The Bane of the Empire

Chapter 6

The man was dead. Murdered by a wolf. His throat was ripped open and his face was unrecognizable. But it wasn't a wolf. It was Hunter. He killed one of the members of The Guild.

Dawn flinched when he took a step toward her. Halting, he met her gaze as she took in his appearance. There was blood running down his neck and dripping from his fingertips. They had been claws just moments ago. Now they were the rounded fingers of a human. But he wasn't a human.

"Who? Wha-What are you?" She stammered. He sighed and flicked the blood off his hands. As if it was water and was a natural motion. She watched the droplets fly through the air. The droplets hit the ground and soaked into the soil.

The soil from which life grew now absorbed the life's blood of a man that lay still on the ground. She watched the dark spots and to any passing person, they were just damp circles of soil.

"You're hurt."

Her eyes left the ground. He took another step toward her, but her body acted on its own. Digging her heels into the soil she clambered back. He was a vision of death. With every swallow, the movement of his neck caused the blood to glisten in the sun. His blue eyes that she had likened to depthless waters now looked to burn as blue flames. And when he took another step toward her, she couldn't stop the words from leaving her lips.

"Stay away from me!"

She was shaking. The small knife in her thigh forgotten. The pain pushed so far back in her mind that the angry wound was nothing but a pinch. Her voice gave him pause. But before he could respond, two figures came running through the trees. Tal and Gavin were panting as they took in the two of them. Gavin's eyes went to the horseman and uttered a low curse. Tal, however, walked to where Dawn was sprawled on the ground.

"Dawn, look at me."

Tal's voice pulled her gaze away from Hunter. Crouching in front of her, she blocked the scene behind her.

"You're okay."

She heard retreating footsteps and a low whisper. After some rustling the clearing was bathed in silence. But this was cut short by the yelp that escaped her lips as Tal pulled out the knife in her thigh. She pressed down on the wound and Dawn felt light headed as Tal wrapped fresh linen around her thigh.

"Sorry, I thought it would hurt less if you were still in shock."

Tal gave her a sad grin and tied the dressing. Dawn didn't want to admit it, but the physical pain was exactly what she needed to pull her back to the present. Tal continued to tie the bandages around her thigh and once they were secure, she offered her a hand.

"Try putting some weight on it."

The wound hurt, but the pain told her that she was alive. The she saw was not dreaming.

"So that was real? He was the wolf."

Tal nodded her head. She suggested to move away from the clearing and Dawn was more than happy to comply. Limping to a nearby stream, Tal filled a canteen and offered it to her. The more control she got of her body the more exhausted she felt. Dawn ached to just crawl back to her home and lay her head on her mother's lap.

Clutching the canteen in her hand, a lone tear fell on her hand. She cried for her family. She cried for the life that was lost to her. Watching the flowing water, Dawn allowed herself to finally feel.

To finally feel the pain and accept that her life was never going to be the same. She had told herself she had to be strong. But before she could be that, she had to be weak. When the tears dried, she continued to sit there, listening to the sounds of the forest. But something had changed inside her.

When there were no more tears left to cry, she began building herself back up. She would build herself anew.

She looked back when she heard the crunch of leaves under boots. Tal had left her alone with her thoughts. But now behind her stood the man who had finally pushed her off the edge. Hunter had cleaned the blood from his skin. His clothes were clean, and his hair fell on his shoulders, wet from washing the blood out of the strands.

"Have you heard the stories of people who could do extraordinary things? Humans called it magic," Hunter began, "but in reality, we are just different. To us what we can do is not 'magic' but just abilities, aptitudes, that we possess."

He walked along the tree line and when she did not flinch at his nearness, he came to stand by the stream. Despite the bone-chilling fear she felt when seeing him covered in blood, she was glad to see him now. She was glad to see that he was not hurt. That the blood he was covered in was not his.

This thought sent a pang of pain through her chest and down through to her fingertips.

Turning to her, Hunter continued, "I come from a long line of beings that have protected The Lands during wars. There were others but only few remain, me being one of the last few."

The stories her father use to tell her as a child came back to her. The children's stories that she brushed off as make-believe were rooted in truth. The man standing in front of her was living proof that those stories were not imagined lore. Her mouth fell open as she gasped. The woman from the forest was one of these fabled people as well.

"From the look on your face, you believe me."

He smirked and Dawn was taken aback by how dramatically it changed his face. He had only ever scowled at her but seeing the slight upturn of his mouth and his white teeth, which now she noticed were sharper than a human's, caused her to stare.

He was beautiful.

In a deadly and predatory way, he was a sight to behold.

She silently nodded and taking that as permission enough, Hunter closed the distance between then and grabbed her hand. His hand was warm and engulfed her entire palm. He began walking away from the stream, dragging her with him. This snapped her out of her trance.

"Where are you taking me?"

Without so much as a glance backward Hunter said, "You are travelling with us now. Obviously, you cannot take care of yourself and lucky for you we are also going to Ilaburn."

He was back to infuriating her. She growled at him and tried to yank her hand out of his grasp, but he tightened his hold. She let out an irritated noise and she could have sworn she saw him smirk.