Look at the wand

Look at the wand.

Such a simple, plain, innocuous thing.

And yet, with this simple instrument, a shortened stick really, with its oak handle and tail-hair of unicorn or feather of a phoenix or maybe even frog’s eye, anything is possible.

It could save a life. A simple flick of the wrist, a latin word pronounced just right, and a life threatening wound becomes a scar, maybe not even that. A decrepit, crumbling room becomes a grand library, with velvet curtains and redwood shelves and perfect, exquisite stained glass windows while a fire crackles merrily in the fireplace. Glasses broken? A wave and a whispered word and voila! Fixed. Hungry? A swish and a flick, presto, a three course meal. It is a doctor’s Elixir of Life, the Holy Grail of architects, the Philosopher’s Stone of all decorators everywhere; the perfect solution to man’s woes and ills.

It can kill a person. Rotate the wrist, whisper the hated word, and a green flash; the stench of death. A father rapes his twelve year old daughter, who drools as her mind goes the same path to nothingness as her voice, and the father is screaming and crying and screams Stop, stop, but he can’t because watching is a jilted lover with a wand in hand and a Cheshire grin. A woman is violated again and again and while inside she screams and begs and whimpers outside she is moaning like a whore and enjoying herself like a slut because the man and his friends all have wands and are forcing her to do these things that she doesn’t want to do but cannot stop. A man is burnt inside out, screaming as his intestines broil and his fluids dissipate and flesh sloughs off while a party of drunk warlocks laugh and giggle and be merry. The mind breaks as the wizards coldly whispers again and again and a rock hard secret agent breaks and cries and pleads and begs. It is a terrorist’s dirty bomb, the crack of rapists and murders, the atom bomb of dictators; the Final Solution for the black hearted.

Save a life. Take it. Make a house. Blow it up. Grow a tree, cut it down; make a dead baby’s heart beat again, or wrench it out of its chest; enchant a car or bike or motorcycle to fly, curse it to become a mad killing machine; a little charm to make her beautiful, a hex to give her the pox; hold in mid-air a falling cat, turn it inside out and scare the little child as blood and guts pour down in gory rain.

This is the wand.

Hunt

Breathe.

That’s all he had to do.

Breathe.

He mustered the strength and took a breath.

Pain.

His vision exploded into stars as the air, chilled by the temperature and just a smidgen of something else scraped the inside of his mouth, chilling the flesh and teeth and blood welling in the corners of his mouth, before scratching the insides of his windpipes on its long way down, blood streaking up into his throat, before striking his lungs, sending icy sensations all across his body.

Then: blessed oxygen flowing into his pumping heart (babumpbabumpbabumpbabump) and then into the chugging steam engine that was his body.

Good boy. Now, exhale.

He didn’t know how long they had been running. Judging from the position of the moon, long enough. Long enough to have been attacked twice, once by a pack of goar-dogs and another by mutant once-men, twisted abominations with impossible physique and worse, impossible speed. Long enough to have fought through a legion of the decayed, hacking and skewering while limbs flew through the air and the unfortunate died screaming as hungry dead mouths reached down and bit. Long enough to have burst through a shield-wall of hired help and into the darkest part of the forest, and there within encountered something even the Hunt commander hadn’t ever even heard about.

The Hunt commander was dead.

As were Hunt novitiates Djoestvy, and Kierran, and Flo, and many others who he did not remember, or would not remember. Hunt thanes Borderrick and Hash had fallen as well. As for the officers…

He was the last officer.

The rest had been claimed in the forest, with the…the…

No!

No time to think about it now.

Don’t think of the horror, the thing, that monstrosity with barbed tendrils with sprouts of moving pincers that went snickety-clack and needle-filled jaws hidden in the trees and the sword-nests that awaited the unwary.
Think of the now. You are the only officer left. You must finish the Hunt.

They burst through the forest edge into white clearing. They had escaped the forest. Huntsmen stopped in their tracks, exhausted and scarred by their experiences. He knew he could not let them stop; if they rested, they would think, and they would remember, and then they would break. This was not acceptable.

‘Keep moving!’ he ordered, hitting the more relactricant of the Huntsmen with the butt of his bow-rifle. ‘Don’t stop! Keep moving! Cowardly dogs, remember your oaths!’

There was grumbling but his company got onto its feet. He was behind them, urging them on. ‘Faster! Faster, oath-breakers!’ The insults worked. They ran faster.
He was worried. He could only see fifty, maybe sixty men with him. There should be more, he thought. His ruminations were quickly interrupted. ‘Hunt maester!’

He turned to the voice behind him. It was Rolesch, the deceased Hash’s dreamer. His own dreamer had been eaten by the gore-dogs.

‘What is it, comrade?’

‘I see…motes of light! They are being drawn towards the Blasphemy…like a sun,’ Rolesch gasped out. ‘It is gathering magick, and quickly. We must hurry!’ he stumbled, kept his feet, continued. No man had moved to help him. He could see how badly Rolesch was faring – he had been wounded earlier (a near-miss encounter with the once-men) and on top of that had to concentrate on locating the exact location of the Blasphemy. Didn’t matter. They could not stop for anything. If Rolesch fell now they would continue on without a backwards glance; the Blasphemy was too close to accomplishing its goal, and he could not allow it. They had sworn it.

Over four thousand Huntsmen had assembled outside the Andrejken tundra and had sworn a blood-oath to end the Blasphemy’s plans, and the Blasphemy itself if at all possible. Four thousand men were divided into four Hunts, which were further divided into four Chases of two hundred fifty men each – these were then split among the officers.
Four Hunts had entered the forest at different points, to ensure that at least one Hunt would make it through. Now, out in the clearing, he could only see his own company. Fifty men against only the Lords knew what. More than two hundred men had died or become lost in that forest – the Blasphemy had undoubtedly even more surprises hidden ahead.
Common sense dictated that he and his company rest here, wait for the other Chases and Hunts. Fifty men could not hope to overcome the wicked and terrible defenses that the Blasphemy would have erected around its person, and even if by the slimmest of chances a Huntsman made it through what could one man hope to do against such a creature?

There was never an option. Time was of the utter essence. Every second wasted was a second that the Blasphemy was using to draw in even more magic, to what nefarious purpose not even the oracles they had contacted knew. The result was the same, however: devastation, destruction, death. They had to stop the Blasphemy, at whatever cost. If his fifty men could even manage to distract some of the defenses around the Blasphemy there was a possibility that succeeding forces could complete the Hunt.

That was, if there were any others left.

‘Contact!’

A scream came from ahead. The whistle of crossbow and bow fire could be heard distinctly from the copse ahead. The forward elements of his company were already retreating, turning occasionally to fire back. Malkryn, the orc squad leader, ran up to him, an arrow hanging out of her arm. ‘Maester, we have enemy elements ahead, unknown number. They’re not undead or mutants, though.’

The relief was almost palpable. Finally, a foe the company could bite into.
‘We do not stop! I repeat, we do not stop! Send some men to the edges, I want complete fire superiority, but we do not stop!’
The orders were carried out quickly. Men charged towards the copse, firing arrows and quarrels from bow-rifles and crossbows. The enemy response was fierce; men were cut down by multiple shots. Their resistance was short-lived; a resounding boom echoed across the field. A tree exploded into pieces, sending slivers of wood into unwilling flesh. He turned and nodded gratefully to the dwarf brothers, who were already reloading their cumbersome matchlock. The enemy fled, were quickly cut down by mass arrow fire.
‘Push on! Do not halt!’ he harried his company on, enfused as they were with the adrenaline of their small action. ‘We do not stop for anything!’