The hunter shut the door and took a moment to breathe. Looking up and down the corridor he saw it was empty. He slid shut his eyes and sniffed the air; a wisp of sourness stung his nose, he heard footsteps all over the building- and one pair below.
On instinct he followed the scent.
As if his mind was freed from his body he walked briskly down the corridors, acutely aware of everything’s’ presence. Hearing a light-footed approach he knew it a servant and brushed away to a pillar. Hidden as they passed he waited for them to fade before walking out, his own steps were like that of a ghost.
Following the sickening sour scent it lead him to a bookcase, and saw slight smudges on the edge. Placing his fingers over it he pulled and it silently swung open to reveal a descending staircase. A flicker of rage spiked into his chest, not for Thea or her people. This rage was his own.
I had finished my breakfast and sat staring at my filthy shoes while fiddling with my hair. Waiting seemed like torture…
The hunter reached the bottom, aware of a singular presence as he entered the dark room. In the centre of it were strange instruments, some empty, splashed with residue or bubbling under blue flames. The walls were covered in strange, shriveled plants, animal organs, new and dried.
‘The smell of fae blood is stronger than you realize.’ He told the figure across the room. A council member. The only one free of the disgusting affliction plaguing the others, had his back turned. ‘Turn around.’ The hunter demanded. ‘Turn around now!’ Slowly the stranger stepped into the light. He had pitch black hair and beady eyes, jaw strong and scarred.
‘I expected punishment.’ The felden began. ‘But not you.’
‘I never came because of you! I wasn’t here for your sins! But that is coming.’ The hunter spoke with cold hate. ‘You have defied everything in this! You don’t understand the ATROCITIES you’ve committed!’ His eyes were piercing, voice bubbling with rage. ‘You risk RUIN! Beyond blasphemy, its inhuman, a soul debt no fire will cleanse, NEVER to be repaid!’
‘I see.’ The one spoke aloof, approaching jars filled with still living fae. He picked up a glass orb of deep crimson, his disgusting eyes reflected in it. He got the slightest hint of a sour smell from his room. He thought he had done well in masking the scent. ‘So I have found true power. You’re presence confirms it.’
‘Power you never got correct! I had to come down here and kill the corrupted beasts you’ve experimented on!’ His memory flashed with the infected worm which he claimed was sick with parasites… The beasts’ roar which sent him off and away from me… He clutched the animal pendent “you’ve brought dishonor and ruin onto ME!’ He being shook with uncontrollable rage. The God of Beasts despises him for his merciful killing. Gods don’t get involved.
‘I’ve done great things. You think the threat you bring scares me?’
‘It will.’
‘I’ve altered the minds of the council with this power,’ that explained the council, their eyes- their minds- were stolen from them, under his control... He controlled any political decisions single-handedly while disguised as being unanimous.
‘Threats will bring more than fear when you realize they ring true. Your suffering will never cease! From this realm and into the next.’
‘I don’t fear the Gods…’ His bony fingers gripped harder on the blood-orb.
‘You will. On my oath.’
‘No,’ he smiled, revealing rows of shiny teeth ‘I am greater than the likes of you- I am a God-Killer!’ He threw the orb and in an unholy flash it exploded!
Thea felt the room shake breaking delicate ornaments books tumbled from shelves, floorboards cracked. I noticed a break big enough for me. I hugged my legs, I was told to stay here.
The Hunter was flung like a doll into stone steps, bones shattering! He was left gasping like a dying fish, unable to move. His leather chest piece was near disintegrated, face filthy. The room was destroyed, the roof splintered, shelves charcoal, jars shattered, plants burning. It mixed together for a sickening stink. Anything in the jars was burning or already dead. A drip of fire caught on newly exposed wood and quickly caught aflame! The hunter couldn’t handle the intensity of the chaos around him.
A voice asked from the black smoke. ‘Do you feel that? It’s pain.’
The hunter groaned in agony as he stood. ‘With the life blood you’ve taken you’ve taken the power of the Gods which those lives worshiped! With each fae drained you defy them more! The seas will boil! The sky burn! Earth rupture with their rage! Nowhere to hide- nowhere to run! THIEF!’
I slowly lowered myself down between one cracked board to another. I heard shouting the closer I got.
The killer stepped through the black smoke, hands dripping with fae blood which formed into icy blue blades. ‘I don’t fear the Gods or their wrath because I will slaughter them all.’ The hunters mind was groggy and slowed by pain, he couldn’t move in time and was blasted back into the wall with a blinding flash! A gash was cut across his shoulder. He looked at the wound, and went pale. Quietly through white lips he uttered ‘I’m…’
‘Bleeding!’ The man erupted into laughter. Hunter stared with deer-wide eyes at the slash. It wasn’t deep, it’d heal in a day but… no matter the wound it shouldn’t be possible! ‘I’ll rip every God to crimson shreds!’ Hot energy burst off of him from excitement.
The Hunter suddenly felt hollow. Gods. Don’t. Bleed. It was as true as the stars at night, as true as the sun which rose in the morn… He dropped to his knees, unable to take his eyes off his reddened fingertips. He could feel hot liquid trickle down his skin. Everything went very quiet, everything but his breath. Suddenly the man in front of him looked… sharper… scary- dangerous. Suddenly an energy spike was plunged into his gut! ‘You’ll be the first on a long list!’
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He yelled in agony, but cut himself off! ‘ENOUGH!’ White light burst away from him- the fires died instantly, glass shattered, the fae blood smearing the walls vanished. All noise and light was stolen from the room!
In the silent abyss the hunter glowed like a fallen star. Taking the stance like he was holding a bow out of starlight both a bow and arrow appeared.
The killer chuckled. ‘A Lesser God of the Hunt can’t kill a man. You hunt. That’s all you’re allowed to do. It’s all you can do. Murder and you’ll poison yourself. You’ll become worse than those sick animals you put down!’
He remembered how he defied and enraged the God of Beasts by stopping the creatures’ sickening spread. By taking the Gods creations unnaturally he earned their hatred… Gods don’t get involved, after all. The one thing they all knew. He remembered the countless animals he killed, all infected from failed experiments by the man standing in front of him now. He remembered the vial, black ooze from their mouth, how their limbs rotted off, how their eyes melt from their sockets!
He didn’t want to become like that…
The killer continued ‘your stars will die out. The sky will darken. Your essence, abilities, will be lost to these cretins forever. To me. So- I dare you, hunter. Kill. Me.’
His glow didn’t falter. The arrow remained perfectly true to its target, his heart.
‘Do you want to become a monster? To kill endlessly, be worse than I? A legend of fear used to scare children at story time! Do you wish to terrify street urchins to famed royalty?’
‘If I walk away now- you’ll vanish. I won’t be able to find you again. You’ll worsen. Kill.’ His voice sounded unearthly, changed due to his powerful form.
‘Yes, I will. So…’ His fingers coiled around the hidden vials and orbs pocketed on his back. ‘Do you choose your corruption- or mine?’
The Lesser God of the Hunt inhaled, about to release the arrow-!
‘No!’ His head snapped to see me fall from a ceiling crack to the floor. ‘Thatcher you can’t!’
For the first time his hate-filled expression faltered when our eyes met.
He let loose the arrow!
A starlight arrow blasted through the feldens chest! His jaw slacked and he gasped from the shock.
He couldn’t have him coming after her.
Dazed, weightless, the Gods light faded to show his more felden, soil-walking form. Darkness, identical to where the arrow hit, spread through the hunters’ chest.
‘No…!’ I hurried to him as he fell to his knees, gripping his cold finger in my hands, watching his eyes grow vacant.
‘You…!’ The experimenter gagged on blood as he stumbled to the wall, crimson soaking his clothes, having seconds left. ‘Weren’t listening.’ He swallowed a jar of fae blood! The wound healed. The darkness slowed to a stop across the hunters’ chest. ‘I…’ The experimenter regained strength, suddenly unscathed ‘am greater than ANY GOD!’ His form glowed red. Fire burst out of him!
I released my hold of Thatcher’s finger and sprinted away, already feeling the heat being emitted off him. In a daze the hunter mustered the little energy he had and threw his arm at me, connecting hard against side and flung me against the wall. Hitting it and falling onto the floor I tried to pick myself up and scramble to a wall crack, and in an instant- BOOM! Fire exploded from the man’s skin igniting the entire room in blinding light and mind-stopping heat!
My ears rang. I couldn’t breathe. For a few moments all the air in the room was sucked away. ‘Damn GODS!’ The killer shouted. I peeked out from my hidey hole. The killer, who was dying not a second ago, now stood tall. Blue flames burnt in his palms painlessly. The wound on his heart had sealed, leaving behind a red mark over his heart. He healed from the blood of my people. I felt sick. This was a nightmare. ‘You don’t get it, God!’ He spat out the last word like poison. He extinguished the flames by clenching his palms to leave them in near darkness apart from the cracks which allowed for sunlight. ‘You watch from the sky, you don’t care about how terrifying our world is. You all just watch as we get torn apart!’
I turned my head to Hunter, who was a motionless heap on the floor, blackened from the flames. My nose twitched not at the smell of smoke, but rose water… Mothers perfume…
His voice became a whisper ‘The Folly of the Gods, this world could burn, and you wouldn’t even notice. Nothing here is yours. You can’t belong here, you don’t.’ His saddened demeanor switched back to his speech-giving self. ‘So I have made a solution.’ He stood up straighter. ‘This damn Order of the Gods will end, and we people can decide our own fate. To no longer be your playthings.’ He grew into a cackle. ‘You’ve brought this on yourself. You think you can kick a starving creature, and not expect it to bite back? I can bring peace with this, not misunderstood silence.’
I looked around to see a few letters finish burning as a woman’s name was lost to the flames. Continuing my search I spotted a dripping potion hidden in the corner of the room beside my hiding place. It was bubbling from the fires heat.
While the snatcher talked I hurried over to it, remembering to step silently with my heel down first. ‘You could have saved us if you wanted. Why?! Why couldn’t you come down to help?! But you do make the journey to take what I’ve worked so hard for!’ He rushed to the Hunter and grabbed his collar. ‘TELL ME! I DARE…’ his voice weakened as his eyes glistened. ‘I dare you to tell me I’m wrong.’ He whispered. The God couldn’t even open his eyes let alone answer him. Throwing him back down the snatcher ran a bloodied hand through his hair, streaking the brunette strands red and forced a chuckle. He turned to his table, his back to the God, to collect the split blood amongst shattered glass. ‘I’m going to enjoy killing you all.’ He traced a dragons head in the puddle of blood, his face reflected in it. ‘And when I’ve mastered this blood-skill, I will take more souls, of greater beasts!’ He stamped his hand into the blood and it solidified into an ice spike. ‘No one will be able to stop me. Not a Lesser God, not a Greater God.’ He turned to see a tiny fairy stand beside the Gods body. He was surprised to see one dare get so close. Itha-Shaw I need to go away from here! I thought, the hot blood on my palms listened and suddenly we vanished!