have been asking such questions since the day we could.”
She grimaced as she moved closer to the fire. How young she must sound, asking questions she never thought or had the need to ask. Here she was, learning to work a farm and ride a horse and hunt…things they taught babes before they could speak. How terribly naïve she must look to him.
“Might want to get some sleep. Dark thoughts can take you to dark places,” said Jon. He made to douse the fire.
“What are you doing?” she asked. It was their only source of warmth.
He pointed to the cave entrance and the lengthening shadows on the river. “No need to give the Hunt a light.” He doused the fire with river water, closing them in darkness, and lay down on the cold rock beside her. “Let’s just focus on getting out of here, and then we can discuss the…dichotomy of life and death.” She agreed. They had more pressing matters than her own self-pity. For the moment, anyway.