20. The Hunt #3
The liquid woman backed away, her form wavering between states as panic finally showed on her shifting features. "This wasn't supposed to—you weren't supposed to?—"
Marx struck.
I still don't know exactly what she did. Her fingers danced in subtle patterns, her lips moving but no sound coming out. Suddenly the woman's constant flux accelerated.
She screamed—or tried to. Hard to scream when your throat keeps melting and reforming. Her flesh flowed faster and faster, unable to hold any shape at all. In seconds, she dissolved into a steaming puddle.
Silence crashed over the clearing.
Three bodies. Three lives ended in heartbeats. The metallic stench of blood mixed with char and whatever foul essence the liquid woman had become.
"Well," Marx said, examining the blood on her arms. "That was efficient."
She kicked the acidic puddle that had, moments ago, been a person. Her boot left ripples on the surface. "Thanks for the assist. I'll try not to make a habit of needing rescue."
But beneath her casual tone, I caught the slight tremor in her hands. The way she kept glancing at the bodies like she expected them to get back up. She looked at Thatcher. Then at me.
“The brother, I presume?” She drawled, any lingering nerves abandoned.
“Thatcher.” He nodded in her direction.
“Pleasure. I’m Marx. I heard you killed a god.” She smiled, sizing him up with a playful smile.
"We need to move," I interrupted. "That was loud."
"Fine." Marx sheathed her blades. "Lead the way, heroes."
We pushed deeper into the brush, putting distance between us and the carnage.
The forest changed as we climbed the gradual slope—thick undergrowth giving way to older trees with little ground cover.
The temperature dropped, and our breath began to fog.
We were heading toward the mountains, the terrain growing rockier with each step.
My mind kept replaying that moment—the knife leaving my hand, the surprise in his eyes, the wet sound of impact.
Is this what you wanted, Xül? I thought bitterly. Your perfect little killer, forged and ready?
We found another clearing. My nerves were shot, every sound making me reach for weapons, every shadow potentially hiding another ambush.
That's when I saw him again. The same contestant from the trees, bow drawn on a golden stag that grazed peacefully in the meadow beyond. Its crystal antlers caught the light, throwing rainbow patterns across the grass. But it was too far to shoot. He was waiting for it to get closer.
There, I sent to Thatcher, pointing.
He followed my gaze. The golden stag stood maybe thirty yards away .
What if there aren't enough prey to go around? Thatcher's mental voice carried an edge. If resources are limited and he gets that stag...
Gods. Is that the catch?
Could be.
Thatcher's expression darkened. We should take him out. Quick strike before he knows we're here.
"No,” I said. "He could have killed me earlier when I was climbing. He didn't."
Marx's eyes flicked between us. "Are you two having some kind of silent conversation right now?"
I met her gaze briefly. "I'll explain later."
"Twins are strange," Marx remarked, spinning a dagger through her fingers. "Whatever you're debating, decide fast. Contestants are already forming hunting parties. Turning on each other. If you don't take what you can now..."
She didn't need to finish. We both knew what she meant.
"He's not threatening us right now. We're not executioners." I locked eyes with Thatcher. "We find another way."
That was before three people tried to murder Marx. Before we added to the body count. Thatcher's jaw tightened. The rules are changing.
Marx sighed. “Some of us prefer our conversations audible."
"We're debating whether to kill him," I said bluntly.
Thais, don't forget we have a goal at the end of this. We have to become ruthless. Become people that we're not. We made a pact, remember?
Marx's laugh was sharp. "Debate faster. He's about to take the shot."
She was right. The contestant had drawn his bow to full extension, muscles steady. A heartbeat from loosing.
“I'm not above stealing that stag.” My voice was steel. “But we’re not killing him.”
I can try to lock his muscles, Thatcher sent. Make it so he can't release. Can't move at all.
"Do it," I whispered aloud .
I watched Thatcher work, though there was nothing visible to see. No grand gestures or glowing effects. Just intense focus as he reached out with senses that shouldn't have existed anymore.
The change was instant.
The contestant's bow string went slack.
"Go," Thatcher gritted out, sweat beading on his forehead. "Can't hold him forever."
I was already moving, Marx beside me, both of us sprinting for the stag. The creature's head came up at our approach, crystal antlers chiming softly as it moved. For a moment, it just looked at us.
Then it ran.
"Shit!" I pushed harder, legs burning as I tried to match its speed.
Marx’s hand went to her belt, came back with a glittering blade, and she threw.
The knife took the stag in the haunch.
It screamed—a sound no deer should make, high and keening and almost rabid. Golden blood sprayed across the grass as it stumbled, crystal antlers ringing as they struck the ground.
I reached it first, star-sword already forming in my hand. The stag looked up at me.
"I'm sorry," I whispered, and drove the blade home.
The stag convulsed once, twice, then went still. Its antlers dimmed, cracked, and fell from its head.
“You take them,” I told Marx. “You’re the one who slowed it.”
“Don’t have to tell me twice,” she said, stuffing the antlers into her sack.
One down. Two to go.
I looked back to see Thatcher releasing his hold on the contestant. The man collapsed to his knees, gasping, hands shaking as control returned. He looked up at us—at me standing over the dead stag, at Marx cleaning her blade, at Thatcher swaying.
Understanding dawned in his eyes. We could have killed him. And we'd chosen not to.
He gave us a single nod .
"Well," Marx said, nudging the dead stag with her boot. "So what's next on our mystical scavenger hunt?"
A horn sounded.
Every muscle in my body locked tight. Beside me, Thatcher went rigid as stone. Even Marx's nonchalance cracked, her face going pale.
"Is it over?" she breathed. "No. It's too soon. We haven't?—"
A voice boomed through the forest. Not Davina's honeyed tones, but a deep thunderous voice of a man. Thorne.
"Time is up. The forest has turned, and you are marked for the chase. Run as the deer runs. Hide as the rabbit hides. Your weapons will not save you, but they may yet serve."
What the fuck does that mean? Panic threaded through Thatcher’s mental voice
I never got to answer.
Agony erupted across my scalp—white-hot, blinding, absolute. I screamed, hands flying to my head as the metal crown came alive. The silver wasn't just heating; it was moving . Flowing like quicksilver, reshaping itself with my skull as the mold.
I dropped to my knees, fingers scrabbling uselessly at metal that had become liquid fire. Warm wetness ran down my face—blood, so much blood—as the crown reformed.
Something burst through my temples.
The pain transcended anything I'd ever experienced. Bone parted like water. Skin split with wet tearing sounds. And through those wounds, they grew.
I could feel every inch, every branching point, every moment as they thickened and spread.
Antlers.
The weight was staggering. My neck muscles screamed as they tried to support this new appendage of metal and bone.
"Thais!" Thatcher's voice cracked with his own agony.
I forced my eyes open to see him doubled over, hands pressed to his temples where his own crown was reshaping. His spiraled into thick ram's horns, curving back along his skull in brutal arcs .
Marx fared no better. She stayed on her feet through what must have been sheer will, but her hands shook as she touched the new growths—silver antlers like mine.
"This is bad," she said, and the understatement would have been funny if we weren't all bleeding and changed and terrified. "This is very, very bad."
The ground began to shake.
It was rhythmic. Like footsteps, if feet were the size of houses.
A silver shape dove from the sky—the eagle we'd been hunting, its wings trailing through the mist. But instead of landing, it slammed into the stag's corpse.
The stag's body convulsed, twisted, changed . Its golden hide rippled as silver feathers pushed through from within. Wings erupted from its sides in fountains of golden blood. And then it grew. And grew.
The stag's legs stretched and warped, hooves splitting into talons that gouged deep furrows in the earth.
Its neck elongated, thickened, metallic scales replacing fur as the eagle's head merged with the deer's skull.
The resulting face was a raptor's beak lined with flat grinding teeth, and eyes that burned with amber fire.
The abomination stood, testing wings that spanned twenty feet.
"We need to run," I whispered.
The contestant from earlier—the one we'd spared—emerged from the treeline. His own metal horns curved from his temples, blood matting his dark hair. He hadn't run. He’d stayed to watch, maybe to help, or maybe he was just too stunned to move.
Now he raised his bow with shaking hands.
The arrow flew true—a perfect shot that would have dropped any mortal beast. It struck the abomination's eye dead center, sinking deep into amber fire.
And dissolved.
The contestant's face went slack as the beast turned its full attention on him. But he didn't run. Instead, frost began gathering around his hands. Ice erupted from his palms in jagged spikes, each one roaring towards the monstrosity.
The creature staggered as the cold bit deep. Frost spread across its wings, weighing them down. Ice crystals formed in the joints of its legs.
The contestant pressed his advantage, and his breath came in desperate clouds. Ice formed beneath his feet, spreading outward in fractal patterns. Massive frozen spears materialized in the air above him, then launched forward.
The abomination screamed again.
"He might actually—" Thatcher began.
The contestant froze mid-cast.
His eyes went wide, hands clawing at his throat.
His skin split, peeling back like old paint, revealing darkness beneath. Wood.
Branches burst from his mouth with such violence that teeth scattered like broken pearls. More erupted from his ears, his nose, the corners of his eyes. They grew, reaching toward the sky as if desperate for light.
His scream cut off as wood filled his throat from the inside.
In seconds, where a person had stood, there was only a tree. Young and healthy and fed by the blood of its birth.
"Davina," Marx breathed, and in her voice I heard something I'd never expected from her—fear. "We’re no longer the hunters. We’re?—"
The abomination turned those burning eyes toward us.
"We’re the prey." I finished, scrambling to my feet.
"Run," Thatcher said.
We ran.
Behind us, the creature's scream devoured the quiet whole.