The silence was uncomfortable. As uncomfortable as one might expect when looking at a corpse. Two owls after midnight , Helva had knocked on the coroner’s door, Veora, who, by force of habit, had learned to delay her sleeping schedule ever since the beast had taken the village by storm. All it took was one look at Helva’s face – shoulders squared, rigid with nerves, and a clenched jaw told the older woman all she needed to know about what, exactly, the hunter had brought back from her journey into the woods.
Without any delay, they quickly made their way to the morgue, not sparing each other any words, as most had felt inadequate at that moment.
“This one looks different from the rest,” the older woman noted, her voice surprisingly calm for the way she had been examining the victim's body just seconds prior. Resting her hands on the stone slab where they had placed the body, she fell into a contemplative silence.
Helva allowed herself to look upon the woman as her mind wandered. For one whose day revolved mostly around preserving, examining and burying bodies, the coroner was… not terrible to look at. Helva had noticed the way in which her eyes crinkled whenever she looked upon a particularly nasty wound or how she’d purse her lips when lost in thought. There were moments when she suspected Veora knew she was being watched yet said nothing. Perhaps she appreciated the attention, or maybe she was simply much too old to care. Either way, Helva found she lost most of her inhibitions after a hunt. She was tired – exhausted, really – but it was easier to dismiss one’s thoughts rather than dwelling on them. She was just tired, she reasoned. With herself, mostly.
Almost as if on cue, a strand of hair fell across Veora’s face, who, in turn, absentmindedly blew it away before leaning back and removing her black gloves. When their eyes met, the older woman’s lips twitched in simple acknowledgment. Nothing more, nothing less.
Helva hummed in agreement, turning her attention to the body lying on the stone slab. It looked… less peaceful, then. When it had been time to pick it up and haul it towards the village, Helva tried her damnedest to ignore the fact that she had felt as though she had disturbed what had been purposefully done. To feel less guilty about it, she shut the victim’s eyes first, finding it increasingly hard to gaze upon the look on her face with each passing second. Desecration. When she had arrived at the morgue, she washed her hands with a sense of urgency, surprising the coroner herself.
“Nasty wound. Other than that, I don’t see many signs of mistreatment,” Veora added, trying to fish a comment from Helva, who had remained silent up until then. Choosing not to push the hunter and instead allowing her the time to come to terms with whatever she had wanted to say, the older woman stared at the victim’s face and attempted to appear preoccupied.
“Being dead is mistreatment enough,” Helva murmured, eyebrows knitting in thought.
“I suppose,” the coroner conceded, sparing Helva a glance in a half-apologetic way. Her work made her look at things in a more… technical and practical fashion. Helva could relate. In order to make their dynamic work, however, they had to take turns balancing each other – so they never lost sight of what they were dealing with.
“Anything else?” Helva ventured, flexing her fingers now and again in a poor attempt to regain all feeling in her body, the effects of that eventful night looming over her still.
“Nothing you haven’t already taken note of, I’m sure,” the woman spoke plainly, but there was an edge to her words. It was almost as if she knew her observations would fall on deaf ears.
“Humour me,” the hunter dryly urged, leaving no room for argument even as she seemed to lose herself in the gaping wound painting the victim’s skin. Veora noticed it. She missed very little.
“I don’t write off foul play. Her tunic being torn near the chest area implies… well, it implies something other than your run-of-the-mill bestial killing one’s already accustomed to,” she made to put her gloves back on, touching the noble’s attire to accentuate her point, “She also reeks of wine.” her nose wrinkled in a clear display of disapproval and Helva exhaled softly, through her nose.
“There was only one set of footprints,” she reminded the coroner, her mind seemingly leagues away from the room they were in. “Unless you are suggesting they grew wings and fled the area, I see no reason to suspect this was done by human hands,” she reasoned. The fact that it had not been a normal murder was precisely why it weighed heavily on Helva’s mind. If she thought about it too much, her palms would sweat.
“You asked,” Veora pointed out almost dejectedly, albeit teasingly, earning herself a curious look from the hunter.
It was quiet for a bit as they both stared at what was before them. Did the beast admire the fruits of its labour? There were cases where it was clear it had taken its time with the bodies, either before or after the killing itself. Helva wondered if the look on the noble’s face had meant anything. That if moments before meeting her end, she had come face to face with the painful thought that her begging had fallen on deaf ears. If the Gods she cried out to only offered irreverent silence in return. In a moment of weakness, Helva reached towards the body, the tips of her fingers grazing the dead woman’s neck, the coolness of her skin contrasting against the warmth of Helva’s.
Lost in thought, she missed how Veora observed her with a keen eye. It was not often that she would pass judgment, let alone on someone like Helva. At that moment, however, the room seemed to get noticeably colder.
“Almost looks peaceful, no?” the older woman said, her voice tight, clearly uncomfortable. She did not wish for a reply.
Helva’s fingers traced the edges of the noble’s wound, the tips of her digits threatening to turn crimson whenever she’d draw a bit too close. It was as though she were attempting to reconstruct the flesh in her own mind insofar as she was able – once you see a dead body, it is difficult to think of it as anything but.
The curious thing about wounds is that some are not at all visible to the naked eye. Helva’s, for instance, consumed her from within.
Before she was able to fall even deeper in thought, the only door leading out of the room they were in swung open, slamming against the wall quite unpleasantly as an older woman, older than Veora, and her companion walked, or strode, rather, into the room. The coroner’s reaction was instantaneous. Without giving it much thought, she swiftly made to cover the victim’s body with a white shroud, the muscles of her jaw tensing in anticipation.
Unlike the older woman, whom Helva suspected was the victim’s mother – if her attire, bloodshot eyes and tear-streaked face were of any indication – her companion made her way into a dark, secluded area of the morgue. Helva could only see their silhouette behind the perforated wall, yet was certain they were staring right at her – they had intended to offer the victim’s mother some privacy, surely, which was reasonable. Suddenly, Helva felt quite out of place. She wished Veora had told her that when she had asked for a guard to send a message for her, it had been to warn the mother of her daughter’s gruesome death.
Helva was not the sentimental type. Perhaps one day she would find it in her to console someone in a way that was… proper. At that moment, however, it felt as if the four of them had been corralled into the room against their will – even Veora shifted her weight from one foot to the other.
Ignoring their presence, the noble’s step faltered as her face contorted with grief. Helva noticed she had been holding some kind of fabric in her arms. It had intricate, golden patterns woven into it. Before the woman’s sob could capture her attention, Helva was able to make out some of the shroud’s design – waves. Isolated, golden waves, swirling with emotion, perhaps even a touch tumultuous near the very top of the shroud, transforming themselves into gentler, unified ripples closer to its end, forming floral patterns when intertwined.
One could call out to the twin gods. Beg Borush to carry their loved ones through calm waters and Tava to guard their souls with care, but the human, ordinary response to loss was considerably less romantic. It was ugly – it had teeth.
“My daughter,” the woman choked out, forcing herself to all but stumble her way towards the body. Her eyes travelled along her daughter’s resting frame, not quite knowing where or when to stop. She seemed desperate for self-control, to postpone her grief in a way that would make the moment less painful for herself, but to no avail.
Helva’s discomfort was uncouthly plastered on her face. So much so that Veora had thrown her a pointed stare, making the hunter take a few steps back to offer the noble’s mother some space to grieve. The second she took note of Helva’s movements, however, the noble’s head snapped upwards so quickly Helva’s muscles tensed in response, almost comically so.
“And what say you, stranger?” she spat out in an accusatory tone, teeth bared in a clear display of barely contained fury. Before Helva could reply, the woman cut her off, “Does my daughter’s silence satisfy you? Has her blood soaked the snow enough?” The tension in the room increased tenfold. Out of the corner of Helva’s eye, she saw Veora look everywhere but at the grieving mother, doing her hardest to mind her business.
“I do not follow, my Ban ,” Helva noncommittally responded, subconsciously straightening her posture and clasping her hands behind her back. At her words, the noble gave her a look of reproach, her upper lip curling and trembling as she weighed what she would say next.
They stared at each other for what felt like an eternity. Helva’s reply had not been gracious, to say the very least. She’d often forget herself when chastised for her performance, much to her superior’s dismay. In her mind, no one had the right to approach her in such fashion. The fight was hers. The beast was hers. The contract was hers.
The older woman let out an incredulous laugh. It seemed to reverberate around the room, making the stillness that came after so… pointed that Helva could hear her own breathing.
“Your impotence is disgustingly appalling,” her fingers dug into the shroud she carried so strongly that her knuckles turned white, “Your kind are meant to fulfill their duty before death reaches our doorstep.” Her voice trembled at the word death, the fiery look of conviction on her face quickly washing away as she seemed to remember she had lost her child. She looked positively dejected.
“As I am sure you have been told, this is no ordinary beast—” Helva tried, not surprised when she was cut off once more. This time, however, the noble’s tone was bereft of maliciousness. She looked exhausted, Helva noted. She imagined a woman of her stature would take her self-image quite seriously, but all she saw before her was a mother whose world had been shattered in an instant.
Helva allowed herself to truly look at her, then. Her hair, despite being braided into a regal updo, had quite a few errant strands falling on her face. Her gown was dishevelled and her skirts muddy. Had she run to the morgue? Her face was entirely bare, free of any kind of powder or lip tint, making the tired lines near her eyes and mouth all the more noticeable. She was truly, and irrevocably, a perfect painting of sorrow itself.
“That… should not have mattered,” she went, her voice rough with woe. After a long pause, she continued, “You tell me, hunter, what I am meant to do with this. The last memory of my daughter’s face, forever marred with loss. Am I to believe there was nothing you could have done? What comfort should that bring me?” It sounded as though the words were merely seconds away from getting stuck in her throat. Helva suspected that, were she to be left alone in the room, the mother’s cries would reach the dead themselves.
The mother’s anger was a precondition for grief; Helva understood this.
“Stay out of the woods.” It had sounded better in her own head. Truly. It was meant to come as friendly advice, and it was true. Nobles simply had to stay out of the woods if they wished to live. Her daughter’s death could have been avoided if only she had listened. Despite that, after the words left her mouth, Helva suddenly felt acutely aware of how she did not know what to do with her hands. She looked foolish, Veora looked mortified, and the one in the shadows cleared their throat.
“What…?” The one word was deliberately drawn out as the older woman’s grip on the shroud slacked in disbelief. She stared at Helva as though she’d been meaning to ask if wolves had raised her.
Helva opened her mouth only to shut it once more. Thankfully, this time, the unannounced individual lurking in the shadows seemed to take pity on her. Curious. It would have been unseemly of Veora to spare her the earful, as she was the one examining the noble’s daughter, not to mention a commoner. The Ban’s companion, however, felt comfortable enough to interject: “My dear, take your time, yes? A parent should never have to outlive their child. This moment belongs to you and you alone,” said the disembodied voice. Helva’s eyes flickered to the perforated wall, anticipating the moment when the stranger finally stepped out from the shadows and into the light.
Her voice was smoothly rich, if a touch firm, even when gently guiding her friend back on track, and yet it could not compare to the way in which the candlelight danced across her features.
She was tall, her ivory skin littered with faint freckles that accentuated the inviting, halfhearted smile tugging at the corners of her lips. She appeared to be younger than Veora, though the crows feet on the corners of her eyes and her smile lines complemented her features beautifully. Her collar brushed against her elegant neck and her attire hugged her frame nicely. She had been wearing black, mostly, save for the trim of her sharp neckline, which was adorned with red and lively wave-like patterns flowing all the way down to her cleavage. The pattern was different from the one on the shroud clutched in the noblewoman’s arms, but it was still Valandi in nature, Helva mused.
With her dark, wavy blonde hair tied back in a silky red ribbon, Helva took note of her sharp jawline and the signs of age on the woman’s face. She was, all in all, a sight for sore eyes.
At the blonde’s interruption, the mother’s shoulders sagged as she brought her attention back to the body in front of her. Helva watched the stranger as her companion made to place the shroud over her daughter’s frame as gently as she could. The blonde averted her gaze, finding the sight unpleasant enough to witness.
Helva decided, then, that it was best to remove herself from the situation entirely lest she become a target once more. Sparing Veora a quick goodbye, the hunter grabbed her cloak from the chair she had placed it on, tossed it over her shoulders, and left the building, feeling the blonde’s eyes boring holes in the back of her head.
↯
“If you plan on adding to what’s already been said, then don’t bother,” Helva warned, not turning back to face the woman she knew had followed her out of the morgue. As if on cue, the rich voice reached her ears.
“My, my. Quite the mouth on you, indeed. And here I thought you’d be a lot more… reserved. Considering your current predicament,” she teased, though there was a hint of annoyance in the way she spoke.
Helva scoffed, clearly unwilling to spare their conversation, if one could even call it that, any more of her time, “The beast is my only concern. Keeping your own from the woods should be yours.” That seemed to greatly displease the blonde, who, in turn, pressed for clarification instead of leaving their disagreement at that.
“My own?” Her voice appeared to drop an octave, but Helva did not care. Or so she thought.
Sparing the blonde an uninterested glance before focusing on the way ahead, Helva did a double-take when no other words reached her ears. When she looked back a second time, she found that the reason why the woman had stopped prying was because she’d been standing firmly in place with an inscrutable look on her face. They stared at each other unblinkingly - long enough for it to seem strange to any passers-by.
It was late, the cold unpleasant enough to bring out a shiver or two. The streets, once bursting at the seams with festival-goers, food carts and music, were now nearly empty save for a few patrolling guards. After a death, folk refrained from leaving the comfort of their own homes. They knew they weren’t going to meet the same fate as the wandering nobles, of course, but spending a quiet evening with one’s loved ones was almost imperative once news of another tragedy reached their ears. It was a cruel reminder of how fragile life could truly be, and what would be lost once it was too late to turn back.
She carried herself quite proudly, her shoulders never sagging for even a moment. She then waited, under a street lamp, for Helva to give her the attention she seemed to think she was owed. Were those hues of silver in her eyes? In a moment of weakness, Helva wished she could take a closer look.
How curious. It seemed the blonde did not appreciate being the one doing the chasing.
“What, exactly, do you take me for?” The woman calmly questioned. Helva noticed the way her lips quirked downwards in evident distaste. What did Helva take her for? The hunter’s eyes travelled along the stranger’s frame once more, taking note of her clearly expensive garments, soft, uncalloused hands, healthy hair, and fair skin. Under Helva’s scrutinising gaze, the blonde did not move an inch. Not because she had been too nervous to, no. She seemed too sure of herself to let it get to her.
“A noble,” Helva deadpanned, failing to understand why she had been asked such a question. If it quacked like a duck…
The blonde tsked.
“Not quite,” she curtly informed, stepping out from under the golden lamp light and towards Helva, “You should be thankful. Had I not interfered, my good friend would have flayed you alive for your indiscretion,” she told her, clearly irritated. It sobered Helva up quite quickly, though. Perhaps that had been her saving grace.
“In case you haven’t noticed,” Helva impatiently gestured at her own dishevelled state, “I have greater concerns at the moment. To me, at the end of the day, an angry noble is better than a dead one,” she offhandedly reminded the stranger. Not wishing to continue any further, which the other woman appeared to have noticed.
“Quite right. Well, I shan’t keep you for long. I simply need to conclude my research,” she drawled, looking at Helva from under her nose in a display of faux superiority. It was a trap. She left the words my research hanging in the air in an attempt to push Helva into asking her what she had meant by it, and, despite herself, Helva fell for it.
“Your what?” Helva flatly queried, looking beyond peeved. If the blonde had noticed, she did not seem to care.
“My research. I am no noble, as you have so unceremoniously suggested. My goals are far greater than that of the bodies you’ve been finding in the woods,” what an odd way to put it, Helva thought.. The more she spoke, the more exasperated Helva looked.
“I’ve had a day. Speak plainly.”
“Gods, you bore me. I hail from Riebel Isle. I’ve come to study your case.”
“If you wish to examine the beast, then I am afraid to tell you that simply won’t happen. Not until it is dead.”
“Not the beast, my dear. I am here to study you.”
A beat. A scholar from Riebel Isle? Leaving the comfort of her home and crossing the very sea to study… her? Despite being quite a ways away, Helva was aware of Riebel Isle and its School of Navigation’s strong ties to To-Valand. Still, none of it explained why she had become an interesting case study to the stranger before her. Danger and death plagued the land all over. Helva was not special, surely.
She was staring. Again, the stranger did not seem to mind, but as time stretched on, the impatience written on her face slowly shifted into mild amusement.
“There won’t be any need to thank me. I am simply saving your reputation, after all,” she chose to fill in the silence instead, throwing a quizzical look in Helva’s direction. She could see the gears turning in the hunter’s head, but at the mention of reputation, she all but shook herself awake.
“I do not need your help. Go back to your island while you still can,” she snapped, turning on her heel to leave once more, only to be cut off for the umpteenth time that night.
“They are growing restless, hunter. Do not be so quick to reject your salvation,” the blonde humbly retorted, “The nobility questions your motives. It finds your lack of action disturbingly suspicious. A hunter facing an untameable, foul beast… yet each time you leave those woods, you never bring back its head. Only another body,” she gave her pointed look before deliberately clasping her hands at her front. Helva’s eyes narrowed.
“You think I am doing this?” she asked in earnest.
“Please,” she guffawed in a way that nearly insulted Helva, “Do you take me for a fool? I find your lack of reverence irksome, nothing more. When I look at you, I do not see a killer,” it was almost said in lieu of an apology. Almost. It was too blunt, but, then again, she seemed to be a blunt woman.
“What do you see, then?” Now, Helva was the one fishing for an answer, and for the first time since the second they had met, the stranger paused, gave Helva a long look of appraisal, and mulled over her words. Unlike the blonde, Helva did not care for being stared at. Hands balling into fists at her sides and jaw perpetually clenched, her lack of control was painfully obvious to the likes of the woman standing a few meters before her.
There was a glint in the blonde’s eyes. She allowed the silence to stretch a while longer, hoping to increase the hunter’s discomfort for as long as she was able. When Helva’s nostrils flared, a knowing smile slowly played across her lips.
“Inexperience,” finally came the response. Her voice was even, yet her eyes told a different story, “But do not worry. It is only a matter of time, in your case. Regardless, I will not take ‘no’ for an answer. This benefits you as much as it benefits me. Perhaps even more so, in fact,” she spoke plainly, as though she knew more than she let on.
“If you say so—” Helva begrudgingly tried, holding back a roll of her eyes when the blonde, once again, cut her short.
“I know so. I suppose you’ll be off frolicking in the woods soon, yes? I will find you in the morning. Eleven owls past midnight, perhaps. I suspect you are the type to laze the day away,” she waved her hand dismissively, ignoring how Helva’s face hardened in response.
“Wh—”
“And in return, I will keep you informed on what is being said about you amongst the nobles.”
“I don’t think that’s a balanced exchange at all.” Helva’s burgeoning anger was hard to ignore at that point, and, much to her surprise, it seemed to have caught the other woman off guard. It was as if the very concept of obstinacy was unknown to her. Funny. She practically swore up and down that she was not one of the people who’d usually get their way on account of their family name and social standing. The blonde’s expression dulled as she reared back slightly.
“I understand,” she murmured after a long pause, placating Helva with an unkind smile and a stare that could freeze any flame over. There was an air of superiority in the way in which she tilted her chin upwards, slightly, before settling on what she would say next. Had she been… holding herself back from being unimaginably ill-mannered?
“You guild members think yourselves immune to whatever one might think of you because you hold the concept of balance above all else,” she went, with a controlled smile that did not ever reach her eyes, “So much so that when the daughter of an esteemed noble is savagely murdered you choose to sulk and wallow in self-pity over having failed on your promise as opposed to the ramifications your failure might have. I am sure you take your craft very seriously,” it was said mockingly and so harshly that she had practically spat out the word craft, “I am afraid to inform you, it does not matter. Not one bit. Now, you’ll take my help and you’ll be very thankful for it. Won’t you?” Her smile threatened to drop, but her posture remained as straight as ever. Helva was staring. Again.
“Did they put you up to this?” Helva asked, her voice tight with emotion. She felt as if she had been chastised by one of her superiors. It hadn’t made her feel small, per se, but she still preferred not to be on the receiving end of the stranger’s passive aggressiveness a second longer. At the hunter’s words, the other woman dramatically scoffed.
“Please, they couldn’t make water ripple if they threw a rock in it,” she responded with simple directness. “I shall see you in the morning,” oof. If looks could kill, indeed. Helva watched as the researcher wasted no time in turning her back on her and striding towards the morgue once more. She did not look back.
↯
So, Helva had overslept. She chalked it up to the eventful night she had had, choosing to ignore the fact that the Valandi researcher had guessed correctly – she was going to laze the morning away. Not intentionally, of course. She shifted in her sleep so many times the sheets were dishevelled, and she would’ve kept her eyes shut for even longer had a noise against the wooden shutters not awoken her. It was persistent, almost rhythmic, and it irked her to no end. After a particularly loud tap, Helva threw her legs over the bed in a flash, walked up to the window, and pushed the shutters open.
Squinting her eyes when the sunlight hit her face, she caught the culprit out of the corner of her eye – a crow. The fiend had been pecking at the damn shutters for what had felt like hours and was now perched on a windowsill across the room she was in. Helva looked ridiculous, staring at a bird with suspicion first thing in the morning, but the poor wretch looked sickly. Sickly, yes, but with enough energy to wake her up.
Tilting her head to get a proper look at the bird, it mirrored her movements before giving her a resounding caw. Yes. Whatever that meant. She remembered, then, that before heading to her room, she had asked the innkeeper for some bread. She was no longer going to eat it, so she set the whole thing on the windowsill, giving the bird a curious look before turning her back on it and getting her armour ready for the day. When she glanced back out the window, the crow was nowhere to be found.
…
Slowly making her way down the steps and towards the chatter near the tavern in the common room, Helva tightened the straps of her leather armour on her chest, making sure each piece was safely secured and snug against her body. She had made it a point to wear less constraining armour that day and to braid some of her hair to tie it back in a way that would keep it away from her face. Save for the leather bracers and knuckle covers she wore, the rest of her arms were exposed. The bottom half of her body looked more or less the same, but at least she could move freely – which was useful. She found that prioritising movement was key, especially considering the kind of fighter she was.
“... and then they came runnin’ back, complainin’ about some… wailin’, was it?” a traveler spoke, out of breath. “Aye!” another voice interjected.
“Why on earth would you even venture that far deep into the woods? Have yous lost your bloody minds?” the innkeeper chastised, a vein popping out of their neck as they tossed one of their clients a giant tankard filled to the brim with ale.
“B-but the, erm… It’s not comin’ for us. It’s comin’ for them lot.” An uncomfortable silence fell between them. When they finally took note of Helva’s presence, the group turned to stare straight at her as hushed whispers filled the room. Well, they hadn’t been wrong. The beast didn’t have its eyes set on any commoner – it killed nobles. Even so, it would seem that the harsh, cold truth brought them enough shame to keep them from saying it aloud. Helva could understand where they were coming from.
They were glad it wasn’t them, of course. Still, the last thing they needed was for the nobles to see them under a different light. It was not every day that the populace was practically envied, but, then again, humans did plenty when faced with the disturbing concept of their own mortality.
“Don’t stop on my account,” Helva flatly stated, urging them to speak freely. The group looked uncertain, afraid it would say too much too quickly, so the innkeeper broke the silence instead.
“Bulwark,” the innkeeper started, voice stuck in a perpetual scolding tone, “Tell them they shouldn’t go into the woods. They won’t bloody listen—” another voice interrupted the owner, then.
“Bulwark, somethin’s out there,” a farmhand blurted out, her eyes wide and panicked. Helva noticed the way her hair stuck to her forehead and how sweat dripped from her temple down to her jaw. It was too early for the beast to be hunting. It didn’t exactly have a fixed schedule, but it preferred to lurk in the shadows. Not quite nocturnal, but it played it safe nonetheless.
“Well, go on then,” Helva motioned for the woman to proceed. She looked between her peers with uncertainty, but when they grumbled their general agreement, she used her working gloves to wipe the sweat off her forehead in resignation.
“Near the hamlet,” unsettled murmurs broke out in the crowd. Helva knew the history of the place - thought it was enough to keep most – no, everyone – out, but apparently not. It would seem they did have much more in common with the fools the beast hunted. Helva narrowed her eyes and nodded at the farmhand, urging her to continue
“We saw nothin’ but we heard plenty,” the worker hastily explained, sensing the hunter’s disapproval.
The Wailing Hamlet. A name chosen not because it had quite the ring to it, but because many had perished there. Helva struggled to understand why anyone would ever wish to approach such a place – legend claims one must simply not set foot in the area. The horrors that plagued it went far beyond what was conceivable. Some say the village is haunted – haunted by poor choices made in times past. Choices that brought a whole community to its knees.
Oftentimes, it is best to leave the dead undisturbed. Set good conscience aside, lest unexpiated transgression sink its teeth into one’s flesh.
The dead, as Helva had learned, represented more than a shell of what once was. They were alive in their own right, truth be told. So alive, in fact, they’d beg the living to turn back and look if they could. Helva had felt it before. Whenever she succeeded amongst the Guild, whenever she pushed forward and kept on living… something, in the very depths of her mind, made her feel disgustingly inadequate. The dead perished, and the living felt damned.
She’d heard the others argue over whether or not they would have let the horrors into their homes or fallen prey to the welcoming voices of loved ones who were no longer among them. Some were convinced they would have kept their doors well shut, but Helva knew it was all talk – casual bravado to keep what deeply unsettled them at bay. There were certain memories Helva could only look at retrospectively.
She had buried comrades before. If one of them called out to her at that moment, Helva was not so sure she wouldn’t look back.
“Hearing plenty doesn’t mean much. The place you speak of is not exactly known for being peacefully quiet,” Helva noncommittally reminded them with an impassive look on her face. At that moment, she took out one of her daggers from her belt and a sharpening stone from her satchel, dragging it over the blade with slow, deliberate movements.
“No, this was different. You have to trust me!” she pleaded, her expression pained, as though the mere thought of not being believed after what she had heard physically hurt her, “There's someone out there,” she gravely finished, letting the words hang in the air quite uncomfortably.
“And what’s she meant to do? Goin’ to the Hamlet alone is suicide!” shouts of agreement broke out. Some tavern-goers went so far as to say it was clearly a trap. It did not move Helva as much as she thought it would.
The beast’s presence engulfed her, its energy all-encompassing. If there was even a slight chance of it prowling in the Wailing Hamlet, then being a step ahead was imperative. Perhaps it was its resting place, a very good one, at that. The odds of being disturbed that far deep into the woods were null, and Helva was painfully familiar with the beast’s smarts.
It was dangerous, and she’d be throwing herself into the dark, but still a lead. The thought of coming face-to-face with her Death Bringer made her palms sweat in anticipation.
“I’ll go,” Helva suddenly said after swiping her dagger against her whetstone harder than she had intended, not the slightest bit contemplative as her mind appeared to be perpetually set on her mission long before the dangers of the Wailing Hamlet had been discussed among the tavern-goers. “You said it yourselves, it might be a trap. If it is, it is. If it isn’t, I’ll get to meet the idiot who thought it was a good idea to gamble their life away by going in there in the first place,” she sternly finished. The innkeeper looked at her as though she had lost her mind.
“And if you don’t come back?” one of the travelers hesitated, scratching the back of their neck with uncertainty written all over their face.
Despite not having tamed the beast, Helva stood among the people as their shield, a protector. Her death would make matters infinitely harder for everyone, especially for the nobility. A Bulwark’s success was everyone’s triumph, and their death ruinous.
At the traveller’s question, Helva stood, strapping her daggers to her belt and throwing her cloak over her shoulders, “I can live with that,” she responded in a level voice before pulling her hood up and walking out of the inn, paying no mind to the protests that reached her ears.
↯
If one couldn’t understand why The Wailing Hamlet had been given that name, approaching the path that led to it would be enough to know why, exactly, everyone had been told to stay away. There was a nagging thought in the back of Helva’s mind telling her she was a fool for pushing her luck like this. The hairs on the nape of her neck stood on end whenever she heard a noise – it was getting harder to see the further she marched into the woods.
The trees near the Hamlet were wilted, twisted something foul. Everything about the place told her to turn back and leave, but she couldn’t. Wouldn’t. If there were even a slight chance of finding the beast, she would happily die trying.
The Wailing Hamlet, known to bring ruin and death, looked quite alive despite its abandoned state. With the fog growing thicker the closer she got, the hunter could not help but think she had been intruding. As if she were being coaxed into approaching the damned place, her eyes were fixed on the main wooden gate, her feet bringing her closer to her target as her hands itched to reach for her weapons.
Exhaling a shaky breath, she took note of the knot twisting and contracting deep within her body. Her arms and hands tingled. Something called out to her – she could feel it. In response she straightened her posture, her jaw set. She would not lose herself. Not now.
Moving as quietly as she could, she made to remove her daggers from her belt and stuck to the shadows whenever possible, hoping the cover provided by the fog would be enough to give her an advantage.
The outer stone wall surrounding the Hamlet had begun to look the worse for wear – dilapidated, really. Following it in case she found a possible entry without having to cross the main gate, there were moments when Helva swore she heard something – noises akin to one’s dying breath, almost too faint to catch. She pushed her worries away, her shoulders relaxing for but a moment once her eyes landed on a large hole in the stone wall. Some of the stones were scattered. Helva approached it with caution, realising the wall had not fallen naturally – it had been purposefully torn down and pushed out from the inside.
Keeping quiet, she made her way into the Hamlet and was immediately hit with a stench she could only describe as standing near a ditch filled to the brim with dead bodies. In her line of work, that was not a good sign; the dead rarely rested.
She heard it then. A moan. Immediately, Helva took cover behind a building, pressing her back into the rotted wood as she waited for any signs that confirmed her suspicions. Another warbled moan. Pressing her lips into a thin line, Helva moved excruciatingly slow, peeking from behind the building to look for the source of the noise.
There, to the left of a destroyed merchant’s cart, was a… what…? Helva narrowed her eyes, her brow littered with sweat as she attempted to make out what she was seeing. It was too small and slim to be a bear, too big to be a deer. A large mutt, perhaps? It looked wounded beyond belief with very few patches of fur on its body.
Another noise, and Helva was certain it had come from the creature. It had not been a moan that time but a wail that rose and fell in tone unnaturally as though the animal had been attempting to reconstruct a sound from memory.
A Feral. That much was clear. Helva was familiar enough with those throughout her training years. Alone, they did not pose much of a threat, not to a skilled fighter, but in a pack, they were dangerously vicious and unpredictable.
The gruelling history of the Wailing Hamlet made mutations in the area more common, the raw energy bled into the land and into everything surrounding it. Helva felt as much herself. The air in the village was dense, making her heart beat faster and her hands clammy. Her foes got a lot stronger and, in turn, so did she.
There was a time when Helva had felt terribly sorry for the creatures. To think of losing control over one’s own mind or of how easily one can be broken and reshaped into something completely unrecognisable would make even the toughest soldier pause. Everything was different now. She had a mission she would see through. Levent had decided.
Watching the animal closely, Helva held her breath and bit the inside of her cheek. Eyes darting to the left when a scurrying sound reached her, just on the opposite side of the stone wall, Helva broke into a sweat when she realised the creature had heard it too, and, in response, turned eerily quiet.
Tilting its head towards the general direction of the sound, Helva noticed the Feral’s missing its upper jaw, its tongue hanging loosely to the side. When no other sound reached the animal’s ears, it stood, impossibly straight, on its hind legs. After a moment’s silence, the creature let out a preternatural cackle, followed by a strangled, choking sound. By the time it dawned on her that the animal had been mimicking past victims, Helva’s stomach was churning.
Stomach tying itself into knots, the hunter felt a second presence in the area, yet could not see it. There were certain instincts that Ferals did not desert. Dogs were not solitary animals; they were bound together, overprotective of one another and hunted in packs, much like wolves. Helva prayed they weren’t wolves.
Pushing past that unpleasant thought, Helva made sure to avoid crossing areas without any cover, sticking to the sides of the buildings instead. Just as she was about to cross the path to another house, she heard a pained hiss coming from within the walls she had been hiding behind just moments prior. It sounded human enough, different from the noises the other creature had made.
In a moment of sheer idiocy, Helva debated going inside, knowing she’d be losing precious time if the beast had been hiding in the village. She could not afford to lose the opportunity to corner it or take it by surprise.
She clenched her jaw, mentally kicking herself for hesitating when in enemy territory. It was only when faint sounds of a struggle, accompanied by a sharp “Fuck!”, that she made up her mind. If the idiot inside got any louder, they’d both be in a lot more trouble very soon.
Circling to the side of the house, Helva peeked through the window and came away empty-handed. The place was a mess. It didn’t seem as though it had been broken into as much as it looked like whoever lived there had left in a hurry. There were no signs of whoever was trapped inside, making Helva curse under her breath.
There was no way she’d be entering through the front door, as the house faced what Helva could only imagine was the village’s former cobbled marketplace, with absolutely nowhere to hide. As such, Helva examined the building. There was only one other possible entry point, but she’d have to climb to reach it. Oh, well. Resting a hand on the side of the house, she pulled back when she felt the sponginess of the wood. It was rotted, all right. Letting out a string of expletives so long she’d make even her superiors blush, she strapped her daggers to her belt and got to climbing, making sure to support herself on the bits of wood that looked dry and firm.
Who was more foolish, she mused, the person trapped inside, or the one climbing the damned building to rescue them? As if on cue, the log Helva grabbed crumbled underneath her touch, sending her nearly flying. As a last resort, she jumped, aiming for the balcony that seemed just out of her reach. Her breath caught in her throat when one of her hands missed it. Thankfully, she had two.
“Piece of—” she started, sounding slightly brittle as she pulled herself up and onto semi-solid ground, “ fucking shit.” Helva breathed, slapping her palms on her knees and doubling over to catch her breath. Feeling beyond irritated, she threw her hood off her head in a tantrum before pushing her way inside the house.
The room was damp, musty, and, most importantly, in complete disarray. The air was so heavy that it was considerably more difficult to breathe. Her lips downturned in distaste as she looked around the room she had climbed her way into.
The light provided by the moon was no longer enough to illuminate her way forward. So much so, in fact, that the area felt quite claustrophobic to be in. She should have brought a damned lamp.
Taking in a deeep breath, Helva’s eyelids fluttered as she slowly faced her palms forward, hands resting at her side, “Show me what you’re hiding, then”.
After a moment’s silence, one where the hunter made sure it was safe to attune herself to the environment, her eyes closed. Fingers twitching in response to the energy thickening the air all around her, Helva’s muscles relaxed with each passing second, even if her blood rushed to her extremities. There was an odd taste in her mouth, one she could not quite pinpoint. Her skin tingled as she tittered on the edge of what seemed to be barely contained in the Hamlet. She was careful, though part of her wished to dive in. Reasoning with herself, she locked those feelings away and listened.
Outside. Light padding on gravel. Four legged. The creature she had seen before. Though…
It was not alone. The sounds were faint, but unmistakable. Choked breathing, prolonged sighs and… sardonic laughter? It was imperative to tread lightly. She would not stay safe for long.
Turning her attention to her immediate surroundings, neck craning to the side as she searched for signs of life, flashes of white shone behind closed eyes as she reached the source of the noise she had heard before.
There. Downstairs.
“...ood son of a—” followed by uncomfortable grunting and hissing. Not a great mental image, but it was very clearly who she had been looking for.
Helva could feel her heartbeat on her neck, prompting her to shake her limbs in an attempt to release some of the energy she intentionally blocked within herself. Opening her eyes once more, she took another shot at making out her surroundings with the new information she had.
There was only one way out of the room, Helva noticed. It appeared that she’d stumbled into someone’s study. She suspected this was no commoner’s home – the bailiff’s, perhaps. It was one of the largest buildings in the village, and the thought of being enclosed in a space that was unknown to her set her on edge. Glancing towards the window, the light of the moon shone on the desk that was at the very centre of the study. Helva approached it absentmindedly when something caught her eye. Raising her hand to intercept the beam of light, she watched as the dust particles in the air shifted with her movement, yet, when she stilled, the environment remained frozen.
It was one thing to feel as though she was being watched. It was another to be in an unfamiliar place where everything was unnervingly quiet until it wasn’t.
Covering her nose and mouth with her arm, shielding herself from the still air, Helva suddenly became acutely aware of her current predicament and what she had been doing. There were many ways in which her evening could end in tragedy, but she was so close. She could feel it. Countless hours battling an invisible enemy, and, for once, she could be a step ahead. It was all she needed. All she needed to— CRACK!
It happened in a flash. So quickly, in fact, that not even Helva had had the appropriate time to react. Stepping on a particularly soft patch of wood, Helva’s weight came crashing down through the floor. It was as undignified as it sounded, and the hunter would have laughed had she not slammed her lower jaw on the wood on her way down. Everything was a blur. All she remembered was a very sharp pain taking over her entire skull before it all went dark.
It was her. She was the bigger fool.
↯
Something tickled her face. At first, Helva believed she’d open her eyes and find herself sleeping in the room she had reserved. Perhaps she had had too much to drink, because, surely, there could be no other explanation as to why she had a splitting headache. Whatever brushed against her cheek the first time did so a second time, and Helva, in a moment of utter stupidity, believed she was in the room she had rented, indeed, and with company. She thought of blonde waves and a teasing smile. Curious glances turned furtive when caught, and… a bird…?
A particularly unpleasant caw reached her ears. It had sounded almost impatient, prompting Helva to move, which she would have done with ease had she not been hanging upside down. It hit her all at once, then, and she snapped her eyes open.
Her jaw hurt, almost unbearably so. As far as she could tell, she had not dislocated it. Reaching up to touch her face, she immediately noticed how hot the skin was to the touch – the blood had been pooling to her head for Gods know how long. She had to move. Quickly.
“Oh, thank the Gods, I thought you were dead!” came a voice from below. The hunter had half a mind to acknowledge it, not trusting herself with what surrounded her. It had not been a hallucination, however, for when her eyes scanned the room, they landed on a farmhand. A trapped farmhand. Well. Weren’t they the perfect pair?
“I— what…?” she hesitantly croaked. Now knowing what, exactly, had been tickling her face, Helva pushed her cloak to the side to properly scan her surroundings. She was quite the sight, truly. To further accentuate the ridiculous turn of events, she slowly tipped her head to follow the sound near her feet.
Ah. There it was. A crow. The crow. If Helva hadn’t known better, she’d think it was mocking her.
She watched as it hopped around the hole in the ceiling, a hole she had made, which was quite embarrassing, and tilted its head quizzically. Well, crows were curious creatures, and Helva had been in a curious situation. She attempted to move her foot, and the bird quickly jumped out of the way.
She racked her brain, trying to understand how, exactly, she hadn’t fallen yet, which was when she saw it. Her other foot, the one she couldn’t move, was very painfully wedged between two pieces of wood. Dry, of course, because that was just her luck.
“Don’t move!” said the farmhand, exasperatedly. She had almost forgotten his presence, “Or, I dunno, move less, for fuck’s sake.”
Eloquently put. Well, the issue was that, between the two of them, enough noise had already been made. The man was stuck under a fallen banister, which wasn’t hard to get out of, and his saviour was dangling through the ceiling. Any more noise was sure to bring the mutts straight to their location, which was why he hadn’t even dared to attempt to crawl his way out from under the structure. Unfortunately for them, the only way out of their situation wasn’t exactly what either of them would consider refined.
“How long…?” Helva muttered, feeling increasingly more uncomfortable as she regained her consciousness. Her upper body felt heavy. Her hands felt swollen and her arms stiff. It was not good. Not in the slightest.
“Too long. I think you slammed your head or something. Been out cold since,” he whispered in a small, panicky voice, trying to relieve some of the pressure on his legs by lifting the banister some more, hissing in the process.
“Shit,” Helva finally said. Looking around her for something to grab, “I have to get out of here,” she explained, as though it was not obvious. The more movements she made, the more the wood creaked, making both her and the farmhand grimace. She almost wanted to ask him why he had wandered into the place, if whatever he had been looking for was worth his life, but before she could open her mouth, the wood gave, making her drop a few centimeters lower. It wasn’t that big of a drop, but she was not particularly interested in falling face-first onto the floor.
After a moment of tense silence, where the pair held their breath in response to her fidgeting, the man spoke once more, “I am in no position to help, as you can see.” He gave out a derisive laugh, almost chastising her for not standing still. At that, Helva impatiently flung her cloak to the side to lock eyes with him, her own wide with rage.
“Could you just not talk?” she spat out before going straight back to attempting to free herself. The bird watched her closely, but when she inched closer to her feet, it seemed to make up its mind and flew out the window without so much as a goodbye. At that moment, Helva wished she, too, had wings.
Ignoring the man’s protests, Helva reached up to pull her leg free, knowing full well that when she did she’d have to ready herself for a fight. Nothing had been going according to plan, and she could practically feel her chances of surviving the night dwindling by the minute. Either way, she would not cry over spilt milk. If these were the cards she was dealt, she’d simply have to roll with the punches.
Helva had been taught to push past her sprawling pain and hold on to something real, to something she could change. Looking inward very rarely meant anything. Where others preferred to linger, Helva rushed. The weight of things was unbearable at times – it slowed her down. She’d take a lesson over being left wondering. So, she rushed.
She pulled once, twice, three times. On the third try, she freed herself and came plummeting down to the floor with a loud, undignified thump. To her dismay, upon hitting the floor, she fell on her side to shield her face, and in doing so, the sharp pain near her hip was so strong it knocked all the wind from her lungs. Gritting her teeth to keep herself from shouting, she blindly reached for her side, trying to find the source of the pain. She felt dizzy and her vision was blurry. In the back of her mind, she could barely make out what the man had been telling her at that moment, even less so when her fingers brushed against a sharp piece of wood sticking out of her body.
Far be it from Helva to be the squeamish type, but between her fresh injury and the way in which the pain at her temples occasionally made her see flashes of white, she felt like she was going to be sick.
Twisting her body into a fetal position, Helva made an effort to come to her knees as needle-sharp pain burst all over her torso. She choked on several breaths, feeling a sense of urgency in getting back up to her feet as the Ferals had surely heard the commotion. When she made to stand, her legs trembled and she doubled over in pain, clutching at her side with shaking hands.
“... no, no, no. We’re fucking dead! We’re dead—” the man was panicking, now wasting no time in pushing the banister away from him, paying no mind to the way it loudly dragged against the hardwood floor. “Those things—” the rest of his words died in his throat as a very loud, distorted sob came from the other side of the door.
“Please…”
Despite her state, Helva froze.
“Gods… spare… please.”
It was almost melodic, as though the mimicking creature did not quite know which tone to use, as the voice did not belong to it – unnatural, gurgled words that weren’t spoken so much as they were stolen.
Helva’s eyes brimmed with tears. Forcing herself to stand upright, she leaned against a table behind her and gazed out of the window. In silence, the pair watched as the one that stalked them paced near the front door, its shadow occasionally flickering beneath it. It was not a person. It was not her beast, either.
Helva felt her sweat drip down her neck, and in a desperate attempt to get a hold of herself, she wrapped a hand around the piece of wood that pierced her flesh and pulled tentatively. The pain was immediate, but as she fidgeted and, in turn, felt the damn thing dig into her side, she noticed that, despite being in terrible shape, the fragment was not too long and wasn’t lodged in too deep. Thankfully, it had not hit any vital organs. If she were to pull it out, however, she’d lose blood. Blood she needed for the fight to come.
Her eyes flickered towards the farmhand, who was desperately looking for a place to hide. Before he could make up his mind, the creature let out a prolonged, dissonant moan, so low-pitched it hit them squarely on their chest. Helva became acutely aware of how nauseous she was. She could smell the rotten creature from where she stood. The kind of stench you’d find in a bog. Still water.
“It’s—”
“Shut your damned mouth!” Helva hissed, and the man acquiesced. With slow movements, Helva reached for her daggers, biting the inside of her cheek so strongly that blood coated her tongue. Her heart was pounding in her chest as she felt her mind slip momentarily.
If the energy shifted near the edge of the village, within its walls it was infinitely worse. There was no more gentle coaxing, no. The raw power coursing through Helva’s veins screamed at her, pleading with her, begging her to give in.
Helva’s control was self-forged, but not iron-clad. In her line of work, there was very little room to play the hero. Those who had tried were buried deep within the land Helva vowed to protect.
“You have so much to learn, girl,” Koral had told her, voice tight with exasperation. “You are as stubborn as a mule and as ill-tempered as the winds. That is not what we require from you. When lightning strikes, you must stand fast. Do not search for it. It will find you. You are of no use to us dead.”
Unaware of Helva’s musings, the farmhand cautiously retreated into an even darker room, reaching behind him blindly so he wouldn’t walk into a wall. In doing so, his hip slammed against the table Helva had been leaning on just moments before, and knocked over a vase. Time stood still, then. Helva’s head snapped to him so quickly she nearly pulled a muscle.
The man watched, in terror, as the vase rolled across the table. Tears ran freely down his cheeks, and Helva’s blood stormed in her veins, the pain at her side numbing as she subconsciously prepared for what would come next. Her wounds galvanised her to take action – before the vase could hit the ground, she promptly shoved the man into the room he had been walking towards and shut the door. When she turned back around, the creature was no longer at the door but standing directly in front of the window.
Its eyes were cloudy, its mouth dropped open in what Helva could only describe as a grin. She watched as a string of spit clung to the animal’s left canine, its skin littered with open wounds and flesh hanging off its body. Before Helva could understand why it had been staring at her so, the animal tipped its head back and released a bloodcurdling, ear-splitting shriek that sounded unnervingly human. At that, Helva moved immediately, focusing on the way the energy gnawed at her bones and commanded her to listen.
Several screams joined the first, and, almost as quickly as they came, two animals burst through the front door, losing their balance as they all but stampeded each other to get to Helva.
Knowing she stood no chance against two Ferals in her current state, she side-stepped the first mutt, kicking it on the ribs to gain some distance on it. Curiously enough, the animal yelped when it slammed against the wall, and, in turn, Helva clutched at her side when it protested against her sudden movements. Pushing past her pain, her eyes snapped to the second beast. Taking advantage of the way the hunter had looked away from it, it quickly closed in, reared up and sank its teeth into Helva’s forearm, not quite breaking through the leather but enough to hurt and cause her to lose her grip on her weapon.
In a fit of rage, Helva slammed her fist against the animal’s sternum only to realise her hand went right through it. Choosing not to dwell on the fact that her hand was now in the mutt’s chest, she used the opportunity to twist it around and grip its ribcage from the inside before turning her body to slam the animal down on its back. With a grunt, she loomed above the creature, raised her dagger and stabbed the brute twice in the side of its neck.
With every movement she made, she felt her blood rushing through her bulging veins like an untamed river – where Tava’s waters were calming and clear, Helva’s were the opposite. She stabbed the animal again for good measure, searching for a sign that told her it was no longer a threat. With her forearm now free, she pressed it against the animal's throat and twisted her dagger until its growling subsided. Just as she was about to turn her attention to its friend, the culprit slammed into her, sending her falling to the floor without either of her weapons in hand.
See, now that she had been in very close quarters with the creatures, she quickly realised they were, indeed, not dogs. Oh, no. They were bigger and a lot tougher, regardless of how sickly they appeared to be. As if to accentuate her point, the wolf bared and snapped its teeth mere centimeters away from her face. Desperate to regain control, Helva brought her knee against its side and attempted to sink her thumb in its right eye, but to no avail. With every snap of the wolf’s jaw, it got even closer to her face, and, for a moment, Helva’s mind reeled.
You must stand fast.
You are of no use to us dead.
Helpless, Helva had to search for her own blessing. Flinging herself back to the present, the hunter locked eyes with the animal, bristling when it opened its jaw unnaturally wide, giving out a loud pop as it dislodged. Helva sought out an answer deep in her innards, reaching blindly for what she could not quite grasp.
Her arms were tired. With every push the wolf gave, the harder it was to keep it from biting and tearing into her jugular. In a last-ditch effort, the hunter released her hold on the wolf to try and reach for one of her daggers. It was mere centimetres away from her grasp, but still too far. When she came away empty-handed, the animal surged forward, primed to strike.
A beat.
Silence. All-encompassing silence, the kind Helva would find in her prayers.
Some Gods were as sadistically harsh as they were merciful, Helva felt. Some would only deign to answer when the knees of those below buckled. An outstretched hand as one burns at the pyre—anything to teach an urgent lesson.
The fine hairs on Helva’s arms stood. Very little had meaning unless blade pierces flesh and one is found wanting. When the body is filled with nothing but the urgent need to fight back, that is when it all falls into place. Helva would not fall unfairly.
“Viharg, heed my call.” Warmth spread from Helva’s toes all the way up to her neck, and when she turned to gaze upon the unyielding beast once more, she found her hand tightly wrapped around its throat. When her fingers dug in deeper and her nails broke skin, the warmth travelling up and down her limbs shifted into a surge of energy so strong the air crackled with it. Putting all her might into it, or the remnants of it, rather, Helva propped herself up with her other hand and pushed herself to her feet, all whilst maintaining her grip on the wolf’s throat. The familiar scent of burnt flesh drowned all her senses, her face twisting in disgust as the animal writhed in pain, hoping to free itself from Helva’s grasp.
With great speed, Helva slammed the creature on top of the table she’d used to keep herself upright, lightning surging from her hands. Whenever the animal attempted to escape, a stronger electric charge forbade it from doing so.
Helva struck it then, a swift punch straight to the animal’s jaw. She repeated the attack, her lightning leaving cracks in the wolf’s skin whenever her fist slammed into it. There were electric, almost rhythmic ripples in every nearby surface. The energy was so strong Helva could barely hear the whimpers of pain from the animal that was now at her mercy. She heard herself scream, but her own voice seemed an ocean away from her body.
By the time the creature had stopped moving altogether, its face was caved in, its jaw only hanging to its face by a small string of muscle.
Helva panted with exertion and planted her hands on either side of the wolf’s bloodied, burnt corpse. As her adrenaline subsided, the pain at her side returned with a vengeance.
“By the Gods,” a voice went, barely above a whisper. Helva refused to turn. If the sight disturbed him, then he’d be less than thrilled to see what the hunter looked like. As if to prove her point, the energy coursing through her protruding veins was but a faint buzz, one that Helva quite welcomed, but the aftershocks put her on edge.
Running her hand across her face to wipe the sweat off it, she turned to face the door, stopping dead in her tracks when two other wolves came into view. To her right, the farmhand was rooted in place, seemingly unbothered by it all as his attention remained solely on Helva. At first, the hunter wanted to tell him to go back into hiding in case the creatures attacked. After an unnervingly long moment of sizing her up, however, Helva realised the wolves had no intention of striking. They were merely watching her.
They were outmatched.
Helva stood incredibly still, making an effort not to clutch her side or double over in pain. She could not show weakness. Not now.
After what seemed like an eternity, Helva watched as one of the wolves gave out a pointed clicking sound, its throat bobbing in response. The silence that befell them was not so much tense as it was awkward. Once again, Helva felt as though she were intruding, waiting on the beasts to pass their judgment in utter bewilderment. When they seemed to reach a conclusion, the hunter’s posture visibly deflated as the creatures turned their back and ran back into the thick fog.
“We have to leave,” she managed, her voice rough and thick with exhaustion. Her eyelids felt heavy; she could feel her pulse near the wound at her side, which was a terrible sign. “Now,” she gravely finished, paying no mind to the way in which the farmhand’s eyes all but popped out of his skull when he took in her state. She must’ve been a sight, indeed. There was blood all over her arms, chest and face. Her protruding veins emitted a faint white glow, and a piece of wood was sticking out of the side of her body. Helva suspected the man was glad she was on his side.
↯
All but taking the door off the hinges, Helva pushed past the entrance and stumbled her way through the morgue with a not-so-dignified grunt, ignoring the distant voices to her right as she opened all of Veora’s cabinets looking for a way to mend her wound.
The injury had considerably worsened on the way back to the village. The farmhand had grumbled under his breath, complaining about having to walk all the way as opposed to getting on a horse, putting his feet up and relaxing. Helva paid him no mind; taking her mare to such perilous locations was simply out of the question. She’d take walking over losing her horse altogether.
As she neared the morgue, the pain at her side was so strong it numbed her arms and legs. The thrill of the fight had proven itself useful as the stabbing feeling near her hip had been barely noticeable then, but after the deed was done, Helva realised the fragment had lodged itself even deeper. Any attempts to dig it out of her own skin were ill-advised. Moving past her discomfort and the grating sound of the farmhand’s voice, the pair made their way back unscathed. Or… relatively so.
“What is the meaning of—” the coroner faltered when her eyes landed on Helva’s frail form, “Bulwark?” she asked, in clear confusion. Helva ignored her and proceeded to push past several vials, herbs and books, clearly on a mission. For a decorated specialist, Veora’s morgue was incredibly untidy. Everything was everywhere in those damned cabinets. Things that didn’t go together sat in the same space, and with every opened door, Helva felt her patience waning.
“I need a needle.” Helva tersely demanded, bringing her lower lip in between her teeth when her hands trembled.
“A needle? But—” Veora questioned. As soon as the words left her, however, she must have taken in Helva’s dishevelled state, which, in all honesty, was not difficult, and paused. There was blood everywhere, the stench was unbearable and her hair was a mess. As if on cue, the hunter made to loosen the straps at the front of her armour, unclasping them so she could free herself of it entirely, leaving her almost as bare as the visitors Veora received.
There was a pointed silence when she undressed the upper half of her body, save for the strips of cloth wrapped around her upper chest, and Helva knew why.
The scars that painted her back were hard to ignore. As angry as the skies and twice as painful, a friend had described. The largest, widest scar travelled down her spine and from it bloomed the rest. They were smaller, outstretched like branches of a wilted tree moving towards the sides of her body, almost fully snaking around her ribcage, claiming it as their own. The day she had been granted those marks was permanently etched into her mind. She’d been growing into them since, but she would not, could not, ever forget the sound of sizzling flesh and the smell of burning skin.
“Helva, have a seat,” Veora said with gentle remonstrance and Helva bristled.
“Just get me the damned needle!” The hunter glowered, turning to face the coroner to bark out another order before the words died in her throat when her eyes landed on the researcher she had met earlier that day.
Her hair, now free from the red, silky ribbon, cascaded down her shoulders, framing her sharp features and wandering eyes in a way that left Helva at a loss for words, which was most unlike her. Noticing the hunter’s hesitation, Veora looked between the pair with quiet curiosity, her eyes flickering from one woman to the other in a way that would have amused Helva under different circumstances.
“Suturing won’t be enough,” the blonde spoke low enough to imply she had not been talking to Helva, even if her eyes travelled languidly along the hunter’s frame, lingering on her shoulders. Helva felt the tips of her ears burn.
At the blonde’s words, Veora nodded and strided to a different room, familiar with whatever process the researcher had been referring to.
“When did this happen?” the blonde queried, deliberately approaching Helva while her eyes took in the wound at her side, the tip of the fragment just peeking out of her flesh. While her gaze seemed distant for but a short moment, she herself did not seem disturbed. Curious.
“It doesn’t matter. It wasn’t the beast. Ferals,” Helva half-heatedly explained, taking in the woman’s form while she had the chance. Her clothes were different, even if just as expensive-looking. She seemed more… relaxed. Helva wondered how many wardrobe changes someone who was not a noble, allegedly, could have. The way in which her garments fell loosely around her waist, wrists and cleavage prompted Helva to question the woman’s presence. She had not been expecting visitors. Not at that hour. Not there.
“I see,” she drawled, a hint of disapproval in the way she sized Helva up, “And you’ve walked all this way with that sticking out of you, have you?” the blonde waved her hand towards Helva’s injury, now making a face.
“I didn’t really have a choice. It’s not like I planned for it to be part of my ensemble,” Helva deadpanned, standing taller subconsciously the more the researcher approached her. At her words, the blonde’s lips twitched almost imperceptibly, her amusement reaching her eyes when they flickered back to Helva’s face.
“Why not? It looks great on you. I still recommend taking a bath at your earliest convenience, however,” she teased, her nose crinkling as if to accentuate her point further, earning her a soft exhale through the nose. Helva was much too tired to laugh.
Wordlessly, the researcher gave the chair behind Helva a pointed look, ordering her to sit. Helva complied, as she had not been in a position to argue, of course. That was all it was. After a prolonged moment of silence, Veora returned holding a basin with warm water mixed with vinegar and salt, no doubt, and Helva resisted the urge to shift in her seat.
“Caring for the living isn’t exactly one of my specialties, as you might know. But we must clean up your wound before doing anything else to it,” the coroner explained, setting the basin on the counter, near the cabinets Helva had been previously ransacking.
“Give it here, then,” Helva spoke with firm condition, not realising the two women were very much unwilling to let her do any of it herself. Veora looked at her, completely nonplussed, her gaze dropping to her nasty injury as if to say she had fully lost her mind.
“You’ll have to take it out first,” the blonde flatly informed, capturing the hunter’s attention once more, “What did you think we were doing, exactly?” she continued, moving to clean her hands off to the side in a way that made Helva feel as though she were imposing, wasting her time.
“Veora, my dear, allow me,” there was a hint of impatience in the blonde’s usually levelled tone, accentuated by her gesturing for Veora to move out of her way. Suddenly, Helva became incredibly interested in the paintings on the walls. The idea that Veora decorated the morgue to turn it into her second home didn’t exactly bring her much comfort, but it did amuse her enough to serve as a distraction.
Hands gripping the sides of the chair she sat on in a most unbecoming manner, Helva’s eyes snapped to the researcher as she unceremoniously hooked her foot around the feet of the nearest stool, dragged it across the stone floor, and made to sit right in front of her newfound patient. Helva was unfamiliar with the woman’s skills – was she truly the right person to pull something out of her? Something… very sharp? Very… inside…of her?
When the blonde’s fingers ghosted over her wound, breaking Helva out of her reverie, the hunter flinched, earning her a narrowing of the blonde’s eyes, “Don’t be ridiculous, now. You’ve been through worse, I am sure.”
“What is your name?” Helva curtly asked, acutely aware of the woman’s proximity. It was an odd moment to try and get to know the blonde, but Helva was not in the habit of letting women that close without having exchanged the required amount of pleasantries, at the very least. At her question, the researcher’s eyes became full of mirth. She held back a chuckle.
“Nervous, are we?” she said in lieu of an answer, using a pair of tweezers to pinch and pull the end of the fragment out of Helva’s body. She was met with some resistance, to which Helva responded by digging her nails into the chair, audibly scratching the surface in the process.
“Maybe I just don’t trust you,” Helva choked out, unwilling to back out of the conversation, as sitting in silence would have made matters worse for herself.
“Ever so ungrateful. You wouldn’t know mercy if it smacked you right across the face.”
“Wha— Ah! Fucking— Cunt!” Helva loudly cursed, squirming in her seat when the damned thing was pulled out of her side. Swatting her hands away when Helva reached for her wound, the blonde gave her a chastising look as she outstretched her hand towards Veora once more. Moments later, she pressed a warm, wet cloth to Helva’s side, painstakingly wiping the dried blood off her skin. There was no time to protest against the researcher’s actions, for as soon as one task was done, she’d quickly move on to the next, seemingly very sure of herself.
“Not quite. Veora,” taking the needle and thread from the ever-observant coroner, she proceeded to sink the tip of it into Helva’s flesh without so much as a warning. Her ministrations could have been gentler if the way in which Helva pressed her lips together were of any indication. Still, it was far better to have a heavy-handed caretaker than to succumb to accidental impalement.
“My name is Helega,” she finally responded, clearly lost in thought as she stitched the hunter back together. Helva watched her in careful silence. A name that rhymed with her own was far more unnerving than she cared to admit, but before she could fully sit with those feelings, the pads of the blonde’s index and middle fingers dipped into her open wound in what Helva could only hope was an accident. Jumping at the jolting pain, Helega’s eyes jumped to the hunter’s own before her hand retreated, her movements now slower and softer by way of apology.
“Helega,” Helva deadpanned once she had gotten a hold of herself.
“The Second,” she said, looking at Helva from under her lashes, wordlessly challenging her to hold her gaze for more than 3 seconds. Helva failed.
If it weren’t for a loud crow’s caw out in the dead of the night, the room would’ve been comically quiet. Helva eyed her with suspicion before schooling her facial expressions once more. It was best not to rile the woman up, given she had been kind enough to aid her. Don’t piss off the cook and all that.
Helva watched in silence as both Helega and Veora moved as one. When the blonde asked for yarrow, the coroner fetched it almost as quickly as the words had left the researcher’s lips. Helva could not blame her; Helega had a commanding presence, and it was easy to fall in line when under her assertive gaze.
Apparently, she had finished stitching Helva’s wound. Helva felt heat rise to her face at the thought of not having been mentally present through it all, considering she was quite familiar with the pain attached to pulling one’s flesh together with a needle and some thread. Who could blame her, really? Veora?
As Helega mixed dried yarrow into some warm water, Veora brushed past the blonde and placed her hand on the small of her back, her fingers subconsciously flexing when they came in contact with the other woman’s body. The paintings were no longer interesting. Oh, Veora would not blame her at all. Not in the slightest. Not when the coroner’s wedding band was noticeably absent, leaving a tan line where a ring should be. Helva did furrow her brow then.
When Helega returned to apply the paste to Helva’s wound, the hunter made to stand, but was swiftly prevented from doing so. Eyes flickering to the hand on her shoulder and the nails digging into her skin, Helva turned to look up at the blonde, a burning question on the tip of her tongue. Helega’s eyes bored into her. At that angle, the light was harsh on her features, making the look in the woman’s eyes seem almost unkind even as her mouth curved into a smile.
“Do not undo my hard work. Sit.”
“I won’t be able to sit still for long.”
“You’ll do as you’re told for now.”
Behind Helega, Veora sniffed, something the pair paid no mind to as they appeared to be in a staring contest. Helva blinked first.
“Come to think of it— Veora, will you?” Helega passed the paste on to the coroner, “I must wash my hands,” she vaguely finished, already putting some space between herself and the hunter before she could notice the former’s posture had visibly become more guarded.
Truth be told, the blonde’s hands were almost as bloody as Helva’s, which was saying something. As Veora sat in front of her and went to work, Helva observed the woman who had saved her from herself. She watched as she harshly pressed her thumb to the very centre of her palm, forehead creasing when the blood took far longer than it should to come off. Watched as her lips pursed when she made to clean her nails. Watched as, for but a moment, her hands trembled. And when Helega glanced in her direction, the hunter averted her gaze.
↯
There were no pleasant dreams that night, only a dull pain at Helva’s side, sweaty limbs sticking to the sheets and a splitting headache to remind her of the price she’d been willing to pay to take down her beast. It was, truly, a lonely endeavour. Helva wondered if she should have died that night, if she would have died were it not for Veora and Helega.
Helega. The woman’s eyes held a river of emotions, yet never lingered on any in particular. Nothing she did was tentative; she moved, spoke and acted with purpose. Everything was meticulously studied until it wasn’t. Until her hands trembled, the muscles on her neck twitched, or her gaze turned distant. See, Helva had become quite proficient at people watching, or just watching in general. She was a hunter at heart, even if her patience wore thin more often than not under current circumstances. It did not take much effort to see who someone was behind the mask they donned. Helega, however, was different, Helva felt, in a way that could not be summarised.
There was much in Helva that needed killing. Pasts that did not serve her. Friends embraced by the land, once warm. Memories of loves that never lasted. Most of it felt antithetical to what her role was, and thus, as time went on, she ripped it all from her skin. Most had been easy to forget. Some had left scars.
Helva’s… appetites, her physical needs, were mostly a nuisance. An itch she did not care to scratch, or did not have the time to. Last night, though, she was certain of one thing: as the blonde’s bloodied hands mended her skin, Helva discovered she quite enjoyed having her name in her mouth.
Some ancient, unnameable thing glimmered in the researcher’s eyes. The grace with which she moved was almost antithetical to what Helva had seen simmering just beneath the surface, yet when Helva peered too deeply, the flame was quickly stomped. It was quite frustrating.
There was a knock at the door. Helva, in a half-awake state, ignored it, thinking it had been that damned bird again. When the second knock came, she tossed and turned in bed, or attempted to, rather, before her side protested against it. The knock turned into two forceful slams accompanied by a voice she could not quite make out, pulling a grunt of irritation from her.
Taking her time to get up, her hand hovered above her injury, never touching it lest she undo the researcher’s “hard work”. She plodded towards the door, looking and feeling terrible, and opened it, turning stone-faced as soon as her eyes landed on who had been on the other side.
“Greetings, Helva,” her comrade greeted, giving her a searching look. His right hand rested atop his sword's pommel, his left behind his back. If Helva hadn’t known him, she’d think he was the city guard. “We must talk,” he spoke gently and with familiarity.
Helva, on the other hand, seethed. To be sent help after asking to work alone was a personal affront. They did not trust her. Koral did not trust her. They did not think she’d accomplish her mission. The pair stared at each other in silence. To meddle in someone’s hunt was a dangerous thing and a sign of what was to come.
She’d have to become a hero soon.