The Pearl Fox

The Group

Hanzak couldn't sleep. It had been a few days since Electra disappeared, and he tried searching for her. He decided to get out of bed, and put on the oil lamp, which made a soft glow. He went over to the window and opened it, just to breathe in fresh air. It was hot an stuffy in his room, which was the same one that he arrived in at the tavern. The night was eerie and silent. Even insects didn't make a single noise in the bushes and grasses. The entire city of Hillside Lake slept, except for a Night Patrol officer who slowly marched along the pavement beneath the window. There was more of those patrolling in the dark out there. Hanzak wondered how these people could do that. Then all of a sudden, a glowing red flame materialised above. A few blocks northwards, the top of the Fire Tower had been ignited again. That Fire Tower was sometimes lit to act as a beacon, for it was tall and guided in darkness and fog. It stood seventy feet high and it's crest was crowned by a spiked brazier and beneath was the Drum Room, and just below that was a belfry.  

Loud thunder rumbled in the far distance. Hanzak looked up at the sky and saw it was clear, filled with stars and three full moons. He wondered if it was thunder really, or just the sound of stampeding animals in the fields. The flaming top of the Fire Tower shone brighter as it burst fuller up from the brazier, with sparks spiralling up to the stars before fading in darkness. He went inside his room and put on his clothes and boots. Something irked him like crawling bugs, and he didn't know why he couldn't sleep but he gave up trying. He wasn't allowed to go into the streets late at night, but nothing will stop him going down into the common room just to sit down there, and ponder about Electra and what she meant by going away. The flower that she'd left him wilted but returned to life, blooming and fresh. So much alive was it that he put it in a cup of water and placed it on the windowsill. 

A day earlier he'd visited a jewellers in Tiger Close, and an old man who owned the glittering shop used a loupe to examine the figurine. It was a "finely decorated work of ceramic" the old jeweller said. Hanzak decided to sell it anyway, and got a nice amount of coinage and green rolls, that was enough to keep him on board at the Headless Horse tavern for another week. His work at the smithy at Corner Street made him forget about Electra sometimes, and he learned as much as he could about the city that was basically his new home. Now he listened in the darkened common room as everyone slept.  

Thunder was growing louder. Quickened footsteps outside in the street alerted him and he quickly pulled the curtain aside just a little, to have a peek. He watched an armoured guard running towards the tavern, and his heart jumped, because they caught up with him. He anticipated a knock now on the door. Preparing to hide, but breathing heavily and sweat dripping from his face, no knock ever came. The guard's footsteps went by and were gone out of earshot. He exhaled a big amount of air and flopped down on a seat. 

Sounds of distant shouting and made him want to see, but the downstairs windows offered nothing. He went back upstairs to his rented room and looked outside the window. He could see some guards and a Night Patrol officer further off West along the end of Garden Street. He guessed that it was a criminal patch they'd found. Then the flame on top of the distant Fire Tower drew his attention, and below this, in the belfry, was a guard. Within seconds, hideous loud noises coming from the belfry, wailed throughout the city. Everyone woke up.

Hanzak watched as there were some Hillside Lake citizens in their nightgowns wandering the streets, carrying candelabras and oil lanterns. Children clung to their mothers and siblings. Dogs barked and soon, a chorus of distressed city dogs howled and barked furiously. It wasn't as loud at the wailing of the Fire Tower siren. Hanzak quickly went down to find out what was happening. He ran towards people and none of them knew what was going on, except that the noise woke them up. 

"The Fire Tower hasn't done that before!" yelled a man. "It's never been both fire and bells!"

"We're at war!" screamed a woman, pulling her grey hair.

"We have to get out!" others cried. 

Hanzak raced across the pavement towards the Fire Tower itself. He ran down Oak Shade Avenue, Corner Street, Gym Passage Street and then Court Street. The entrance to the Fire Tower was open, with two guards just stood nearby, awaiting instructions, with their lances and horses. He could hear the panic amongst the citizens leaving their houses. Babies cried and dogs continued to bark. "What's going on?" Hanzak asked one of the guards.

"You should go home, sir. Go back to bed. All of the people should return home!" the guard said.

Hanzak just fled, and he approached White Lane Street, and arrived to the West city gate, called Cavistan Gate. There were over thirty guards there, some on horseback, with three Night Patrol, who were given orders to keep peace in the city and calm people down. They rushed off, but Hanzak quietly approached the crowd of guards, as the gate was opened there. Hanzak followed them all out. It was darkness outside, until his eyes adjusted and he picked out faint colours of the trees and sloping fields. But there were no clouds in the sky, yet thunder was very loud here. An immense dark cloud engulfed the meadow and it was there that he saw what it all was about: A super Wild Hunt.

Headed by an imposing figure with great deer horns, it rode on the back of a spectral glowing horse that was half a skeleton. Behind, hundreds of similar death riders on ghostly horses spun across the field like a tornado, and they'd flung a dozen decapitated heads, humans and animals, of their victims that fell tonight. Unprepared for this, the guards simply charged forth, as if about to fight a mundane enemy. It was a slaughter carousel, as cut heads and limbs of both guards and demon hunters flew around and fell all over the place. 

Hanzak picked up a sword that was on the bloodied grass, dropped by one of the city guards who was just cut in half. He then had a moments flashback to his childhood. As a boy, he witnessed his own uncle being butchered by men wearing skull masks who carried scythes, battle aces and maces. It brought back tragic memories, and he didn't weep. He cried in fury, raised the sword high in the air and just ran headlong into the dark Wild Hunting party gloom.