Age Of The Marked: Year 719, 6th month, Day 9
The figure reached the top of the wall as Corv began to rise, ducking behind an outcropping as a sentry passed. The figure was wearing a ragged Hunter’s uniform, the hood of the cloak pulled over their face, but missing the accompanying dagger and crossbow, or even a standard issue weapon that many grunts often used if unskilled with ranged tactics. They looked at their gauntlet, a barely noticeable glow surfacing. The figure skulked through the wall until it reached a house built upon it and slid down, the sound of their footfalls negated by the birds beginning to chirp. The figure produced a pack and removed a detailed map of the city, a pocket watch moving backwards, and a rope. They wrapped the rope around their waste, threw it over the house’s chimney and flung that side of the rope to the ground. The figure grasped the side they were tied to and the slack rope and slowly fed themselves more and more rope until they safely reached the bottom. They untied themselves and put the rope away, they checked the pocket watch then began to jog towards the center of the town.
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Lavitz Feld woke up about a minute before the morning bells begun to ring. He rubbed at his temples in agony. Today was going to be difficult, he thought to himself. The execution would be private instead of public, thankfully, for most the execution of a child tended to ruin their day. Only the city council and Hunters would be present. Man, today will be quite the downer, I could really use a drink right about now he thought to himself. He stood up as his mind began to trail off and begun to ready himself for the day. He walked out to his personal restroom, connected by a door to his room, there it was, one of his subordinates already had his bath ready, and he sunk in, the water was hot, and his skin reddened whenever he pulled it out, it was perfect. He sat there, still, listening to the birds outside the open window and his mind drifted. He thought of what he should have said to Mr. Jol instead of what he did, also of dozens of ways to have handled the major. He thought of the girl, Tsel, she had tan skin, probably from long hours of play during the spring and summer, she had short black hair, shorter even than his own, although that was not saying much. She had scabs over her knees. His thoughts froze as he remembered her eyes, like looking into the void itself, her eyes terrifying to behold, they weren't black, they were the absence of light. It sent a shiver down his spine, muffled by the heat of the bath. Now her eyes were a milky white, a stark contrast to before. He dunked his head in the water, his face softening at the heat. He could feel the sting of the heat as it reached his scarred half, after all these years, it would still hurt. He pulled his head out, leaned back, and waited there, motionless, for what felt to be years, silent tears washed over his face. He wiped at his face, and looked at his tears, why was he crying?
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A cold air filled the closed off city hall, it would have felt wonderous, if not for the occasion. The council sat down together in the center of the mostly empty seats and looked at the platform. A little girl, a hood over her face and an inhibitor plate was carried over to the noose. As she grew closer she began to scream and kick the large man. Marcus Grev leaned forward, and listened to the girl as the others attempted to ignore her protests. There was no way she could know about her execution, he thought to himself, perhaps she could feel it in the air. “Bah!” He exclaimed. “Typical Marked, even when they’re oblivious to their world they’ve got to make a fuss.”
The Hunters gathered around and filled the seats around the council, with the more decorated soldiers closer to the council. Marcus noticed one hunter who came in with their hood up, they had a more ragged appearance than the others and Marcus readied himself with insults to get the soldier away from him if they approached, but the soldier simply sat in a heavily shaded area. Oh, that’s right, he thought looking up, with this weird chill I forgot how much heat Corv is beating down on us, he looked around and saw several other Hunters who had their hoods drawn up, and he relaxed again.
The noose was wrapped around her neck, the hood threatening to suffocate the child before they even began to hang her. Marcus wiped at his brow, when did it get so hot, he looked at his fellow council members, they all looked so tired, no, everyone was exhausted. He looked back to where the hooded Hunter was, they were gone. He was yanked out of his seat and a massive hand was placed over his mouth as the sound of the Hunter’s gauntlets alerted them to the Marked. “Here’s the deal!” The massive Hunter yelled out as all the other Hunters aimed their crossbows at the massive man. “This man is going to die.” Marcus’s screams were muffled as his face was lit on fire by the bare hand of the giant.
Lavitz released the bolt in his weapon, the snap of the bowstring sending it speeding forward. The giant flung the still living man to the side, interposing the council member between himself and the deadly projectile, a deadly half second later the bolt penetrated the man’s skull, a jet of blood streaking out of his left eye. The giant grabbed two more additional members by the necks and easily lifted them out of their seats. “Now that we’ve established the fact that Marcus Grev would die I would like to make a proposition.” His voice echoed across the circular platform surrounding city hall as every single crossbow was trained on him, if they had all released at once they most likely would have killed the man, but their fear was rising as the girl’s panicked wails were thrown out to the city limits. All the Hunters had become scared, no one wanted to be the one to kill a council member. The giant’s face tensed, the girl’s fear
was touching even him. “What do you want.” A strained whisper escaped one of his captive’s mouths. The giant looked at the woman and released a bit of his grasp on her. “You’ll need to be louder councilwoman, please, loud enough so that they can all hear, if you’d please.” Pure, explicit rage filled his words, and she felt a bit of that rage, giving her the strength of voice he required. “What do you want, Marked!” She yelled across the area. “Ah, I’m so glad you asked, it’s quite simple, release her and you live.” He felt the tension in her rising, her aggression meeting his own. “I would sooner die than set another of you fucking Marked free upon this world, Fire!” As she yelled her last words her throat ignited in fire, smoke billowing out of her mouth and nostrils. He sighed within himself, dammit, his emotions overpowered the little girl’s fear, well, he tried it Lydia’s way, time to do it his way.
Several Hunters had built up enough courage from their growing anger to release a disjointed volley at the man. One bolt grazed his right arm, not deep enough to bleed, but enough to pain the man, he blocked his left flank with the soon-to-be corpse of the other council member, and he flung the fried woman at a smaller volley headed towards him. He fell to the floor where 4 other council members, their mouths agape begin to cower on the floorboards. He glanced at each of them individually and placed his hands together.
Aggression was his focus, the catalyst to his ability to manifest his mark, anger was enough to cause his touch to torch another, but to truly create he needed pain, emotional pain. His mind drifted to Sol, his friend, cut down as he moved to take his place from the deadly blow, he saw Kitiara, a child of 12 as he failed to save her in time, her limp body swinging from her neck, he saw the boy who he never knew, as he sacrificed himself to save his sister and the monster that tried to protect them, the boy who covered the monster and his sister in muck and rock, he remembered the helplessness of his broken body saved in the muck as the boy was cut down, he remembered when they found the girl, stabbing at the ground until they pierced her heart and left her to bleed next to him, oblivious to his presence.
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They saw the blue eyed man close his eyes, his hands together, sitting still for a single instant in time, they were paralyzed in fear, but when he had closed his eyes they felt hurt, they felt pain, they felt rage, and they gained the strength to attack him, but it was too late. He opened his eyes, the crystal blue replaced by hate, his eyes resembling a raging fire behind milky, smoke filled glass, and the man let out a roar as his arms burst into flames.
The man had knelt down and several of the Hunters ran in to kill the man and were instantly obliterated. A wave of superheated gas expelled from the depression in the wooden platform, the men and women who ran toward it were ignited in the explosion, their uniforms ablaze and their skin boiling as they cooked from the outside in. The platform gave way, the wood but ash in his wake, and the man fell down, landing on the ground below, as the torched cadavers of the council fell about him.
“Go, now, he cannot repeat that ability while his arms are aflame!” The voice of the Colonel pierced through the crackling of the burning platform and screams of the dying. The Hunters nodded and ran to the hole in the area, and descended.
His stolen uniform was on fire and as he ran he burned through the key points in the fabric to allow it to fall away from him. He was on the outside of the execution area and he heard them start to pursue him. How long do I have, he thought, before they kill her just to spite me? He looked around, that platform was made of wood set atop stone, he could run across to the other side to the entrance, but that would be expected. He could take his pursuers on, but that would take too long, what to do.
“Colonel, what about the girl?” Private Salomao asked, terror filling his voice. Colonel Feld shot him an angry glance. “Do you know who that is private? That is the son of Dierlo, that, is Tubal the Pyre Demon! Fuck the girl, he is the target now!” He screamed at the private as he tried to overcome the screaming of the girl. An explosion from outside their location echoed through and they heard a loud crash and turned to the source. Fire billowed out from under his now bare feet, he was crouched as smoke escaped his burned arms and swirled around his muscular build as he begun to stand over the now scorched platform, he had jumped, farther and more powerfully than any creature should be capable of. He towered over all of them, nearly seven feet, and what little of the uniform was left, left nothing to the imagination. “I want the girl!” His deep, demonic voice reverberated through their bones and he begun to approach them. Lavitz set his crossbow to the hood around the girl’s head. Anger exploded out of Tubal, and he opened his mouth in a roar of white smoke at the group of twelve, spreading like wildfire. Their sight was gone, their eyes and lungs burning from the demonic smoke screen. A hand reached for the noose around Tsel’s neck. Another reached for the hand. Major Gail Patricka gripping his hand tightly, a pair of goggles now firmly on her face. She removed her dagger and went for his neck. He caught her hand in his and she grabbed at her own hand, each of their faces glowing a bright red as they struggled against one another, they were both wielding the knife now she in 2 hands, he in 1, and she was losing. His strength pushed her to her knees as the knife grew closer to her exposed neck. A smirk stretched across the demonic visage of the Pyre Demon. She managed to yell out “Colonel” before the knife slid easily into her throat. Tubal removed the knife from the dying woman and hacked through the rope in a single blow.
Tsel was terrified, she didn’t know what was going on, she had heard shots, burning, all while having something over her head and and something tight around her neck, her esophagus was burning and she was about to pass out, then she was whisked away, headed gods know where, so she screamed. “Silence!” A heavy voice told her as she was jerked by his frantic running.
“Gail, hold on just a little longer. Anders! Get your ass back here!” Corporal Anders came back with a burning plank and handed it to the Colonel, then Anders looked around, the other nine were on their way to kill the man, he was glad he was commanded to stay. “This is going to hurt Gail, bite down on this.” He put a large splinter into her mouth and brought the burning poker to her neck. “Anders, hold her down, make sure she does not move her neck, understood?” The corporal put his knee on her chest and grabbed her head with both hands and nodded to Lavitz. Her eyes pupils dilated and she began to convulse as he brought the flaming stick to her wound. Slowly he brought it to her flesh, then pressed it hard into her, Anders was struggling to keep the injured woman as still as possible, no matter what training you had, this was pure instinctual, overriding the logic centers of her brain. He released her and she calmed. He checked the area again, still bleeding. “Only once more Gail, just hold on, alright.” He didn’t wait for acknowledgement, and went straight back to cauterizing the wound, he counted to three again and released. She coughed up blood and it splattered onto Ander’s face. Feld examined the wound again, dammit, I have to do this again he thought. Without a warning he pressed it into her again. Her vision had become blurry, her consciousness only returning to inform her that she was being attacked, telling her body to escape, to fight back, and then after what felt like hours it finally stopped, and everything went black.
Private Salomao followed Captain Eriks down toward the Pyre Demon, his body was trembling. Ericks lead the company of nine to a stone building, calling out he saw him go into it, and they charged in. It was quiet, eerily quiet. They spread out in threes, Salomao with Yiltric and Fuurn ascended the stairs. “Clear!” Yiltric spat, his nerves getting the best of him. “Clear!” He responded, followed by a third response from Fuurn. Combat broke out below, and they rushed down. Eriks was bleeding out from a cranial blow, hard enough to have broken the bone, Salomao couldn’t help but to stare into the man. Two others were dead, one had a large metal rod shoved through her chest, and the third oozed blood from her mouth, her jaw ripped from her head. Yiltric approached her, and she blinked, she was still alive. The other three reached the floor level. “Did anyone hear if the door was opened or not?” Someone asked. Someone responded, the private wasn’t paying attention, but the general consensus was he was still here. Yiltric screamed in pure fear as his boot was burned through by the demon’s claw, they all turned to see the massive man holding Yiltric by the leg, swinging him about and bowling him into two others. The demon’s left arm ignited in flame as it plunged into the floorboards, fires burst out from the wooden floor and smoke materialised before them all. Scream after scream, after scream, until they stopped, and the rooms visibility increased. There was private Salomao, alone, Tubal-Cain, son of Dierlo, towering above him. The man was covered head to toe in the blood of the company. He pulled out a sword and rushed the man. Tubal stepped away from the blade, producing an ugly, misshapen smith’s hammer from the fire proof pack he carried, he used the hammer to pull the sword by the guard, toward him, stealing the private’s balance. He spun about, striking Salomao’s sword arm in an uppercut, connecting with his elbow, a sickening crack echoed through the main floor, followed by a howl of pain. The private raised his good arm. “I, I surrender.” He could taste the man’s fear. “I accept your surrender.” The giant responded and the private breathed a sigh of relief. “As Hunters execute their Marked prisoners, so shall the Marked execute their Hunter prisoners. He reached for the man’s head, scorching it, cooking the man’s brains as he did so, he held on long after the man finally died from the pain. Salomao dropped, the same scar as Feld burned into him. He walked out and crossed into the adjacent building and pulled the blind girl, her hood now gone, easily out of the barrel, and they left the city, their opposition now dispatched, any reinforcements would arrive far too late.
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Twelve days later Colonel Feld walked into the recovery wing, walking to the now fully awake Major Patrika. “Colonel.” She rasped in a weak tone. Her neck was covered in cloth, as were a few of her fingers, cut by the knife while in her scuffle. “How are you feeling Major?” He asked, concern for her abundantly apparent. “Like I look Colonel.” He looked at her. “What, you mean like shit?” He smiled at his own comment and she chuckled lightly, which quickly turned to coughing. “I’m sorry Colonel, I failed.” Her expression was deep, she lamented surviving, of failing to kill the demon. “Failed? You survived an encounter with Tubal Cain, join the club.” He gestured at the scar of the hand around his eye patch. “Not many can say that, not many at all.” His statement quickly descended to a somber tone. He patted her on the leg. “We have been scouring the woods for traces of Tubal Cain, we think we have found a trail, I am sorry Major, but this place may seem a bit scarce for some time, I will be leading the Hunt, we will get him soon, after sixteen years, we better.” He smiled at her, a fake one of course, and he stood up to leave. “Colonel, I want to go.” He looked back at her. “Yes, I know you do, I would love for you to come as well, but not in your current state, there will be other hunts Patrika, trust me, there are always more.” And he walked away.