Chương 48: Beyond walls

The train slowed to a running pace, hurtling through a mist that blurred out the suns. Dalynja, seated at the very front of the massive locomotive, spoke up as the rumbling of the steam engine died down.

"We're close to where someone or something broke the tracks five days ago. We'll start by securing a perimeter with lanterns. My crew and the Richter's will inspect the site before we deploy." The slower they went, the tenser the faces of the workers became. Some stared at the metal walls as if they could see through them. Others had their hands clasped in mumbling prayer. The thumping stopped, and the wagon screeched to a halt. No more crashing winds, no rumbling from the engine. Only silence.

Wretch removed his thick coat and sunglasses, exposing his whipping tail and black orbs for eyes. The nearest workers shuffled in their seats.

"Gas-masks on," Edmund said calmly, handing out leather masks to the rest of the Richters. Each had a metal filter and glass lenses. Elenya inspected one in her hand.

"I really have to fight in one of these?"

"There was no information if this area had tainted air, best be safe," Edmund replied. Wretch pulled one on, tightened the straps and drew in air. A slight resistance with each breath.

"Let's go," Edmund ordered, voice muffled through his own mask. Elenya turned the wheel bolted to the door, the metal groaning. Dalynja's group did the same on the other side. With a piercing squeak, it swung outwards. Tendrils of mist slithered through, curling along the steel floor. Edmund stepped out in front, shield raised. Elenya in her warlike dress followed. Wretch was third. Astrid in her simple breastplate was just behind him. His boots landed on soft grass.

Wretch's own breath echoed in the mask as he looked around. The air was cool and wet, carrying a faint scent of rot mixed with industrial compounds from the filter. They were surrounded by trees. Thin and white, the bark as smooth as a newborn's skin. Purple tinted leaves sprawled from the branches. The mist concealed everything but the nearest trunks. No birds chirped. No wind rustled the leaves. Just silence.

"You hear anything, kid?" Edmund asked without looking back. Wretch held his breath, trying to listen past the wheezing of the gas masks.

"Nothing, but the air stinks."

"Good enough," Edmund said with a nod and took a few steps forward, vanishing into the fog. They followed before he stopped among the trees, producing a lantern from his belt and hooking it to a branch. A soft, warm glow fighting against the milky white. Astrid stretched out her hand toward the strange smooth bark. Elenya's hand caught her wrist.

"Don't."

"Let's move toward the front," Edmund said and they continued in a semicircle, working themselves toward the front of the train, fastening lanterns along the outer perimeter.

"That smell's getting stronger," Wretch said. The lingering rot strong enough to his senses, despite the industrial scent of rubber and leather from the gasmask.

"Be ready," Edmund said, raising his shield. They came to the front, the train's engine still ticking. A growl came from the mist. The Blinking Blade slid into his palm and Elenya raised her halberd. From the choking mist, a giant dog lumbered forward. Dalynja and her two hunters plunged out of the mist behind it. Edmund lowered his shield.

"Clear on our side, yours?"

"All clear," Dalynja replied. Both groups looked down at the tracks between them. The steel rails were cut and demolished, the twisting metal disappearing into the mist. The surrounding ground was upended and heavy footprints marked the earth. Something lay in the grass. A body. Greyish and swollen limbs half buried in the mud. Clothes ripped and caked in dark red. The head lay separate, cut clean from the torso.

"I think we found our culprit," Edmund said. The dog and Wretch both stalked forward, sniffing the air. He studied the decapitated head. A human, her eyes almost swollen shut. Blue lips between puffy cheeks. The hair was short and black, lying slick against her skull. Wretch went through the faces he had memorized, all the people he had seen in that elevator months before. He didn't recognize her. Still. Gulschak got what she deserved. Too bad I wasn't the one to find you.

"Human, decayed," Wretch said through his air filter.

"Smells like the wilds, not a whiff of smog." This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.

"A Gulschak," Elenya said, watching the mist.

"That's bloody certain, but what killed her?" Dalynja knelt by the tracks, brushing a gloved hand over the upended earth.

"Many things fought here. This one died, others fled." Wretch crouched beside her, pressing his mask toward the wet soil. Dalynja stood up as Wretch crawled along the tracks.

"There is something more," Wretch hissed.

"Not human." He caught it. Musty, almost sour.

"Wet fur," he said without looking up. One of Dalynja's hunters chuckled at the display. Elenya slowly turned her head toward him. He went silent, fingers tapping against the masterwork crossbow.

"Something is strange though," Wretch said as he stood up and brushed off his knees.

"The trees?" Astrid asked as she looked into the twirling mist, the thin outlines of the grove surrounding them.

"No," Wretch said, cracking his fingers.

"There are no flies, no maggots, nothing." The others went quiet.

"I didn't notice," said Gulner, clutching his weapon.

"But there are no birds either." In the distance, barely loud enough to brush against his senses, wood splintered. Wretch snapped toward the mist, hand on the Blinking Blade. There was nothing there. Only the vapor clouding his lenses and pale trees.

"I heard a tree split," he said without breaking eyesight from the twirling mist.

"Just now."

"I heard nothing," Edmund said.

"But I trust your ears." Dalynja turned to her dog, and they locked eyes.

"Lukka didn't hear anything either. But she recognizes the smell." The group of hunters looked at Dalynja. Despite the mask, he caught the look in her eyes as she spoke.

"Dog." Edmund turned to the mist.

"We stay sharp. Shifts during the day. One team is on guard and the other resting on the train," he said, eyes turning to the massacred rails.

"At least a day's work of repair, maybe more."

"Agreed. We can take the first watch and dispose of the lady here," Dalynja answered and gestured to the decimated corpse. Soon the Richters turned the lever on the metal door. The moment a gap formed, the mist crawled eagerly inside the cabin. The workers sat tense and all looked up as Edmund peeked in his head.

"Visibility is low, but we're clear to start. Hunters will stand watch as you work. Don't go beyond the lamps," Edmund said, ripping the leather mask from his face.

"Actually don't even go close to them." A few men nodded. Others murmured prayers.

"The faster we get to work," Edmund said, "the faster we will arrive in Sternthal, so let's move." The workers poured out of the cabin. Some manned the steam powered crane, others used hatchets and saws to cut away at the damaged rail. Everyone moved with jittery urgency. In the empty cabin, the Richters sat on their bunk beds by the exit. Astrid turned to him from her bed above, notebook in hand.

"Did you say anything?" she asked.

"No," Wretch said, turning a page.

"Still going through that anatomy book you lent me."

"Oh," she replied, gluing a purple leaf to the margin.

"Sorry then."

"Saint protect you, girl," Elenya sighed from her bunk, hands behind her head.

"Keep your paws off the plants. You don't know what they could do."

"Apologies," she replied, sketching the ghostly trees and mist.

"I'd be damned if I waste this opportunity."

"Is everything out here Blessed?" Wretch said, picking at the scales of his neck.

"Or are there creatures out here that are, you know, regular?" Edmund was reading a newspaper and looked up to gaze beside him.

"It's like a food chain," Elenya answered, staring up into the ceiling and wagging a finger in the air.

"A food chain?" Wretch said.

"Beasts good at killing become Embers. The Embers fight and kill each other for food and territory and those that win might become Firelings and so on. That's what they say anyway," Elenya answered.

"How did you learn that?" Wretch said. Elenya blew a stray red lock of hair from her forehead.

"I experienced it." No wonder I got the Flame of Beasts then. The cabin door squeaked open. Tendrils of cold mist reached through the gap. A hunter from Dalynja's crew, Gulner, peeked inside, pulling free of the gas mask.

"Saint, these things are suffocating," he groaned.

"Time to switch." Wretch pulled on his coat and latched the sheathed Blinking Blade to his belt.

"Eyes open, I don't like this place," Edmund said as he clutched Wretch's and Elenya's shoulders. Outside, the crew worked in hurried silence. A steam powered crane moved meter long railroad tracks from the open cart. No one stood idle in the myriad of movements. Wretch and Elenya took positions by the front of the locomotive, while Edmund and Astrid were at the back by the crane.

"Did you hear that?" Elenya asked through her mask.

"Hear what?" Wretch said.

"A whisper."

"I heard nothing," Wretch said, carefully observing Elenya, though he couldn't read her expression through the mask.

"Probably a squeak from the bloody mask. Forget it," Elenya said, leaning on her halberd, watching the workers.

"Have you been outside the walls a lot?"

"A bunch of times," Elenya said.

"As a hunter?"

"Not back then," Elenya said, inspecting her gloves.

"Damn, what made you go outside the walls? I can't picture that it was rail repairing." Elenya sighed hard enough to leave condensation on the glass of her mask.

"You ever stop asking questions? I worked at a company, hired muscles for all kinds of work. We found ourselves in all kinds of shit. Fought beasts, robbers, rebellions. You name it."

"Rebellions?" Elenya rolled her eyes, visible even through the headwear.

"Not rare in the strongholds. There, now shut your rat mouth before I sew it shut." Wretch was glad she couldn't see him smirk at her ire. Time crawled forward and the mist sapped the heat through his clothes. The milky haze even blotted out the suns. He tapped his claw against the hilt of his weapon, drumming away. After a while, he switched to sharpening them against each other. He was anxious, not that something would happen, but rather the opposite. He needed to grow, and for that he needed enemies.

His claw twitched as the professor flashed before his eyes. Poorest is the man without an enemy. He gave a violent shake of his head.

"I am going to take a leak." Elenya only grunted in response and he walked away to the edge of the hanging lanterns. From that spot, the locomotive was only a blurry shadow. The silhouettes of the workers flickered like ghosts in the haze. It's thick, he thought. He unfastened his belt, scanning the forest. The mist swayed despite the lack of wind, spiraling over the wet grass.

"Son," Edmund's certain voice drifted through.

"I found something." Wretch jerked his head to the side. But there was no one there. Only long, thin trees.

"Over here, kid!" Edmund continued from just beyond his sightline.

"Me and Astrid spotted some tracks, mind lending us your nose?" Wretch's boots brushed against the grass.

"Where are you?" he said, stepping forward.

"Over here, I can see you," Edmund answered, just a little deeper, just out of sight.

"Did you lose your mask?" Wretch said as he moved over roots and moss.

"You sound clear." In the middle of a step, he froze. His tail whipped, claw clamping around the Blinking Blade. Wait. A quick glance behind him. It was all gone. The shape of the train. The workers. The lanterns. Only pale trees and a sea of mist coiling around him in deathly silence. He was alone. The hair on his neck stood up, his own breath echoing in the suffocating mask distorting his senses.

"Wretchy," Astrid's voice called, filled with worry.

"Are you all right? Come closer, let me check on you." With a snarl, Wretch ripped the mask off his face. The blade gripped tight, bared teeth and whipping tail. For a moment he looked more like a cornered beast than man or hunter.

"You are not them. Step through the mist and grant me an enemy."

"I can explain," Astrid's voice answered.

"Just get over here."

"No," Wretch growled.

"Son," Edmund's voice said.

"Move it. That's an order." Wretch backed against a tree trunk, pressing a hand against the bark as he scanned the surroundings. It all looked the same, wet grass and pale trees. Where had he come from?

"Hey lil rat," Elenya's voice mocked from the fog.

"Why run? Scared of a little mist?" He flicked his eyes toward the ground. He might be able to track his steps. Then came a female voice that pulled at something deep within. Clear and warm, like a child's memory of home. A soft voice he had vowed to never listen to again.

"After all this time, you haven't changed. My little Wretch." Wretch's figure convulsed, the skin squirmed and his black eyes grew wide.