Chương 74: A step from Home

In a haze of snow, a white rabbit jumped. The small woodland creature rushed between rocks smoothed by millennia of subjugating wind and ice. The creature stopped, digging with its two paws to reveal red grass growing in skeletal remains. In the white blur behind it, a dozen eyes lit up. Naked hands reached out slowly through the storm, white spiderlings crawling on bluish, pale skin. The rabbit was none the wiser. Just as the hands lunged, a screech of metal cut through the air.

The rabbit darted away, vanishing into the snow. The creature in the storm grabbed nothing but a handful of snow and blood-red grass. The dozen eyes looked up into the chaotic snowfall. A metal leg descended, crushing rock and rumbling the earth. Something was crawling through the storm. A colossus moving in a hymn of rattling cogs and roaring engines, a procession of machines lingering in its wake.

In the distance, down the treacherous slopes and pines, stood a ruined fortress connected to a bridge, its ancient walls marked by fresh wounds. Far from the mountains, two figures moved over the dunes, leaving twin trails in the scorching sand. One was far smaller than the other, dressed in simple trousers and a bloodied shirt, barefoot and with a tail whipping lazily behind him. Around his neck hung a tiny spiked cross, threaded onto a strip of ripped linen.

The other figure was taller, clad in armored boots that reflected the morning light through layers of scratches and dried stains. It had been seven days since they left the black city in haste. By day, they had walked through the dunes. By night, they had hidden from the ravenous crows, huddled together in whatever shelter they could find. Each night grew colder. Wind gave way to rain, and rain to a raging storm that tore the heat from their bodies but granted them enough water to survive.

Even on this side of the black fortress, the lightning figures fought against the waves of crows at the edges of the dunes. Their battle kept them awake and sent tremors through the ground. Gradually, their surroundings changed, the dunes replaced by hardened cliffs and the ruins exchanged for rock outcroppings. The strange stones grew in size with every mile from the strange city somewhere on the shuddering horizon behind them. They walked with dragging steps and raspy breaths, but neither voiced any complaint.

They just walked, leaving two trails, one from armored boots and the other from bare feet. The cliffs and dunes ended in a sudden upward slope that curved around the dunes, stretching into the horizon on both sides. In silence, they walked up to the cliff.

"Do you need help?" Wretch asked as he turned to Elenya. She was starving. If anyone could tell, it would be him. Her skin was tightly wrapped around her frame.

"Yes." That simple answer spoke volumes from someone like her. His eyes lit with fire, and two large, ashen arms grew out of his form. Elenya grabbed onto his back before he climbed the cliff with relative ease, putting her down at the top as the arms disappeared into his flesh. On top of the cliff was a rocky crag. Tiny trees clung to the gray and white rocks. To the north-west rose the mountain ranges, the Scar Spines. They had grown more distant since the last time he saw them.

Wretch drew in air through his sensitive nose.

"I think I recognize this area," he said excitedly, turning to hold Elenya's arm and pointing forward. She looked at him, and her eyes widened in realization.

"You do?"

"Yes, yes. The train passed through here on the way to Sternthal. It wasn't far after we left that stronghold underground."

"Stonemourn," Elenya filled in. Wretch nodded as Elenya exhaled deeply.

"Steak and potatoes, wait for me," she said and looked up toward the sky.

"And the shower. Don't forget the shower," Wretch said, rubbing his hands with an expression of pure greed. He turned around and waved.

"So long, sand. You will not be missed. Actually, I would go so far as..." He stopped himself as he looked out over the dunes.

"No bloody way," he said under his breath.

"You thinking about a bed? That would be nice too," Elenya said with a smile as Wretch stared into the dunes behind them with gritted teeth. She followed his gaze and, as quickly as it had appeared, her smile faded. Far away in the distance, their trail snaked up and down hills and around columns of stone. Something walked along it, dragging its matted and bloodied fur through the sand.

"You've got to be kidding me. Grendel's damn pet," Elenya said. A name washed over his mind, one that he recognized. Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation. Vishnii, Eyes in the Mist. Wretch turned around quickly.

"It saw us. We've got to go. Now." They took off, sprinting along the cliffs toward the west.

"Can we fight it?" Elenya asked over her shoulder.

"It's a Blaze. I've fought it once and it wasn't close," Wretch said, jumping over a rock. They stumbled on quivering legs through the low brush, the lack of strength apparent even to Blessed like them. The trees grew thicker and the vegetation denser. Wretch took the lead, leaping over bushes and weaving between branches and thorns while Elenya barreled straight through. A rustle ahead made Wretch skid to a halt. Elenya collapsed to her knees behind him, gasping. He crouched and raised a finger to his lips.

Birds burst from the low canopy ahead. Then came a sound, a high-pitched clicking and shifting of limbs. A howl answered from behind. Through the mesh of leaves and branches, something moved. Something as large as a carriage with chitin that caught the light of the suns. It extended its upper body over the trees, revealing a head reminiscent of an oversized grub. Elenya held a hand over her mouth while Wretch sat still as a statue, his heart beating in his chest. Another howl rang out behind them.

The grub moved, crawling through the underbrush on a myriad of legs towards the noise disturbing its territory. Wretch and Elenya looked at each other.

"Let's go." A minute later, the unmistakable noise of wood breaking echoed through the thin forest, and the howl mixed with strange clicks. They dashed forward, moving between the rocky outcroppings and thin birch trees while a thunderous battle grew in the distance. It didn't last long, and soon the forest returned to its eerie silence.

"Maybe it lost?" Wretch wheezed after a while. Elenya only answered with a simple nod, but a piercing howl from behind drew her lips together and furrowed his brow. They pressed on, thorns and stones tearing at their skin. Soon, the light grew dim and twilight illuminated the white and black trees. Occasionally, a laugh or a howl echoed through the trees, coming closer. When it became too dark for Elenya to see her feet, he led her by the tail. His feet had become bloodied by the rocks.

He fed tiny flickers of flame into the torn flesh to keep moving. Suddenly, he came to a stop. Elenya slammed into him, and they both tumbled, not onto earth but onto cold metal.

"What's happening?" Elenya asked, looking around in the dark.

"Tracks," Wretch said, poking the metal with a claw.

"They are even real."

"If we follow them south, we'll reach Stonemourn," she said, reaching toward his voice and hauling him up to his feet.

"We keep going," he said. He saw her look behind them in the dark, then turn back and nod as his tail slithered around her wrist. They quickened their pace, their bodies fueled by the promise of salvation and the end of an ordeal. They rushed through the night, hours bleeding away to the sound of their hurried breaths. When the light of dawn illuminated the sky, Elenya's clothes were caked in mud, sweat drawing lines in the dirt of her skin, and Wretch's feet were red with blood up to his ankles.

The two strange figures hurried along the tracks. The crags had gradually turned into a thick forest, filled with the chirps of birds welcoming dawn.

"I think we are getting close," Wretch wheezed as the first rays of the sun peeked over the Scar Spines to the east. A rustle came from behind them, and they both turned, weary-eyed and breath caught in their throats. Nothing was there, only swaying leaves. There's no wind. The sound of shifting air brushed against his senses. It was barely audible even for his improved hearing. Wretch reacted instantly, throwing himself into Elenya and slamming them both onto the tracks as his skin writhed.

A claw the size of his torso tore through the space they had occupied a heartbeat earlier. Arms twitched out from under his skin, reaching toward the ground and Elenya like the legs of a hatching insect. Nails shredded against the coarse gravel under the tracks as he bolted away. Another strike whizzed by, sending a tremor through the earth and filling the air with the noise of screeching metal.

He crawled at furious speed a few dozen paces before jumping, pivoting in the air to make both of them land on their feet. Elenya landed in a wide stance, the Blinking Blade in her hand, looking around wildly. A low, inhuman laugh came from the tracks before them.

"It's her," Wretch growled. Vishnii stood before them in her larger form, towering and hunched, fur matted with blood and the discolored innards of some other freshly slain Blessed. A long snout jutted from the tangled mass, mist puffing from her breath. Where eyes should have been were stitched slits, but beneath the fur, a dozen other fiery eyes watched them. Fewer than before, more than half torn or pressed shut. Even for a Blaze, the trek through the wilderness had not been without cost.

Still, the beast now stood between them and their goal further down the tracks. Elenya released the cleaver strapped to her back and swung the Blinking Blade in a few practice strikes.

"It's hurt," she said as her eyes lit and shades of red danced on her skin. Wretch ripped the black cross from his neck, and with fiery eyes, the relic elongated to the size of a warhammer.

"It can turn into mist unless you grab or attack it," Wretch snarled, his teeth exposed and skin squirming. The hound took a step toward them, a long tongue licking its snout.

"Its transformation to this larger form is another Blessing. It seems great at tracking, which could be a third, and the fourth is probably all those eyes."

"We blind it and hack it to death?" Elenya said, inching toward the lumbering creature stretching its razor-like claws.

"We have won with worse plans," Wretch replied.

"A lot worse," she agreed, baring her own teeth. The three figures stood still, poised under the rising suns. Wretch, Collector of Wounds, and Elenya, Butcher of Hordes to one side, starving hunters from a civilization beyond the horizon. And Vishnii, Eyes in the Mist, a gruesome beast from the foot of the mountains in the distance. A bird jumped onto a branch, and the glow of the sunrise reflected in its eye. It rustled its minuscule wings and chirped once.

All three hurled themselves forward in a frenzy of blessed fire.