Demons of the Hunter

by Stephen Allan

  “I’ve enjoyed killing you and your criminal magi friends,” he sneered. “But for you, I’ll make your death especially enjoyable. I’m going to fantasize about the way I’m about to kill you for a long, long time.”

  He spat on her as he tightened his grip. He crushed her windpipe. She could not breathe. Her vision was fading. She tried even more to cast anything—a flicker of a flame, a single shock of electricity, a breath of wind—but the guard had too much control of her. She was too focused on the hand around her neck.

  “Goodbye, you little brat. I’ll bet your father and mother were some of the people here. Know that I enjoyed killing them as much as I enjoy killing you. Especially your mother. Oh, yes, child. I had my way with her before I slit her throat.”

  My mother…

  Mama…

  A new level of anger reached Zelda. It was not an anger she was conscious of. In fact, the fact that she was losing control of her senses probably made her even more dangerous than before. But she no longer focused on the hand crushing her throat. She didn’t focus on anything. Her anger didn’t just possess her. It became her.

  Her anger ballooned as she felt a surge of power from deep within her. It was a power she could not control, but it was a power that she did not bother to try controlling. It felt like the very power of Indica itself, come to life through her body. It felt like a supernatural power that would transcend her being, her existence.

  What would happen? She didn’t care. If it wiped out Hydor, so be it.

  The guard must have noticed something in her, for his grip intensified, his face became less sinister and more overtly angry, and his hand trembled. Zelda paid no attention to the outside world. She closed her eyes, but she could see an enormous amount of power within her. It was not truly “seeing” it, but it had color, a shape, and a movement all the same, as if created and presented within her soul.

  She felt her body closing in, as if contracting on herself. Sounds around her went silent.

  She saw a flash. In the flash, she saw a single figure, one with thick muscles, dark skin, and bright turquoise eyes. She heard a grunt at the exclusion of all other sounds. The figure extended its hand.

  Then the world went dark and silent.

  And then, somehow, even with the force of the guard’s hand around her neck, she screamed.

  An enormous, powerful, sudden wave of ice exploded out of her. All of the universe around her, save for Garo, who quickly protected himself with a barrier, froze as the wave spread even further outside the young girl. Zelda could once more sense the magic as it left her body, but the force of her power left her barely in control. Had she unleashed something even more forceful, she didn’t know what would happen to her, let alone the other two magi.

  It felt like the spell had taken life out of Zelda. But through it, she could see everything the spell touched.

  The hand on her neck froze. The magic continued to spread. It reached all across Dabira, to the far side of town and to the river on the eastern side. Everything in its path turned into crystal ice. A lone guard who had returned to the ship quickly pushed back and escaped the ice by the slimmest of margins. Zelda’s spell did not reach that far, but she cared little. The guard would deliver warning to the empire, which would shudder to the day it died.

  Tetra, too, had placed a barrier around herself.

  But Yeva, who still lived, did not. She froze, encased in a thick layer of ice. But Zelda felt no emotion, so wrapped up in the spell that the only thing she felt was the power of the spell.

  Finally, the spell ended, fizzling out on the edges of town. Zelda felt painfully weak, as if she might collapse and never rise again, but when she opened her eyes, she stared at the frozen guard. He still had his hand around her neck, albeit in a much looser position. She yanked herself away and watched in horror as the twisting of the arm removed the guard’s limb from his body.

  Then the rest of the body followed, and what remained of the guard shattered into a million pieces.

  She barely had any energy to think about what had just happened, let alone to react in any fashion.

  All around her, much of what remained of Dabira did the same. Enemy soldiers, shattered buildings—it all turned to shards of ice, cracking and breaking into millions of little pieces. It would’ve looked so beautiful if not for the devastating power it showed Zelda had. Yeva… please survive. Please.

  And any other magi who still lived… don’t tell me I killed you. Please.

  She remained on the ground, mostly out of exhaustion, but then out of fear of what she was capable of. What mage had ever had the power to channel magic without a weapon, only to then realize that they could spread even more powerful magic across a vast distance? She knew this was not a power readily accessible, but it struck fear in her how she’d leveled an entire city just by having tapped into a primal level of anger she’d never felt before.

  What if there were further levels? Would the magic consume her? Destroy her in the process? Destroy the world in the process?

  And what had she seen in that moment just before she thought she might die? What was that vision? Who was that figure?

  What made it all the more terrifying was how easily Zelda had reached her dark side. It hadn’t come when the guard choked her. She’d already felt her spirit broken in the battle before that moment. Did her will to be good shattering make her more powerful? How would she work her magic?

  But whatever concerns, whatever fears, whatever wonders she had vanished when she heard Tetra beginning to sob and cry ahead of her.

  Weakened to the point of almost passing out in what remained of the streets, Zelda opened her eyes and struggled to her feet. She staggered forward, nearly tripping several times, and gasped when she reached Tetra.

  Around them, the buildings had collapsed, turning Dabira into a wasteland of ice, open space, corpses, and death.

  And soon, Garo would join the deceased as he took his last few breaths.

  “Garo, Garo, no, no, no,” Tetra said. “No, my love. No. No.”

  Gone was the viciousness and callousness of Tetra. Gone was the cold-blooded hatred she possessed, the eyes that bordered on evil. Gone was the dominating, aggressive woman who controlled Garo for the last several decades. Gone was the sadistic, extremist leader of the Shadows of the Empire.

  Instead, Tetra became the mourning wife, the one overcome with grief as she watched her husband of her entire lifetime dying under her arms. She had managed so far to keep her composure, not yet crying, but her voice was rambling and mumbling. If she had not dived into her tears yet, she stood right at the cliff of it. And once Garo finally did pass away…

  Peering just around them, Zelda saw the frozen sculpture of Yeva. She rose, her legs shaking, and she stumbled over, each step a challenge to prevent from falling over. As if coming up for air, she gasped when she reached the young girl. She reached into what little remained of her power and found just enough magic to cast a small fire spell.

  It did not completely unfreeze Yeva. But it brought her back to life, freeing her face and her feet. Parts of her arms remained frozen. But Zelda felt incredible relief that her actions had not cost her her only friend.

  “What happened?” Yeva asked as she shook to remove the remaining ice.

  Zelda barely had the energy to speak. She instead turned her body, giving Yeva line of sight to Garo and Tetra. Immediately, Yeva burst into tears. The battle and its aftermath, it seemed, had broken her, but in a very different way.

  Zelda put her arm around her and thought about Garo and Tetra, the couple. Centuries of love. How quickly did Garo and Tetra feel it had gone by? How long had it been since Tetra held Garo like this? Did she regret keeping him at arm’s length for so long in the name of defeating the empire? How would she handle a moment like this when she could look back on it? Would she look upon it with disgust or appreciation? Had she even loved him in the years prior, or had she pushed him away… until the final moments of his life? />
  Zelda could barely keep herself from falling to her stomach or back. Half the reason she had her arm around Yeva was to keep herself upright. She still had not gained any energy back from her powerful spell and struggled to pay attention to what she saw. It helped that everything around her had vanished. She could even see the sea from their vantage point.

  But the sea, the sky, the river, the surroundings—none of it mattered. She just felt glad that Garo had not perished because of her ice spell. Nor, for that matter, had Tetra. Yeva had given her a scare, but she’d avoided the worst of it.

  But had Garo casting that spell cost him his life? Had he made sure to stay alive, except that he had lost all of his energy in the process?

  No, Zelda. Don’t. No. Please. Don’t let it be. It’s not your fault. It’s…

  “Tetra, my beloved,” Garo said.

  His voice was creaky and his face seemed to age before Zelda’s very eyes. His gray hair became terrifyingly thin and his eyes sunk deep into their sockets. Before, he had perhaps looked like a man in his eighth decade, old but not on death’s bed. Now, though, his skin wrinkled terribly and his hands looked to be made of bone. Zelda thought of how he needed to use magic to keep himself alive, and with no energy to cast such spells, his life was ending.

  “I never let a moment go by where I didn’t think about you,” he said, putting his hand on her cheek. “No matter what we did or where we went. You were my reason for everything.”

  Tears finally fell from Tetra’s eyes, sprinkling Garo’s robes. As sad as the moment was, Zelda took some small solace from it. Tetra had her soft side. Her emotional, vulnerable side. She might yet be reached or consider more rational methods. There was hope the future didn’t involve Hydor in flames. The future Mama and Garo desired.

  But, too, how tough must the moment have been to have her husband touch her this way? Zelda thought about the nights before, when they had slept somewhat together but not touching. How long had it been since Garo touched Tetra so lovingly? What would it do to go so long without it and then have it in such an emotionally wrought moment? Zelda was only fourteen, but she already knew it was so tough to see.

  “I’m going to make sure you live on in name forever, Garo,” Tetra said through sobs, her voice wavering. “I’m not going to let anyone forget your name. You’ll live on forever through the tales. No empire is going to erase what you did. I promise you that.”

  Garo smiled softly, but barely had the strength to speak. His face continued to age, and he became almost grotesque to look at. He could not have more than a minute or two left.

  “I cannot control what history wishes… to see me as,” he said. “But I know that you love me and that you have always loved me, and that is enough.”

  The tears came more rapidly from Tetra as she began to cry uncontrollably, her lip quivering as the tears fell onto Garo’s face.

  “I do love you, Garo. I love you. Always have. Always will.”

  “Good,” Garo said. The word was said so softly that it almost sounded like a breath of air than the actual word. It took Zelda a few seconds to process the fact that he had actually spoken. “I have done what I needed to do. I—”

  Suddenly, his eyes went wide and his face froze. His chest still heaved, but it looked as if he had cast a spell that prevented him from moving otherwise.

  “Garo?” Tetra said.

  Zelda felt a lump in her throat.

  “Garo!”

  Zelda bit her lip and looked down at the ground as she felt her eyes water.

  “Garo! Please!”

  But then a gasp came and Zelda quickly looked up.

  “I saw…” he said, and he met eyes with Tetra. “Chrystos. His words. His form. Tetra. My books. The library. You must… go.”

  “I will, Garo.”

  “Our teachings… must not be… lost… or we all… die. Baha… mut… he…”

  “I understand, Garo, I—”

  But then he gave a disturbing rattle that sounded like a harsh groan and his body went rigid once more.

  This time, his chest did not move.

  “Garo.”

  Nothing.

  “Garo, please, tell me you’re still here.”

  Nothing.

  “Garo…”

  Tetra bowed her head as the tears fell down. Zelda could no longer help it, either. She, too, cried as she bowed her head. She and Yeva leaned on each other as tears cascaded from their eyes. There was no longer any reason to hold them back.

  Garo, the man who had pushed Bahamut back. The man who had founded Dabira and given the magi a place to call their own. The man who had sneaked to Caia and, with Tetra, founded the Shadows of the Empire to fight back against the empire. More personally, the man who had taught Zelda how to read and how to better hone her magic. The man who had played the role of father, something she had never had. The man who had told her how important she was to the future.

  He was gone.

  He’d died at the hands of the empire.

  He was never coming back.

  There would be no sudden resurrection.

  It was all the more tragic that Zelda had long assumed him dead, the natural course of life having taken him, only for him to reappear in the last few days as a mentor to her and Yeva. He’d imparted so much advice.

  And now he was truly dead, fallen at the hands of some scummy soldiers who had come to tear the world down.

  Tetra let out a loud shriek that had to have reached back to Caia. Zelda hoped that the emperor might have heard it, and if he did, that he would quiver in his boots and live the rest of his life in fear of Tetra’s revenge.

  Would the death ever stop? Would there ever come a day when they could all live forever without fear of death? Was such a thing possible?

  More specifically, could those that she cared for just stop dying? Could she have that chance?

  As long as the empire lived…

  But what if it went beyond the empire?

  What if it was just in the nature of people to slaughter each other, to kill those who they did not agree with? If the empire fell, someone or something else would come up in its place. What if the solution was not the removal of empire, but the removal of humanity?

  That meant she was as guilty as the empire. And knowing that she was now capable of ruthless murder, it wasn’t as absurd a proposition as it would’ve been a day before.

  In fact, if her spell had done the damage she suspected it had, there was no chance that Tyus had survived if he was still here. Then at least the empire will collapse following Rufus’ end.

  Tetra continued to bawl into her husband’s chest. Zelda watched, grief-stricken, feeling depressed and that nothing she did would matter. She looked over to Yeva, who just stared at the ocean with dead, sunken eyes.

  Not only had they lost a man, they’d lost a city. Undoubtedly, Rufus Syrast would be back home indulging in wine and women in celebration. He’d dance, declare victory, and would taunt the rest of the magi. It might take him some time to learn of the destruction of Dabira, but when he did, he would hold nothing back.

  His celebration would not last long. Not if Zelda, Tetra, and Yeva had anything to do about it.

  Zelda sat on the cobblestone for what felt like hours, just listening to Tetra sob and pour out more emotion in that time than she had perhaps in over a century. So, too, did Yeva sob, but for the most part, she sat in silence, listening to Tetra pour out her soul to her husband.

  Finally, Tetra cleared her throat. She leaned down, kissed Garo on the lips, and then stood. She eyed Yeva first, then Zelda, and gave an exhausted, emotional sigh. She looked to have aged a decade, gray streaks appearing on her face, her wrinkles visible, and her eyes darker. Zelda found it more surprising she hadn’t aged as much as Garo had.

  “I don’t care for power any longer,” she said, her voice still tinged with tears and emotional. “I don’t care about making the Shadows the power of the this world. I don’t care about anything, tru
ly. I just want to see the empire collapse. If all of Hydor collapses with it, so be it. And you can’t change my mind, so please don’t try.”

  “I won’t,” Zelda said.

  She wanted to fight. She wanted the empire to pay. She had unlocked a side of her that she could not just put away any longer.

  But there was one thing she wanted to do before anyone else so much as picked up a rock.

  “But there are so many people who died here. So many people. Him, among them. Children died. Mothers and fathers died. Good people. An entire town perished. Friends. Family.”

  She tried not to look at Yeva when she said family. Only in that moment had Zelda realized that Yeva had perhaps lost even more than Tetra. Certainly more than Zelda.

  “I feel we should pay our respects to them and give them a proper burial of some kind. We should make sure they and this city are remembered. They must never be forgotten. I, I don’t know how we would, I’ve never been to one, but… please, Tetra.”

  Tetra seemed to give it genuine thought, remaining silent for several seconds as she bowed her head and closed her eyes. Zelda decide no matter what Tetra said, though, she would remain. Too many people she cared about had perished for her to callously leave their remains behind.

  Finally, though, Tetra spoke, her eyes surprisingly compassionate.

  “If I remain here, Zelda, I fear I will never move forward,” she said. “I have come to realize what happens when one suppresses their feelings for as long as I have, and you don’t need to be my age to know it is not healthy. I will live an open life as much as I can, though I know not what that will consist of after I finish off the empire. I just know that I cannot stay here if I hope to save other magi.”

  “So…”

  Zelda didn’t want to say it. She really didn’t want to utter it. But she had to.

  “You’re going to leave Garo here?”

  Tetra bit her lip. Zelda knew the question had affected her, but she couldn’t help but broach it.