by Darius Hinks
The doe bolted, snapping Finavar back into the present.
He cursed as the animal disappeared from view. ‘I must stay focused,’ he said. The words fell from his cracked lips in a hoarse whisper. After weeks without food, his thoughts were vague and unruly. He knew that he must eat soon, or his promise would die with him, but it was so hard to keep his mind in one place.
He dropped from his perch, staggering as he landed.
The sound of his fall disturbed something behind him and Finavar’s instinct threw him around, his bow raised.
A long, sinuous shape darted through the grass.
Finavar loosed a shot, mouthing a charm as he did so.
To his surprise, the shot was true and a rat rolled across the ground with the arrow through its side, coming to a halt a few feet away.
Finavar closed his eyes in relief, then begged the rat’s forgiveness as he dropped to his knees and snapped its neck.
Along with the bow, Finavar had salvaged a sword from the battlefield and he used it now to skin the animal, talking to the rat as he did so. He explained that he would waste no part of its flesh. Then he ate the animal raw, grunting hungrily as the stringy, still-warm meat slipped down his throat. As he ate, he recalled the horror of the battlefield. He had returned looking for weapons so that he could defend his brother’s corpse from scavengers, but he fled almost immediately, overwhelmed by the sight of so many corpses. Between them, Orion and the outsiders had turned Drúne Fell into a slaughterhouse.
Once he had devoured everything he could, Finavar cleaned the rat’s skin with his knife and draped it over a branch to dry. Then he spread the sticky bones across the grass, knowing that others would find sustenance in them after he had gone.
Finavar could not remember the last time he had eaten and he felt a rush of energy as the rat’s spirit mingled with his. He could have found no greater way to break his fast. As the rodent’s energy flooded his limbs, he thought again of Jokleel’s charred corpse.
‘I will free us,’ he said, wiping the rat’s blood from his lips and pointing his sword to the north of Drúne Fell. ‘The Council Glade must fall,’ he said, as though speaking to a gathering. ‘Ariel’s reign must come to an end. All these years we have defended ourselves from outsiders when the true threat was here, at the heart of the forest. I will hold true to my word, brother. I will lift this vile curse. I will show the asrai the truth.’
His stomach turned and his throat filled with bile, but he swallowed hard and held the meat down. ‘I promise you Jokleel, I will survive. I will rid the asrai of this burden. I will rid us of Orion.’
Chapter Seven
Orion ran for a long time before he realised he was not alone. It was only as he reached the deepest haunts of the forest, where the tangle of brushwood and ferns slowed his pace to a painful jog, that he noticed three shadows, keeping pace with him through the night.
He paused at the crest of a bracken-filled hollow, panting and trembling as he eyed the shadows. The days had passed in a blur and he was finding it increasingly hard to distinguish spirit from flesh. The Otherworld loomed constantly at the edge of his vision and strange vistas bled through the earth, causing him to duck and weave around beings that could not exist. The ghosts of Orion rumbled constantly in his thoughts now – muttering obscure, gnomic phrases every time he paused. With so many intangibles, Orion had begun to disregard anything that did not bend and snap beneath his hooves. Most of the visions were vanquished by a shake of his head, but as he peered at the three shadows they remained solid and vivid, skulking through the trees as he tried to discern them.
Orion looked down and saw that his chest and forearms were streaked with fresh blood. He scoured his memory and found nothing but daemons and ghosts. ‘The hunt,’ he breathed, realising he had lost himself again. What had he killed as he ran? He looked closer and saw scraps of skin and fur beneath his talons. ‘The hunt,’ he repeated and the voices in his head rumbled in reply.
The shadows answered with three mournful howls.
Orion felt a rush of emotion as he realised that his hounds had followed him. They were as strange to him as anything else but, with the year dying around him and his strength falling from his limbs, living companions of any kind suddenly seemed wonderful.
‘Fuath,’ he cried, reaching out into the darkness.
One of the shadows rippled and broke away from its companions, skirting the edge of the hollow and padding to Orion’s side.
Orion hesitated as the creature approached, unnerved by its appearance.
The hound was twice the size of any normal dog and where its eyes should have been were a pair of furnaces, leaking ruddy flames around the animal’s head. Its jaws were huge and its slavering lips curled back as it approached, revealing a row of long, vicious teeth. The hound let out a low growl as it reached Orion and greasy, matted hair bristled along the length of its back.
Orion sensed the other two hounds emerging from the trees behind him but he kept his gaze locked on Fuath.
‘You are mine to command,’ he said, trying to reassure himself, but he sensed his mistake before the words had left his lips. Whatever manner of beings they were, the hounds served no one; not even a king. Seeing them now, away from the clamour of the hunt, he saw that they were as ethereal as the visions that had haunted his journey north. They were caged in flesh and bone; imprisoned in the bodies of hounds, but they were far from mortal. The flames licking from their eye sockets were just a glimpse of their true nature. They, more than anything, were the soul of the Wild Hunt.
Orion realised that he was barely their equal, never mind their master.
Fuath sat and the other two followed suit. The low growls continued, but the hounds seemed to relax.
‘I must find my queen,’ he said, looking at each of them in turn. ‘But my mind is…’ He frowned, unsure how to explain himself. ‘I am confused.’
Orion had the overwhelming impression that Fuath was about to speak. The dog had tilted its head to one side, as though considering his words.
‘We are one,’ said Orion, and this time he knew he was right. Whatever sorcery had bound his soul to the Wild Hunt, ruled the hounds too. They understood him in a way no mortal could. They, at least, should know that he would not have chosen to act as he did.
‘I must make amends,’ he muttered. ‘Will you lead me to Ariel?’
The hound narrowed its eyes at the word ‘amends’, as though in disapproval.
‘I must fulfil my destiny,’ said Orion, trying a different tack.
The hound continued staring at him for a moment, then it lowered its head in what seemed like mute agreement.
Orion was about to speak again, when all three of the hounds dashed away, heading north along the edge of the hollow and vanishing into the trees.
Orion smiled and raced after them, struggling to keep up as they leapt over branches and raced down mist-shrouded gulleys.
The act of chasing the hounds threw Orion back across the centuries and, as they raced north, he tumbled into the past. He saw countless, bloody hunts; trees filled with the bodies of those he had slain: animal, asrai and human. But there was something profoundly different about the hunts of the previous years. Every act of violence he perpetrated added to the untamed beauty of his people – it made them more perfect; more alive. When he raced with the hounds, he pushed the asrai a little further from the linear, crushing ugliness of civilisation. He knew it was right. He knew it was his purpose. Atolmis’s words came back to him as he ran, and suddenly they made sense: ‘You are everything that defines us’.
The thought of the priests filled Orion with grief, quickly followed by determination. The high priest had chosen him, all those months ago, to perform the ultimate duty. ‘I will not fail,’ snarled Orion, racing faster after the hounds. ‘I will prove you right, Atolmis. I will become the king.’
&nb
sp; As the hours passed and Fuath led him back to more familiar glades, Orion found himself dwelling on his actions over the summer. He saw the stone guardian, smashing its ancient ward at his command; then he recalled the rotten oak, and the grub that devoured Sélva. A horrible doubt pressed over him. Was it too late? Had he already destroyed the kingdom he was sworn to protect?
A lazy, golden dawn was falling through the branches as Orion reached the glades of Ariel’s court. He recalled the distant, unearthly gaze of his queen and crushed his doubt. ‘I will become the king.’ He bared his teeth in a snarl as he broke through the trees. ‘Once Ariel has led me to Sativus, everything can be as it was. I will heal the wounds I have created. I will heal the forest. I will show Sativus he was right to trust me.’
A few minutes later, Orion staggered to a halt at the edge of the clearing, dumbfounded.
The royal dais had been destroyed. Where once there was a perfect disc of grass, there was now a patch of raw, churned earth and exposed roots. At the centre of this wasteland were the still-smouldering remains of a great fire. A column of smoke reached up to the clouds and filled the air with an acrid stink, adding to the autumn haze and forcing Orion to narrow his eyes as he picked his way across the upturned soil.
The hounds waited in the trees, leaving Orion to advance alone. As he approached the smouldering pyre, Orion saw scraps of flesh and armour scattered across the soil. His sense of disbelief grew. Violence in the sacred glades was unheard of. Not even the most determined outsiders had ever reached this deep into the forest and, even if they had, Ariel’s handmaidens would never allow them enter such places. Orion stooped to examine a tattered robe and frowned. It was of asrai design.
He peered through the smoke-filled air and sensed that it was full of rage. The whole glade was taut with pain. The Otherworld was even closer here. He could see the trees’ souls, shimmering in a maelstrom of colours.
Orion dragged his consciousness back to the present and saw that there were figures silhouetted by the remains of the fire, their heads bowed in prayer.
He gripped his spear as he advanced, furious that anyone would defile Ariel’s halls in such a way.
As he neared them, one of the figures cried out, her voice a mixture of pain and hope.
‘Orion!’ cried Ariel, gliding across the clearing towards him, trailing smoke from her tawny wings.
As his queen approached, Orion felt the strength go from his legs. The weight of their past crushed him. The hunger of the hunt fell away and he dropped to his knees.
Ariel landed on the grass and stared coldly at him. Then her eyes widened as she took in his scarred flesh and withered limbs. ‘You’re wounded.’ She bowed her head for a moment and when she looked up her expression had softened. ‘You gave them everything, again.’
Orion recoiled from the pity he saw in her eyes. He had abandoned her and she looked at him with compassion. No words of accusation could have cut him more deeply.
‘I failed you.’
Ariel’s gaze hardened again. ‘Is it true, then? Have you destroyed the Council of Beasts?’
Orion was about to answer, when he noticed handmaidens, gathering around them, bowing their heads in respect. Their robes were tattered and bloodstained.
Orion stood, and managed to meet Ariel’s gaze. ‘What happened here?’ he asked, looking at the churned trenches that surrounded them.
Ariel’s voice was unusually brittle. ‘We should talk.’ She signalled for one of her handmaidens to approach.
Orion backed away as he saw who it was. ‘Naieth!’ His pulse raced and the voices in his mind growled a warning.
The prophetess gave him a look as cool as Ariel’s. ‘My king.’
Rage and shame collided in Orion’s mind. At their last encounter Naieth had begged him not to enter the Vaults of Winter and he had dismissed her like a fool. He had been so sure of himself then; so powerful. To meet her in his current state, weakened and haunted by the knowledge of his mistake, was almost more than he could bear. He met her eye and, to his horror, he saw that even she pitied him.
‘Why don’t you gloat?’ He glared at the copper-haired sorceress. ‘You know what a fool I am. You know what I did.’
Naieth ignored his question and her expression remained unreadable. ‘My king,’ she said, waving her staff at the corpses, ‘the most unwelcome messenger is amongst us. We are beset by phantoms and apparitions.’ Her eyes widened and she spoke with uncharacteristic simplicity. ‘We have been attacked.’
Orion realised that, rather than being calm, her face was rigid with emotion. He could not tell if it was grief or rage.
‘What did you do?’ asked Naieth. She looked at the bodies in the mud and then back at Orion. ‘Why are you here now? Where are your priests? Where are the Wild Riders?’
Orion stared at her, mute with anger and shame.
‘Where is Atolmis?’ Ariel demanded.
Orion looked away, picturing the gruesome death of Sélva.
Naieth watched him closely, then looked at her queen.
‘Come,’ said Ariel, taking both of their arms but refusing to look at Orion. ‘We have much to discuss.’
Orion yielded and the three of them made their way through the crowd, stumbling across the brutalised clearing, and entering the enormous oak.
As they stepped through the vast antechambers of the tree, Orion recalled his glorious birth, just months earlier, with Ariel at his side. He remembered the proud roar he had unleashed as they stepped out onto the royal dais, on the first day of spring. How strong he had felt then; how potent.
The tree groaned and shifted around them as they walked, assuming a profusion of different shapes and leading them to places none of them had seen before. Blades of moonlight sliced through the gloom, alighting on roots the size of hills and bark as old as mountains, leading them deeper into the ancient, heavy blackness.
Ariel’s flesh shimmered as she moved through the dark, rippling across the roots until, after several minutes, she came to a halt. She muttered something and Orion gasped as silver veins pulsed across the walls, lighting up a large, circular chamber. The lights grew brighter and Orion saw that the room was lined with a ring of seats, each one a misshapen lump of knotted, polished root that resembled a different kind of animal. The roots were twisted around bones: gleaming, bleached ribcages and femurs, and as the light shifted, Orion realised that the roots were moving – expanding and contracting as though breathing. There were serpentine runes carved into the earth and it was clearly a meeting place of some kind – a room of governance or prayer, like the chapterhouses he had seen in the outsiders’ stone temples.
‘Where have you brought us?’ he asked, finding it suddenly hard to breathe. The air in the chamber was heavy, as though not intended for mortal lungs. The little he managed to gulp down left him feeling light-headed and, as he studied the creaking chairs, he felt the Otherworld pressing closer than ever before. Ariel’s silver light pulsed and undulated across the walls, throwing odd shadows. It seemed as though there were figures sat in the chairs, watching them.
Ariel’s eyes brightened as she looked around the room. ‘I have brought us nowhere. The Oak decides, as always.’ She looked at Naieth, who was staring at the empty chairs. ‘But I know where we are.’
Naieth nodded, matching Ariel’s half-smile. The lights were glinting across her rune-covered robes, and as she approached one of the chairs it looked as though she were wreathed in white flames. She placed one of her hands on the chair and Orion saw that her nails were several inches long, curling around her fingers like coils of yellow smoke. She stroked them across the chair and looked back at Ariel, her eyes gleaming.
Orion was finding it increasingly hard to breathe and did not notice their excitement. The shadows were closing in on him and taking shape; pawing at him with broken limbs and accusing him with mute, desperate screams.
As Ariel and Naieth gently examined the circle of chairs, treating them like holy relics, Orion thudded across the chamber and sat heavily in the nearest one, feeling as though he were assailed by dozens of silent attackers.
Ariel was too busy studying the room to notice his distress. ‘Why would the tree bring us here?’ She turned to look at Orion and the suspicion came back into her eyes. ‘Why did you come back to me now? Why on this particular evening? What did you wish to discuss?’
Orion tried to reply, but his breath was coming in short gasps and all that emerged from his throat was a hoarse groan.
Ariel stepped to his side. ‘This is the very heart of the Oak.’ She placed a hand over Orion’s throat and he immediately felt his airways start to open. ‘The air here belongs to another time.’ As her fingers stroked his face, it seemed as though she was going to ask him something kinder. Then her expression became cool again. ‘You will grow accustomed to it in a moment.’
‘And what of the ghosts?’ He waved at the shadows. ‘Will I grow accustomed to them?’
Ariel and Naieth looked at each other in surprise, then Naieth nodded. ‘You see further than you did, my king. You see things we do not.’ There was a trace of humour in her voice. ‘Winter is approaching. Soon we will face the longest night.’
Ariel blanched at the mention of winter and glanced at Orion’s scarred limbs. Then she looked around the chamber and repeated her question. ‘What did you return for? There must be some reason the Oak has shown us to this particular chamber.’
Orion shuffled uncomfortably in the chair, looking at the dried blood that covered his body. Every inch of him was plastered with signs of the Wild Hunt. ‘Naieth was right. I should never have entered the Vaults. I created an imbalance. I disturbed the soul of the forest.’ His words were barely audible. ‘I destroyed the Torr-Ildána.’