The Crimson Hunters

by Robert J Power

  “Might be, that some young warriors will flee and leave their kin altogether,” she added. “They might just up and abandon those waiting behind the walls and spend a coward’s life earning regretful breath.” She spat again.

  “Every night they will come, and those few behind the wall will get better at holding them, get better at stabbing their black hearts, get better at killing, but it’ll be futile because everything’s lost, anyway.

  “Everyone they’ll ever love will be dead.

  “In a few nights, there will be few villagers left.

  “There will only be a few monsters left.

  “Then it’ll just be one person on the last day.

  “They’ll never know why or how they survive.” Her voice was cold. It was like steel.

  “All they’ll know is they’ll never rest until every thurken demon in these lost lands is dead,” she said, before wiping the last tear away and flicking it away in disgust.

  “Won’t happen tonight,” Seren said, and Kesta nodded in agreement before dropping the reins in the goddess’s lap and taking her place at the back of the cart. She wrapped some rope around her waist and attached it to each side tightly and strapped herself in. She emptied a set of quivers out in front of her and knelt down against the edge with notched bow. Natteo notched two bolts and gripped his mount’s reins. His face was pale, and he offered Derian an ‘it was a fine life’ nod.

  “Kesta and the new girl lead us through the pack. We charge at them and breakthrough to the town’s gates. We stay alive, and once we’re back in behind the walls, we make a new plan,” Lorgan said, and Derian thought it so stupid that it might just work.

  “Let’s go earn some gold!” he roared and struck his sword against his shield loudly.

  “Let’s kill every one of them!” shouted Kesta, and she fired one arrow into the valley below, signalling her murderous intentions.

  “Let’s go be heroes!” cried Derian, feigning bravery and trying to ignore his bladder suddenly filling.

  “Let’s go die like idiots!” shouted Natteo, and he wiped a tear from his eyes and replaced it with a demented sneer.

  “All die together,” Seren said, and she brought the cart down towards the battle.

  16

  The Battle of Treystone

  Any talented bard or drunken storyteller will tell a middling story and embellish just enough to make it impressive. With no respect for practicality, they’ll suggest a thousand fiends felled to one victorious hero, they’ll pledge that a bond between lovers could overcome any odds—including death itself—or they would insist that goodness always won out.

  Derian could accept most embellishments with a smile. All but one, that was. Time. He didn’t know why time irked him. Only that it did. Storytellers would have you believe battles stretched for hours, days, or longer, when really, they fought battles in horrible, ugly, violent, and bloody moments. It took only a single pulse for blood to begin to spill, and it took only a breath for any heroic warrior to take his last breath.

  It didn’t take hours to charge down a valley of fire, blood, misery and monsters, and it didn’t take hours to become a hero in battle. However, it only took a moment to be forgotten, and as Derian followed his comrades towards doom, he wondered whether there would be any great tale told of their foolish heroism.

  It all went wrong from the start.

  The first anculus demon to spot the attack was the first demon to die. From its place at the edge of the battlefield, it turned to the sound of its vanquishers and managed a scream as it fell under the crush of Seren’s charging horses and the massive wooden wheels they led. Unfortunately, the cart bounced awkwardly on its exploding head and veered harshly wide and nearly flipped. Were it not for the ropes holding her, Kesta would have fallen swiftly into the night. As it was, Seren recovered control, but the charge pulled her away from the rest of her companions. Wary of stopping to get back into formation, she followed her momentum and disappeared from Derian’s view into the mass of demon bodies.

  With no cart barging their way, Lorgan led his horse forward to break through the rear guard, swinging indiscriminately at any grey flesh he could. He drove his horse down along the valley aiming for the gate, and he was impressive. However, like a fist clearing the way in an ocean’s lazy wave, what space he made, closed behind him, and Derian and Natteo could not follow. Watching helplessly as he raced towards the gates, falling under some protection of the line of defending archers, Derian and Natteo pulled away searching for a route of their own through these hostile grounds.

  Derian, ever calm atop his magnificent beast, chose agility over speed. He guided Natteo through oblivious monster after monster, dodging their delayed instinctive blows as both mercenaries passed.

  It worked wonderfully for at least three moments before a flailing claw struck Natteo’s horse and caused it to rear in fright. Instead of fighting the horse’s reaction and continuing with Derian, Natteo fired two bolts into the offending monster and swiftly reloaded as a dozen canis demons attempted to surround him. Derian screamed out for his friend, but his survival instincts and his route took his best friend from his sight.

  Honourable man?

  It didn’t take long for Derian’s route to become crammed with the enemy, who were slowly realising they were facing an invasion of their own. All around him they snapped and growled, and still, he tried to make it for the gate, knowing any moment that he would be torn from the saddle. He held his breath and waited for the end, and his limbs became numb as though not his own, and then, without warning, Seren and Kesta rumbled by him and earned him a reprieve.

  They also earned renown worthy of legends all by themselves. Weighed down by what supplies remained, the cart became a thundering weapon, trampling all beneath its thunderous hooves and unforgiving wooden wheels. They raced through the battlefield in a great arc causing confusion and devastation as they did.

  I want to kill them all.

  All canis fell beneath their charge, leaving smeared demonic mulch in their wake. Atop the cart, Kesta fired at any anculus unfortunate enough to come in her sights, and she was incredible. With limbs no longer reacting to his will, Derian found himself inspired and charged away from his route recklessly, towards the biggest brute he could find.

  I’ll start with this fiend.

  “Come on, you thurken cur!” he roared and did what all reckless heroes did in tales, and he didn’t really know why he did it; he leapt from the saddle with Rusty already drawn.

  “For honour and glory!” he shouted because all heroes hid their terror behind war-cries as they felled great monsters. He wasn’t sure he’d struck gold with that outburst, but by the time he thought of something else to say, he’d already fallen upon the monster and knocked it to the ground. So he struck down upon it with all his might.

  Unfortunately, he hit one of its horns and the sword rebounded backwards. The tarnished grip snapped in half leaving him defenceless and looking a little foolish. Only then did he notice the demon was already dead, killed by one arrow from either Kesta or a rogue shot from the town.

  “Ah, Rusty,” he moaned and picked up the blade, holding it to the grip as though the source would weave them back together. The source made no attempt, and his horse, sensing the opportunity of escape, ran off through the mass of monsters, leaving him rightly thurked.

  The hold upon some canis demons around him diminished with their master’s death, and they scattered like a shoal of fish. Unfortunately, there was plenty to take their place, and Derian found himself surrounded again.

  Suddenly, a shrill whistling sound filled his ears, and a volley of arrows landed all around him. They struck two of the monsters down (in a pathetic show of ineptitude), and he heard a cheer from the ramparts. Though he didn’t know why; he waved in appreciation. Less for the kills but more for the flaming arrows which caused a nice burning distraction.

  He held Rusty in his grip and lamented the loss. It looked less an average sword and
more a larger than advised dagger.

  Dagger.

  He tore his vest beneath his armour and began wrapping the old threads around the end of the blade where it had snapped free because that’s what unskilled mercenaries did instead of giving up.

  “This will do,” he said aloud as a body came tumbling from a passing horse and rolled to a painful stop at his feet.

  “You idiot. You lost your horse and broke your sword in the same breath!” cried Natteo, in mocking terror. He climbed to his feet and fired at a rushing demon who’d stepped over a burning arrow, hitting it twice in the head before it collapsed on the ground.

  “I thought I lost you.”

  “You owe me money.”

  “Why did you come for me, brother?” Derian demanded, and Natteo grinned manically.

  “So we can walk into the darkness together.” The demons formed up around them. Snarling cries filled the air, their vile features revolting in the glowing embers of the fading arrows burning up around them. As though taken from the mouth of a drunken bard or talented storyteller, Derian and Natteo went to war. Back to back, they drew what blood they could shed, knowing it could never be enough. The monsters kept coming, and the pair kept killing. Natteo fired bolt after bolt into the swarming masses, and Derian stabbed swiftly any who neared with his long-dagger. As though blessed by a god from the source, somehow, no jagged set of teeth fell upon them, and no flailing claw tore them open. They moved and turned with the sway of battle, screaming and cursing and massacring all beasts who stood near them.

  “We can do this. We can survive!” Derian roared.

  “We really can’t,” Natteo replied, and he was right.

  17

  Everyone Dies… Again

  As swift as battles were, massacres were even shorter, and the massacre of the Crimson Hunters was shorter than most. If it had been a tale to tell the masses, it would have been underwhelming and symbolic of their ineffectiveness as a mercenary outfit.

  Derian never saw the first of his comrades fall, he only heard a defiant roar louder than any demonic wail, and through a break in the bodies, he caught sight of Lorgan, striking out at anything near him as he bravely attempted to regroup with them. He’d lost his horse along the way, and he swung shield and sword with such force that monsters fell to the ground all around him. As he drew nearer, however, Derian could see the unnatural strain in his movements and the heavy breathing of a man taking his last few breaths. He broke clear and fell at their feet in a wet heap.

  “Fight with me, boys, so the girls might reach the gate.” He sounded as though he spoke from beneath a lake, and Derian caught sight of the deep gash along his side. Lorgan rolled in the grass and tried to rise, and Natteo fell to his knees beside him. Derian froze seeing so many white ribs protruding out through broken flesh in the night air, and he held back a wail of melancholy. He’d felt this pain before at the side of his mother’s trodden body as she gasped her last.

  “I don’t know what to do, sir,” Natteo cried, and he took Lorgan’s hand as he convulsed. Still, Lorgan tried to rise before cursing his blood as it streamed out in a misty haze covering both Derian and Natteo.

  From a few feet away, a monster had the audacity to disturb them from their horror and charged. Derian stepped to the beast and drew its attention, sending his dagger through the monster’s brain effortlessly before knocking it away as though it was no threat at all. Other monsters circled them, but they made no move to strike, as though silent orders were whispered in their ears.

  “Help me up,” Lorgan said as his lungs sank in blood, and then he fell back in the grass as the last of his strength left him. Natteo patted him on the back but did not help him rise again, for the old man was already slipping towards the darkness.

  “There is no need, sir. We have won this battle,” Natteo said, and Lorgan gasped lightly.

  “I feel I am drowning,” Lorgan gasped, and he spat crimson blood from his mouth. “A terrible thing to drown, not worthy of any hero’s legacy,” he whimpered, and he looked beyond Natteo to something in the darkness beyond.

  “We are lost,” Derian cried and fell away from Natteo and the dead man.

  No mercy.

  He tasted metal in his mouth, and he wanted to kill them all. He wanted to rip them as they ripped others. He wanted to kill as many of those thurken curs as he could before they struck him down. Without thinking, he charged into the waiting horde recklessly. In his blood-covered left hand was old Rusty and in his pristine right hand was Lorgan’s sword. It was heavy, and he waded into them, covering himself in their blood, and the world became a blur of snarling, claws, hatred, and death.

  He was no great warrior, but a furnace of rage moved him. He struck harder than before and suffered fierce blows, all the while pledging to himself that he’d treat his injuries after the battle, even though he knew these to be grand lies. He gave himself to the fight, and for moments, he was a true mercenary. Violent, cruel, fierce, and victorious, and to any of the watching eyes from the wall, he was a hero with spinning duel blades.

  At least, for a time.

  A slip of the hand undid everything. A small beast on four hooves charged past him snarling, only to receive a strike from a plunging blade that went deep through skin and muscle but held fast. The dying monster howled and broke clear taking his sword with it, leaving only his untrusty long-dagger.

  A moment after, he didn’t even have that.

  In his defence, it seemed like a good idea and not an attempt at attaining Seren’s forgiveness in his last act before he died. For the second time.

  The cart had delivered wonderful mayhem charging through the horde, knocking the larger demons asunder and killing the smaller ones outright. However, there were only so many collisions in the terrified horses’ resolve before their power dwindled. Before the cart slowed to a trot. After a few laps around the battlefield and nearly all of Kesta’s arrows drawn and fired, the wagon became less an undefeatable war machine and more a target, but instead of pulling the fatigued mounts from the melee, Seren had dared one more deathly charge and doomed them all.

  With the cart struggling for crushing momentum, a large anculus demon leapt aboard and fell upon Kesta with slashing claws. It plunged its jagged talon into her stomach, and Derian sprinted towards the cart knowing full well there was no hope.

  The demon tore chunks of brown-skinned meat from her neck, but she was defiant. With her last arrow in an iron grip, she stabbed repeatedly until the shaft split, and she had only a twig in shaking bloody hands. Kesta cursed loudly as the beast impaled her with its massive claws one last time and lifted her high into the sky before tossing her into a group of chasing monsters.

  “Derian!” Natteo screamed, but Derian could do nothing but charge for the cart.

  “Deria–”

  From somewhere behind he heard a sudden silence take his best friend, and he refused to look back, for seeing Natteo torn limb from limb would be too much to take.

  He watched the demon turn on Seren as she tried to free herself from the rider’s seat, and still he had not neared the cart.

  Save her.

  Something deep down within him whispered in his mind. Something watching from a million miles away, from a different realm. Something which guided his thoughts, guided his ability.

  Save her.

  Rusty really was a terrible weapon. He flung it away. He thought it a strange throw too. It arched high in the air, above the horned heads of those who would kill him, before coming down at a swift, deadly angle, embedding itself in the demon’s head standing over Seren.

  Derian roared in triumph as the beast fell from the cart silently, but in avoiding another invading brute, Seren turned the cart suddenly and with the turn, she brought her charging down upon Derian.

  “Be carefu–” he screamed and caught sight of the girl, and he thought her beautiful, even as the horse struck him, and he fell beneath the cart’s dreadfully swift spinning wheels.

 
Seren screamed as Kesta stepped from the world, she felt her passing and wailed aloud like a daughter upon losing a mother, for Kesta’s will and heart were incredible, and she had been kinder than all others. Even as she died, the woman fought, and Seren thought this the finest part of being human.

  Human.

  She was becoming a fine human; she was very sad it would end. She screamed in fear and panic, and she pulled the horses to the side hoping to knock the beast clear. Her horses obeyed and incredibly the beast lost its footing and fell away, and she kicked them forward, but she pulled too severely and they veered wider than she expected.

  They hit a large rock, and she felt the world teeter unsteadily. For a moment, she thought the entire cart would flip but it didn’t. She roared in triumph, and there was a flash of white skin as she saw stupid Derian in front of her, but it was too late.

  Spittle formed in her mouth. She hated him, but still, she tried to pull the horses wide of the idiot, but he fell beneath her and a stream of blood splattered up and splashed her in the face. His body broke into a million pieces, and the wheels flattened his face to nothing, and she felt some sorrow. Not much, but a little.

  Then she felt something far fiercer than pity or regret. Her stomach erupted in fire, and she screamed aloud. It was no mere wail of agony; it was a howl, fiercer than any demon’s cry, and it erupted from her body like a molten ocean, deep beneath the ground.

  Not yet. I’m not ready.

  She fell from the cart as if thrown and crumpled in the dirt and screamed as though her tormentor was trying to tear right through her body—and perhaps she was. Her tattoo of gold was glowing and burning as though on fire, and it became solid.