Chapter 4

The day of the autumn equinox passed, and sometime later the half-year anniversary of my participation in this quest. The winter was coming but I could tell that we were less than half a day, maybe only a few hours behind the beast. Recently the creature had been hunting and feeding itself much more often than before. I had of course used the opportunity to collect all the extra sparkles and some of them were usually attached to a thread. I could see the threads much more easily now but I had decided to ignore them since they didn’t seem to have any effect on me or on the magic energy of the sparkles. Even if I had gotten better at creating them, my ability was still quite limited and I wanted all the extra help I could get. Then - finally, I could say - even if I couldn’t tell if it was the effect of my magical sparkles, but for the first time I could not sense any hesitation among the other party members; it wasn’t quite the total opposite but there was some enthusiasm. For the first time, I had a feeling that they also wanted this chase to end.

Once again, we had to cross a cold creek and as usual, there were no bridges available, not even fallen logs that you could use as a support while crossing. In a way, crossing a creek is quite easy and you even have options: Either you find one of the places where the water is shallow and the flow is fast or you pick some place where the flow is slower and the water is deep. In general, the last option was safe and slow while the first was much quicker since there wasn’t the same need to take off your clothes and protect your stuff from getting wet.

In the latter case, we would send one of the men across with a rope and the rest of us would use it for safety while crossing. Cajsa was usually the next to last to cross the stream while I’d be the last and the one who’d bring the other end of the rope to the other side. Of course, we could have pulled the rope to the other side but then it’d become wet - and there is quite a difference in carrying a wet rope or a dry rope. Besides, this latest crossing was nothing special.

The wind had blown hard the whole morning but that was nothing extraordinary and I could feel no sudden gusts. I followed Cajsa as she was hanging on the rope just about ready to climb up the steep creek bank, which was also quite normal for us as we had done it several times during the last months. On my side of the creek I held the other end of the rope that went around a nearby tree and I could see Cajsa reach the other river bank. Something in the corner of my mind made me look up and what I saw made my hair stand on end. Dozens or probably hundreds of magical threads were pulling the branch downwards. To me it seemed that the branch might break and fall any time now. Somehow, I just knew that the branch would fall down and hit her head with serious results.

“Cajsa, watch out!”

Then, without any extra warning, there was a loud crack. It wasn’t the branch that broke; no - it looked like half the tree was going down on her. It was like time had suddenly slowed down when I saw her look up and see the falling tree.

Then several things seemed to happen simultaneously. I thought about releasing the rope, but I could tell that the rope wouldn’t go down fast enough. So, instead of releasing the rope, I thought that slipping and getting wet would be less of a risk than standing under a falling tree. Almost as soon as that thought had formed, I swore that I could see sparkles forming on the rope just where she tried to grasp it. I could see the terror in her face when her leg slipped and she started to fall into the shallow water near the river bank but not before letting out a mind-blowing scream.

As soon as Rafal had noticed that something was wrong with Cajsa he turned towards her and started running to her which was the last thing he needed to do since Cajsa was now protected by the bank of the river.

“Raf, no!” I shouted.

Yelling to him had no effect and now he was running directly under the falling tree. Just when I was sure nothing could save him, it was like a gust of wind had just hit the falling tree and it turned away from the running man. Only it wasn’t any kind of gust but it was those magical threads that pulled the falling tree away from Rafal. Almost. Almost, since one of the bigger branches hit his shoulder and I could see and hear that it hurt him. The next, moment the only noise that could be heard was the wind at the top of the trees but it lasted only a moment. Then I could see Cajsa crawling on all fours up the river bank to the side of the cussing and cursing Rafal. From the tone of his voice I could guess that he wasn’t severely hurt - with luck he might have only broken his collarbone.

Suddenly I felt beaten and cold. Once again, the beast would slip our hands because of an injury. What’s more, I was sure that I had just revealed my ability to see those magic threads - and the more I thought, the surer I became that this whole incident had been created for that purpose only. I started gathering the rope and rushed to the other side of stream forgetting all safety. Once I got to the other side I started getting our rope under the branches of the fallen tree and while doing that I made sure that I also captured all the magical threads I could find and I didn’t just snatch them but I also pulled them towards me with all the meager magical skills I had.

Maybe my skills were not so meager at all, since I managed to gather several threads and I could sense them coming to me. Despite my anger I did my best to store the feelings connected to the threads that came to me. While still catching the threads, I could see that some of those threads started to turn pale and the last four or five of them that I caught felt like a bee sting. Gradually I came back to my senses, and I just allowed those threads to fade away while I freed the rope from under the branches and climbed to the shore myself still breathing heavily. Rafal was already sitting and I could see that his collarbone was definitely broken. I couldn’t help thinking that my actions with magic almost got my friend killed!

“Raf, are you okay?”

“Can’t you see that he’s not okay! He’s got a broken bone!” Cajsa scolded.

I have no idea who was the most surprised of us, but Rafal certainly was the most embarrassed one. I could not help grinning and that made Cajsa even angrier. She was about to yell something more, but Rafal put his good hand over hers.

“Cajsa, it’s only a collarbone. I’ve broken it before.”

“But you might have gotten killed!”

All of a sudden she was blushing and the rest of us decided that this was the best possible time to check that all our gear and backpacks were okay, but before long it was time to wrap Rafal’s shoulder.

“Okay, I’m ready to go on,” he said.

I was only a fraction faster than Cajsa and our Lieutenant.

“Look Sarge and Lieutenant, I think it’s time to try something different. We all know that winter is coming and we are so high that it can hit us quite hard. Once the winds turn South they can bring snow, a whole lot of snow, even on this side of the mountains. I haven’t seen the creature like you have but whatever it is, it’s not stupid. It also knows that the winter is coming and it’s preparing itself for it. I’ve no idea what it plans to do, but I’m certain that it intends to stay alive. Sarge, getting your shoulder well will take weeks of rest. It’ll kill you if you start running in the forest. I’m quite certain that there’s a village if you go down that creek.”

Rafal was a bit dumbfounded since I usually didn’t talk like that to any of them, especially not to him. However, Elof turned to me, and decided to play Lieutenant.

“You have it right Stian, that’s what we’ll all do.”

Too bad that I didn’t want to play.

“Nope, you’ll do that. I’ll take my crossbows and go hunting. Most likely I’ll not be able to kill it, but two arrows will probably slow it down and keep it close until we all are good again. Look, I have no illusions that my two arrows would kill the magical beast, but I’m sure I can at least slow it down.”

“Son, you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.” Rafal looked deadly serious when he looked at me - and so did Cajsa.

I hurried on, “I think I do. I’ve seen what it can do and I have quite a good idea about how fast it is. But the point to me is that I want to get back home someday and now I need to start working on it.”

We argued back and worth for some time, but finally I had to agree that Ove would join me.

After some more negotiation, he and I decided to leave most of our personal stuff here and carry only our weapons and a little food. I convinced them that I was sure that I could find my way back here even if I didn’t explain why. Hell, I couldn’t really understand it myself but I just knew I could do it - especially now when magic had been used here.

Ove and I started our journey and for a moment I followed the tracks the alien beast had left behind it, but after a moment I stopped and started feeling our environment. I had been hesitant to do it since I didn’t want to give away my abilities, but now I reconsidered the situation. I could continue following the track and lose a palm-width – an hour for The Guardians – maybe even two. Or, I could track the beast a palm-width earlier and study it. A palm-width - or about an hour earlier if you had some sort of time measuring device available. Not really a difficult decision when you are going to attack a monster almost alone. I turned away from the track and started, motioning Ove to follow me.

The sun was still up and would be for some time when we stopped: Really stopped and remained standing for a while when I tried to get a feel of our surroundings while being extremely cautious with everything related to magic. We both were breathing quite heavily and while waiting for my breathing to stabilize, I picked up my crossbows and started making them ready. I had made sure that we’d be approaching the area of - area of nothing - against the wind. To tell the truth, I wasn’t absolutely sure how close we were but I knew that we were so close that the uneasy feeling could not be avoided. I had no idea if Ove sensed it or not when he moved next to me.

“How do you know it’s there?”

Well, that answered that question.

“All the other animals avoid this area, I have no other way of explaining it and I’d appreciate if you’d not report it forward.”

He snorted. “If you have it right, neither of us will be reporting anything to anyone.”

“Why did you come with me then? I could have done this alone.”

“Shit, what kind of a Guardian would I be if I’d let a kid face that thing alone? Besides, none of us is expected to return. I’ll just face my fate a bit earlier than the others.”

“Ove, I’ve no intentions of dying today. Absolutely none. But I hate the idea that the beast could just leave the area and prepare for the winter.”

He just shrugged and started stringing his own bow but I stopped him. I knew that he had decent skill with his bow, and in theory it would be as efficient as my crossbow. The problem was that you had to be standing while shooting and with my crossbow you could stay low. I was sure that the eyesight of the beast at least as good as ours - probably better.

“I’d rather hope that you’d be able to give me the second crossbow as soon as I have launched my first arrow. After the second arrow, we’ll run.”

I had no doubt that the beast could outrun us easily – for a short distance. However, I was quite sure - or at least hopeful - that I could outrun it over a long distance. My only problem was that I had no idea of knowing how short that short distance would be. Hopefully not very long.

“What if you miss?”

“I won’t - I want to see my fiancée again.”

At first, I was not able to see the beast. Or rather I was able to see it but I didn’t see it, but I did see something that my senses informed me was an enormous deer. A deer with a skin of feathers. My mind was screaming to me that those kind of creatures didn’t exist. I kept on looking at it when I saw something that troubled me even more. I saw the grass move next to the creature. Move like something was walking there; it was like something was moving carefully and simultaneously following or hunting something. Then I got it - the beast was chasing rabbits. Only, deer didn’t hunt rabbits and I was quite sure that it was not a deer we were after. Suddenly there was some rapid movement and I could see a rabbit first hanging in the air, and then it disappeared.