*CRACK*

Wood snaps behind me, and thick lumbering steps shake the trees. Dew rains down around me, and I cover my mouth with my hands. I hear the damn thing huffing nearby. It sniffs the ground. Pawing here and there, with its sharp claws.

I breathe in, and out slowly trying and failing to calm myself.

“RRRRAAAAUUUUOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO”

It vocalizes shaking around me. I can feel it reconnect with the ground. It shakes everything nearby, damn near the whole forest is alerted to its presence. It doesn’t care though. This is an apex predator of apex predators. It goes quiet for a moment. Then a claw goes streaking down inches from my head shattering the log I’m hiding behind.

“RRRRAAAAAAUUUOOOOO”

I stumble, and take off sprinting. I don't bother to look behind me I know it follows. Its footsteps shake the ground behind me. It doesn’t matter what I run through, over, or around. It's like being chased by a truck, it shatters any, and all debris in its path.

I shake the staff in my hand. “NOW WOULD BE A REALLY GOOD TIME TO ACTIVATE YOU HUSSY.” I shout at it, with no response.

I vault over a log, and hear it shatter behind me. Thick, hot breaths practically on my neck. I see a break in the trees, white light practically blinding me. With nowhere else to run I kick it into overdrive. I take a step out of the forest, and am falling. A 12-foot drop below me, the ground races to meet me, and I can hear the thing skid to a halt, as dirt tumbles over the edge.

“RRRAAAUUUUOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" It cries. I hit the ground, and bounce. I suck in a breath, and pain flares in my chest. My legs are fine though. I hobble forward out of the small clearing and to the next set of trees. I cough blood onto my sleeve.

“RRRRRAAAUUUOOOOOOOOOOO" The beast calls again, fucking abomination.

I lean against a tree and cough up more blood. I had to make it back. Thelia, and Anise were waiting for me. When the damned monster came after us we split up

“RRRAAAUUUUOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" It called again. It was farther this time, but it had my scent now, it would find me. If we were all together maybe we could take it. Now we knew it was here, knew it was waiting, but we were in its territory.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Thelia we have something to confess.” I started, Anise and I had shared hushed whispers with each other for five days, two on the road, and three at the cave while I wrote down, and downloaded information. I’d been fired from my job, had nearly 500 missed calls. And my father's lawyer has been trying to get incontact with me for the past week. Even so far as sending my steam account messages. I emailed him back.

Hey Reggie,

Sorry, I haven’t been in contact, but something happened, and I’ve been reevaluating what I know.

I am on a trip, and don’t know when I will be able to return. Cancel all of my subscriptions to everything except my cell phone bill, and buy the building at the coordinates I’ll send you later. I should have a couple 100 million dollars in the bank, from my father. Make sure that my ownership is airtight. By the pipe system underneath from the government if you have to. If people give you shit for it I will just give you my account information. I’ll be able to contact you for the next few days, but I’m not sure after that. Tell my father hello, and that I might be close to forgiving him.

From your favorite client,

Jonathan Johnson

The coordinates I sent Reggie were to where the portal was located. Apparently some abandoned subway station in the middle of nowhere Queens, New York.

Reggie was thankful I finally replied, but not to happy about my impulsiveness. He agreed to my demands though, and said “I’ll do the best I can."

This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

“So…. What are you going to confess?” Thelia asks.

“Well you see Anise-" I start, but am quickly cut off. “I’m a necromancer.” I chuckle dryly, “I prefer the term alternative summoning.”

Thelia scratches her cheek, “That makes sense, I just thought you two were fucking. Guess I owe Rogue some money.”

Anise blushes furiously, “You thought what? I would- I mean- You-.” She storms off somewhere else, now upset.

Thelia bursts into laughter. I let out a sigh.

“Why don’t you go for it? The tension, is that the right word, the sexual tension between you is so thick I could cut it with scissors.” Thelia says.

I wave my hand. “I can’t I have someone else.” I tell her. My face must have changed because she looks upset now.

“This someone else is not around any longer is she?” Thelia asks. I open my mouth to reply, but just shake my head. She sits down, and lean her back up against me.

“Dwarves are like that.” She says. “They mate for life, and they live very long lives. Almost as long as elves.” She waves her hands in the air. “That's how this whole Orc-Dwarf thing started near half a century ago. A dwarf, and orc fell in love, shortly after for a dwarf, 15 years, the dwarf died. The orc took her time to mourn and, as orcs do, she found someone new. She spent 10 years in mourning unheard of for an orc. But the dwarves expected her to remain as such for her whole life.”

Thelia picked up a rock, and shattered it. “You see orcs believe that the soul is split up, and divided between multiple people of many races. And when those souls meet they fall in love. So when one person dies they take on the soul from the person they loved, then you move on and find the next person. And when someone finds all pieces of the soul they can move onto the afterlife once and for all. They can live with each of their loves for all of time.”

She lets out a sigh. “Dwarves took it as an insult however, and started a petty war over it. How long have you waited, how long since your soul was joined.”

She pats my shoulder reassuringly.

“Almost 11 years.” I say hoarsely. My staff hums slightly.

“Come tell me about her. Get it off your chest. I can tell the pain of heartbreak when I see it.” Thelia says.

I wipe off my eyes. “I’m fine.”

“Come now don’t be like that,” Thelia replies. “Tell me about her.” She insists.

“No, I’m fine seriously.” I tell her.

“Hey it’s okay. I’m your blood oath your secrets are my secrets.” Thelia urges

“Lay off, I don’t want to talk about it.” I snap. “I didn’t ask for your blood oath, so fuck off.” I turn my attention back to the task at hand, copying out the process for refining beets into sugar.

“Hey guys what’s this?” Anise calls. I roll up the paper and return it to the scroll case. Anise is crouched on the ground looking at something on the floor, a long feather. The feather was near the length of my arm, and brown and black.

“It’s a feather a strong wind probably blew it in here.” I reply. “Looks like an eagle feather maybe.”

“Do you think it’s a drale?” Anise whispers. Thelia laughs, “Drales were hunted off these lands a long time ago. Maybe in giant territory you could find some. But we are to far away. I have to agree with Jonathan it’s probably just some eagle.”

*Tink*

The metal disc inside our time candle drops.

“Well we should probably head to bed now, I’ll finish writing the rest of this one passage down, and we can leave tomorrow.”

Watches were fairly simple, and nothing happened out of the ordinary. We ate some simple porridge for breakfast, and I finished beet sugar refinement. I had that written down, along with how to refine rubber, and how to pasteurize milk. I also bought a few how it’s made ebooks, and downloaded them. How engines worked, some more detail on the printing press, and firearms, a history book about the cotton gin, and sewing too. I also stealth downloaded a few movies. Castaway, LoTRs, all of them, and the princess bride.

The walk out of the tunnel was uneventful, Anise had kept the feather. It was tucked into her hair now. I had tied her sandy blonde hair into a bun, and tucked the feather into it. We had a brief lunch at the main chamber where Waylax was. Thelia hadn’t asked why it wasn’t filled with poisonous gas like I claimed, or where he and his ‘hoard’ had gone, which was fine by me.

As we left a thick smell hit our noses. The smell of bile, and blood. Thelia tensed, and put on her caestus. Anise readied her mace. I held my staff over my shoulder like a baseball bat.

It was a blood bath outside. Something that had at one point resembled a deer was torn to shreds. Blood covered the ground, bones were smashed to bits, and bits of meat were everywhere.

“RRRRR" Something growled, it dropped from the mountain face above.

700-pounds of fur, feather, claws, and beak descended upon us. Anise shouted something, but another one of it’s roars drowned it out. We sprinted down the mountain path. The beast lumbering towards us. It yelps and with a loud thud it falls over. Sliding down the slope while we sprint away. It’s not down for long, and is back on our heels shortly.

“SPLIT UP, AND MEET BACK ON THE PATH TO TOWN. WE CAN’T FIGHT IT NOW.” Thelia shouts.

If we stopped at all it would kill us. Its claws ready, and waiting to strike. We each took off in different directions. I however was the unlucky one. The one this monstrosity followed.