That Night...?

[Okor]

Dirt paths, half-sunken into the mire, ran throughout the Pale Moors, the shackles of civilization left over from a time when despair had not settled into the very roots of this ‘verse. Travellers trod upon these dilapidated roads, blissfully unaware of the eyes of men, beasts, and worse that watched from the woods. The Moor-Born, those that suffered outside the stone walls of the last stronghold of sanity, knew better than to subject themselves to such hungry eyes: the beast-paths that Dracula’s minions stalked upon, that any true animals had long since abandoned to the Vampire’s monstrous minions. Only the desperate or determined made such journeys, walking in the footsteps of the Dark Duke’s soldiers.

Saalras, Falk, and Halgrim stalked these ruinous roads, silent as they mantled the thorned roots that choked the twisted trail. The milky-white corruption that ran through their veins seeped from the wounds the sister and the huntress had inflicted on them, the carrion-creepers withering where the blessed blood baptized it. They were all that was left: Their Huntsmaster and brothers in blood had fallen on the field of battle.

But their purpose remained. They knew this path well, the vampiric influences that had shaped it having long since abandoned it, leaving it a relatively safe route through the darkness of this land. Dead branches parted, giving way to a full moon shining through dark clouds. The tattered trio took a moment to rest under its baleful gaze, the flayed skins heaped upon their forms shifting, twisting, sprouting black fur.

Wordlessly, they moved, overturning rocks and digging deep into the hollows of long-dead trees, hard-wrought hands pulling free bandages soaked in plagued poultices, rusted blades kept at the ready for a situation such as this. Bloodshot eyes stared out from beneath leather hoods and ragtag collections of furs, hides, and rags, facial features and fear alike hidden. Falk wrapped a length of rusted iron chain around his bulging arm, foul fluids oozing out from beneath his armour as he spoke.

“Gudrun’s dead by a Godling’s hands.”

The others nodded solemnly. The Huntsmaster had seen them through the coming of Diablo, through the madness that followed, and led them through the dark days since. Worm-ridden hearts ached for his loss, and the brothers they left behind in the bog.

Halgrim sighed, shaking his head. “Don’t change things. We’ll have to find more to take up the axe ‘n keep the carrion at bay. Aint many Moor-born left who’re willin’ to leave the light to put an axe in a Skinshifter’s skull.”

Saalras, brother of Saalrik, Son of Saal, grunted as he splinted his split palm, dead fingers giving a gentle twitch. “Be needin’ more, then. Lotta Palebloodied lurkin’ behind the walls, needin’ summat to do. Ain’t gon be easy, but some of ‘em’ll take to it like a Were-beast to carrion, if they don’t get fangs in their throat soon enough.”

The three hunters nodded in agreement, their newly-salvaged weapons and tools adorning their savage armour. There would always be more men, like maggots crawling through the corpse of the world, gnawing at the roots of reality until it all collapsed once more into the primordial soup. But the great rebirth was not yet- life, cruel and vicious as it was, must be cultivated and protected, as the alternative- a sterile, unending, ungrowing reality, was far worse.

That was why they hunted these haunted lands: life always finds a way, and the only thing standing between a Were-beast’s claws and a Moor-born’s flesh was a hunter’s axe. There was a farm, not far from here, nestled in the shadow of the woods. Few minions of Dracula hunted so far from the black gate, and a few wolf-hides nailed to rotten trees served as an ample dissuasion to any who would encroach upon the homestead.

Gudrun had a reason for his predations around the small farm: Badrun. Perhaps fated by their parent’s interesting sense of humour, the Huntsmaster had taken to hunting, while his sibling took up the scythe. One had chosen the hunt, while the other found comfort in hearth and home. Blood bound them, a sentiment the Hunters shared, their communal contagion pulsing through their venom-laden veins.

Someone had to tell the tale of Gudrun’s death. They shouldered their burdens, descending down the gentle hill, candlelight flickering in the yellowed windows of the home ahead, promising warmth and succor from the swamp.

A simple wooden fence defined the perimeter of the estate, enough to keep simple-minded beasts on one side or the other, but the trio crossed it with ease, well-worn boots crashing into the mud beneath. Halgrim advanced, only for Falk to place a hand on his shoulder, pointing towards a window lit by a guttering flame. A spray of crimson decorated the dirtied glass, still wet as it dripped, rivulets of red running free.

Near-silent oaths and curses fled from festering lips as the hunters drew blades, twisted knives and hefty axes clutched in contagion-riddled hands as they spaced themselves, the home eerily silent as they advanced.

Not far now. The porch, inexpertly built by Badrun’s own hands, welcomed arrivals. A wolf’s tail wrapped around one of the wooden pillars, a gift from Gudrun, and, if folklore was to be trusted, a ward against Dracula’s magics. It seemed to have done precious little to protect those dwelling within.

Falk reached out, rags and ragged hides doing little to cover his infected claws as he clutched at the knob, pulling the door open, its unlocked nature all too evident.

A hall of horrors greeted them.

Blood dripped from the walls and ceiling, with the lack of corpses doing little to assuage their fears. They had stalked the shadows of the moors long enough to know the appetites of the beasts that lurked within. Lesser men would have vomited, but the Hunters had suffered this world too long to succumb to their mortal fears.

But the icy grasp of terror reached towards their hardened hearts when they saw what was walking towards them. Tendrils, crimson and ebon, wrapped around the arms of an approaching entity, claws as long as any blade entwined with one of Badrun’s sons, leading him along. By the Plague God, the child: rents in their torso had been sealed with squirming biomass, their eyes wide as they idly scythed their new claws through the air.

The child’s eyes grew wide, as he recognized the fur-clad Falk and his companions. “U-uncle?” The hooded man raised one arm, scraping his talons against the blood-soaked wall, wooden shavings falling to the blood-soaked floor. A smile gleamed from the darkness inside that hood, as it corrected Jacob. “No. They've been working with those ladies, Jacob. Can't you smell their scent on them?” Tainted talons rapped against Badrun's boy. "You head back inside. I'll take care of them."

The hunters swore, turning and launching themselves off the porch as they fled, barking guttural commands at each other in their ersatz hunt-speak. Halgrim turned, his heavy axe cleaving through the monster’s fingers as they descended, seeking to cleave through his flesh. The hunter howled as he drove his fist forward, smiling as he connected with the beast’s maw, only for it to turn to a grimace as fangs sunk into his fingers, ripping them apart.

Falk’s chain lashed out, cracking the killer’s skull, driving the beast back as he turned to face Saalras, a knife held in the swift hunter’s one good hand. “Run! Tell the blind! We’ll bleed the bastard f-” the speech was interrupted as the mutated man wrapped his claws around the chain, dragging the hunter through the mud, closer to those blade-liked claws. Halgrim readied a set of iron links of his own, the plagued pair seeking to shackle the beast for as long as they could.

“Go!” He screamed, grinding his heels into the earth as Saalras turned, dead heart slowly beating as he prepared to make the second sacrifice of this damned night.