Haldamir's Hunter

“You swore!”

“Only if I got the information I needed. Now I must go forth and search for a child of Haldamir’s!”

“Please,” the old man begged pitifully. He collapsed to the ground shaking. “I will die.”

Raven’s eyes narrowed in disgust and he removed a pouch from his waist. He threw it down before the man repulsed and a phial of golden liquid rolled out toward the man.

“You should have died long ago fool,” Raven snarled. “You keep this selfish existence up because you fear death. It breaks nature’s laws.” The man scrambled to take up the vial and unplugged it with shaky, clumsy fingers before downing it all in a desperate gulp. Raven shook his head and stormed out of the hut, full of fury and loathing

“You need me,” the man shouted back, feeling the liquid restore his body and mind. He felt more alive than before, bright eyed and vigorous.

“As of late,” Raven replied softly, “you haven’t been useful to us.” He looked over his shoulder again. “You are something of a bother. And you have lived too long Aros. We are tired of looking to old fools for false guidance.”  A flicker of shadow appeared in the forest colored eyes. “May you find peace in your mountain old man.”

The wiseman began to sweat. He touched his brow and looked at his fingers. His mouth gaped in disbelief when he saw there was blood mingled with the sweaty water. He trembled like leaf and tried to form a curse at the young man. His tongue grew sluggish and heavy in his mouth; he could feel his lungs shrivel and his throat constrict. Down on one knee he went and soon both. He bumbled uselessly as the poison seeped deep into his body and gnawed at the innards and bones, turning them to liquid.

Raven turned and left before the scene became too gruesome. He didn’t smile nor did he spare the old man a second thought. He did as he was told and deemed right. The man had lived too long and his unnatural battle against the arms of age carried on too long. Mortality, Raven thought to himself, isn’t a curse for one to dispel with a healing draught.

Silently the red-hooded warrior mounted his steed, a surefooted black mare with a smudge of white upon her brow and followed the mountain trail down toward leveled land.

He had a difficult task ahead of him-hunt down the Hunter.

                     * * * * * * *

Raedin lifted the newly dropped lamb from the wet grass with care. The little thing bleated and wiggled a little, but when he wrapped his cloak around it and pressed it into his chest, it relaxed and set its head down on the crook of his arm. It let out a sweet maaa and Raedin stroked its fuzzy head.

Its mother however, was not so happy. She tried to ram her head into his legs but he easily kicked her away. He was glad to collect the last lamb and be rid of the constant butting of the mothers with their little horns. It left him feeling sore in the legs and sometimes a well-aimed strike would break the skin. Raedin often thought about making a slingshot and hitting the ewes when they came too close but that would require to two hands and the lambs took up most of his arms.

Perhaps a dog, he thought. A good dog to snap at the ewes’ feet and drive them off of him and toward the barn. He would have to ask Farmer about that. He deposited the last lamb in a warm hay pile inside the barn and gently lifted a little fuzzy leg. He tied a blue ribbon around the baby’s neck, signifying that is was male, and begrudgingly let the mother in. She gave him a good whack before trotting to her bleating baby in their own stall.