The Hunter of Hawk and Wolf-Chapter 18 : Chapter 18

In the hollow where the frost hag had lived, Sevha’s eyes snapped open.
Crackle... crackle...
Pushing himself up, he saw a campfire burning before him. On the other side of the flames, Teresse held the soundly sleeping Legra.
She looked him over. “How do you feel?”
“The paralysis is gone.”
“And your wounds?”
Teresse tossed Sevha a small pouch of jerky. He pulled out several pieces and chewed them all at once, then got to his feet, moving his body to test its condition.
“Don’t push yourself. Your injuries from Anse Castle haven’t fully healed.”
“The situation demands it. Besides, I’m used to wounds like these.”
As if to prove his point, Sevha fiercely chewed and swallowed the jerky.
Teresse didn’t challenge his bravado, instead nodding toward the frost hag’s corpse. “If you’re in such good shape, cut out its poison glands.”
“What for?”
“Poison is always useful.”
She had a point.
Sevha approached the corpse, slit open the hag’s armpits with his knife, and pulled out the glands. He stuffed them into the jerky pouch and tossed it to Teresse.
Looking weary, she fumbled the catch, and the pouch bounced off her forehead with a soft thud.
Sevha spoke brusquely, affecting a lack of concern. “You have what you wanted. Get some sleep. We have a full day of walking tomorrow.”
“One day down. Six to go.”
“A week was just a guess. I’ve never actually set foot on the summit.”
“Why have you only gone near it, but never to it?”
“The summit of the Frost Mountains is sacred ground to the Anse. Only the chief—the Count of Anse—may enter.”
“Sacred ground?”
Hearing the curiosity in her voice, Sevha began to tell the tale of the Anse Tribe.
“The hawks of the Anse domain don’t live in the Labyrinth Forest. They live here, in the Frost Mountains. And the hawk is the symbol of Anse.”
Teresse listened, then ventured a guess. “So the Anse Tribe originally lived in the mountains?”
“That’s right. Records in the Dan Anse family archives say we lived in the Frost Mountains before the founding of the Holy Empire.”
Sevha recalled what Edgar had said after reading those same records.
“My brother believed the story of our tribe descending from the Frost Mountains into the Labyrinth Forest was the origin of the myth—the Goddess Diaka sending the Hunting Hawk Anse down to the earth.”
“It sounds like your brother didn’t believe in the myths.”
“To him, they were just a code of laws, metaphors for the creed our tribe must uphold.”
“And you? Do you believe?”
Sevha chose neither to believe nor disbelieve. He remained silent.
Teresse pouted, looking bored. “I think a hawk really did become a person.”
“Why?”
“It’s more interest—”
“Why!”
“In a world where corpses walk, why couldn’t a hawk become a person?”
“The Sage of the East would be speechless to hear you say that.”
Sevha explained the true nature of the undead, discovered by the Sage a century ago.
“The grudge worm is an insect that nests in and controls corpses. The undead aren’t walking dead… they’re just mobile nests for grudge worms.”
Just then, a cold wind swept over them.
Sevha stopped talking and walked to the entrance of the hollow. Teresse laid Legra down and followed.
Standing at the mouth of the cave, they looked out at a curtain of pure white.
A blizzard was falling on the Frost Mountains.
“So the mountains are finally throwing a tantrum,” Sevha murmured.
“Should we wait for it to stop?”
“A snowstorm in these mountains can last a month. If we wait, we’ll starve.”
“The snow is too heavy. We’ll get lost.”
As Teresse spoke, a hawk cried out nearby. It cut through the flurry, flying toward the summit.
Sevha watched it and said calmly, “Don’t worry. A Hunter of Anse never gets lost. Not even in the Labyrinth Forest.”
Two days later, they were still climbing through the blizzard.
Sevha paused to catch his breath, looking around. The world wasn’t white, but a violent, churning pale.
Too slow.
His party repeated the cycle of climbing, resting, and climbing again. But without proper rest, they grew more exhausted by the day, and their pace slowed accordingly.
This will take more than a week. The food...
As Sevha tried to calculate their remaining supplies, the snowfield collapsed in the distance. A rumble like a monster’s roar echoed through the ground.
Legra tensed.
Teresse smiled faintly, a flicker of interest in her eyes.
She asked, “That was snow collapsing over a crevasse, wasn’t it?”
“The Maw of the Mountains. If you’re swallowed by that maw...”
“You die.”
“Maybe? If you’re that curious, go get eaten.”
Sevha forced the joke and resumed walking in silence.
A short while later, they arrived at the base of a cliff.
“Hell…” Sevha cursed.
“Lord Sevha. Should we go around?”
“Night is coming. There’s no time.”
Sevha took a rope from his pack. He tied a handaxe to one end, fastened the other to his waist, then handed his bow to Legra and stretched before the cliff.
“Legra. Magus. I’ll climb up and lower the rope for you.”
They both nodded.
Sevha steadied his breath and began to climb.
Though he wore gloves, the snow-covered cliff was slick. Still, he climbed, gripping the rock so tightly he felt his knuckles would break. The higher he went, the more snow poured down from above.
Frost crept across his face, from the corners of his mouth to his eyebrows, his bangs, until his entire face was white.
It hurt as if his skin were being flayed off, but he did not rush. He knew one small mistake could lead to disaster, so he endured the pain and climbed slowly, steadily.
Thirty minutes passed. He barely managed to reach the top, utterly exhausted. To avoid a mistake at the last moment, he gasped for breath, his face caked in frost.
“Haaa...”
Just as his breathing began to settle...
“Haaa...”
He heard another sound.
“Haaa...”
Crunch.
Footsteps.
Sevha’s eyes flew open. A chill ran down his spine.
It was an ominous feeling, as if a hunt had just begun—or perhaps, he had just become the prey.
He snapped his gaze upward.
In the distance, on a hill blurred by the driving snow, stood a figure.
It was broad-boned but gaunt.
It wore a wolf’s hide over its head.
And it was drawing a bow.
I’ll die.
The moment he felt death’s approach, Sevha threw himself sideways.
At the same time, the figure released the string.
An arrow cut through the snow, grazed past Sevha, and slammed into the cliff face.
He flailed in the air, drew his knife, and plunged it into the rock. It stopped his fall for an instant, but just as a searing pain shot through his arm, the blade snapped.
Sevha fell.
CRUMP!
He hit the ground. Legra and Teresse rushed to his side.
His pack had burst, but he was alive. His whole body ached as if it had been shattered. His head spun, his thoughts a muddled porridge.
“Lord Sevha!”
The moment Sevha forced himself to his feet, an arrow tore through Legra’s pack. As its contents scattered, Sevha yelled, “Down!”
He shoved Legra and Teresse to the ground, snatched his bow and an arrow, and took aim.
The figure already had him in its sights.
I’m faste—
Sevha released the string, thinking no one could shoot faster than him. But the figure released its string at the exact same moment.
Both arrows cut through the snow. Sevha threw himself aside. The figure did the same.
As he rolled, a thought struck him. His arm ached and his head was spinning; he hadn’t drawn as fast as usual, but it had still been fast. For someone to match that speed, their archery...
Anse Archery?
Just as he realized the figure was connected to the Hunters of Anse, a great gust of snow billowed up, and it vanished from sight.
Sevha knew instantly what was beginning.
He got up and yelled, “Run!”
So they ran.
“Hunter!” Teresse cried. “Do you know what that is?”
Sevha answered with the grim face of a hunter.
“A Hunter of Anse.”
He knew the thing’s identity was the same as his own. And so, he could predict its next move.
It’s nearby.
The figure was neither seen nor heard. But if it was a Hunter of Anse, it had to be close.
As if to confirm his suspicion, an arrow flew at Teresse. Sevha grabbed her and rolled.
The projectile struck the cliff beside them, and only then did Sevha see it wasn’t an arrow.
A sharpened bone?
Another bone flew at them. Still holding Teresse, Sevha rolled sideways to evade it, then scrambled to his feet and ran again.
If I don’t strike back, we’ll die. If it’s a Hunter of Anse...
Sevha imagined it. What he would do if he were the attacker.
The instant the thought formed, he stopped running, spun, and shot an arrow behind him.
It flew through the snow and struck the figure, piercing the wolf hide it wore. The impact knocked the hide off, revealing its face.
Pale and pocked with rot.
The front of its neck was torn open, as if gouged out.
A man in his fifties. An undead. A dullahan.
But Sevha didn’t call it a dullahan.
He knew the face. He knew the name.
“Yuska.”
Legra, too, saw the undead’s face and whispered a name, not a classification.
“Grand…father.”
The undead was the Previous First Hunter.
“Yuska!” Sevha bellowed. “You abandoned my father and ran, only to end up like this! You’re too pathetic to even curse!”
In response, the Dullahan Yuska drew his bow.
“Move!”
As Sevha’s party ran to dodge the arrow...
CRUUMBLE!
The ground roared like a beast and gave way.
“The Maw of the Mountains...!”
As he fell into the suddenly opened crevasse, Sevha slammed his handaxe into the wall. He snatched Legra and Teresse, gripping the rope tied to the axe as the three of them plummeted into the dark.
Yuska stood at the edge of the Maw. The sound of impact echoed up from the bottom.
THUD!
The flesh on the front of Yuska’s neck tore with a wet sound. From within, dozens of black grubs pushed their heads out.
The grubs looked around. Then, as one, they lowered their heads toward the crevasse, as if taking aim.
From the torn throat of the undead, a voice emerged, like the grinding of rotten flesh.
“My… hunt… is not… over…”