White Stag

by Kara Barbieri

  Adrenaline kicked my senses into overdrive, and the power I absorbed reached out wildly to touch the other fighters. Below me, Rekke finished off her last attacker, but one of her hands was draped across her bloody belly, holding in her insides. The young goblin’s laughter would never brighten the forest again. Hatred burned away the pain in my body. She was young, so young. She shouldn’t even have been on the Hunt, and now she would die before ever growing into her own.

  I glared as Elvira hacked away at the last of her pursuers with her sword and dagger, not even sparing a glance at her dying niece. She’d gotten what she wanted. At the very bottom of the trails Soren streaked by on Terror, the dead littered around him like fallen leaves. His face, body, and hair were streaked blood red, and the static of power that pounded through him stole the breath from my lungs. The hard muscles in his arms and shoulders rippled with strength. For once, the sight of a blood-covered goblin didn’t terrify me. With an arrow pulled back toward my chin, I shot again and again, helping him fell his foes.

  A horse screamed, and I broke out of my daze a moment too late. A dagger was stuck in Panic’s eye. He skidded through the ice and fell, only to rise and fall again. Blood gushed from his wound, and he shrieked as the life drained out of him. I jumped off the horse, my own eye so full of pain I barely stopped myself from ripping it out. I skidded across the rocks, the hard fall and momentum bruising and battering my body. My insides turned to fire as the animal connected to my mind died. With my body screaming, I pushed myself upright to find Elvira a few levels below me with an arrow aimed right at my heart.

  I gripped the cliff face and pulled myself up, staggering at the weight of my own body. From off in the distance someone shouted my name, and phantom aches told me to lie down and give in to the cold numbness spreading through me. A single thought broke through the cold.

  I will not die. I will not die here in the ice. I will not die here by that woman’s blade. I will not die. I will not die unless I take her with me.

  I jumped off the side of the ledge, free-falling down and down and down. The wind whipped my face, stealing tears from my eyes. My body was boneless, weightless, melting as I fell through the air onto the wide-eyed goblin below me. Bet you’ve never seen that before.

  The impact knocked the breath from my lungs, and I gasped for air. But I had my hands in Elvira’s hair, my legs wrapped around her torso, screeching like a madwoman. The cat reared and fell as Elvira’s sword stuck through its belly in the confusion.

  We wrestled on the ground, her lengthening nails tearing chunks of skin out of my shoulders, ripping at my clothes. I reached up, digging my fingers into her eye sockets until they were warm with her blood. Rolling over and over, weapons forgotten, I slammed against the dwindling ground. Above me, Elvira’s sightless eyes blazed with fury, and blood streaked down her once-beautiful face.

  “You’re supposed to die!” she shrieked. “It can’t be this hard to kill such a pathetic thing!” I grabbed a chunk of rock and bashed her in the head, fighting to get her fingers away from my chest. Once they sunk in, all she had to do was rip my heart out.

  “I told you I was hard to kill!” The taste of her blood in my mouth sent me into a frenzy, and I slammed both hands over her ears.

  Momentarily deaf, she let go, and I scrambled back away from the edge of the cliff. My bow and quiver pressed into my back, mocking me.

  Elvira lunged and grabbed at my shoulders with her clawed hands, leaving bloody grooves in my skin. She slammed me against the back of the cliff as ice shards fell around us. I brought my knee down on her crotch, and she yowled like a dog, but didn’t let go. Blood plastered my face, blinded my eyes, and covered the ledge in a slippery pool.

  A sharp stone cut into my back, wetness seeping through the once-fine tunic. Elvira and I rolled until I was facing open air.

  “You’re not so pretty now.” She smiled in a bloody, freakish grin.

  “Take a look at yourself.” I spat blood in her face. In the split second it took for her to regain her bearings, my legs were already wrapped tightly around her torso, and my fingers dug deep into the roots of her hair.

  “If I’m going to die,” I snarled, “then you’ll die with me.” Then I let myself fall back into the abyss.

  10

  MONSTERS

  MY MUSCLES BURNED like molten lava. A slow, agonizing pain spread throughout my body and left me fighting for breath. I gasped, greedily sucking in the cool air. The blue sky was a small speck far above me.

  Vines and cobwebs wrapped neatly around my body, restraining and suspending me in midair. Every time I struggled to break free, the vines tightened around my body like a constrictor. Elvira’s broken body lay below me, a snarl across her dead lips. The twinges of power forcing their way through my skin were already fading.

  On instinct, I lashed out at the vines, kicking and tearing. Elvira’s power fueled my tired, injured body, giving it the adrenaline I needed. But no matter how much I struggled, the vines held me tight, and I swayed, helplessly vulnerable in their grip.

  Images of the battle on the mountain flashed behind my eyes. The memory of Panic’s dying shriek broke my heart into pieces. He’d been a good horse, and all it got him was a dagger in the eye. Rekke was gone too; someone who despite my best efforts had managed to worm her way to a place close to my heart, someone who could’ve become a friend if I’d let her. She shouldn’t have been on the Hunt in the first place, and now she was dead because of the crumpled body below me. Every cell in me ached to pummel it to a pulp until it was unrecognizable. It was as if the feeling of Elvira’s blood between my fingers would make up for the lives she’d cut short. The small satisfaction that her gambit to kill Rekke and secure her position had ended in her demise did nothing to quell the rage and sadness inside of me.

  Once more, I twisted in the vines, lashing out with bound legs, and once more I failed to get free. The small speck of blue sky was now an indigo blanket. I closed my eyes, praying to whatever deity would listen that Soren got out all right and that the blood streaking his body was not his own.

  The hair on the back of my neck rose as footsteps echoed through the dark caverns. I thrashed wildly. If I got a glimpse of what this place looked like, I might know what type of creature called it their home—and more important, if they wanted to eat me.

  The high walls of the cavern glistened with crimson liquid too thin to be blood, dripping down onto moss the color of moonlight. Bones and feathers littered the floor, and among them sat a humanoid skeleton. I swallowed the fear threatening to rise. Escape was my goal and fear only got in the way. I brought one vine-covered arm up to my mouth and gnawed at the bitter-tasting plant.

  The echoing footsteps stopped. “You won’t get out that way.” Someone giggled.

  “Where are you?” The voice came from behind me, but there was only darkness.

  “You should be more polite,” she said. “It’s not fun when everyone doesn’t get along.”

  “Show yourself!” I snarled. Whoever, whatever these creatures were, they needed to know they wouldn’t cow me no matter how vulnerable I was, swinging from the vines.

  “Poor girl.” This voice was obviously male, and his words stung like dripping acid. “So much to lose, so little understood.”

  “Odin’s ravens! Who are you people?” The voices echoed all around me, the words repeating themselves over and over like a chant. I whipped my head around the cavern, but besides the feathers and old bones, the only moving thing was the sluggish liquid dripping off the stone.

  “That’s not very nice,” the female said. This time I pinpointed her voice to a crevice above me. The creature’s large dark eyes twinkled with amusement, cracks formed along her eggshell-white skin, and a shock of brilliant green hair hung in her face. Oh no. Gods above, not this.

  The male clucked his tongue and stepped into a patch of the shining moss. He stood there as I hung from the vines, boredom in his reddish gaze. His ebony skin was also crack
ed in places, and a tail swept beside his legs, the tip twitching back and forth. The bare skin of his chest flaked away at his ribcage until the bloody bones and muscles underneath were exposed.

  I swallowed my rising dread. Svartelves. It had to be svartelves. The good news was that they probably weren’t going to cut me up and eat me; the bad news was that they were notorious for driving people insane. Somehow, that made becoming an hors d’oeuvre a lot more appealing.

  “Tibra is right. You should be nice,” the male said, leaning against a jagged stone. The red liquid dripped onto his bare chest and spread out like roots to his shoulders and fingertips, to his neck and breast, and down to his stomach before sinking into his body and disappearing. He circled around me, and I caught a glimpse of his hollow back. With his eyes on me, I felt very, very naked. “You could’ve ended up like her”—he flicked his tail toward Elvira’s broken body—“but we decided to catch you.”

  “She didn’t die from the fall; I killed her.”

  He raised his eyebrows slightly. “Oh? Well, perhaps you could explain the broken neck, then? Or the spine?” He curled his upper lip as he nudged the body with his foot. “Of course, a fall couldn’t have gouged her eyes out, now could it? I guess we can share the credit, if you wish. You already possess her power, anyhow.”

  From behind me, the girl giggled again. “Can we keep her, Donnar? Can we?” With the way she widened her eyes at Donnar and clasped her hands together, Tibra looked like she was begging for a pet. I swore inwardly.

  Donnar did another circle around me, his tail flicking back and forth with contempt. Almost like Soren’s growls, it had a language of its own. “She smells like goblin,” he said as he stuck his face in mine. “A strange odor for a human.”

  “And you smell like svartelf, and that’s a strange odor for anyone,” I countered. “Now if you would be kind enough to let me go.”

  Donnar laughed. “Go where?”

  “Home,” I snapped.

  “And where is that?” Like Tibra, his eyes sparkled in delight at this new game. Like Tibra, he was also very lucky I was restrained right now.

  “Stop playing with me. I’ll give you whatever you want, but just let me go home!” There was a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. And where is that? If I tried to picture home, the image became blurry, unfocused. I shook off the image. I knew where my home was.

  Donnar shook his head, tutting as if I were a naughty child. “You didn’t answer my question, though. Where is your home? Your village has burnt to the ground, your blood relatives have all perished, humankind see you as a blood traitor. Yet here, no matter what changes you make, you will always be human first and goblin second, and your morals will be compromised by the way society has run for thousands upon thousands of years. Not to mention, why leave and search for your heart when it beats right in front of you?”

  A chill went down my spine. “How do you know so much about me?”

  He smiled, showing yellowed fangs. “It is my job to know. I wait and I watch and I see your fates play out in the bloodwater that flows down the mountain. There are those who seek me for this knowledge, but the more I give, the more they come away with their minds broken. But you already experienced that—even if you did not know it at the time.”

  “Strangely enough,” I snapped, “I don’t know what you’re talking about now either! Stop playing mind games with me. Let me leave!”

  “Why?” he asked again, his tail sweeping across the floor as he knelt beside me. “You have nowhere to go. And what world would accept a creature warring against herself?”

  “I’m not warring against myself,” I said. My stomach churned at the thought that this creature knew of my every struggle and was laying it out before my eyes. The pit in my belly grew as his words goaded me like a cattle prod.

  Donnar clucked his tongue again and drew a line down my jaw with his dark fingers. I shivered as claws protruded from his knuckles. When he brought his hand away, he left a warm, wet mark behind. Then with a flick of his wrist, he slashed the vines apart.

  My head cracked against the ground, and I groaned at the multiple stinging cuts and bruises. It was hard to think through the thick haze of pain; my injuries screamed, demanding my attention. The blurry, sleek rainbows of the bloodwater and the shining moss doubled before my eyes, and the world slipped further and further away with every throb of my head.

  Wildly and half-blind, I groped the bone-littered ground for my bow and quiver, praying they had survived the fall. If these creatures wouldn’t let me out willingly, then I’d force them to. Gods damn the pain in my body, I’d had worse and survived. “Looking for this?” Donnar balanced the bow on his fingertip, twirling it like a baton.

  I lurched forward, stumbling to the ground on deadened feet. “Give me that.” I scrambled to get up, only to realize my arms had gone numb.

  Tibra flitted to stand beside him. “Aw, you hear that, she’s like a baby. Please can we keep her?”

  “What did you do to me?” I panted, curled on my side. Icy coldness was spreading like liquid through my insides. It burned, it froze, and I wanted it out. I dug into the underside of my arms but nothing stopped the pain. Tears glistened in the corners of my eyes as the world spun around me. The coldness crushed the breath out of my chest. My mouth opened, but only a strangled cry came out. My senses turned upside down as I failed to push myself up and crawl away.

  Claws clacked against the stone as Donnar came to stand beside me. He squatted down, clutching my chin. The claws on his knuckles brushed against my cheek, glistening with something dark and wet. “You’re so afraid,” he said, smiling. Rows upon rows of sharp, pointed teeth stared at me. “I’m not doing anything to you, dear child. Your body is finally catching up to your mind. Didn’t the young lord tell you that agonizing over your decision would drive you mad? It breaks you from the inside out. You survived the fall because like all things that end up here, you seek knowledge. Knowing has the power to kill.” He glanced at the bones scattered across the cave floor. “I don’t envy you.”

  No. No. Let me leave. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die! Each breath was a struggle, each conscious second ticking by a battle, but no matter how hard I fought, the darkness that crowded my vision pulled me deeper and deeper into its grasp.

  Donnar smiled sadly at me. “I guess that is the nice thing about being undecided. You can choose between the blood of battle and the blood of birth, of good war and bad peace, of which arms you wish to push away and which arms you wish to hold you close. It’s a beautiful thing. A maddening thing.”

  My eyelids drooped. His riddles turned my brain to mush and the cold darkness surrounding me whispered invitations in my ear.

  “Make your choice wisely, little one.” I closed my eyes as Donnar’s dry lips pressed against my forehead.

  * * *

  THE SVARTELVES’ DARK CAVERN was gone. Bones of beings, both animal and human, immortal and mortal, littered the floor. I stepped carefully, waiting for my injuries to scream in pain, but they never did. No body lay on the ground, twisted with a broken neck and spine, face bloodied from my nails. My bow and quiver were pressed against my back in their familiar embrace.

  I continued down the cavern, ducking under stones that pointed down from the ceiling, jumping over those that surged upward from the ground. Far ahead of me, the manic cackle of a goblin echoed off the cavern walls. I picked up my pace, careful not to make any noise as I followed the sound. The high-pitched shriek of a human child mingled with the manic laughter, and I broke into a run through the passageways.

  I sprinted around the corner only to come to a stumbling halt as the scene unfolded in front of me. The small child raced around the rocks while the goblin guarded her like a sentry, fondness in his eyes, as she tried to climb the wall of the cavern. A rock came loose, and she shrieked as she fell, but the goblin’s arms were waiting to catch her. He said something to her in a language I didn’t know, but I picked up the worry in h
is tone. The girl crossed her arms, pouting, but relented to his demand. He set her down again, and they raced through the shadows.

  Their silhouettes danced around me, laughing and hooting with glee. In between the flashes of their bodies, their features merged and changed at random. Sometimes the girl had blue eyes, sometimes brown. Sometimes the goblin’s hair was cropped short, sometimes it was down to his back. Both silhouettes stopped their dance and came to a halt in front of me. Their features changed so fast that they were both everyone and no one. Only one thing remained the same: One was goblin and the other was a human child.

  The two forms melted away, and I stood alone in the darkness. “Donnar! Where are you? What are you doing to me?”

  The only answer was the steady dripping of bloodwater. My fingers curled around my bow, tucking it under my arm as the passages twisted and turned. There had to be a way out or at least a skylight. “Donnar?”

  In the distance a voice was chiding someone, but every time they spoke, the sound changed. An old woman, a young man, a toddler barely able to form words, all saying the same thing.

  “You wouldn’t have to suffer if you just gave in.”

  “Who’s there?” I called, rounding a corner so fast I nearly smacked into stone.

  “I would suffer more if I just gave in.” This voice was spitting and spiteful, fueled with fire and fury. Underneath the fury was passion kindled by the flames. “You act like this is an easy choice for me.”