The Hunter of Hawk and Wolf-Chapter 44 : Chapter 44

Sunset on the plains. Tents of two different kinds mingled together, forming the camp. Inside, Sevha was tending to Shri and Toto.
“Eat up, Shri. You too, Toto… but not too much.”
Ignoring Toto’s indignant stare, Sevha had just finished feeding them when Tataka approached.
He threw an arm around Sevha’s shoulders and shouted for all to hear.
“Time for another drink!”
A week had passed since he’d joined forces with Tataka. Sevha had spent the entire time drinking with the man.
He couldn’t help but sigh.
“If I die of drink and go before the Goddess Diaka, I’m sure she’ll shower me with praise.”
Tataka met his sarcasm with a reply that was equal parts humor and gravity.
“She’d praise you for that more than for dying with an ally’s knife in your back.”
Sevha glanced around at the men of the Blanc Army and the Broken Tusk Tribe moving between the tents. Knights and conscripts alike, the soldiers of the Blanc Army tensed whenever they passed one of the Tusk tribesmen.
“Seems our week of drinking together was for nothing,” Tataka muttered.
“Telling them your people weren't the ones who plundered Blanc didn't do any good either.”
For the past week, most of the Blanc Army had treated the Broken Tusk Tribe as uneasy allies at best.
Dissent in the field meant certain defeat. Sevha and Tataka had tried to foster harmony between the two groups, but they still had a long way to go.
“Sevha, we have to do something. My people are starting to resent your soldiers' attitudes.”
Just as Sevha was furrowing his brow over the problem, someone yanked Tataka back by the hair.
“Which son of a bitch—!”
“It’s me.” It was Vega, Tataka’s wife. “Tataka. Weren’t you supposed to feed the werewolves today?”
“What? Ah… r-right. I did. I fed them.”
“You did? Then why is one of them hopping on its hind legs begging me for food?”
“M-Maybe it just likes you that much?”
Vega’s smile was murderous.
Enough with the jokes.
Tataka’s eyes darted around before he spoke again.
“Look, with a smile as beautiful as yours, how could a werewolf
not
beg?”
At Tataka’s cringeworthy compliment, Sevha muttered, “The man must be blind.”
Whatever Sevha muttered, Vega seemed pleased by her husband's praise. The corners of her mouth lifted slightly, and she let go of his hair, trying to suppress a grin.
“I don’t know why I ever followed a man like you… but I’ll let it slide this time.”
Seeing Vega struggle to hide her delight, Tataka laughed. She smacked him on the head before turning to Sevha.
“It's fine if you want to drink with my husband, Hawk, but make sure he gets his work done first.”
“I wasn't the one who invited him to play.”
Just then, Eshu approached. He glanced at Tataka and Vega, then gave a slight bow to Sevha alone.
“Legra and the scouts have returned, Young Master. We should head to the tent.”
As Sevha nodded, Vega spoke to Eshu casually. “Commander, thank you for helping me move my things the other day.”
Eshu gave a slight nod of acknowledgment before heading toward the tent.
Tataka watched him go, a smirk on his face.
“He dislikes the Tusk Tribe, but he won’t refuse a lady’s request for help. What a proper knight.”
“He is,” Vega replied calmly, a warning in her tone. “If I hadn’t met you first, I would have pounced on him.”
“What?”
“It’s a shame I met you on a full moon, a night when the people of the plains grow restless. I missed my chance.”
“V-Vega!” Tataka started after her, flustered.
But as Vega walked away chuckling, Sevha grabbed his arm and dragged him into the tent.
Inside, Teresse, Eshu, and Legra were gathered around a map on the table, which was marked with small horse figures.
Sevha shoved Tataka into place beside Eshu and addressed Legra without preamble.
“.”
“The Carved Tusk Tribe is moving toward Garde Castle.”
Teresse spoke as soon as Legra finished. “It seems our last raid was effective.”
She pointed to several locations on the map representing villages the Carved Tusk Tribe had plundered over the past week.
“The frequency of their raids has increased. They must have lost a good deal of food in our last attack. And because of that… they can no longer cover their tracks.”
The strength of the nomadic Tusk Tribe was their speed, which normally made them difficult to track. But by forcing them to raid for food, their lightning-fast movements had become a clear, traceable path.
“So we can attack them whenever we choose.”
“Correct. But so can the Count’s army.”
“The Count’s army…?”
“They intend to settle things with the Carved Tusk Tribe once and for all. They’re also moving toward Garde Castle.”
The Carved Tusk Tribe numbered eight hundred. Their own combined force was eleven hundred. The Count’s army was two thousand.
Sevha imagined the Count’s army attacking the Carved Tusk Tribe. The outcome was obvious: a decisive victory for the Count.
He wasn’t the only one.
“Young Master, we must attack the Carved Tusk Tribe now. If we wait, more innocents will be plundered, and the Count will be the one to claim victory.”
Eshu argued for a swift battle, his voice agitated.
But Teresse immediately shot him down. “We can’t be reckless. For us, a single defeat means the end.”
“I wasn’t asking you, handmaiden!”
“And what you seem to be missing, knight, is the intelligence to understand them.”
“Why you—!”
“Enough.” Sevha cut them off.
He said, “All we know about the Carved Tusk Tribe is their number. It would be foolish to start a hunt with so little information.”
When Sevha’s eyes asked what else they knew, Teresse spoke first.
“The Carved Tusk Tribe’s homeland, the Great Plains, is one of the Eight Demonic Realms—a land where humans have never settled. And yet… I’ve heard there are no vicious beasts or monsters there.”
“Then why is it called a Demonic Realm?”
Tataka answered Sevha's question. “I wasn’t on the plains for long, so I don’t know for sure, but this is what Vega told me.”
He explained, “It’s a Demonic Realm because its inhabitants drove every last beast and monster to extinction.”
Sevha understood the implication immediately.
The people of the Great Plains are as strong as beasts and monsters themselves?
Tataka added, “And their chief, Achuk, is said to be of the Pure Blood of the Great Plains.”
“Pure Blood?”
“It means his bloodline has never mixed with anyone outside the Tusk tribes.”
“So? Does that make him formidable?”
Tataka shrugged. “Even Vega isn’t Pure Blood, so she doesn’t know what makes them so different.”
Then he fell silent.
Sevha processed the new information.
“So, the Carved Tusk Tribe could be stronger than their numbers suggest, and they may have a trump card…”
Having come to a decision, Sevha spoke.
“We’ll head for Garde Castle as well. But we’re lacking information, so we will avoid a direct battle.”
The moment Sevha said they’d avoid a fight, Eshu couldn’t hold back.
He burst out, “What more information do we even need?”
Sevha let out a sigh. “Eshu, why are you in such a rush?”
Eshu went quiet, and Teresse smirked. “Because you want to wash away your guilt, don’t you?”
Eshu’s eyes blazed.
Sevha looked at Teresse, a silent question in his eyes.
“I agree with you on one thing, knight. The fact that you did nothing while this territory fell to ruin wasn’t because of the Tusk Tribe or the Count. It’s because you were a coward who kept his mouth shut until an heir to the Blanc name finally appeared.”
“You…!”
Guilt for having done nothing gnawed at him. That was why he was clinging so desperately to this opportunity.
“Don’t be rash, Eshu,” Sevha interjected. “Haste will lead you to one place and one place only: the Judgment Hall.”
“You only say that because you don’t know the horrors we’ve endured, Young Master!”
Eshu held fast to his argument, and Sevha’s voice turned cold.
“Even if I became the Marquis, you would still call me ‘Young Master.’”
Eshu flinched. He turned his back and stalked out of the tent without another word.
Watching him go, Tataka laughed. “Looks like there’s another one who needs a leash.”
Sevha sighed, recalling the late Marquis’s words.
Order the knights to live parentless.
Sevha understood what he’d meant now.
And because he understood, he grumbled, “This is when I miss the Hunters. So few of them ever had live parents.”
***
A Forest Near Blanc
A merchant caravan was taking a rest.
Inside one of the wagons, a girl glanced furtively at the man sitting with her. His hood was pulled low, but what little she could see of his face was so covered in burns it hardly looked human.
How hideous.
The girl looked outside the wagon and saw the man's companions.
They were only traveling together because the caravan had been attacked by monsters on the road. The strangers had saved them, so her father, the caravan master, had hired them as guards.
Father will hire anyone to save a little coin…
To shake off her unease, the girl climbed out of the wagon. One of the caravan porters was singing.
“The Knight of the Shield is the new boss of the brothel row, so his shield protects the whores and all.”
It was a crude song that had recently become popular near Blanc, one that praised the devotion of Blanc's suddenly-appeared bastard son to his people.
“The young master’s left hand holds a shield, his right holds Mari’s bouquet.”
As that verse rang out, the burned man in the wagon behind her smiled faintly.
His lips had seemed sealed shut all this time, yet surprisingly, they parted.
“Miss, what song is that?”
“Sorry? Oh, it’s a song about the Marquis’s bastard son, the one who just appeared in Blanc.”
“Blanc… I see. So that’s how it is.” The smile on the man’s lips deepened. “Mari… she delivered the bouquet after all.”
Hearing the joy in his voice, the girl began to think he might not be as bad as he looked.
She worked up the courage to ask him a question.
“What is it you do?”
“We are simply… hunters.”
“Hunters?”
The man said nothing more about himself, asking a question of his own.
“And you? What company are you with?”
“We’re from the Empire’s…”
She never finished the name.
Thunk.
A knife buried itself in the crown of her head.
The caravan master and porters stared, stunned, as the girl died without a scream.
Then the burned man’s companions were on them, killing them all.
With knives, handaxes, and arrowheads.
It was monotonous, brutally simple. A job.
When they were all dead, the burned man spoke.
“You heard the song. Marina stood proudly before the Hall of Judgment.”
Then, he and his companions tied torn scarves around their necks. The man stepped down from the wagon, ground the girl's corpse under his boot.
“But we, to our shame, did not. So let’s go. Let’s go earn another chance to take line before Judgment… Hunters.”
They marched into the forest, the torn scarves at their throats fluttering fiercely, like the wings of a wounded hawk.
Like the mane of a hungry wolf.