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Starlit Saga - The First Hunt

Caia trudged through thickets toward the injured man’s cries. Falling rain hushed the forest. No wind or squall, only the world’s long, heaving breath. She found him leaned into the folds of a shalestone spur. Before he could notice her, she saw that a leg and an arm had been bloodied and the flesh of his hand stripped from knuckle to wrist. He had wrapped it with his own robes and held the knot heavily, though it sagged. He was stuck in a bramble of gnarled blackberry that stained his robes. He caught a glimpse of her incandescent pearl hair and jumped in surprise. “Oh! Brightness, you scared me. Where did you come from? Have you—have you come to help?” he asked, holding back from pleading. He tried to lift himself but winced and slumped down again. Caia stepped past him to a bent tree and begin to wrest sturdy branches away, taking up bark strips and long stalks to fashion a sled. “Give me your sash,” she said, and, though befuddled a moment, he did. She knotted it at one end to use as a handle and pulled it together at one end. Meanwhile the westerman babbled on, using his reed hat to shield himself from the rain. “I had been told by many messengers before me, that there’d be few in the Crossroads who’d help me if I so much as tripped over a berm. That you all still take after the ancestors who walled off the whole nation, and there was nary an inn bed to be found even in friendly Ithlvale. But I’ve always wanted to see the Nivenwood.” Noticing his pronunciation was odd, Caia’s interest was piqued. She heard a rustling nearby, however, and kept to fashioning the sled. She used a spare cord from her moccasin to finish it. Wood squeaked as it came together. “I know,” he chuckled, going on, “I know this is not the Nivenwood, but it is beautiful, and it is Niven, and, well, wood. Everything about your land is so, so beautiful—and dangerous. I thought myself doomed in this beautiful, dangerous land.” Caia began to lift him, pulling him onto her makeshift gurney. His thickly-wrapped hand grasped at her knee. “Thank you,” said the man. Mud from his silks left stains on her furs. His eyes were deep, bright and zealous as the sun. “Thank you.” She nodded, brought him up into place, and told him, “Hold onto the sides,” then pulled by the handle made from his sash, which had grown stronger as it moistened and coiled. At first she slipped a little, but found her footing scrabbling over pinecone shards and felled branches and rock formations like bone. Descending the first hillock, the sled drifted forward and nearly took her along for a ride. It twisted around and slid down the hill. The injured man yelped in panic, but Caia rushed forward to stop him. She wouldn’t make the same mistake twice. The desperate slapping of beavers attempting to save their home filled the vales with life, distorting the sounds of the village’s springtime revelries. The injured westerman had been quietly singing a tune he learned from a sailor but, forgetting the words, it dithered into a hum. Caia pressed through a knoll to a spot where she could rest. She propped the arms of the makeshift gurney up in a Y-shaped bough and kept watch through the jagged boulders rising from tall grass. A chill had tickled in her skin, as if a mosquito had snuck under to feast. The man sighed thankfully. “Nearly out now. I can hear their festivities,” he said. Both of them leaned back, breathed easy. Caia hunched over with her hands on her hips. But a slight, aberrant noise caught both their attentions. A sound like the crinkling of aluminum. Bellows that shuddered in the trees and the ground. She had heard the same sound over the hills in the nights throughout the summers of her childhood. Hunters would descend from the village in droves when it crept too near in the fall. By the last moons of the year they would howl in their packs, filling the mountains with eerie, high-pitched music and beautiful lights. By the first moons of the next cycle, most would be culled. Gripped with equal parts wonder and fear, “A dyrewolf,” the westerman gasped. Another foreign word that interested Caia, it would be brought up again over rabbit leek stew that night, but at the time it went by unquestioned. She scanned the thickets, shuddering and reverberating. A squeal like warping wood cascaded right to left with no clear origin, then the quiet returned. Suddenly, she spied a patch of earth and grass and out-of-season mushrooms that took on a faint shine, moved as if there was wind when there was none. Warping and rising, grass shifted into trees and stone, doubling, tripling as they changed. It was only a mirage covering a glassy hide. She moved slowly at first. Her fingers slipped over the gurney’s handle. She knew it would know she had seen it if she reached out too fast. She shifted to push it back from where it was lodged, and nearly slipped off her feet in a carpet of wet leaves. The woods themselves began to gallop, letting out sharp metal yaps. The illusions from its crown disappeared like the flames of a torch burning out. Twenty or so eyes made of lightning charged behind a wall of glass dagger teeth. As the westerman panicked, Caia dug in and forced the gurney out of the tree, sending it spinning downhill. She clamored from the mud, sliding down behind. Razored paws slammed against the tree just behind her, nearly crumpling under the beast’s weight. Sawdust sprayed her face but the stubborn branches held the creature there for a moment. Glimpsing back, she saw its muscles and blue veins and bones churning like gears pulsating beneath see-through thin skin. It broke through the tree’s remainders after them, but Caia was already only a shadow in the distance. Its metal roar echoed through the woods. She brought them up a steep rise through uneven gravel. “Don’t leave me with it,” pleaded the westerman, yanking at a moccasin—snagging so she stumbled before taking up the flimsy handle again and tearing with all her might toward a dense cluster of cottonwood saplings. A crooked lightning-struck tree cast its shadow to fallen trunk that formed a border ahead of them. The westerman whined as he watched the creature tearing thick trees asunder. “Quiet,” she snapped. She pulled him over a stone into the thicket. As they sank into the saplings, he saw the shadow of a great tree fall above them. Heard its snap and the caw of many birds lifting away as it groaned and fell with a shuddering slam. They slipped over the smallest trees without issue, but she struggled to wade their hardening stream. Branches broke beneath them, threatening to impale with one foul step. Rough bark began shredding the gurney, along with his silken sleeves. Looking back, he saw the face of the horror that had haunted him since noon. He gasped four small, sharp gasps, and urinated a little in his breeches, but otherwise he froze entirely. Months later, after looking back many times on the experience, his logbook would read: Under my 9th Sun in the land of the Crossroads, I was set upon by a dyrewolf, and saved by a hunter of that land. Firstly, and most predominantly, upon close sighting of a true dyre creature—not those found roaming in the farm fields outside Ithos Aurvari, fattened, warped and altogether unrecognizable from their far more fit progenitors—it must be noted that the innards of the beast seemed altogether separate from its hides. Its lower jaw was quintisected into sharp prongs which would lance or, alternatively, spread to a frighteningly wide degree: so much so that its secondary arms seemed inclined to separate as well into pincers, perhaps for gathering prey more easily into its maw. Inside, it appeared, were many toothed tongues. Its skull was arranged so that one could glean bright matter underneath. It cast flashes and illusions from its countenance, and a howl that could shake the knees of the Watchmen of Aurvari. Yet equally as fearsome was my savior, the Maqoan huntress, who could not have been older than your my messenger brethren. Truly, it was the brightmost sight this traveller has witnessed on his trails. The kill, the beast, the entire experience, was purely, impenetrably Niven. - Silos Aiotonos, messenger of the Illuminatori, house Ceinos. 9th Division, C1266. The beast leapt upon the boulder behind them and let out a great bellowing screech. Its insides appeared ready to belch forth and escape. Thick crystalline spittle slung from its teeth. It spotted them down in the chaparral and began pacing back and forth on the face of the stone, whining, sounding jilted. It seemed to consider—should it jump, it might be snagged on the small trees and lose out on its prey. Its throat bulged wide like a bullfrog’s, ejecting a bitter wark . Caia didn’t deign to look back. She kept pace through the growing wood, drawing the gurney over the fallen tree trunk. Dirt was piled nearly halfway up on the other side, forming a small ramp. The hulking figure disappeared, though they could see its shadow galloping around. It would be quick to set on them again. As she hustled them toward the next clearing, Silos questioned nervously “Can we not simply stay here?” Caia drew him partly out into the neighboring grove. The grey skies were bright as compared to the darkness beneath the canopies. She untied him from his rickety sled and looked over as a vicious stamping careened in from the left side. Frantically, he attempted to escape the cart, but warned, “You must trust me.” “No,” he whimpered, “oh, no.” She could tell it was nearly there by the way that the small critters fled from their hiding spots in the bushes. The beast charged around the bend, its squeal piercing their ears. In the same moment that the creature loomed, she yanked his sled from the bushes—Silos quailed, and Caia twisted. He fell out and into the dirt and went scrambling. The sled wedged into place, directly in the creature’s path. Caia ducked, and the dyrewolf’s razored claws missed by mere inches. The gust from its passing tossed her pearl hairs. In a split second, it contorted to redirect itself, but the mud that had collected in its paws would only assure its momentum was kept. It slammed into the gurney, whining, lanced by its main axle as it broke. The cords exploded and the whole gurney became scraps, Silos’ silk sash fluttering away into the brush. It tumbled and collided with a row of larches, which continued to shiver long after they had jumped up again to rush off. She pulled at the westerman who stumbled but did his best to keep on, forgetting his injuries for the time. He yelped with each step, but managed to keep on. Caia drew her lancet and snatched up a stone in its sling arm. When he began to limp, she hoisted its long grip under his arm as a brace. When they passed the next copse and could feel the rain showering them again, she peered to each side. This next small glade was among the last before the village. Were she hunting, she would catch her prey here or not at all. Before her was a thicket that rose from beside a boulder, its trees bowing and hanging overhead. She levered her weapon to toss the westerman into the grass. His fingers squelched, and the bronze ornaments of his robe shivered. “Wait, don’t leave me here,” he called as her form was blurred by the rain. A little soggy notebook slipped out of his breast pocket, and he retook it. She send the stone she had collected tumbling over the hill, snatched a tree with her lancet, swung up into it and disappeared. “Wait,” he cried, seeing shadows move among the brush, and bade her, “please!” His injured hand shook beneath his weight. From behind him came the crunch of broken boughs, and an unmistakably angry wark, wark . Tree trunks leaned and rolled away. The metallic whines seemed to search through the woods. Through the shadows of trees, he spied the colors of its lightning eyes. He crept back as it grew nearer and nearer, larger and larger, its steps heavier than ever before. A reflection of the forest itself, beneath its mirage crown, fangs like icicles fell. Rows of grey teeth took in deep whiffs of hillside, searching where Caia had thrown the stone. It paid him not mind at first. Spittle feelers searched the land, extruding and returning into its maw. It peered around the thicket, up into the trees where Caia had disappeared, and finally to him. It let out a disappointed hurumm. Though weighty, her paws were small. She was young; this may have been her first hunt. The projections of her mane shifted from green stalks into orange mushrooms and blue butterflies, then faded. Her eyes remained, bright lights flashing in thin slits, as if her cranium was only a helmet for the creature inside. Silos whimpered as she neared. He thought she might dive and snatch him up into her jaws, but she stepped over, searching the trees. He squirmed into their angular roots. The beast encircled him three times, sending out clicks and screeches that echoed back. Scouring the brush, it left his sight for a moment. Silos clamored to throw himself over a small wall of dirt. The dyrewolf returned around a wide oak before him, and he fell back again into the roots, reaching for the wild sky, praying, “O, Bright Father, dyre lords, tree spirits—whoever can hear me!” But he saw her shadow above. The wolf with a face of rippling glass lunged, and as it did, a whole regimen cape to its aid: flying spears and stones, lightning, fire, thorns and faces of folk and eyes and teeth and horns of larger dyre animals. All these instances comingled together into one great fearsome beacon—perhaps reflecting its own innate feelings of fear. As it hurtled toward him, the showers silenced the girl leaping from the branches overhead. Her shadow dove atop the dyrewolf, the oldest tool gripped tight in her hands. A smack from the heavy rock shuddered in the earth, as did the creature’s fall. Its eyes fluttered like lightning, its jaw chattered and it screamed, clawing to escape, slashing Sylos’ silks before another blow landed. Crack—it let out a sound like iron scraping iron, then turned on the huntress. Its throat expanded until it seemed nearly inside-out. The stone raised above her head again, light from the creature’s widening mouth blooming in the falling rain, this moment was locked into Silos’ memory. His notebook recorded: Another recollection on the dyrewolf, it was as if the storms battering the bays of Sheia Morel had been bottled and later released. In those shipyards where pincers rise from the waters to meet the hulls and nuisance mooring ships, frightening whole crews off of their ferries, there are days wherein no one will dock, and the Aurvari Watchmen have to come and clear out the waters so the traders can trade. The waters are deadly, and yet the children still frolic on the beaches; the silvery sand and blue algae lend it a beauty unique to its place in the world. So it was in a single wolf’s maw. The claws of its gullet reached for her, my huntress savior, like a whorl of icy crags drawing sailors into the trenches of the western seas. Yet still, they sail. The creature’s fluid brain writhed behind its unhinged jaws. Its scream shuddered their hearts. Caia dropped the stone. Without thinking, she took her lancet from its sheathe on her hip, and thrust it in. The creature reeled back and shook and pawed at its own face. Despite any attempt, it would not come unlodged. It spurted bright green blood, twisted up in innumerable incandescent tongues until nearly sideways. Silos watched in horror as the tool bent like straw, then snapped. Caia’s shadow curled behind, raising the stone overhead. A last strike drove the creature to the ground, she fell over it, and the lancet shot up through its head. The stone and the creature’s glassy skull both fell into pieces. A soft, woeful moan came from the dyrewolf. Her scrambling paws could not lift them. Her eyes dimmed and darkened. Viscous tendrils limped, letting out a multicolor ooze. Azure and emerald streams danced with failling rain. Caia lifted herself away, panting and heaving, slowly, as it seemed the creature might still be alive. Its paws still twitched. The lights of its innards hadn’t died yet. They still seemed to watch her from within its carapace. They followed her hand as it touched softly at the glassy plates of its head where her spearlet had exited. They were smoother than she expected. The beast was a spectacle of flesh and crystal, and now it was dead because of her. Its beautiful body had been twisted into something grievously hideous by her hands. Soon its lights had gone out. A tear may have rolled down her cheek into its wound, though one be certain in the rain. She bowed her head down and lent the dyrewolf a prayer taught by her mother, which had only graced the hides of rabbits, elk and mice up to this point. “I have seen your sacrifice. Honor as you are and were. Ancestors accept your gift. Honor as you will be. Your circle remains unbroken. May your spirit find peace through Ominni.” Then in one motion she gripped its center mandible—what the Niven people call its jawpick—and bent it back. It broke off in a long shard, along with three incisors on each side. This snap echoed through the wood as well. There came a whimper from the brush. It was Silos. His gaze was fixed on her. To quote from his notebook a last time: She was alight with a brilliance that would surpass all the lakes of the north. She dripped with dyreblood, hearkening to my days among the ever-feuding wildfolk in the south—who kept a ritual with the painted blood of the creatures, covering their huts and their totems with the blue-glowing stuff. But in this instance, the huntress was both the victor and the totem over which the victory was honored. She had championed the wild before my eyes, in a way I had could never have imagined despite all I’d observed to that point. I will not shade you, reader, there was a fear in me: for the silence, and for the way the blood seemed to love her. For she was the victor, and perhaps even more animal than the dyrewolf had been. From the way that Silos slumped over, Caia thought that he had died. She was shocked, but stood still a moment before crawling over to check. His heart beat and breath ran. He was alive—just fainted. She realized she left azure blue stains on his gold threaded robes. The rain would never wash them off. After catching her breath, she began to cut into the dyrewolf’s hide. The unconscious westerman was wrapped in a sheathe of rubbery layers of hide, dyremuscle and glass. It left a trail along the hillocks as if some sort of giant alien slug had crawled through. Slime accumulated on undersides and in moccasin stitches. The mud behind sparkled teal green. Mist trailed from her body. Blue blood coated her body, though her hands were red with her own. The new makeshift gurney—the second she’d made in such a short time—bobbled out of the shrubbery, into the paths on the hillside path toward Maqoa. She was already past the field of dead trees swathing her brother Rennic’s house. She was alone on the path. Up ahead, the village was alive with celebration. Legends of the village were told in the images that rose high above the bonfires, projected by the same sort of glass that made up the dyrewolf’s bones. Their colors swirled in the smoke and danced on the clouds. They rose in the distance from other towns too: from Ishvale and Ithlvale, and the smaller Nivl sisters, flickering like candle lights. A lightning bolt shifted into a pack of serpents which gave way to hunters and all of it corresponded to the lyrics of songs that Caia could only partly make out, but knew all too well. Further up the hill, beside her mother’s home, a pair of shadows waited, emblazoned against these sagas illuminating the night sky. They stood as witness to her. Caia followed the scent of rabbit leek stew.

Stillwatch - Same Nightmare

“Remember that time,” wondered Grady, “outside of Formosa, you and me and the boys took out that cartel kingpin—what was his name? Estaba- Gustavo- Cortez? That whole hostage thing. Killed a schoolbus full of kids, burned down that whole rat’s nest of a village just to find us.”

“I remember,” you said with a voice like the crunch of broken glass.

Grady went on, his tone always calm even under the hottest of fire. “Bastard had what was coming to him. You remember that one?” (‘That one,’ he called it. Like it was a night out on the town).

“Been a long time,” you said, not wanting to admit to recalling the instance with complete clarity.

“Yeah, it has,” said Grady, and though you hoped that he wouldn’t, you knew he was all too ready to remind. “You put a shell into his right eye—his good eye—powder-end first. I held him down; you picked up a ball-peen hammer, and set it off,” then he laughed. His smile, his voice, every wrinkle on his face, it reminded you of yourself. Like the shared features of twin brothers, after years of walking very hard and very different roads. Only the scars were different. His laughter died down and the muzzle of the pistol he held nudged the wound on your head.

“Let him rot in hell,” said Grady, and he looked at you with those bright blue piercing eyes as pitiless as the snowfall, soul barren as the wide Alaskan fields. Much like the man in his story, his own right eye had been bloodied. He seemed to cry dark, meaty tears. His blood was slick between your fingers, and it stuck on the steel hilt of the knife you had at his throat. He had a tooth of yours lodged in the tread of his boot that screeched on the ice with his every step. Against the deep blue sky, the clear white snow, the red liquid streaming over his chin might as well have been black as oil. Oil fields burned in the distance: a half-billion dollars of crude every second, turned into ash. That’s what you thought all this had been for, but Grady didn’t seem to mind it. If only it was so simple, you thought.

Grady puffed at a cigarette as always. He turned to view the smoldering landscape behind him. You remembered at this moment how the smoke felt in your lungs on that damp morning in the forests of Argentina: like molten daggers tipped with ice.

As they often did, the last words Grady said would haunt you even after you woke: “Let him rot in hell,” he repeated, mumbled, then snickered. “We’ll meet him there.” He smiled at you and pulled the hammer back with his thumb.

You lurched awake, gasping for air, thrusting the whole bed forward, yanked back by the handcuff clamped on your right wrist. The agent in the corner of the room didn’t look up from his paper or appear surprised in the least.

“Same nightmare again?” he asked indifferently.

Anachronomikon - The Offer