The Unwanted Winter - Volume One of the Saga of the Twelves (21 page)

He would do this, so his
people would rise in the eyes of the Lord of the Storm as well. The
Vülfen, the master race to which he belonged, would rule second to
none. He would help raise his family to heights undreamed of in the
dark centuries of the past. They would push above the Swüreg dolts,
the Antithues Demon-lords, the Wërggig Warren, the Yíyak Giants,
and the swarms of Skrímsli alike. The Vülfen Kur Ambalaj will grind
them all into the dust of servitude.

He would do this and
relish every second of it.

He stifled a chuckle with
the back of his steel shod fist. It was then he felt the wind. So,
it would be the air he’d experience first, he contemplated
inwardly. Cool - getting colder – air, heavily ladened with more
chemical elements than he was used to inhaling. His lungs labored
for a minute or so until he got used to the
thickness
of it.

At last, the deformed,
featureless myriad of colors sharpened, focused and the details of
what was around him sprang to life before his large, black,
piercing eyes. He found himself in an open area of sorts, covered
here and there with
green
grass, which made him raise his eyebrows in
surprise. He was able to hide most of his initial shock. He had
never seen a green as vibrant and full of life, even in the dark.
He had always seen through others’ eyes, never his own. The
difference was incredible.

Where there was no grass,
there was dirt, hard-packed and dusty, as if trod upon for many
years. He glanced around seeing a few unfamiliar trees and hedges
of origins and names he knew not. There was a fence made of some
type of strange metal in the distance and, what he assumed, were a
great gathering of human dwellings beyond. Some of them with lights
burning without flame, others, completely dark. From his position
in the open area, he was so far from them. He doubted any human
could hear him, even if he shouted. They were quite some distance
away.

Above, the sky was clear
and dotted with far less stars than he was used to seeing in the
heavens at night. Every single one of them was out of place, the
unfamiliarity of the cosmos was slightly disconcerting, but he was
expecting it and didn’t show any outward sign he’d even noticed.
Behind him was a road of some sort, paved with the smoothest
material he had yet to see anywhere, but in the World of Man. He
turned fully to face it, staring at it for a time, astounded as he
began to realize it stretched for many leagues in either direction.
Every few seconds, a conveyance - moving without any type of animal
pulling it - shot passed him at incredible speed! This caused his
eyes to widen briefly, surprised that, despite the lateness of the
hour, humans would be out and about in such numbers, flying across
the land at speeds nearly double what any animal from his world
could manage.

“
Cars”, Fenris, they are
called “cars”.

He had been told, of
course, this was a world of mechanics and not spirit like the one
he’d just traveled from. The last time he’d been upon the World of
Man, human endeavors into this new lore had only just begun. The
Seeker had helped him with some of the “changes” of this place,
though he loathed being in the same castle as her, let alone in the
same chamber. He had endured it, because she was a frequent
traveler to this place. A place some said was her plane of birth,
though he denied it to the point of violence. No one as hollowed of
emotion, hardened against feeling, could’ve come from a human
mother. The Seeker was something else entirely. The Human Race was
too weak to produce the Stiletto of Storm.

After the initial
surprise, he pushed all thoughts aside, as he felt the presence of
his companions at his back. He walked forward a pace or two to give
them adequate space. Some of them were quite large.

He looked down at himself
out of habit, seeing the familiar black and red, studded-leather
jerkin he always wore when in the field. The matching breeks upon
his legs were tucked into knee-high boots, stout, steel-reinforced.
From the belt about his waist hung his longtime friend, his long
sword – Dräk-Mür, which meant
anguish
in the disgustingly sweet
language of this particular realm. Smiling, he caressed its’ wide
pommel. It was Vyche-forged, so it hummed lightly with the boiling
magics within.
Soon, my old companion,
soon you will drink much blood and taste much gore.
Soon…

Out of the night, from
behind a pair of large trees with low hanging branches, walked
three figures. Two of them were small, almost child-sized, the
other was monstrous. If he hadn’t been expecting them, knew them
for who they were, he would’ve drawn his weapon immediately and
commanded the rest of his Band to prepare for battle.

That not being the case,
he reacted in the opposite and casually walked toward them. His
armored fingers hooked upon his belt at either side of his waist,
he planted his feet a shoulder-length apart. The others came
forward out of the shadow and into the light. His eyes settled upon
the hulking, four-legged beast as it approached. It stood nearly
five feet at the shoulder on four heavily muscled legs culminating
in broad feet and cruel, three-inch claws. Its’ mouth was made
great by a huge row of sharp, yellowed fangs splotched here and
there with some dark fluid. Clutched between its’ massive molars
was what looked like the bone of the upper portion of an arm,
belonging to a not quite, fully grown human being. Its’ eyes shown
red and burned like coals deep in a fire, smoldering and hot,
without depth or life. They burned with hate, death and malcontent.
It lowered its’ head closer toward the sodden earth, baring more of
its’ horrible teeth and the bone as well, as if it was bowing to
him.

It was, of
course.

The sight of the bone
though made him frown, his face darkening with anger.

“
I
thought I made it clear there were to be no
incidents
that could draw the
attention of the local authorities?” he lisped, his voice like
sandpaper over coarse wood.

“
My
Lord, a matter of some… shall we say, magnitude arose. I’m afraid
my pet had to
attend
to it in order to ensure another, even more important,
condition of yours remained intact,” said one of the small figures
as it too came from the deeper shadows of the
trees.

He had seen it clearly the
whole time. His vision was quite capable of piercing through the
deepest shadow. His eyes danced over the small form. It was no
larger than a human child of four, maybe five years of age, though
its body completely wrapped from head to toe in a long flowing,
black robe, complete with a hood and low cowl. Its’ face was hidden
from view. He could only make out the creatures twisted, wizened
hands and the very lowest portions of its arms, both greatly
wrinkled and pale in the starlight.

“
Explain yourself, Prēost,
or die here,” he said gruffly. His companions behind him shuffled
as they readied themselves to carry out any order, should he choose
to give one.

Speaking as if he hadn’t
heard the threat upon his person, the tiny figure motioned toward
the other small figure still in the shadows. He turned back to look
at the Vülfen, the hooded figures’ diminutive companion didn’t come
forward, though, but chose to stay close to the hindquarters of the
great beast. “My pet, as commanded, had been keeping tabs upon the
Twelve with all the due diligence of her good offices and
discovered this very night that one of them was about to be harmed.
She acted upon the situation accordingly.”

“
And
from the trophy still within the beast’s maw, I deem this
act
involved the death
of a human,” said the creature clad in armor, barely able to
contain his fury.
By the Storm Lord,
himself, I told them there was to be no slayings of any sort during
the course of this mission! Stealth and deception are the only
tools needed here!
He seethed his jaw as
clenched nearly as tight it he’d done when he traveled from his
plan to this one.

“
Regrettably, m’Lord, this
is true – a human, a male human, was slain by my Pets’ familiar.
The actions of this particular human would’ve proved detrimental to
your long term plans,” replied the hooded figure, clasping its’
hands before it, rubbing them together in false
supplication.

He considered this for a
moment, staring hard at the tiny robed figure, who hadn’t moved.
Not even a flinch was evidenced under a gaze that would’ve sent
others screaming in fear. “Are there any other such
incidents
I should be
made aware of, Prēost?” each word clipped as if he were eating
them, instead of speaking aloud.

“
No, my Lord, all else is
going according to plan. The Twelve have been identified by our
most excellent tracker here. None of the Guardians will escape us,”
he began motioning once more to the other small framed creature in
shadow, “They should be easily rounded up once the Rending is
initiating and the Melding begins.”

He just grunted, but
didn’t say anything for a time.

Only the traffic behind
him could be heard.

“
The Kring-Hël as well?”
he asked suddenly.

“
Yes, m’Lord, the boy has
been marked as well as his two little sisters. My Flesher has made
it her mission to be very, very close to those three at all times.”
From his stance alone, he could tell the small man was being
smug.

“
And the Elemental?” he
went on, not about to compliment the wrinkled old man nor his bitch
of a Flesher either.

A loud cracking abruptly
resounded through the brisk night air. The great beast had begun to
chew through the arm bone in his jaws, small splinters and
fragments peppering the ground about its paws.

“
She is almost as
important as the Kring-Hël,” he added, scratching at the underside
of his snout, masking his discomfort of the beast as it chomping
through the three-quarter inch bone with ease.

“
The Isighünd is keeping a
close eye on her, My Lord. In fact, if it hadn’t been for his
dedication in this matter, she might’ve been hurt, quite badly. I’m
afraid, the human boy had very bad intentions toward the girl. It
would have been a messy one, indeed.” The diminutive, coifed figure
glance up into the starlight, his chin and mouth coming into view,
his lips pulled thin with a wide grin. He actually hopped one foot
to the next in what could only be excitement. “You know, my Lord,
how much we Prēosts love a good rape!” he said through a quivering
voice. “I believe it would’ve been worse than that.”

He ignored the others
expression, knowing full well how much the other relished sexual
torture. If what he said were true, then it was probably for the
best the human male had been slain. Besides, he had decided long
ago, it would be him who would have her maidenhead. It was a
welcoming thought that it remained intact. “Well, we surely
couldn’t have abided that, Prēost.”

“
Indeed, my
Lord.”

“
Well, then where are we
to lay in waiting until the appointed time?” he asked gruffly,
glancing behind him at the fifty or so figures that had followed
him from his world. He swept his gaze back toward the three figures
in front of him.

“
We are currently within
the confines of the park of San Pasqual, as the human’s term it. We
will have but a short trip into the Arroyo of Saco to the east,
naught more than a mile or so from here. That is where our hidden
camp lies,” the hooded man replied, pointing past him, over his
right shoulder where the valley they were standing within turned
into a canyon of sorts.

“
Good, then let’s be about
it and get out of the open,” he commanded curtly, spun on his heel
and began walking in the direction the small man had indicated. His
companions immediately followed in tight military
formation.

At his back, the wrinkled,
pale man, the Prēost smiled anew. “As you wish…”

He made a series of quick
gestures to those of his Band with one hand and they began to fan
out, scouting the area. Their huge, lumbering bodies were amazingly
quiet as they scurried from the park.

Ten seconds later, San
Pasqual Park was as empty as it usually is at this time of night,
excepting of a few cowering birds and rodents that dared not move
from their dens or places of hiding until almost an hour had
passed.

The minions of Storm had
frozen them with terror.

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