The Huntsman - Part One

An amalgam of sea and cherries filled the woods. The August heat baked the scent into foulness, and I inhaled each glob of tart cherry and bitter salt with dread. It was the scent of my sister’s blood.

I sat in a thicket, next to Sharon’s body. I used to call her Shar. Used to. Her head was gashed, her chest pierced, and her hands and arms covered in a sleeve of slash marks. Her body had been stripped. Blood cascaded down her cocoa skin.

I tilted inward, as if my insides were being crushed like a soda can. At eighteen, I was six feet tall with a bulk of muscle, but my voice was washed in jerky hormones, pitching my voice high and low like a battered ship. I had no wailing voice, only a shrinking cry.

Shar was sixteen, smart and pretty.

She was going to be a beautiful creature.

Was.

Something fluttered along the tops of the scaly trees, disturbing their flock of leaves, through which the sun dripped and scattered the shadows on the ground. I growled, or at least I thought I did. I couldn’t hear much above my pounding pulse and the figment screams of Shar.

But I could smell, so I sniffed the air and caught the trail of the killer. His scent was of a bar: caffeine, cigarettes, and beer. I followed the stench through the trees and over the boggy ground to a murky stream.

A man hunched over the clouded water. He was trying to splash Shar’s blood away, but his neck and face remained speckled. The scratches on his arms still bled, the blood beaded up like tiny balls of wax.

Shar knew this man.

I knew him, too.

Otis Hein.

He went to high school with Shar. Otis was a second-year senior. He was a nineteen-year-old who looked like a truck driver, drank like a sailor, and smoked like a recovering addict in need of a new addiction.

I wanted to rip him apart, but as Otis turned and eyeballed me, I felt a cold thing run through my blood. Otis’ eyes were different. They weren’t the normal dull or vacant windows. They were dressed in dark draperies that hid his wickedness with smiles and winks.

“He said you were coming,” Otis said.

“You killed her.” They were the only words I could say without crying.

Otis shrugged. “She was a dirt dog in need of putting down.” His eyes drifted up along the tops of the trees, and then he smiled. “You need to be put down, too. He said I should skin ya and then roast ya, just for fun.” Otis winked. “I’m thinking I’ll eat ya, too. I heard werewolf meat is sweet. Is it true?”

His words didn’t mean anything. They were cotton clogging words that got wedged in my ears. My fists were ready, but I couldn’t move. I couldn’t speak. I had never killed anyone before.

Otis pulled a knife and poked the air with it as if he were Zorro. “These woods aren’t yours. You can’t just hunt whatever whenever. You’re a thing, not human or kind. I’d cage you, if I thought it would do any good, but you’re unnatural, and things like you need to be destroyed.”

“I’ll kill you.” They were the only three words I cared about.

Otis chuckled. “He said you wolves are nothing but a sack of hunger and rage, easy to stomp out. I think he’s right. He’s always right.”

His words finally made it through my ears. Questions climbed up my throat, but only one word made it out of my mouth. “Who?”

“He told me what would happen if we don’t stop things like you. You look like us, but underneath you carry a dark disease, an impurity. He said you think us regulars are fodder, but hell if I’m gonna get served to the likes of one of you. I won’t let that happen, and neither will he.”

Confused, I glanced around. I didn’t see anyone, but I heard a flutter from above. A shadow darted along the ground and then rolled back into the spiky shades of the trees.

It was nothing, I thought.

It had to be nothing.

But, what if it was something?

“You don’t look like much.” Otis ran his hand over the scratches on his arm. “Your sister put up a fight. Doubt you will.”

My blood heated. My skin tightened, accentuating every bone and ropy muscle. My jaw flared in pain, as my teeth lengthen into jagged summits. Unfurling my fist, I flashed my inch-long nails.

“I’ll kill you.”

Otis grinned and twirled his knife.

He wasn’t afraid, but I was.

There was something in the trees. Each time it shifted from branch to limb, I felt the wind dip and roll over my back. I could smell the danger; it was smoky like a campfire, and it burned my eyes and clogged my throat.

“Come here, dog. I’m gonna stick ya and then roast ya.”

I didn’t pounce.

I didn’t rush.

I walked to Otis, staring him down. “Go ahead.”

Otis jabbed the knife into my side. The blade slipped in between my ribs. “I told ya you’d be easy.”

It burned like rubbing alcohol, but I didn’t scream. I grabbed Otis’ hand and twisted. The tip of the blade broke off inside of me, but I also broke Otis’ wrist.

He howled.

Shiny tears gushed down his face.

I smiled.

“Silver plated isn’t the same as sterling silver. You should have done your homework.” I fished out the tip of the knife with my nails. “Now, I’m going to kill you.” I lifted Otis by the neck. His body jerked, his arms flailed and legs kicked. It was a sloppy kind of doggie-paddle that got him nowhere.

Something fluttered above, and the shadow, long and lean, darted along the ground.

Was it a man?

Could it be only a man?

No, it was something much more sinister.

I threw Otis into a tree and then took a quick peek. Nothing and no one was around, but I smelled smoke.

“Who’s here? Who are you working with? Who told you to kill Shar?”

Suddenly all I cared about was who and why.

Did it really matter?

Yes.

Otis stemmed his pain by pushing all of his agony into a laugh that sounded of a hyena. “He’s behind you. He’s above you. He’s in front of you.” He rolled into more laughter, a crazy mad-scientist kind of laugh that made my blood shiver.

I glanced over my shoulder. No one was around. I turned back to Otis. “I’m going to kill you.” I thought if I said it enough it would turn out true.

“If I fail, he’ll send another.”

A sliver of ice ran down my spine.

My nerves knitted into a prickly rope.

I finally understood I was the prey.

“Who will he send?”

Otis smiled as he sat up. He lifted his sleeve. Tattooed on his left wrist was a thick black spiral. “Another huntsman.”

I stopped breathing. My heart flapped at irregular beats. My sister was dead, I was trying to kill a regular, and there was a shadow overhead, but none of that scared me as much as the Huntsmen. They were a secret society, a group of men skilled in killing humanity’s aberrations. They were a bedtime story my mom used to tell Shar and me. “Be careful of what’s lurking in your shadow,” my mom used to say. “It might be the Huntsmen.”

My stomach tightened. “They don’t exist.”

Otis laughed. “He says you look scared, because deep down you know they exist. My daddy was one, until he was killed by one of you.”

“I’m not scared,” I said, but as a long shadow draped over me, I jumped. I looked up into the trees.  “Who’s up there?”

“Does it matter? You’re a wolf without a pack, and lone wolves don’t last long. You’ll be hunted until the end of your days, which aren’t many.”

My mind tumbled and then slipped into gear, cranking out scenarios of my torture and death. I wasn’t like Otis. I wasn’t a regular guy. I was a kid with something wild inside me, but it didn’t mean I deserved to die. It didn’t mean Shar should have been killed.

“They won’t find me,” I said, “but they will find you.”

Otis laughed. “We’ll see.”

I charged him, and we tumbled. Otis tried to gouge my skin with his broken blade, but I was too fast. I ripped into him. His flesh was thin and chewy and stuck to the roof of my mouth like peanut butter. The shadow settled above me, but I didn’t stop. I left a trail of Otis: flesh, muscle, fat, and bone.

The shadow darted overheard. “Who’s there? I’m not afraid of you.”

“But you are.” It was a peppy voice, full of cheer.

I turned. A shadow stood. Its form wobbled, the blackness condensing into human shape. First there were legs and arms, and then a head. The smoky shadow dissipated, revealing a man. He had thick fire-red hair, pale skin, and black eyes. He was dressed in black pants, a white button-up shirt and a teal vest.

The man flashed a smile and winked. “I will admit it was fun-fun-fun watching you play with Otis.” He hopped forward and tipped his head. “But you still have to die.”

I wanted to charge him but held my legs steady. “You’re the one who told Otis to kill my sister?”

He nodded, with a wide grin.

“You want me dead, too?”

“It’s nothing personal; just my duty. You are an impure breed, all creatures are, and because of it they need to be destroyed.” His white smile flickered. “You are nothing but a wolf in human skin. You are a rabid dog.”

“What are you? A shadow? A man?”

He hopped up and floated toward me. I braced for impact, but he dropped down in front of me and winked. “I am Iapetus. I am the piercer of minds. If I could twist your brain and make you kill yourself, I would, but since I can’t, I’ll send someone else to do the job. Unlike Otis, who was stupid and untrained, the next one will be skilled and methodical.”

My knuckles popped as I balled my hand into a fist. “You’ll send another huntsman?”

Iapetus winked. “They are my servants. They will hunt you down and skin you alive, just because I tell them to.”

I shook my head. “No, they won’t. You won’t get the chance to tell them to.”

I punched Iapetus in the jaw.

I jabbed my nails into his chest.

At least, that’s what I tried to do.

Iapetus didn’t move, but my jab and slash went through him as if he were nothing but a cloud of smoke. “That was fun-fun-fun.” He winked and then twirled up into the air, his human form dispersing into a fuzzy black shadow. “Of course, you’ll run now, and you’ll hide. If the next huntsman doesn’t find you, something else will.”

Iapetus’ shadow disappeared into the tops of the trees. My legs buckled, but I stayed righted, biting down every emotion that flared under my skin.

I was afraid.

I was angry.

I was lonely.

But I pushed forward. I cleaned up in the murky stream and then collected Shar. I’d head home and bury her next to our mother. Then, I’d pack a bag and leave the only home and woods I knew. I’d find a way to kill the Huntsmen before they killed me.

I studied the tangle of shadows meshed in the trees. Iapetus wasn’t there. But the smell of greasy carcass and smoke hung in the air, and the August heat baked the scent into foulness. I inhaled each gobbet of fat and tendril of smoke with dread. The Huntsmen were in my shadow.