23. Henry #2
I laugh along with him at the sheer absurdity.
Even before the wall fell, I wasn’t prone to flights of romanticism, but since the attack hollowed me out, I’ve filled every empty inch of space inside of me with simmering anger.
Every time Stefan makes his snide comments.
Every time I think about the Carrenwells merrily ruling over Lunameade with no consequences.
Every time I have to perform some official duty as heir and feel Holly’s loss all over again.
Kyrin’s ears perk up and the fur on his back rises as he glances down the wall. He bares his teeth and lets out a low growl.
Bells ring out in a familiar pattern. This frantic, drawn-out clanging means a breach. The Drained have breached the wall. Two more short trills ring out.
“Hunter down!”
The shout comes from the darkness down the wall to our left, and Kyrin takes off toward it, growling.
Fear arrives before any of my other senses can register what’s happening. It’s there and gone so fast—shoved away by years of training and the intimate knowledge of what happens to hunters who panic when the Drained attack.
My father is already in motion, one hand holding out a blade, the other pouring well water down the edge of it. I follow him, coating my blades as we sprint along the top of the wall toward the sound of claws and steel meeting.
We pass four torches, and the scent of blood and rot hits me just before the fight comes into view.
Two hunters are fighting off four Drained. Their movements flicker in and out of shadows. I’d almost rather fight in full dark. The stuttered, dancing torchlight and the illusion of being able to see something are distractions.
I cut my father off, forcing him to stay behind me as I charge into the fight. It’s the least I should do. If I were wise, I’d send him away. But the head of Mountain Haven can’t be seen running from a fight.
I recognize the hunter closest to me, Pelan Langley.
He’s guarding someone wounded on the ground.
It’s a technique we all use, called blood baiting.
When the Drained are near fresh blood, they’re so desperate to get to it that they will always take the shortest path.
It’s easier to fight a wild beast off if you know its motivation.
Their appearance is humanoid since they were once humans.
I never quite get used to their eerie appearance.
After turning, the Drained grow more hunched and animalistic, their skin going gray, their bodies gaunt, and their eyes black as night.
Their fingers lengthen into dark claws and their teeth turn viciously sharp.
The beast roars in my face as I step between it and the wounded hunter. Its breath smells like iron and carrion. I grip the hilt of my sword until it hurts so that there’s no room for the fear that scent evokes.
Kyrin snaps at the Drained one’s ankle, but it swipes its claws at me. I dart left and run my sword across its ribs .
It screeches as the well water sizzles on its skin. It stumbles back, and I shove my blade up between its ribs and into its heart.
The Drained lets out a loud wail and curls forward. Its whole body crackles as it lets out one last screech and disintegrates into ashes.
I turn just in time to see my father shove a beast back off his blade and over the edge of the wall.
Pelan has finished off his beast as well, as has the other hunter, who. I now recognize as Kayleen Reyas. She nods to me as she kneels beside Pelan to tend to the wounded man.
Finally, I turn my gaze on the injured hunter. Maxime Palemore. He’s one of the fiercest men in the entire fort, five years older than me and still in his prime at thirty-eight.
Kyrin paces back and forth beside the guards.
“Did they bite him?” I ask.
Maxime shakes his head, but we can never take a victim’s word for it.
We always have to check. While their claws can maim, a Drained one’s bite transfers the disease.
It starts with a fever and then an almost deathlike state where the heart slows so much, its beat is barely perceptible. Then they wake, violent and hungry.
We’ve only seen hunters survive a bite three times. The rest have all either been killed as they were transforming, or shortly after. A bite from the Drained is largely considered a death blow.
However, it’s not uncommon for men to deny it and only admit later what happened. That threatens the safety of the entire fort.
Pelan looks up from the wound along Maxime’s stomach. “No bite. Just claws, but it’s deep. He needs a healer before he gets down.”
I glance at the bell beside the nearest torch and ring it five times in quick succession to call for a healer. There are at least three healers stationed at the level one wall at all times so they can respond to emergencies like this.
My father nods to Pelan and Kayleen. “Clear the area. Make sure there are no more. We’ll hold this spot and Henry can work on him until the healer arrives.”
The two hunters split and walk in opposite directions in the protocol we use to ensure there are no further breaches.
My father kneels beside Maxime, and I walk to the wall. “Listen for the mist. Then help him. ”
Peering over the side, I squint into the dark, listening for the rushing sound.
It’s never been clear if they follow the blood mist or if it follows them.
The wall is tall enough to keep out most of the Drained, but there are those hungry enough to wear their claws off trying to climb it.
That’s my best guess for this breach. What concerns me is that they occasionally hunt together on the ground, but apart from the night the fort fell, they tend to climb alone.
A chill runs down my spine as I turn and kneel beside Maxime. He winces as I probe the bloody wound.
Pounding footsteps sound to my right. I jump to my feet, drawing my sword.
But it’s just Kayleen and a healer who emerge from the shadows. The woman nudges me out of the way and gets to work immediately, speaking quietly to Maxime as she works.
After a few tense moments, Maxime is able to sit up with Kayleen’s help.
“Get him to the clinic downstairs so he can rest and send up a reserve hunter to replace him in the meantime,” my father says.
Kayleen nods and leads Maxime off into the dark.
We hate calling on reserves. It means that we’re waking someone who has probably already worked their required shifts this week.
It’s hard work staying vigilant on the wall, and we limit shifts for that reason.
But desperate times call for desperate measures.
If I weren’t getting married tomorrow, I would do it myself.
We fall into silence, the two of us facing each other, leaning against the stone railing of the wall.
“That’s the fourth hunter down in two weeks,” my father says quietly.
Naima will be able to heal him so he’s good as new, but Maxime is very experienced.
This is just a sign of how thin our lines are getting.
When the wall fell, we lost half of the newest class of hunters because they were the least experienced at fighting the Drained, but they were almost all stationed on levels two and three.
In one night, I lost half of the men I grew up with and a third of the women.
This problem has compounded over time as older hunters aren’t able to keep the same number of patrols anymore and we don’t have enough skilled hunters to replace them.
“Standing on that wall at night is not a job just anyone can do,” my father says.
“We need the Carrenwells to send us those able-bodied guards sooner rather than later. Once that part of the marriage contract is complete, we can move to the next part of our plan and work at depleting their control in Lunameade.”
I stare out into the dark forest. I can hardly see a thing, but I can hear the occasional hoot of an owl from somewhere deep within the woods.
Animal sounds are always a good sign. They get quiet when the Drained are close.
Plus, Kyrin has gone back to meandering down the wall casually instead of growling at the dark.
If he doesn’t hear anything, we should be safe for now.
“How do you know that who you’re going to replace them with will be a better option?” I ask. “What if we’re just clearing the way for someone worse?”
My father turns to face me. The torchlight casts shadows over his eyes.
“I’ve made that mistake once before. It’s not one I’ll make again.
You’ve made your desire to know the full plan clear, but I am reminding you again that there is a reason we compartmentalized information, and you are in too deep for us to tell you everything?—”
“I’m not?—”
He holds up a hand to silence me. “I don’t mean that I don’t trust you. I mean that I don’t want to put you in a situation where you have to compromise the plan to win her over. It’s best if you know less for now.”
“I wouldn’t do that.”
He places a hand on my shoulder. “I know you think that now. But once that blessing comes into place, you might be less certain. I know that the real driving force behind you all these years has been the fire of revenge. I worry what you’ll do without it to keep you going.
I worry you’ll keep burning even once this fight is won. ”
I swallow the lump in my throat and breathe out slowly, watching the cloud of vapor dissipate.
I wish I could say that he’s wrong, but sometimes I feel like I’m made of nothing but that churning need for revenge.
The ability to put rage into action—to rebuild and reinvent myself into someone who can settle this score by any means necessary—I have only been able to do that by ignoring what it took to get here.
My father turns his face, and in the torchlight, he looks older than ever.
“Sometimes I feel like I lost both of you that day. Holly was gone and you came back as someone else, with an extra weight on you that you’ve never been able to lay down.
I pray to the Divine you’ll be lighter when this is over. I miss my son.”
He squeezes my shoulder, and I want to reassure him so badly. But deep down, I know that I’m in this mess too deep already, and with tonight’s attack, I don’t have the luxury of time to worry about my soul and what this fight might cost me.