“You’re Bray,” the first man said, stepping forward and extending a dirt-stained hand. “I’m Hildebrand.”
Bray walked the remaining steps and narrowed the gap, taking the man’s hand. “Bartholomew said I could join you.”
“He told us,” Hildebrand said. “We waited a few extra minutes, in case you were coming.”
“I’m Levi,” said the man with the gums.
Bray studied Hildebrand and Levi, counting six men behind them. All were dressed similarly. Bows much like the one he was carrying hung over their shoulders. Full quivers were stuck in their belts, opposite long, flat swords on their waists, and they carried backpacks.
“We should get going,” Levi said.
A few of the hunters turned, giving quick waves to a few soldiers, and then they headed across the massive bridge. Bray followed close behind. They walked silently under the noise of the waterfall, heading toward the boulders that separated the road from the bridge. The sun crept over the eastern mountains, revealing the dark silhouettes of the rising hills. Bray kept his torch high as they reached the far end of the bridge and the soldiers parted to let them pass the stones, and then they were headed down the road, away from The Arches and back into the wild.
Chapter 63: Bray
Levi and Hildebrand hung back next to Bray while the other men walked a few paces ahead. Ever since they left, the men had been asking questions, and Bray had deftly been answering, giving the same information he’d given the others. In the conversation’s lulls, they watched him expectantly, as if he might reveal some secret weapon or godly mystery. They were probably hoping to obtain some information that they could take back to their friends.
Or perhaps something they could take back to Deacon.
Bray wasn’t a fool. Every move he made, every word spoken, was being scrutinized.
Bray kept an eye on his surroundings. A thin layer of snow covered the road. He could still see some of the tracks their horses made riding in, mostly covered by the tracks of other men coming and going to The Arches.
The river hung off to their right, following the road so closely that Bray wondered if the gods and the Ancients had worked in tandem. The surging waterfall was behind them, but Bray could still hear it, roaring faintly over his shoulders, reminding him they had left the islands behind. Despite his reservations about the hunters, he felt a strange sensation of freedom that he hadn’t felt since leaving Brighton. Days in the foreign settlement had given him a claustrophobic feeling.
It was good to be out in the wild.
“We were thinking you might bring the god weapons,” Hildebrand admitted, once the rest of their inquiries had been exhausted.
“Not today,” Bray said.
“A shame,” Levi said. “It would have been nice to see how they worked on animals.”
“Perhaps next time,” Bray said. Looking at the road ahead of them, still cautious, he asked, “How far are we going?”
“As you can imagine, lots of places have been heavily hunted around here,” Levi answered. “We’ll cut into the forests through a pass between the mountains ahead. We know a few spots that might give us luck.”
“Maybe we’ll land some wild boar,” Hildebrand added.
Pointing at the river, Bray asked, “Do you ever hunt on the other side?”
Hildebrand shook his head. “Not lately. We’ve had some trouble with Savages nesting in some crumbled buildings over there.”
“They are a nuisance,” Bray muttered.
“Deacon’s going to send out a group to dispose of them,” Levi said. Patting the bow at his side, he said, “I’d do it myself, but I’d rather spend the energy on something we can eat.”
“I hear you,” Bray said.
Back in Brighton, Bray might’ve been excited at the prospect of demons to kill. Demons meant coins, and coins meant any number of things on which he could spend them. But now, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d taken a scalp. He followed the hunters as they walked farther.
“I noticed you have an injury,” Levi asked, motioning to Bray’s shoulder. “Did you get it while hunting?”
“No, I got it in battle,” said Bray.
“Are your people at war?”
“Yes,” Bray answered, realizing he didn’t know the exact answer to that question, and probably never would.
He was never going back to Brighton.
Hildebrand nodded grimly. “I don’t remember a time when our people weren’t at war. The Halifax men are a threat we’ll never be rid of.”
“We hope to, one day,” Levi said.
They kept walking next to the river, following the road as it curved around places that Bray hadn’t seen yet. The steep banks on his left were filled mostly with trees, but every so often, he saw the remains of a building. Most had only a single wall, or two. In one building, missing the front two walls and covered with a broken roof, he saw a skeleton sitting upright in a corner.
Catching Bray looking at the bones, Levi said, “That’s Henry.”
“Henry?”
“Our hunting partner,” Levi explained as a few of the men chuckled. “He’s been here since we were kids. Every once in a while, a bone or two will disappear, but he’s mostly remained intact through the seasons.”
“He’s good luck,” Hildebrand added.
“Who is he?” Bray asked.
“No one knows,” Levi said. “It could be the skeleton of a demon that was killed long ago. Or someone from a tribe that passed through here.”
“Hopefully he’ll be good luck for today’s hunt,” Bray said.
“We’ll see.”
Chapter 64: Bray
After hiking the road a while longer, they cut from the road and headed up an incline, hiking through a pass between two mountains. The snow, mostly thin on the road, was a little deeper due to the cover of the trees and the lack of sunlight melting it. Sticks and rocks poked through the ground’s white layer. The sun had risen high enough that they no longer needed torches, but in certain places, it gave off a glare that Bray didn’t like.
The men around him breathed heavily as they made the climb. Bray shielded his eyes, surprised to see another building in the distance.
“What’s that?” he asked, pointing.
“Nothing significant,” Levi said with a shrug. “A long time ago, it housed Savages, but the soldiers took care of them.”
They hiked toward it when a sudden movement made Bray tense. A familiar shriek echoed off the surrounding mountains. “It looks like more came back.”
The men sprang alert as three demons sprinted from behind the building, wailing and crushing the snow with bare, dirty feet. Their bulbous heads sagged to the side as they screeched. Bray drew his sword. The hunters in front were already engaged with their flat swords, swinging at the charging demons. He watched as one of them hacked at the first demon, sending it wailing and bleeding. Another cut through a demon’s neck with apparent skill, dropping it to the snow. The third demon skirted around the first group of men, perhaps looking for a meal that hadn’t already been claimed.
It came towards Bray.
Bray stabbed the creature in the chest and ripped out his sword. The creature fell to its knees, gurgling its last breath, toppling.
More demons ran into the open from behind the building.
At least a dozen.
If Bray had been alone, he might’ve been worried, but the hunters were unfazed. They hacked and sliced with a precision he hadn’t seen in a while, battling off the approaching demons. The twisted men fell underneath the men’s swords, screeching as they died. One of the hunters nocked an arrow, sending a well-placed shot at a slow demon that had tripped on the slippery slope.
Bray fought off two more that ran at him, hacking off one’s hand and spearing it in the heart, then slicing another’s neck. When he was finished, he stabbed the fallen demons for precaution, ensuring they were dead, watching as their blood stained the snow around them.
The
mountain pass fell silent, save the exhilarated breaths of men who had survived a skirmish. He looked around, verifying none of the men had fallen. None were injured. None were afraid. They looked at each other with determined eyes that recalled previous battles.
“Let’s make sure that’s the last of ’em,” one of the hunters said as he started up the hill. A few others followed.
Levi and Hildebrand walked over to join Bray.
Noticing the three dead demons on the ground, Levi said, “You can fight.”
Bray nodded. “I would hope so. It’s what I’ve spent most of my life doing.”
“Let’s catch up to the others.”
**
The building was empty, but it reeked of demons. The carcasses of a few animals lay in the middle of the floor, chewed beyond recognition. Leaves and sticks littered the floor, blown in after years of open doors and windows, or dragged in by demons’ feet.
One of the hunters held his nose from the smell. “We’ll have to let the others know to be careful.”
“Nasty, stinking louts,” said another, surveying the stench-ridden dwelling.
Finding nothing else of interest, they left the building and continued hiking up the pass, wary for demons, but they saw no more tracks, and heard no more screeches. Most of the bloodshed seemed to have been left behind. Soon they were on level terrain. The forest sprawled out in front of them, filled with trees, scrub brush, and snow. Bray saw some squirrel tracks on the ground.
“A good sign,” Levi told Bray quietly, pointing at them.
In the time they’d hiked, the sun had risen further, illuminating the trees around them and casting off the morning shadows. The initial glare had dissipated.
The men fanned out. Bray wasn’t used to coordinating with others, but the hunters covered more ground than he could alone, keeping sight of each other between the trees. Bray listened for rustles in the dead brush that would alert him to game, or other dangers. He looked for tracks in the snow. Levi and Hildebrand kept close, scrutinizing the ground.
They walked for a while with no sign of anything.
Finally, Bray spotted some tracks veering off from around a nearby tree, heading through an area of thick bushes and bramble. He stopped and hissed to the others, “Pig tracks.”
Hildebrand and Levi came over to look at where he was pointing.
“It looks like a decent-sized boar,” Hildebrand agreed.
“With any luck, the hairy beast is nearby,” Levi grunted.
They followed the tracks through the scrappy foliage, readying their bows and arrows. Some of the other men had spotted something else, heading in another direction. Levi and Hildebrand’s breath plumed the air as they walked alongside Bray. Hopefully they’d bag a hog.
Bray had just passed a group of trees when he spotted movement in the distance. He raised his bow and advanced. Through the trees, a black, coarse animal was rooting in the ground, quartered away from him, probably looking for nuts or insects under the snow.
“I’ve got him,” Bray whispered, calling his shot as he pulled back his arrow.
Hildebrand and Levi crept quietly next to him, preparing arrows in case he missed. Bray aimed, ignoring the lingering pain in his shoulder from his gunshot wound. He held the arrow still, aiming a third of the way up its body and near its front leg—a kill shot without much chase, if he made it in the heart or lungs. The pig looked up.
It snorted.
Before it could run, he sent the arrow flying. The shot went straight and true. The pig squealed as it turned in circles, spraying the ground with its blood, and then ran thirty yards and dropped. Hildebrand and Levi cried out, impressed with Bray as they ran to recover the beast, which had already stopped breathing.
“Looks like you got its heart,” Levi said, with respect on his face. “We’ve seen too many get away, with the wrong shot.”
Bray nodded as he bent down next to the dead beast. “So have I. The harder part is cleaning and carrying it,” he said, taking some game bags out of his backpack.
“Normally whoever kills it gets a break,” Hildebrand said. “We can clean it for you, if you want.”
“I’ve got it,” Bray said, still feeling the pain in his shoulder, but not about to let that stop him as he reached for the knife on his hip.
Chapter 65: Kirby
Kirby hadn’t slept much after Bray left. For a while, she watched William sleep, but eventually she made her way outside to tend the horses. While she was feeding them, several people opened their doors and peered out into the daylight, glancing in her direction. A child several years younger than William waved. Later, more people emerged, starting on morning chores, or carting baskets to other parts of the island. Some collected firewood from the backs of their houses to replenish what had burnt down in the night.
The sun was well over the tops of the trees when Kirby saw Flora coming up the road. She stopped and stood up straight, greeting her.
“Good morning,” Flora said, carrying another basket.
“More fish?” Kirby asked.
“The fish weren’t biting this morning,” Flora admitted. “I brought some bread. Hopefully William hasn’t eaten yet?”
“He’s still asleep,” Kirby said. Catching a whiff of the food, she said, “You didn’t have to bring us anything. We still have plenty of vegetables from the market.”
“I was concerned about him. I haven’t seen him in a while,” Flora said with a warm smile.
“He’s been asleep since yesterday afternoon, on and off,” Kirby said. “Perhaps we shouldn’t have been out so long on the second island. He’s exhausted.”
Flora looked concerned. “I hope he feels better soon. Maybe we need another healer. Occasionally, we use some of the healers on the second island.”
“Deacon said something similar,” Kirby remembered. “How many healers do you have there?”
“More than a handful. As you can imagine, our elderly tend to get sick more often.”
“That makes sense.” Kirby nodded.
“A few of those healers are among The Important Ones. They know remedies that the younger healers don’t use. They rarely leave the island, though,” Flora explained. “Occasionally, under dire circumstances, sick people are brought to the second island. If William gets worse, perhaps Deacon will allow it.”
Kirby thought on it a moment. “No, we will stay here. We will see how he does. I don’t want him to move any more than he has to.”
Flora nodded. “I’ll leave this bread for you. Please tell William I said hello.”
“I will,” said Kirby.
Chapter 66: Bray
Bray allowed the other men to carry pieces of his quartered hog. There was no way he could carry it all himself. Most of the men were congratulatory towards him, though he still wasn’t convinced they weren’t going to rob him and take the rest of his kill. Despite his misgivings, the men already seemed to have forgotten about him as they wove through a cluster of short, green pines that still held their needles, continuing the hunt.
The area around them was quiet, save the sound of Levi and Hildebrand’s footsteps crunching over the snow, and the sounds of the other hunters.
By the time half the day had passed, a few of the other hunters bagged boars—though none as large as Bray’s—and a few had killed rabbits. The hunters cleaned and gutted those animals and carried or dragged them along, depending on the size, or put pieces in their bags.
They kept hiking until they reached an overlook that dropped into a large ditch, surrounded by an overhang of large trees. Bray walked next to Levi and Hildebrand, reaching the edge and looking down into a massive, sprawling ravine. The other hunters took up spots further down next to them.
“We have some luck here sometimes,” Levi explained, pointing into the ravine.
Beneath them, the land curved sharply downward, leveling out in a long gulley filled with snow. Bray startled at something enormous covering the bottom of the slope.
“B
y the gods,” he whispered. “What is that?”
The gigantic brown, corroded object was the size of several houses in Brighton. It took up most of the gulley. The bulk of it was comprised of a single, long tube, with numerous rusted holes in the side that might’ve once been windows. Wilted plants stuck out wherever gaps had rusted in the sides of the metal. Two angular, rusted pieces of metal stuck out from the middle of the tube. It looked like the Ancients made the device.
Or had they?
“Is this leftover from your people?” Bray asked, unable to look away from the strange object.
“No, it is leftover from our gods,” Hildebrand answered, noting Bray’s expression. “Surely you’ve seen things like it in your travels?”
“Nothing exactly the same,” Bray said. “Similar things, maybe, but not this.”
Perhaps proud of something with which he could impress Bray for a change, Hildebrand said, “We have a man who studies some of the objects the gods left behind. His name is Jonas. Jonas believes our gods used devices like these to travel through the air. The long pieces of metal on the side resemble a bird’s wings. The gods used these devices to get from one part of the forest to the next, or perhaps to travel over water and to other lands.”
“They could reach each other very quickly in devices like these, according to Jonas’s guess,” Levi added.
Bray shook his head. He’d have to ask Kirby about it when he got back. She’d already surprised him with her knowledge of the Ancient objects called cars.
“Imagine what we could do with an object like this,” Levi said, shaking his head.
They marveled in silence at the object for a while.
Finally, Hildebrand said, “For now, it is a place where we can scare up game. Come on, let’s go.”
**
They spent some time walking next to the strange object, scaring up rabbits that were hiding beneath the object, or sending rats scurrying. Some of the hunters bagged rabbits with their bows.
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