Chapter 22 - The Hunt

Author's Notes: I had quite a bit of difficulty with this chapter, and it turned into two chapters, so it took far longer than I'd expected. Then again, I think my writing is slowly improving, at least in a creative sense if not necessarily in a mechanical one. So, that's the good news. I think the story will get better and more fully fleshed out in the coming chapters. I hope you enjoy the ride as much as I will.

“Greetings, Mortal,” came the voice, soft yet crystal clear, imbued with a quality that tugged at my heartstrings. It was as though some inner ghost were telling me that this woman was worthy of my trust. Not only that, but also all my respect and even devotion. That was no mean feat. As a matter of fact, I naturally distrusted anyone, just as a matter of principle. But now I felt as though I were a schoolboy in front of his first crush, and a myriad emotions assaulted my mind as a furious scowl began to work its way into my brow.

“I am Lady Elienne, First of the Eternal. It is imperative that you attend me with utmost earnestness, for I shall guide your footsteps in this most perilous..”

She continued to speak, but the rest of it was lost to me as a silent roar began to thrum within my mind, slowly building in momentum as it crashed time and time again against a smothering incorporeal barrier slung across my consciousness. At first, this wave of defiance was easily crushed into dust and scattered away with hardly a ripple. However, I would not relent. I kept pushing at it, worrying at it like a beaver gnawing at a particularly hardy tree trunk. Time and time again, I could feel the crushing weight of the pressure in my mind stamp my resistance into nothingness. However, every single time it would gather itself again out of every corner of my outraged mind, only with more momentum, more anger, more power.

Finally, a crack could be heard inside me, and my willpower arose within me like a sudden typhoon as it rapidly swirled into one terrifying vortex, and it fairly crackled with energy as it pounded against an invisible weak point in the barrier.

BANG.

A resounding explosion rattled my mind as all the energy I’d been accumulating finally broke through, completely shattering whatever power had been holding sway over me.

*TIRRING!*

Congratulations! Your Talent "Stubborn Mule" has reached rank F level 5.

My lungs were working furiously as I silently fumed. A pathetic attempt to influence my will? It was the first time I had come into contact with truly hostile magic, as that’s most likely what it had been. At first I’d been understandably wary of magic and all that occult mumbo jumbo, but if all it took to break its hold was a silly talent for stubbornness, then I was all set.

I slowly brought my breathing back under control as I examined my interlocutor with acute interest, though I can understand how others might have mistakenly thought I was sizing her up for a meal. This, of course, was utter nonsense. How could that possibly be, when this was likely a being of a higher dimension of power or a mighty guardian entity in absolute control of this space. The most prudent course would, of course, be to pay my respects and ingratiate myself to such a power.

“So you’re the misbegotten spawn of a mangy goat running things around here?”

Damn, I really hadn’t meant to do that this time. I suppose I may have a bit of a habit of thinking out loud really nasty things about others which I might be better advised keeping locked down deep, deep inside, then tossing the key overboard.

In the other hand, I don’t really give a shit. She had just tried to magick me. Be nice to a manipulative little whore like her? Fat chance. Though of course, by appearances she was hardly fat at all. Or a whore, for that matter.

The apparition in front of me was that of a young maiden in her early twenties, with an air of nobility and fine features that could not only be described as inhumanly beautiful and captivating, but also inspiring in a way I could not quite grasp. She had deep eyes that sparkled with a fierce inner fire, an ardent determination that would not bow down. Yet, her rosy lips were curved upward in a benevolent smile as she gazed upon me, just as a mother would upon a recalcitrant child throwing a tantrum.

“Mortal, it doth not become thee to besmirch thine tongue with such foulness of spirit. Thou must hearken..”

I immediately held up my hand, interrupting her, “I can’t even understand just about every other word out of you, woman.”

Though her expression hardly shifted, her lips did quiver ever so slightly. Also, was that a little tension I noticed at the corner of her eyes?

“Mortal, per your request, I shall deign to speak to you in a manner better suited to you,” She replied, making a face as though I’d just asked her to swallow a turd. "In the passage of the countless centuries to which I have borne witness, the means to communicate through spoken language has undergone subtle yet profound variations, many of which seem unfamiliar to you.”

I shrugged noncommittally, urging her on.

“I welcome you to the Labyrinth of Souls. You must have many questions, but time is precious. The soul of the child you seek is tied to the fate of that one,” she explained urgently while tilting her head in the direction Pacha had run in, a tone of deep distress clearly distinguishable in her voice. “You must save one if you wish to save the other. I shall provide all the assistance I..”

So that’s how she wanted to play this. Huh. Yeah right.

I lifted my hand up, palm facing her, indicating what I thought of that idea, then just for added emphasis, I added in my most infuriatingly indifferent tone, “Not interested.”

“But to save the chil..”

I rolled my eyes as I slowly shook my head, “Please. You’re not even trying. Here, let me guess. Fight shades from the past, save child and win, blah blah. Like this is some sort of fancy test or rat trap, depending on which side of the wringer you’re on, and you expect me to be all deferential and eager to please. Well, I’m not buying it. First of all, that’s some seriously messed up interior decoration out there, what with all the walls full of people being flayed, decapitated, gutted, and otherwise butchered wholesale. That kinda clued me in as to what sort of place I should expect. Also, just what kind of benign power would require the sacrifice of a living soul just as a ticket to enter. Added to which, of all the memories you could have rifled through, you just had to go and pick this particular one. Probably some sort of connection between Sol and Pasha, likely a fruit of my own inescapable sense of guilt and self-loathing. Even so, you rub salt all over that wound, then expect me to be all happy that you’ve deigned to show your face and talk to me only after I’ve been raining on your parade all night?”

“But ya know what, I could have put up with all of that. Just shoved it aside and been a happy-go-lucky, hope-for-the-best optimist with a deathwish. I really could have, and all those reasons I just mentioned are really just excuses, stuff I bounce around in my brain and rattle around to distract myself, try and rationalize it for me and my overblown ego,” I added lightly, almost as though it were an afterthought. Then I paused to lift my gaze and lock onto her eyes, just so she could see the brutal honesty of my next sentence, “But in the end, the simple truth is I just don’t trust you.”

That’s right. I’ve been through some pretty hairy situations in my life, and apparently I haven’t grown any wiser with age and experience. What I have acquired, in the other hand, is a gut instinct that just tells me when someone or something smells fishy. I can detect that reek from a mile away, and often times that has been the dividing line between life and death.

Knowing whom to trust.

It all comes down to that, when you boil right down to it. That was part of why I’d been able to fraternize with Zephyr, Sol and Reaver in the very short time I’ve been in Aeterna, in spite of the crusty cynicism that covers my heart, running all the way to the core. It has so many wounds and scars, sometimes I think the old ticker is just one big scar, numb to just about everything the world can throw at me.

I may not be the most sensitive - or sensible, for that matter - guy in the world, but I can smell fish from the other side of the world. Just like now. Forget all the fancy wrapping, all the flawless beauty and the smothering air of benevolence that seemed to hover about her like an almost palpable aura. I wasn’t buying it. This chick, if she was a chick, was trouble. She reeked of it.

Seconds slowly ticked on by, an eternity by anybody’s measure. We stood there, unmoving and unyielding, waiting for the other to make the next move. It was almost like a game of chicken, to see who put on the grown up pants first just so we wouldn’t have to stand around and stare at one another all day. Of course, I could have broken it off, and I probably should have, given that I was obviously the one in enemy territory.

Still, I do so hate to lose.

In any event, after an eternity or two, she finally cracked. It was minute at first, the subtlest of changes in the air around her. Her expression remained the same and none of her features shifted even a single millimeter. Still, there it was. One moment she had been all benevolence, kindness, love and all that useless crap. In the next she was all ruthless efficiency, icy aloofness. It was all just business.

“Very well, mortal. It shall be as you wish. This veneer of humanity wears ever more tiresome with every iteration, and in the end the result shall be the same. You have fallen within the Labyrinth of Souls, and you will wander its endless halls until your very essence has been consumed by The Worthy.”

“Ah, see? Doesn’t it feel good, getting that off your chest?” I grinned at her, as though I hadn’t just heard her refer to me as though I were some kind of new age health supplement to be taken before supper every day. “Now I feel like we can finally begin to establish some sort of rapport. You know, take that next step in our relationship?”

The only reply I got to that was an icy stare that could have frozen hell over.

“Look, we don’t need to be enemies. Maybe we started off on the wrong foot. You give me the kid and the mutt, and we’ll be on our way. Hell, if you like, I can even send you a few people who could use some serious soul scrubbing, or whatever it is you do here.”

“You seem to be operating under a misassumption, mortal,” came the frosty reply.

“Oh?” I raised an eyebrow.

“For any successful negotiation of terms, each party must have sufficient bargaining capital. You, however,” came the clipped voice, already dismissive as her figure slowly started to fade from my vision, slowly dissolving into the mist around us. “are already ours.”

Alright, I had to admit that was a very well delivered line. I even felt a slight chill invade my chest for just a second, but that was about it. I shrugged it off.

“So, that’s it? More meat puppets dredged up from the past? It’s gonna take a hell of a lot more than that to stop me,” I mused out loud, laying Katherine’s stock against the ground and lazily leaning to one side.

“Gloat while you can, mortal. The more you struggle, the more succulent our feast,” came the voice from the air around me, and there was now only the faintly discernible outline of a pair of eyes left in the air before me, watching me with the first glimmer of something other than cold detachment. If I had to name it, I would say it was hunger. “I shall relish the experience.”

The world around me slowly began to fade away, starting from the very edges of my vision. Inky darkness was encroaching from every corner, squeezing what little light remained towards me. The sounds of the forest around me were also gone, and not even the rustling of leaves or the passage of wind could be detected.

“Shia,” I mouthed, not daring to make a sound. “I guess you were right.”

Instantly, my adoptive book-daughter’s voice came chiming in right next to my ear.

“Of course I was right,” came the slightly impatient words, tinged with not a small trace of smugness. “I told you the probability of an error in my deductions was within the eighth percentile range.” Children with their fancy talk, really.

“Yeah, yeah. So, what’s next?” I replied, almost managing not to roll my eyes.

“Like I told you when we first entered, we’re not truly here. It is not an illusion, but neither is it real. If my estimations are correct, then we are currently under the effect of a very powerful spell structure that allows an individual to enter a part of their own consciousness and interact directly with the soul energy around them.”

“Like a soul realm, then.” I added helpfully.

“If you must call it that I suppose you can, though that’s a crass oversimplification,” came Shia’s mournful sigh. Did all children get into this annoying habit of talking down to their parents like that? “It does heavily involve the individual’s soul, but the environment itself is not truly connected to one’s soul. Instead, it is the product an impressive magical array which facilitates the projection of skillfully manipulated external soul energy constructs onto the target individual’s inner spiritual consciousness.”

“So all those meat puppets I’ve been felling left and right are all chunks of soul energy shaped by this guardian bitch’s will?”

“Ah, more oversimplification, but essentially, yes,” came Shia’s somewhat resignated voice.

I decided to conveniently ignore that tone, and bravely pushed forward. “So, the bait is set and all that is left is to wait to spring the trap?”

“Umm, mommy.. you should understand that the entire structure of these trials are devised in such a way that they would mentally, emotionally, and spiritually drain the trapped individual, feeding upon the energies released by their every struggle. Should the victim’s inner defenses weaken enough, he would likely lose cohesivity as his sense of self slowly degrades and eventually becomes assimilated to..” came Shia’s concerned whisper.

“Basically, it wants me to struggle until I flop over dead so it can have me for supper,” I supplied helpfully, with a huge grin on my face.

“Uh-huh. Umm. Mommy, why are you grinning with the big scary wolf grin again?” came the hesitant query.

“Because these poor devils have no freaking idea of who they’re messing with. Get into a shoving match against the power of my will? Hah. The poor deluded bastards. They really think they’ve got what it takes to play hard ball with me?” I sneered wickedly, the hair on my arms already standing on end like a wolfhound who’s found the scent of blood. Sure, when you took in my pathetically low level, the appalling state of my overall physical constitution, and the destitute state of my combat skills in this world, I could hardly deny that I would rank right up there with plankton or whatever else served as the bottom of the dietary pyramid in Aeterna.

That said, you really wanted to get into a clash of wills against me? Hah. I had a goddam certified bullet-proof soul, and I would rip bloody chunks out of anyone who even looked at me crossways. Soul-wise, that is.

Hey, I AM Mr. Devourer of Souls, after all.

They thought they had me cornered, trapped, when it was the other way around. At long last, I could finally smell prey once more, and it had awakened my lust for blood, for the thrill of the hunt and the glorious ecstasy of the kill.

I lifted up my head and took a whiff in the air. Ah yes, there it was - the sweet scent of blood hanging like a gossamer sheet in the night.

All that was left was to taste the sweet thrill of the hunt.

“About time they learned just who the real hunter is around here,” I finished, as the darkness finally closed in around me, swallowing me whole into a strange, weightless world with neither light nor sound. I had even lost the singular feeling of self-awareness a person has regarding their own body. I was merely a disembodied chunk of badassery hovering in the darkness, looking for some ass to kick.

“You look just like Reaver right before he goes to a corner to pee,” supplied Shia helpfully.

No sense for the dramatic, these damn kids. No flair for it at all.