Caracara's Hunt

"Scatter!" he shouted out and rushed forward.

This startled the beast, but it did not slow. With its long legs, it covered the distance between them and pounced on him. Sharp claws flashed before Arawn, but he had been expecting it.

Rolling down, he avoided the attack and whirled around. Ether was in his hands, and he sent ether blade after ether blade into the creature"s back. It howled in fury and turned on him. With a powerful jump, it was before him, about to slam him to the ground.

Ether flashed, blinding the creature, and Arawn rose to his feet, running away. He wasn"t a master swordmage to fight in close combat. His heart was already beating at his ribcage like a terrified sparrow.

The beast bounded after him the moment it regained its vision, but the ground disappeared under its front paw, and it fell, hitting the ground with a loud thump. Betty rushed to its side with her sword raised high and hacked down at the beast"s left flank. Yet her blade didn"t even cut the skin.

Surprise flitted past the woman"s features, but she didn"t freeze. Upon realizing that her attacks were as pointless as Arawn had said they would be, she grimaced and fell back. Or tried to anyway.

The beast wasn"t going to let her leave just like that. It whipped around and clawed at her side. As fast as Betty was, she could not avoid it fully, and the claws tore through her side. They cut her leather armor and drew blood, but not much more.

"Betty!" Rain screamed and ran forward.

Rocks rose from the ground, lifting her up, and she jumped on the beast"s back. With all of her power, she stabbed both of her knives into its neck. The creature howled, but more in annoyance than pain. The knives had barely broken the skin.

With unexpected intelligence, the beast fell on its back, almost squashing Rain. The woman, however, was an earth mage and opened up a hole in the ground to save herself. Once the beast returned to its feet, it looked around, looking positively dumbfounded. Where had the bug on its back disappeared?

Arawn threw a dozen or so ether blades to not give it time to think. The beast obliged him and forgot all about Rain. Its head swiveled toward Betty, however, since she was closer.

When the ether blades approached, the beast dodged most of them. Like a formless shadow, it twisted right and left. On some instinctual level, it seemed to know that Arawn"s attacks weren"t normal and could possibly hurt it.

Val unstoppered his waterskin, and water flowed out in a rush. When the beast turned to go after Betty once more, he sent the water into the ground. The creature"s progress slowed instantaneously. It howled in a shrill voice and pulled its feet from the mud that entrapped them.

When it shifted its gaze to Val, Rain popped up in its blind spot and struck with both her knives. From Betty"s attempt, they knew that casual slashes wouldn"t work, so stabbing with all strength was their only choice.

The sudden attack gave enough time for Betty to finally regain her footing and escape. She touched her bleeding side, then shook her head and checked that her small shield was securely attached to her left hand.

The beast"s original target was gone, so it went after Val. A momentary sprint was enough to close in on the man without giving him a chance to react. Val called to the ether and covered the beast"s head with a water bubble, but the ether did not stay stuck. Upon coming in contact with the beast"s skin, it scattered, dematerializing.

Arawn created an ether wall before Val to give him an extra fraction of a second while swinging ether blades as fast as he could in their direction. Yet he knew it wasn"t enough. Although his attacks gave the creature pause and made it dodge, this was a game without a victor.

If the present situation continued, his companions would exhaust themselves first. For every move the beast made, the three people had to do at least three. Their legs were shorter and their steps covered less ground. There was no way they could battle the beast in stamina.

But they couldn"t stop it either. Arawn had hoped that with Rain and Val"s skills, they could keep it in place long enough for him to congeal enough ether to land a killing blow. However, it did not seem to be the case.

The beast had no trouble dodging all of them. After the first couple stumbles, it even learned to be careful about its footing, avoiding most of Rain and Val"s traps.

"We need to do something before all of them get killed."

The beast realized that it was being led around the nose and lost its temper. With a low growl, it turned on Rain, who was the closest, and attacked her like there was no tomorrow. Each of its pounces shook the ground from its weight.

Rain was forced to use all she knew about being a fly to dodge. She couldn"t take a breath before sharp claws or teeth came at her waist, legs, or head.

On the side, Betty stabbed at the beast"s back leg, but she was ignored. The creature didn"t even turn her way. It acted as if her attempts at injuring it didn"t deserve any notice.

Val received the same treatment. When he realized that, he ran over and hacked at the beast"s side with his sword. It wasn"t too effective, but he was at least doing something. The mud had lost its effectiveness long ago.

"Why do I feel like there is something wrong about this…"

Arawn had a bad feeling, but he couldn"t put a finger on it. They weren"t winning, but they weren"t losing too badly. If the beast made a single wrong move and let him get close, they could get rid of it in one hit.

As he thought while keeping up the barrage of ether blades, he realized what was wrong. But it was too late to warn the others.

The beast suddenly turned on Val. Its upper lip rose in a sneer, revealing its bone white fangs. Betty screamed, but she couldn"t do anything besides throwing herself in front of the beast, and that wouldn"t help anyone.

The beast ignored even Arawn"s attacks as it closed its jaws over Val"s arm. His bones cracked with a crunching sound, and the man screamed. The sound that left his mouth was more animal than human.

Strangely though, the pain had stabilized him, fueling something lying deep within him. In a blink of an eye, he pulled out a dagger with his left hand and stabbed it straight into the beast"s glowing eye. Once, twice… and then the beast sent him flying while howling like a thousand demons.

Its sharp voice woke Arawn from his stupor, and he congealed as much of the ether as he could. The beast was turning in place, trying to reach the dagger with its claws to pull it out. Yet every time it came close, it howled in even more pain.

Arawn threw a gaze at Rain. She looked haggard, but not out of it yet. When he motioned with his head toward the mad beast, she nodded.

The next moment, the ground underneath it fell down by a hand"s length. The beast had forgotten all about its surroundings from the pain and lost its footing. This was more than enough of a chance for Arawn.

He compressed so much ether into the next two ether blades, he was afraid they might burst. While they still held, he sent them at the beast lying p.r.o.ne on the ground and howling its pain away.

The creature felt the approaching danger. It jumped to its feet and turned its head around to see with the left eye. By that time, the ether was already on it. The condensed light burned through its skin, searing it away along with the muscle and bone.

The howling grew even more ear-splitting before quieting swiftly. The beast tottered on its feet for a moment more, then sent the humans an aggrieved look and fell down on its side.

"Is it dead?" Betty asked, not daring to walk closer to check it. "It"s dead, right?"

"Yeah," Arawn said, guessing more than being sure.

The beast had been seared almost all the way through. If it could have survived that, it would be immortal.

A groan came from their right, and Arawn saw Val lying on the ground. There was a pool of blood around his stump, and his paleness rivaled that of the dead. He was trying to move, to push himself up, but with only the left hand, he could not do it.

Arawn ran to him at his fastest speed, forgetting all about his own exhaustion. He dropped by the man and helped him sit up. Val groaned, biting on his already bleeding lips to stop himself from screaming.

"We need to help him," Arawn said in a shaky voice. Only then did he realize that he was trembling all over.

It was his fault. Everything was always his fault. If he had stopped the others from following him, no one would have gotten hurt. Betty"s side was still bleeding from where the beast had nabbed her with its claws. Rain had avoided most of the attacks, but even she had received a few deep scratches, while Val had lost his arm. His arm!

How was he supposed to live from then on? No one would ever give him a second glance, let alone care about his existence, be it women or business partners. A man who couldn"t defend himself and his family was not a man.

"Help me stop the bleeding," Rain said, crouching down by his side.

She tore Val"s sleeve off and did her best to wrap up the wound. The cloth soaked through almost instantaneously. The dark stain on the brown robe was like a blaming finger aimed at Arawn. He couldn"t help but think about how he had cost the man an arm.

Footsteps came from the gra.s.sland, and Arawn jumped to his feet, a storm of ether at his hands. He sent it forward without even waiting for whatever it was to show their face.

"Arawn! Stop that!"

It took a moment for Arawn to recognize Corwal"s voice. When he did, he let the ether go and fell back to the ground, holding Val up. The man was barely conscious and growing paler with every pa.s.sing second. His eyes roamed the surroundings, refusing to look at the bleeding stump, but always returning to it.

Whenever they did that, his expression would falter. He seemed to be on the verge of crying but unable to. Something was holding him up from within, but it was slowly losing the battle.

"What happened?" Corwal asked while going down the hill.

His eyes soon landed on the dead beast and the pool of blood beneath Arawn"s knees. He ran over to them the next second. After taking in Val"s horrid complexion, he cursed while calling upon the ether.

"I told you I"m no doctor."

Yet even as he said that, he unwound the makeshift bandage and placed his hand on the wound. This time, Val screamed. He could no longer hold himself together and lost consciousness.

Ether rushed into his arm, knitting the muscles where it could, but their ends hung limp in the open. The same happened to the nerves and blood stream. Corwal could restore what was before, but not force it to grow differently, like cover with skin what was once the continuation of the arm.

Corwal"s expression darkened, and he called upon more ether. It went toward the arm, fusing with the muscle and bone as well as skin, but then stopped, not moving from there. No matter how Corwal tugged at it, the ether refused to create something new.

"f.u.c.k you and your mother," Corwal hissed and reached into his pocket.

From it, he pulled out a small talisman and placed it on the bleeding stump. The iron changed color upon contact with blood, and ether rushed out like a wild beast. There was not much of it, but it moved with purpose.

Without any one of them present giving it any command, the ether which had been trapped in the talisman went into the arm and made quick work of the damage there. The way the muscles were arranged changed, as did the bloodstream. The bone was shortened and its jagged end rounded up. Any bone fragments left in the arm were pushed out before skin covered everything up.

In no more than a minute, the stump became nothing more than an old injury. If Arawn hadn"t been present for all of it, he would have been certain that Val had always had a stump. After all, there was nothing to give away that it was a recent injury.

"What was that?" Rain asked.

Corwal glanced down at the b.l.o.o.d.y iron talisman in his hand and threw it away. "An artefact." He turned to Arawn with an icy expression. "Next time you try to act the hero, check what you"re pitting yourself against. That artefact could have bought me a city, and now it"s been wasted for no good reason."