Testing

by S A Maus

  Through a brief break in the branches, Omer beheld that dusk was coming. They had been running for nearly an hour but the presence had not ceased. They passed up a high ridge that swept up into a cliffside. Here the forest was joined by thick, brambly brushes that seemed to slow the creature. They were drawing nearer, but still they could catch no sight of it.

  A moment later Tahr stopped and raised his hand. They were standing just beneath a sheer cliff, beyond which a thin clearing of rocky ground waited where the weeds and brambles spread out like a blanket.

  “Something else is here,” Tahr said. He looked about wildly until his eyes fixed on the opposite side of the clearing.

  “I don’t see anything,” Omer said. “I don’t think we’re close enough, yet. It is still beyond us.”

  “I am not feeling the Malphic,” Tahr said slowly. He fell silent a moment, head cocked to the side, and listened. Omer joined him, though he felt a yearning in his legs to continue running. The presence was the first real lead they had encountered on their strange journey and his body rebelled at the thought of leaving it. Yet, as Tahr remained still, so Omer mirrored, and in the quiet he realized what had caused the veteran Hunter to stop. The quiet. The world was silent, void of all creaturely sounds, with only the gentle wind rustling the tops of the trees to remind them it was still moving. They were deep in the wild of the Arbelete. They should be hearing an endless cacophony of insect buzz and animal cries, if not birds calling back and forth with their songs.

  “You hear it?” Tahr asked.

  “I hear nothing,” Omer nodded. “Something has disturbed the woods, and I do not imagine it was our creature.”

  “The Mist has been disrupted,” Tahr said. “The animals fled from it, but it was not this creature we are chasing. We would have felt that sort of power. This happened long before we arrived. Can you track anything? What do you feel?”

  “Emptiness,” Omer said. “It feels like life has been… purged. Even the trees feel faint, though they do not appear sick. This is unlike any magic I have felt before. It is like… it is like the absence of magic, actually, like someone took all the magic and got rid of it.”

  Tahr nodded his head. “I feel the same and I know only two things which give off such a feel. Mass death and Planewalking.”

  Omer waved his hands about him. “I don’t think death is our problem, unless these trees are faking it. Do you really think a Planewalker came here? There hasn’t been a recorded Planewalker in two hundred years.”

  “Planewalkers are eels in the river, very hard to detect, even in cities,” Tahr said. “We are in a far corner of Hyrotha. Thirty Planewalkers could live here and Shalim would be none the wiser. Not that I am claiming it. Only offering ideas.

  “This presence we are chasing is not a Planewalker, though,” he continued. “Azod encountered one back in his day, talked about it like it was a green sunrise. Said they are very distinct, like they don’t quite belong in the world. ‘A boot worn over your shoes’ is what he called it. Not evil, but not wholesome either.”

  Omer whistled into the evening air. “A ghost, a dead family, a strange creature, and perhaps now a Planewalker. I think Azod would have come himself if he knew how odd this would be. This needs a Master’s experience.”

  Tahr frowned. “I am experienced.”

  “I meant me,” Omer said. “Planewalkers are Master-duties. Should we even keep going? I know Planewalkers are not always dangerous, but the ones that are… I’m not sure we could handle one.”

  “We likely could not,” Tahr said. “Any Planewalker will be a master of the Mist. Of course, this could be a Dreamwalker. They are more common. But I haven’t the slightest idea how a Dreamwalker would end up out here in the forest. “

  “We need to be sure,” Omer said. “Perhaps we should not face this creature down, but I would rather not return to Master Azod without a clue as to what it is.”

  “I won’t object,” Tahr said. “Can you sense which way the absence leads? I cannot make it out.”

  Omer closed his eyes and focused, feeling along the empty space in the air where life ought to have been. “Towards the coast, I think,” he said. “That is away from this other presence we have been chasing. We should not leave it to the wild. They may be related.”

  “They may be, but we can leave neither unseen. Your nose is better suited to tracking. I will leave you the creature. I’m better suited to things that require a sword, and this absence might ask for just that.”

  “Then north for me,” Omer said. “We should return to the Falln home by morning, no matter what comes before us. We cannot allow ourselves to be pulled too far into the wild while strange portents surround this contract. Shalim needs to know.”

  “It is your contract,” Tahr bowed. “A word of advice though, Omer, do not engage unless you have no choice. As you said, this has been a strange journey, and I do not think we should test our skill against whatever works these levers.”

  Omer nodded. Then they split, Tahr to the west towards the coast and Omer running north towards the quickly fading mind on the horizon.

  The cliff they had been standing beneath gave way to a rumpled ground of uneven trees that wound here and there with thick, gnarled roots. Omer was passing into the hills, the land rising and falling in accord. The trees began to grow far apart, with knots of root between them, and the sun, which was now orange on the horizon, began to cut through in places. Grass returned and weeds with it, and as he ran Omer felt the life of the forest burgeoning back from the ground. He passed a den of foxes with a mother peering out. Overhead the birds had returned and were singing.

  His quarry was passing over the hills with a speed that rivaled the Hunters’ own, a feat that few creatures of Aarde could manage; but it was failing in its escape. The earth was soft and loamy in the valleys beneath the hills, and here and there Omer would find deep prints in the earth, impossibly far apart and heavy, and certainly belonging to the creature. He would be upon it soon. There was only so much land left in Hyrotha before the sea.

  Two hours of tireless chase later, Omer found himself standing at the edge of the Arbelete looking up at the Roc Mountains. The forest failed there, limping into a scattering of trees and high bushes that eventually stopped altogether as the hills became more rock than dirt. Stars were high overhead now. The half-moon was breaking through the final, sparse trees and giving a dim halo to the night.

  The hills ahead opened up into a long ascent of craggy earth, eventually becoming high cliffs and jagged gaps far away where the mountains began. The Roc Mountains were not friendly, even to a Hunter, being little more than jutting faces washed clean by heavy rains and then broken by freezing winters. It was a daunting place that offered no harbor to Man or animal, and yet Omer could feel the mind still before him, somewhere amidst the rock and sheer earth.

  Can it fly? He briefly wondered, but then dismissed the notion. Omer would not have kept pace with a creature that could fly at such speeds. It would be long passed into another part of the country. It had disappeared, somehow; likely into the cracks of the world.

  Omer began to walk the foot of the mountains, remaining alert for any sign of the creature’s passing. There were plenty of tracks to follow, the earth was hard but loose and crumbled easily, but all the tracks he found seemed to be of deer or goats that dwelled in the area and none looked out of place. A couple times Omer came across tracks that looked vaguely Man-shaped, though they were old and could have been misshapen from the winds and rains.

  He searched for almost an hour without success, and he began to think the creature had slipped his grasp, even though he could yet feel it. The presence had not moved since he arrived. It was static, sitting somewhere beyond the rock and earth that lie before him. Then it struck him, a realization so obvious he almost laughed to the empty air. The creature did not escape into the mountain. It had escaped underneath.

  Omer backtracked quickly into the woods, following the path he had taken
as best as he could remember. The hard rock of the mountain offered no hope to fleeing prey, but the softer earth near the woods offered an easy place to dig if one had the patience and strength. Omer found the tunnel shortly after. It was dug on the far side of a small rise in the earth just behind the tree line, hidden from anyone approaching from the south but plainly obvious to all others. It was an old tunnel, dug long ago by a burrowing animal, but whatever Omer was chasing had commandeered it for its own purposes, perhaps even making it bigger. Massive indents riddled the tunnel floor just a few steps inside, where the earth was soft and wet, and while none were as clean as the prints at the Falln farm, he was certain they were all made by the same creature. More intriguing to Omer, however, were the second set of tracks that could be made out in the center of the tunnel. They were old and run over by the creature, but Omer could make out the distinct shape of soft boots.

  “You should not be here,” a voice suddenly broke the quiet of the mountainside.

  Omer whirled, his sword flowing out of its sheath. A man was standing in the forest, shrouded beneath the deeper shadows of the eaves but not hidden to Omer’s Tested eyes. He was wearing a leather jerkin, colored red and black, and beneath it a thin black shirt. A hood was on his head, black with a red stripe down its center, and he wore a cut mask that ended above the nose, hiding all features. The only distinguishing mark, besides his strange colors, was the emblem on his left pant leg, a white wolf’s head contrasted against a red full moon.

  “Who are you?” Omer asked, feeling suddenly nervous. Few were the Men who could catch a Hunter unaware, and they were nearly all of the dangerous sort.

  “A star lost on open seas,” the figure replied. Omer thought he heard sadness in that voice. The figure suddenly reached behind its back, revealing there a short sword Omer had not seen before. He drew it and held it ready. “This is not your land,” the man said.

  “Neither yours, unless you are King Madwin,” Omer retorted. “But you are wrong, all land is a Hunter’s domain when magical creatures are about. There is one inside this tunnel.”

  “It is my tunnel. It may stay if I wish it to stay,” the figure replied.

  The flutter in Omer’s stomach grew stronger. The figure was not advancing, but there was an air of menace about him, a sunken, confident power that needed no fanfare.

  “What is it?” Omer asked. “Shogot?”

  “Not your concern,” the figure growled. He took a step forward. Omer tensed, gripping his sword a little tighter. A mortal Man was no more a threat to him than a fox, but Omer could not shake the suspicion the figure before him was something altogether different.

  “If it is unnatural, then it is certainly my concern,” Omer said.

  The figure took one more step, passing from the shadow of the trees into a dash of dim moonlight. “What makes something unnatural?” the figure asked. “Is your sword any less natural than the iron that formed it?” He took another step.

  “Born of unnatural means,” Omer answered. “Whatever is inside, I know it is not a creature of Aarde. It is twisted, perhaps evil.”

  “Evil?” The man said slowly, as if mulling the word. “Who decides that?”

  The figure was almost within striking distance now. Omer could see under the hood. The eyes beneath were gray, or white, he could not be sure; they looked strange, as if the pigment had been pulled from them.

  “I will,” Omer said, “and I will end it, if I must.”

  The man stopped. “How strange,” he said, so low that Omer likely would not have heard it without his enhanced hearing. Then, more loudly, “To hear the unnatural decry itself. Another time. Another life.” The figure shifted now, moving sideways. Omer saw now that he was sidling towards the tunnel, likely to set himself up between Omer and the darkness with a single leap.

  “Stop,” Omer commanded. The figure did so. They were standing only a few meters apart.

  “I am doing you a favor, Hunter,” the figure said, a dark edge to his voice. “What is inside this tunnel is of no concern to you. Go back to your halls. You are outmatched.”

  The flutter in Omer’s stomach became a full cavalry of butterflies. The man spoke with the assurance of one who has conquered, a veteran of battle resigned to yet another clash. The manner in which he stood, calmly, as if he was certain Omer was no threat, gave the Hunter anxious pause. Omer looked to the looming dark of the tunnel. The creature within was returning. He could feel the mind drawing nearer. If it was an ally of the man, then Omer needed to make a decision and do it quickly.

  Despite Tahr’s warning not to get drawn into battle still fresh in his ears, Omer stepped towards the figure, a blur of green and gray, looking to war. His sword was not his weapon; instead, Omer led with a fist, hoping to catch the man quickly and subdue him before the creature arrived. He nearly yelped in surprise when his blow was met by the open hand of the stranger, a red and black shadow that matched his own. At that same moment, the blade in the man’s opposite hand swung up and towards Omer’s shoulder. Not a killing strike, but enough to disable Omer if it landed cleanly. Omer frantically pulled his own blade up and the two swords clashed. His whole body shook with the force of the blow.

  “You are no Man,” Omer grunted.

  The figure gave no answer. The hand let go, sliding under Omer’s arm and slamming into his chest with an open palm. Had Omer not been Tested, he had no doubt the blow would have knocked all the air out of his lungs; but as it were, he only retreated a couple steps.

  The creature in the tunnel was drawing nearer. He could see it in his mind’s eye, a candle in the dark to the north.

  “What are you?” Omer wondered as he brought his sword back to a guard.

  Then, suddenly, the man dropped into a stance Omer knew well, for it was taught religiously to every hand in the halls of Shalim: the Adderkine.

  “You’re a Hunter,” Omer declared with wide eyes.

  “My name is mine alone. Hunter, I am not,” the figure said.

  “You stand like any in Shalim,” Omer said.

  “Shalim does not claim the martial arts.”

  “What -,” Omer began, but was interrupted as the figure darted forward, sword sweeping up from a crouch. Omer caught it without trouble, though he shook once more with the force. In the brief moment the sword was cutting towards him, Omer noticed something odd: the blade was turned on its side. The blow was not meant to kill but to stun.

  The figure spun away, lashing out with a kick as he did, which Omer knocked aside. The man was just as fast as Omer, but he was clearly less practiced. Omer’s deflection seemed to catch him off guard. He slipped, skidding away in the dirt before righting himself.

  The man stood to his full height (perhaps a hand taller than Omer) and stared at him. His eyes were grim and angry, but they quickly grew wide, a look of fear that burst suddenly out. Omer assured himself that the stranger realized he was outmatched, face to face with a true En’shen.

  The moment did not hold long and Omer’s confidence washed away with it. The stranger’s sword readied again, twirling from the left hand to the right and then up into a rising cut. Omer frowned, confused. The blow would glance him at best and miss him wildly at worst. Yet, even so, he stepped to the side to avoid it. He was met with a clang of metal meeting metal.

  Omer looked down, wondering if he had been struck on a strap, or somehow the sword had turned without him seeing. Instead, he found, lying at his feet, an arrow driven deep into the earth. The man’s blade had caught it.

  Realizing there was another attacker, Omer turned to the woods, towards the dark shadows where the arrow had come from. Another figure was there, dressed in the same black and red as the man across from him, only this one bore the more petite form of a woman. She had another arrow nocked and aimed towards Omer.

  The arrow flew. Omer fell away, letting it pass overhead as he rolled back into the clearing.

  A snap of twigs in the forest to his south drew his attention. Another cloake
d figure was running out of the woods, a longsword at their side.

  Three? Omer frantically backed away, giving himself plenty of open ground to assess the situation. Briefly, he wondered how three Men had managed to evade his notice until they were near, but if the first figure was their warning, he feared they were all as capable as a Hunter.

  So focused was Omer on the newcomers that he forget of his true quarry, but his attention was quickly returned as a howling cry broke out of the tunnel. The creature he had been hunting was suddenly at hand. Omer turned. A black shadow, darker than the night and seeming to swallow the light of the stars, broke out of the tunnel and bore down on him.

  Omer stepped aside. The unknown creature flew by.

  The pommel of a blade collided with Omer’s head, borne by the first stranger, who had stepped near in the confusion. The world spun, but Omer shook it off. Six months ago such a blow would have knocked him out, now it left him only with a dull ache and a vague ring in his ears.

  Then a palm collided with his temple. A well-placed blow. A practiced blow. A Hunter’s blow.

  The world faded and Omer fell into the dark.

  ***

  Omer woke some time later to the sun shining in his eyes from the eastern sky. His head throbbed, but even as he stood his body began to knit the wound and suppress the pain. He looked about. He was still in the clearing outside the tunnel. Noon was coming on fast and behind it a length of clouds promising rain. The arrow that his mysterious foe blocked still lie at his feet. The land was empty otherwise.

  Omer reached out with his mind, searching for the creature that led him so far. He found only the dim minds of the mundane creatures that filled the forest. The strange shadow was gone.

  He sighed. His head was swimming with the strange occurrences that had beset their journey, these new cloaked figures the oddest of all. They seemed to bear all the skills of a Hunter, if perhaps lacking the polish that came from decades of training. Omer was loathe to entertain the idea they were Rogue. Hunters that forsook the order were so exceedingly rare that Omer doubted there were even three alive in the world, and the number of En’shen who turned aside were even less. They were a mystery.