Of Wolf And Witch

by S. A. McGarey

  The men-at-arms looked at him. “Thank you, sir hunter,” one of them said.

  “Duncan,” Duncan said “Duncan Frey.”

  “Thank you, mister Frey.”

  “I don’t suppose there’s any coin for my trouble?”

  “I’m sorry, sir. We haven’t any coin to spare, but perhaps miss Jayla at the inn will give you a free night's rest and a good meal?”

  Jayla stepped forward. “Consider it my pleasure. You saved our town, and your lady friend here saved our people. It is the least I can do.”

  “Throw in some drinks and I’ll gladly accept,” Duncan bargained.

  Jayla nodded.

  “Lead the way, Miss.”

  Jayla led Duncan and Ravenna to the inn while the villagers began the work of re-burying the dead. As they walked, Duncan began to speak.

  “You helped them out too?”

  “I did,” Ravenna replied. “They had some wounded. All minor wounds, but with infection, it could have been worse.”

  “So, healing magic?”

  “Yes… Is that a problem?”

  “No.”

  Ravenna was surprised at this. Duncan hated magic but had no problem that she used it to heal people. “I thought you’d have a problem with me using magic on them.”

  “I don’t like magic. It’s messy and people can get hurt, especially when it’s used wrong,” He touched the mark behind his ear. “That said, you used it responsibly. You helped people. I help people by swinging a sword and killing things. You help by talking to people and treating them. You did a good thing here Ravenna. It’s something I could not have done. I don’t mind that you used magic this time. I’m glad you were able to help them.”

  “Duncan, I didn’t realize you had such a soft spot for people,” Ravenna teased.

  “It’s hardly a soft spot. People are the reason I still find work. Maybe since we did good things here, people will remember, and call on us again, hopefully, next time with coin.”

  “So this is more about getting paid than it was about helping people?”

  “It’s about both. I’m a hunter. I do unsavory things for coin. That doesn’t mean that I don’t care about the people I help. I just don’t deal with them very well. I wasn’t always that way though. It’s only been since…”

  “What?”

  “I’ll tell you all about it over a drink.”

  Before long, Jayla had led them to the inn. Duncan needed a drink, especially with the story he was about to tell.

  Chapter 9

  Duncan ordered a mug of mead, and Ravenna mimicked him. Mead was a close second favorite for Duncan after Frostfall ale, but Frostfall Ale was only really popular in the north, where people loved the cold, although it did see a small niche market in the capital and Southgate where people thought it was too hot and wanted something to cool them down. Mead was good though. The honeyed flavor made Duncan’s stomach soothe and warm up with no real effort.

  “So, what were you going to tell me?”

  “An old friend. Her name was Asha.”

  Duncan looked around the inn. Virtually no one was there, Jayla was behind the bar, but otherwise, the place was empty. People were still busily re-burying the corpses that had been reanimated by the necromancy of the witch. A fire roared and crackled in the fireplace, warming the interior of the wooden building.

  “Asha was a girl from Frostfall that I was involved with. We were together for quite some time, and we were going to be married.”

  Ravenna could hardly believe it. “You? Married?”

  “I wasn’t always this way. I used to be normal,” Duncan said. This story changed everything. It wasn’t a pleasant one to tell. He took a swig of his mead and continued. “At least, I thought we would be married. We never really got the chance though.”

  “Something happened to her?” Ravenna asked.

  “Tell me, have you ever heard of a Sanguine? Duncan asked.

  “Blood-sucking creature? Real nasty thing, right?

  “That’s it,” Duncan confirmed. “One of those happened. It came to Frostfall and started dropping bodies, but it was smart. Only came out at night and was real quiet about it all. Just so happened I was up late at my father’s forge and was up all night. When the sun began to rise, I decided to go see Asha. I went across the city to her place, but what I found was unpleasant, to say the least.”

  “The Sanguine?”

  “Yes. It found Asha. It was feasting on her when I arrived. I don’t know how many bodies it dropped during the night, but hers was the last. I had one of my father’s swords with me, and I used it to slay the beast, but it was too late for Asha. She was already turning, becoming one of them. Sanguines tend to do that. If they don’t outright kill you, they turn you instead. Some say it’s the sweetness of your blood that causes them to do it, but no one knows for sure.”

  “So Asha is a Sanguine now?”

  “Asha is dead. Killed by my hand,” Duncan said, peering down into his mug of mead. “I had to stop her from turning. I couldn’t let another Sanguine roam the city; much less let the woman I wanted to marry become such a monster. It broke my heart to do it. It broke everything that I was, but it had to be done, so it was done.”

  Ravenna seemed to understand Duncan a little more now. The sorrow she sensed with her empathic magic made so much sense now. “Duncan, I’m so sorry you had to go through that.”

  “Since that day, I’ve hunted monsters. I don’t want others to have to go through what I did. I can handle it, but not everyone else can. If I can save someone from my fate, then I’ll do it. So you see, it isn’t that I don’t care about people. I do. It’s just that I don’t function well around them. I haven’t since I lost the one who actually mattered.”

  Ravenna leaned over and gave Duncan a quick hug. “I think I’m beginning to understand you, Duncan Frey.”

  “Yet I know nothing of you, Ravenna, other than that you are a witch and that you seem to enjoy helping people. Tell me more about yourself. After all, I did share with you.”

  “That you did,” Ravenna said. “Alright, I can tell you about myself.”

  Ravenna glanced down at her mug of mead as she began to weave the story of her past.

  “As you know, witch magic is learned, not bestowed. This means you likely want to know what set me down the path of witchery. My parents are… no longer in the picture. When I was a young girl, my parents were murdered by bandits, right in our own home. I hid and was careful not to make any noise so that I would not be discovered. When the bandits left, I gathered some belongings and headed to the nearby forest, for I feared the bandits would return. It was in the forest that I met someone who changed my life. In the forest lived a witch who offered me power. She saw my sorrow and offered me the opportunity to become more powerful and to take vengeance on the bandits that murdered my family. I was afraid but I was also angry. Angry at the bandits, angry at the world. So I accepted her offer despite my fear. She trained me in the ways of witch magic. I grew more powerful in the next few years, but it wasn’t very long before the Rivanian Royal Witch Hunters came skulking through the forest looking for her. She told me to run, to avoid the witch hunters. I hid amongst the trees and watched as they found her. They proclaimed her to be a witch and put her to the sword. I watched as they beheaded her and took the head as proof that they had found a witch. The king would undoubtedly be happy, but I was alone again. I was in my teens then, and decided that I would continue learning and try to become stronger in the ways of magic.”

  “Looks like you succeeded,” Duncan said.

  Ravenna smiled slightly at that. “After that,” She continued, “I did exactly what you’d expect. I divined the location of the bandits who killed my family using my new magic, and I found where they operated. Their base of operations was a small camp outside of Dusk, where I grew up. I made my way to the camp, raised an impassable barrier around the camp, to prevent anyone from leaving. Finally, I set the camp ablaze with my magic
. Magical flames sprouted up throughout the camp. The flames could not be doused by water or suffocated by a lack of air. Only by my will or my death would they be extinguished. The bandits went into a panicked frenzy, running away from their camp only to find that they could not leave. My barrier stopped them in their tracks and ensured their eventual demise. The bandits burned to death… every last one of them. As they last bandit, the leader, screamed with his dying breath, I ceased my magic and inspected the dead. My job was done. Their charred bodies would serve as a warning to any who crossed me.”

  “Ruthless,” Duncan said shortly. “If you are that powerful, then why haven’t you killed me yet?”

  “For one,” Ravenna began, “It’s hard to kill someone with magic when they have a magical dampening pendant like yours.”

  “I’ll give you that,” Duncan replied. “What else?”

  “Secondly, there are some things in this world that are simply stronger than magic.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like love,” Ravenna said. “Or in your case, hate. Hatred for my kind like you have… my magic wouldn’t stand a bloody chance.”

  “Interesting,” Duncan said, having learned something new. “I found your story enlightening, Ravenna. You and I, maybe we aren’t so different after all.”

  “Maybe we aren’t. Maybe we are.” Ravenna remarked. “You might know my story, but you don’t know me.”

  Ravenna was ready to retire for the night, but Duncan wasn’t quite there yet. I downed his mug of mead and ordered another. Ravenna sipped the last of hers and sat the mug down.

  “Which way to my room?” Ravenna turned to ask Jayla.

  “It’s upstairs, the last door on the left. I’m sorry, but I’m a little short on space, so you two will have to share a room. I hope that isn’t too much of an inconvenience.”

  Ravenna scowled. “It isn’t ideal, but we’ll survive.”

  Duncan took a long swig of mead from his new full mug. “I’ll be up after a bit. Don’t feel like you have to wait for me.”

  “Don’t worry, I won’t,” She replied.

  Ravenna made her way up the stairs until she was no longer in Duncan’s sight. The sounds of the tavern were much different than the sounds of the forest Ravenna had been used to. He hoped she’d be able to find sleep. Then again, she probably had sleep magic or something equally as unnatural to help her, Duncan thought to himself. He took another long swig of mead and settled down in a corner by himself, listening to the bard sing and play his lute. Every few minutes, a serving girl would come to check on Duncan to see if he needed anything. Duncan only ever ordered another mead, barely looking at the girl, who, to others would have seemed quite fetching. Duncan had no eyes for her though, much to her dismay. He was lost in the bard’s song, and even further lost in thought. He thought of the witch Selene, whom he would soon kill. He thought of Ravenna’s story and how they were more similar than they were unlike. He thought of those words she said. It was true that he knew her story, but how much more could she have hidden beneath the surface? Perhaps she was right. He didn’t know her, but that didn’t matter right now. They were just traveling companions, maybe not necessarily by choice, but still bound together in Duncan’s quest for revenge.

  In the small hours of the early morning, past midnight but not yet sunrise, the revelry in the tavern had ceased. The bard was gone, along with most of the women who watched him that night. Duncan chuckled and thought that he probably had a good night. Others were passed out from drinking too much. Only Jayla was still awake, cleaning dishes and looking out into her kingdom of the drunk and weary. Duncan nodded to her as he walked by, going to the stairs and ascending to the second floor. He quietly opened the last door on the right, closing it behind him. He stripped off his armor and his blade and laid them on the floor. After going to the room’s privy and relieving himself of the mead, he walked back into the room and laid down on the floor beside his gear. In no time, he was asleep.

  Chapter 10

  “Hey,” Duncan said in his gruff tone. “Wake up.”

  Ravenna’s eyes slowly opened up. They weren’t ice blue as they normally were. They had become a shade of black. Not quite full black, but not grey either. Black gave way to blue as Ravenna came to and joined the waking world.

  “I was sleeping,” she said in an irritated tone that suggested that she was not done sleeping.

  “I know. It’s morning. We need to get moving.”

  “Ugh,” Ravenna uttered with disgust. “Morning,” her eyes flashed yellow with loathing.

  “Come on. Up with you.”

  “Fine,” she said, rising from the bed. Her nightgown draped over her body, hiding her curves beneath the fabric. “Give me a moment to ready myself, and we will head out.”

  She strode across the room and into the privy to get dressed. Duncan put on his gear as Ravenna readied herself for the journey ahead. Today they would begin the trip to Hammerforge, the dwarven city in southwestern Rivania. Hammerforge was the place where the biggest Blacksteel vein known to Rivania was located. It is where the Blacksteel that made up Black Ice came from. The witch’s trail led there according to Ravenna. He didn’t know what she was possibly doing in Hammerforge, but if she was there, it couldn’t possibly be a good thing. The dwarves were in as much danger as he had been as a child, if not more. The witch had likely only gotten more powerful and nastier over time. That is, in Duncan’s mind, what witches did after all.

  As he mused on his thoughts, Ravenna exited the privy and came into the main room. She wore the same clothes from the day before, but they did not have a distinct scent. It was as if she used her magic to rid the clothes of their scent and make them clean. Useful, even if it was magic.

  “Ready to go?” she asked.

  Duncan nodded.

  The trip to Hammerforge would take a few days, even on the rented horses that they used. They would need to stop to make camp a few times, and might even be able to stop at another village along the way. The most perilous part of the trip would begin once they crossed into the Rivanian desert.

  Rivania was home to a desert in the southern part of the land. It covered most of the south, including the capital city of Rivan, which was known as an Oasis among the sands, as if it were the sole diamond in the rough. Desert stretched out both east and west from Rivan, and covered the area of two dwarven cities, including Hammerforge, where Duncan and Ravenna were bound. Like the rest of Rivania, the desert was home to monsters all it's own. Efreets and Djinns lived in the legends of the desert, but few had ever claimed to see one. It was thought that they were legends and nothing more. Some giants even roamed that scorched land, laying claim to the wastes that were unsettled by man, elf, or dwarf. Beneath the heated sands, there lay another creature. It was a colossal worm capable of swallowing men and their mounts whole, leaving not even bones to be found. All these dangers lay in the path they must take. Still, there was time before reaching the desert.

  Dawn lay in the middle section of Rivania’s strange climate. It wasn’t far enough north to be covered in frost, nor far enough south to be embroiled in the heat of the deserts. It was in the temperate middle area, and the people there enjoyed it. For the first day of their trip, Duncan and Ravenna would need to cross the temperate area reaching from Dawn to the outskirts of the desert. It is there that they could make camp. If the horses made good time, which Duncan suspected they would, then the journey would be easy.

  It was late morning when they finally set out, and the journey began peacefully. The horses carried them forward without resorting the full-blown galloping. It would do no good to wear them out right away. Duncan and Ravenna both made awkward attempts at small talk, discussing their favorite bards and bardic songs and stories. It was decided that Duncan’s favorite song to hear the bards of Rivania play was called ‘A Song of You’. It was a tune written by an unknown author describing his love in a song. Duncan enjoyed it because it was passionately written. In truth, hearing it
made him melancholy. He loved the tune, but it reminded him of Asha, and it left a bittersweet taste in his mouth. Duncan wasn’t much for bardic stories unless they involved a lot of combat and death, but the songs always managed to get to him. Perhaps it was their melodies and hidden meanings, but they reached Duncan’s heart when little else could. Ravenna, on the other hand, rarely heard bards perform. She knew some of the stories, but not as the bards told them. Most of the ones with happy endings ended much worse than the bards would have you believe. As for songs, Ravenna knew too few. Much to her surprise, a voice began to sing some of the more popular ones. It was a gruff voice, lacking fine-tuning, but it got the melody mostly right. She was surprised to see that it was none other than Duncan singing to her.

  Your eyes just like a sky so blue

  For you, my heart is always true

  Nothing I would rather do

  Than spend my life alongside you

  It was nothing more than a simple verse of a simple song, but it made Ravenna smile. She never thought she would hear Duncan sing, yet here he was, singing a tune and getting lost in it. If she didn’t know better, she would say he’d momentarily forgotten about Selene and his hunt for her. Ravenna decided that if all bards sang songs like that, then she might like to hear them sometime. She hadn’t been around too many people, living in the forest, and one thing she missed out on was the entertainment of a good bard. Duncan resolved to fix that as soon as possible.

  As time passed, they found themselves making good time and not being overly bored with the journey. Eventually, they came to a small ravine, with a bridge crossing over it. A group of three men stood on the bridge, blocking their path forward. The horses stopped as they came within shouting distance of the men.

  “Toll bridge,” said one of the men.

  “Excuse me,” Duncan replied.

  “You gotta pay the toll if you want to cross.”