Light Dawning

by Ty Arthur

  There were only a few lives required at first to start the summoning.

  Knowing there was nothing he could do to stop something already done, he could only watch mutely as history repeated itself with the reverberations of unholy magic. There was a sharp noise again, like the one he’d heard the night before heralding the apparition’s appearance, but this time coming from up above deep within the boughs of the old tree.

  There were jagged rents of horror cracking across the wall of mundane reality, and the hunter was helpless to stop them. He could only watch what had already occurred and understand he had no ability to go back and prevent it. These poor souls were doomed, no matter what he did now. The past was to play before him, lives were to end, and he’d have no say at all in the matter.

  Something up above was answering the heretic’s call. They filtered down through shafts of light, like angels descending from the heavens, ethereal and translucent, barely there at all. That’s when the killing began. Even the hunter’s stomach churned at the sight of the massacre. The translucent void-things delighted in their charge, eviscerating the innocents, glorying in the screams, deriving pleasure from each spray of hot blood against the cold ground and each discharge of viscera. When the ghostly forms finally gave up their struggles, a wall of intense heat rose up from the tree, echoing the past as it spread across the ground in long lines.

  The hunter couldn’t watch anymore, and he turned his gaze the opposite direction while flipping the page to see what the heretic had to say about this abhorrent display.

  She cried, my Trin, as our friends fell and the blood flowed. I couldn’t help it. I smiled. Each death made my heart sing.

  That sound of plucked chords continued up above and grew louder as the slaughter drew on. More of them joined in, and soon they fell to discord, out of sync with one another. The wobbling violins reached an unbearable din that the killer couldn’t get out of his head, and he pivoted to face what had been done.

  The charred dead looked up, snapped necks all horribly askew and guts strewn across the snow, and smiled as they played a chorus of the infernal and the damned. They lifted their arms, ghostly fingers pointing and accusing. He didn’t know if they pointed at him, the book, or the child. Having sent so many to that side of the veil himself, the hunter now caught a glimpse of what that fate truly entailed, and what he had to look forward to when he inevitably made the journey himself. Terror was not a feeling the hunter was accustomed to. Unable to bear the visions any longer, he fled across the wilderness, seeking any refuge that might be found.

  In the corner of his vision the hunter caught sight of a faint flicker in the distance, the telltale glow of a far-off fire. With nowhere else to turn, he pushed his way through the drifts, holding the infant above the snow and hoping to find some refuge. Ahead through a handful of snow dunes he could see the source of the blaze: a cabin lit afire, bringing artificial day to the dark night. With all the snow surrounding the structure, it would be the best source of heat and safety in the area, regardless of what had caused the blaze.

  He stopped suddenly when something stirred in the powdery field before him, expecting to see another ghost of the past re-enacting its end. Something large, like a slumbering bear awoken, lifted up out of the snow. The hunter expected the skein of white powder to fall away and reveal fur or skin or scales, but as it rose a horrid realization came upon him. The thing was the cold, composed of frost and rime and freezing death.

  Some remnant of the black powers the heretic had brought to bear, the icy monstrosity rose out of the snow to block the hunter’s path, prowling low to the ground with a sleek grace that belied its size. Without hesitation he placed the newborn girl onto a tuft of snow and focused his warmth onto his hands as his dagger was pulled free and his thoughts turned towards his trade. He couldn’t save the lives that had already been ended. He couldn’t undo any of his past deeds. But he could use his skills to destroy this unholy thing and save one child.

  Hunter and demon met in a collision of limbs and snow, each determined to undo the other. Freezing fangs found their mark as steel bit into a snow-packed flank. Each withdrew for a moment to take stock of the damage done and the violence to come. Not allowing his opponent even a second’s respite, the hunter ignored his own wounds and forced his power to flow through his limbs, hurling himself back into the fray with all the strength he could muster.

  Caught unaware and unused to prey that bit back, the demonic creature let out a piercing howl as the blade bit deep inside again and again. It belched out a frozen scream, bringing down a tree in the distance that snapped in half in a shower of frozen wood when caught in the line of searing cold fire. Despite the display of frozen power, the man remained maddeningly just out of reach as it moved far faster than any mortal should have been capable of.

  The plucking of strings wouldn’t stop in the hunter’s head, and he snapped his wrist up and down repeatedly, digging in his blade and twisting viciously to kill that awful sound. Pouring all that he had into his strikes, it was over in mere minutes as cold killer met ice demon, and each left its mark upon the other. But only one could survive.

  His warmth long since spent, bleeding and broken, the hunter retrieved the child and crawled his way towards the burning cabin. Wishing he could have read to the end mere days before, he flipped open the heretic’s journal one final time and read the last line to be found.

  I’d trade a hundred thousand of your lives to get her back. And now I can.

  The hunter looked down at the child in his arms who had been the cause of all this destruction. If innocent lives taken forcibly started the summoning, perhaps a truly guilty soul offered freely could stop it. Perhaps it was time for another trade, and a pyre would be nice and warm about now.

  Leaving a trail of frozen blood behind him, with no inner warmth left to call on, the hunter of men set the child down gently and dragged himself into the burning structure, calling out the name of a god long forgotten by men.

  When it was all over, when the flesh had finished crackling in the fire and the soul had long since left the body, the hunter’s mark set down the firebrand he’d used to start the blaze, stepped out of the shadows, and reclaimed his reborn child.

  Afterward

  The preceding short story “The Trade” was written in 2013 after I experienced a devastating loss. It was my way of telling the world I'd do anything to get back what was gone, even if it could only be accomplished within the confines of a fictionalized fantasy world.

  Almost two years later, when my wife and I experienced another similar loss, I was no longer interested in resurrection fantasies or in using the written word to work through the pain. It seemed fitting to take the world from “The Trade” and expand it out further. “Light Dawning” wasn't written to make me feel better, but rather to make all of you feel worse. Hopefully it darkened your day just a little.

  Always remember: no matter how bad things become, they can always decline further, and life always has new horror in store you'll never see coming. With that in mind, there's already material in the works for the follow-up to “Light Dawning” as more corners of this bleak world are brought into the light.

  About the Author

  Ty Arthur gets to meld his passions with his work while freelancing for the likes of Metalunderground, GameSkinny, and WorldStart.

  His debut sci-fi / horror novella “Empty” was released in early 2016, with many more dark tales still to come. Arthur writes to exorcise his demons and lives in the cold, dark north with his amazing wife Megan and infant son Gannicus Picard.

  Acknowledgments

  Copyright © 2017 by Ty Arthur. All rights reserved.

  This release wouldn't have been possible without the assistance of many fellow authors, fans, PR agents, friends, family, and editors along the way all offering their thoughts and advice.

  Thanks especially due to those pushing me along when it seemed like the project would never see fruition: Wendie Nordgren, Tri
stan Thorne, Dominic Stabile, SA Hunt, Michelle Garza, Brian Barr, Allen Lanning, Jake Sorich, Randy Pepprock, Chris Jeffrey, Michael Arcand, Cristal Frost, Liam Duncan, Sandor Hopkins, Jordan Hilker, Doug Gibson, Carl Frederick, Ollie Hynes, Curtis Dewar, Tom George, Nev Murray, Angela Crawford, Jimmy Wienholz, David Spell, and too many more to mention.

  Special thanks for the licensed artwork assets courtesy of despositphotos, and to Apostrophic Labs for the excellent font gracing the front cover.