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xykesh · 2 years ago

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The Girl in the Cage, Part 4

Genre: New Adult Fantasy, D&D-esque Fantasy, Action Wordcount: 2,346 Summary: Valerie and List face off against the village’s monster. List’s true nature is revealed.

List’s head snapped toward the jail’s door at the sound of the lock turning. Her tail went rigid as she backed into a corner of her cell, and her hands curled into fists.

Sheriff Darshan staggered into the jail, his steps lumbering and off balance, like at any moment he might double over. His breathing was ragged, and his forehead glistened with sweat.

“You. . .” he grumbled. As if to punctuate his sentence, thunder rolled in the distance.

“What do you want?” List snapped.

She jumped as the sheriff lurched forward, rattling the cage as he slammed into the bars.

“You have to go.”

There was an edge to the sheriff's voice, a growl in the word “go” that unsettled List. There was violence in that voice. Her unease only grew when the bars of her cage began to groan, and she realized it was because under the sheriff’s grip, they were bending.

She found herself even more grateful to the girl who’d removed her chains. At least now, she’d be able to defend herself. Even if she was cornered. And even if the sheriff was apparently strong enough to bend iron with his bare hands.

Her heart began to race, and her body tingled in anticipation. Then a familiar voice came from outside.

“Evening, Sheriff.”

Valerie stepped into the jail, her wristbow loaded and leveled at the sheriff’s chest. The man snarled.

“You. You shouldn’t be here.”

“I’ve been getting that a lot today.”

“This isn't your business, outsider. Leave.”

“From what I hear, it only recently became yours,” Valerie said. “When did you and your wife move here, Sheriff? A few months ago.”

“Stop talking.”

“Right around when some people started hearing a monster in the woods, I’d imagine.”

“Stop.”

“Did you ever hear one, on all those nights you and your wife disappeared into the woods? Because I bet if I asked around, I’d find out people always heard those monsters on the nights the two of you went out.”

“Or was that little cabin the two of you built soundproof? Certainly looked strong. Maybe even strong enough to lock up a monster on nights you couldn’t control it. Until it got stronger. Until it got out.”

“You don’t know me,” Darshan growled. “What I’ve been through.”

“Maybe not,” Valerie said. “But I know that you’ve got a girl locked up that you know is innocent. I know that your shack in the woods was built to keep something in, not out. And I know you were the one who killed your wife.”

An animalistic roar tore itself fromDarshan’s throat as he lunged for Valerie. On instinct, she loosed a bolt into the sheriff, hitting him square in the chest with a wet thud before she leapt out of the way of his charge and let him crash face first into a wall.

“Holyshit,” List said. “Is he dead?”

Valerie stared at the body with ice in her veins. He ended up crumpled on the floor, half slumped against the wall, the bolt jutting out just to the right of his sternum like an off kilter flagpole as blood began to leak from it.

“I . . . he came at me,” Valerie said, stunned. “He—”

For a moment, Valerie’s mouth went dry as she stared in stomach churning horror at the first human being she’d ever killed.

And then the sheriff twitched.

“Don’t move,” Valerie warned. “If you disturb the bolt, it—”

"You . . ." Darshan growled. "Should have stayed . . . away."

With a grunt, he grabbed at the wall, trying to find purchase to haul himself back onto his feet. His fingers carved grooves into the wood, growing larger as they dragged down. With a sickening snap, his back doubled over in an unnatural hunch. His jaw jutted forward as his teeth grew and his hair became thick and coarse. His face went from scraggly, to bearded, to completely covered in hair. His muscles swelled, with his clothing and even skin ripping open as it failed to stretch with his body.

In the span of a few seconds, the sheriff grew into a hulking, bestial form that struggled to fit inside the cramped space of the jail. Its body was covered in coarse, black fur. Already massive hands sported elongated, gnarled fingers tipped in claws. And its face had morphed from a man’s into a wolf’s.

A single, hoarse whisper escaped Valerie’s lips.

“. . . werewolf.”

“What?!” List balked.

“Werewolf!”

Darshan lunged again, and this time Valerie had to dive out of the way. With his considerable bulk, he smashed into List’s cage, buckling several of the bars as she instinctively fell back, landing on her ass.

“Shit!”

Valerie loosed another bolt, then another, then another, all while backpedaling across the floor and desperately trying to scramble back to her feet. Darshan barely seemed to register the shafts as they sank into him, his advance relentless.

He brought his claws crashing down, and Valerie only narrowly rolled away in time. By the time she got to her feet, she had to duck again just to avoid his next swipe. Every time he missed Valerie, he tore further into the cramped interior of the jail, leaving it covered in claw marks and broken boards.

Valerie had dodged everything so far, but given how easily he was tearing the jail apart, the sheriff would only need to hit her once to end this. Trying to reload in the middle of their melee was too hard, so Valerie stopped trying, and the next time she saw an opening, she jumped into the air, and jammed a bolt straight into the werewolf’s eye.

The monster gave a yelp and swatted her out of the air and into the bars of List’s cell hard enough to knock the wind out of her. Clutching at his face, Darshan barreled for the door, breaking it and its frame as he retreated.

On the floor, Valerie coughed once, finally able to breathe again. “That . . . hurt.”

“I’m sure. Not to be insensitive, but can you get me out of here?” List asked, shaking the bars of her cell. “Preferably before that thing comes back.”

Valerie grunted as she got to her feet, her body still aching from the last hit she’d taken. After a bit of wondering and an attempt to squeeze List through the warped bars, Valerie found the keys to the cell in the shredded remains of the sheriff’s clothes, and managed to get the damaged cell door open enough to let the hellborn girl slip out.

As the two of them stepped out of the jail, stray raindrops began to find their way down from the dark clouds above, and Valerie cursed under her breath.

More rain.

“Where did he go?” List asked.

“Not far,” Valerie said, finally reloading her wristbow while she had the chance. “Werewolves are territorial, and as far as he’s concerned, I’m trespassing.”

“You’ve dealt with a lot of werewolves, then?”

“Not exactly. I’ve read a lot about them.”

“That’s encouraging.”

“I know what I’m doing. Just stay close, and we’ll get you somewhere safe,” Valerie said.

“Tell me you’ve got another weapon I can borrow.”

“Not unless you count a whip.”

“Why do you have a whip?”

“It’s an exercise in—it doesn’t matter. Just stay with me.”

List groaned, only for her frustration to be replaced by panic as she spotted a large, dark shape looming on top of the sheriff’s home. She had just enough time to register the look of murder in its one remaining eye before it leapt down, coming straight for them.

Valerie shoved the two of them apart just as Darshan's hulking body crashed down onto the spot they’d been standing a second earlier, and loosed another bolt into the creature’s back. She rolled with her own momentum, creating distance as she reloaded. She came up spattered in muddy water, weapon loaded and ready to fire.

On the opposite side of the werewolf, List recovered her own footing, and with a flick of her wrist, unfurled a long, leather whip. Too late, Valerie registered that the weight of the weapon was gone from her hip.

“List! Be—”

With what could only be described as expertise, List twirled the whip around her body before cracking it straight into Darshan's face, leaving a gash on its cheek. The werewolf turned to face her with a snarl, lunging forward, but List was already moving, keeping the whip thrashing around her as she did.

As Darshan closed in, List leapt back, clear of his reach, and delivered another whip crack, this time to the monster’s throat, before immediately cracking it again, striking it in the eye Valerie had stabbed earlier.

The werewolf recoiled and howled from the pain, instinctively retreating a few steps and giving List time to pull further away. She yanked the whip's length back to her, catching it in her off hand.

Valerie stared, dumbstruck and catching rainwater in her open mouth.

“. . . careful.”

List caught Valerie’s eye before jerking her head toward the werewolf. “Come on! Or did your werewolf books tell you to just stand there and gawk?”

That, and Darshan recovering from List’s attacks, finally snapped Valerie back to her senses, and she took aim once again as the beast charged. Questions about when and how List had learned to use a whip even better than Valerie could wait. There was a monster trying to kill them.

As the fight progressed, Valerie found herself working with overtime, and struggling to keep up. List’s surprising proficiency with a wildly inefficient weapon aside, she was severely lacking in other fundamentals. She fought with a wild abandon and no heed of her surroundings—including Valerie’s line of sight. The girl's constant, erratic movements didn’t make lining up a shot any easier. But she had to try.

A whip could sting something fierce, and it certainly made for a spectacle, but it wasn’t going to put down a beast like a werewolf any time soon. Truthfully, Valerie wasn’t sure she could either, given how most of her shots went ignored by the sheriff.

Aiming for a clear weak spot, like the head or vital locations, at least provoked a reaction, but the constant holding and repositioning List’s fighting forced her to do made the opportunities for such shots few and far between.

And as it turned out, List wasn’t the only one not minding her position. Valerie got so caught up in trying to line up a shot, she didn’t realize until it was too late that she’d positioned herself directly in the werewolf’s path of retreat. The next time it recoiled from one of List’s strikes, it retreated straight toward Valerie. And in an instant, she was too close.

In the split second she realized her mistake, she panicked, and the werewolf pounced. Before she could react, she was on the ground with the werewolf’s jaws caught on her wristbow. The metal apparatus crunched and buckled under the beast’s teeth, ruined.

Valerie kicked and shoved, trying to get free before she lost an arm, but it was like kicking a brick wall. One of the werewolf’s claws dug into her shoulder, and she screamed. In a last, desperate play, she grabbed hold of one of the many crossbow bolts still lodged in its hide, and started stabbing. There was no thought or strategy to where she stabbed—only a desperate, animal desire to survive.

It didn’t stop the werewolf. But the whip that wrapped around its throat did.

The weapon went taut as, at the other end, List dug her heels in and pulled with everything she had. Between her and Valerie, the two of them just managed to hold the monster back from tearing Valerie apart.

“Get back here, you overgrown mutt!” List grunted.

The werewolf responded by jerking hard against the whip, yanking List off her feet and straight toward it. It swiped at her in the air with its claws, and Valerie screamed as she watched blood spray out from List’s face.

When she actually caught sight of List’s face as the girl tumbled through the air, Valerie’s scream got stuck in her throat.

A massive red gash had opened on one side of her face, starting part way up her cheek and reaching all the way up to her hairline. Blood ran freely from the wound, leaving half her face almost completely covered in her own blood.

And she was smiling.

Never once letting go of her whip as she careened through the air, List yanked hard on it, pulling herself back to the ground as she twisted mid air to land on her feet. Her whole body tensed from head to tail, and energy like red lightning crackled across her whole body as the tattoos on her body glowed blood red.

“Is that all you’ve got?!” She screamed. “You're boring me!"

List yanked on the whip again, uncoiling it from around the werewolf's neck as she readied another swing. The energy dancing all across her raced down the length of the whip, and it flashed as cracked it one last time. The entire whip became a blinding length of bright, glowing red light, tinging the rain and mist around List as it cast her features in its bloody glow.

When the whip struck the werewolf, it slashed through his neck as if it wasn't even there. Blood gushed out from the wound, spattering against List as she stood, shoulders heaving as blood ran down her face. The werewolf gurgled, limply grabbing at its throat as it dropped to one knee, and then to the floor. After one last twitch, Darshan went still in a pool of his own blood.

The wicked grin never left List's face.

As Valerie stared at the hellborn girl standing bloody and victorious over the broken, bolt-ridden corpse of the werewolf, a part of her wondered whether or not the town might have had two monsters in it after all.

#outsiders of xykesh #asher #fantasy #fiction #webfic #webfiction #web serial #writing #dnd #episodes #tiefling #hexblade #blood hunter #writeblr #creative writing

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xykesh · 2 years ago

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The Girl in the Cage, Part 3

Genre: New Adult Fantasy, D&D-esque Fantasy Wordcount: 1,420 Summary: Valerie investigates the truth behind the monster attacks. The monster strikes again.

List really had given her shit directions.

And yet, Valerie found it hard to put too much of the blame on her. If she were trying to give directions to the shed in the woods outside of town, she wouldn’t really have had much more to add beyond “half an hour that way.”

“Half an hour,” incidentally, turned out to be a lot closer to three hours when you were searching a forest for a tiny, half destroyed shack with no real landmarks and only a vague heading.

But, eventually, and more through luck and persistence than any skill with navigating the woods, she found it. In a small clearing only slightly larger than the structure itself stood an old, overgrown building.

She could see why List had called it a shed. It certainly wasn’t much bigger than one. But it looked closer to the jail back in town than something a person might use to store their tools.

The walls were thick and sturdy, built out of logs stacked on each other and held in place with multiple braces. There were no windows, and the door frame featured metal rungs that could have been used to bar the door shut . . . from the outside.

The door, incidentally, was in mostly rotted away pieces scattered around the forest floor. What was left of it, along with the door frame and the whole of the otherwise bare interior, was covered in long, deep claw marks.

Now that she was here, she could make out something in the forest floor she could call a path, if she squinted. She never would have noticed it if she’d just been walking through, but actually looking for it and knowing this was where it led, there was a clear part of the forest where the brush had thinned out, where fallen twigs were more scarce. Abandoned, much like the shack, but not long enough for the forest to fully reclaim it.

She could see why List hadn’t slept here. The sheer number of deep, jagged scratches in the walls gave the place the air of a brutalized animal corpse—a sign of a violent predator, to be avoided at all costs.

The beginnings of a theory took shape in her mind, but pieces were missing. She needed more information to give it shape, confirm a few things, and fill in the gaps. And for that, she needed to go back to town.

Even though he was the one who seemed to be the most comfortable around her, Valerie chose to stay away from Sheriff Darshan for now, opting instead to take her chances with the rest of the town. She walked the town, catching people who weren’t in a hurry, and started asking questions.

It was more of a struggle than she expected.

When she wasn’t met with outright distrust and dismissal, she got confused reactions from people who thought the monster problem was over and done with already. At first, she’d tried to convince the people that they were wrong, that List wasn’t their monster, but too many people had apparently seen the fight she’d put up getting dragged into the cage, and the rest had heard even more wildly exaggerated versions of it.

So eventually, she stopped trying to convince them, and just started lying.

“I’m just trying to collect a complete record of events. This kind of information is invaluable in the event something like this happens again.”

“Just because it’s in a cage doesn’t mean it’s not dangerous. If I can figure out exactly what kind of monster it is, I can make sure it doesn’t have any more surprises up its sleeve.”

“The sheriff is concerned there might be more than one. Which is why I’m looking into things. There are certain behaviors that give away whether a monster is alone.”

Invoking the sheriff in particular proved extremely effective, dissolving some of people’s worst attitudes toward her and more often than not leading to compliance. She hesitated to use it too much, though, lest word work its way back to the man himself faster than she wanted. He was going to find out what she was doing, if he was even halfway decent at his job, but as long as Valerie finished her investigation before he turned up and interfered, she didn’t care.

No one knew anything about a shack in the woods, and asking if people ever spent a lot of time out there in a town of hunters and loggers just got her laughed at. The only halfway useful tip she got was to ask the sheriff, since he used to go into the woods often with his wife, before the monster had arrived.

The attacks had begun a month ago, with the sheriff’s wife being the very first victim. On a romantic evening in the forest, the couple had been ambushed, with the sheriff only barely escaping with his life.

Intermittent sightings followed in the forest, along with several mauled animals. Initially, the sheriff forbade search parties to search for the monster, advising people to stay within the town as much as possible and only enter the woods in groups for hunting and logging. But then the first attack inside the town happened.

Late at night, while everyone was at home asleep, a family living at the edge of town were woken up to the sound of their front door being torn off its hinges. The thing that attacked them in the dark was fast and vicious. It was driven back, but not before it had taken a woman’s arm, blinded her husband, and left all of her children with nightmares that still hadn’t gone away.

Several people left town the next morning, and that was when the search parties began. But up until the night they’d caught List, they always either came up empty handed, or had to flee the woods for their lives.

What intrigued Valerie the most was one person who swore on their unborn children that they’d heard the monster in the woods before the sheriff and his wife were attacked. Months before. When she asked where they’d heard the monster, the area lined up tellingly close to where she’d found the shack.

The late afternoon found her back in the town’s tavern, collecting her thoughts over a mug of cider.

Technically speaking, she’d done her job. She’d been sent here ahead of a real monster expert to do the groundwork of an investigation. Get a lay of the land and a basic understanding of the situation to separate fact from rumor. She’d done that and then some.

And yet, she felt so close to doing so much more than that. She could feel the momentum of her investigation, and she was terrified of losing it. She had to keep going. Keep digging.

A bell ran somewhere in the town, and everyone in the tavern stiffened. A moment later, a haggard, terrified man came storming in, red in the face as he gasped out, “Monster!”

One word, and the entire tavern exploded in a chorus of voices.

“How?”

“Did it escape?”

“There’s more of them! What did I tell you, there’s more!”

“We should have killed it when we had the chance. It’s called for help!”

“Sheriff said—” The messenger paused to take a few more ragged breaths. “—everyone inside! Shut the windows! Lock the doors!”

“The sheriff! Where’s the sheriff?”

“He’s going to try and run it off, and make sure the one in the cage don’t get out!”

“Gods above.”

“It’ll kill him!”

“Shut up! The sheriff knows what he’s doing.”

For her part, Valerie hadn’t moved since she’d heard the word monster, as she absorbed the town’s messenger’s words. The sheriff was out, potentially in path of the thing that had really killed his wife and terrorized his town, by himself, while everyone else was instructed to lock themselves indoors.

She almost felt the click in her mind as the last piece of the puzzle fit into place.

She stood up in her seat, and made straight for the door.

“What are you doing?” someone shouted. “We can’t go out there! It’s too dangerous.”

“You’re right, it is,” Valerie said. She fingered the safety mechanism of her wristbow, and the arms of the weapon sprang into place with a metallic snap. “In fact, you should barricade this door as soon as I’m gone.”

With that, she scooped her hat back onto her head, and marched out of the tavern.

#outsiders of xykesh #fantasy #fiction #webfic #webfiction #web serial #writing #asher #dnd #episodes #blood hunter #investigation #csi: xykesh #town under siege

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xykesh · 2 years ago

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The Girl in the Cage, Part 2

Genre: New Adult Fantasy, D&D-esque Fantasy Wordcount: 2,182 Summary: Valerie meets the “monster” the villagers have captured, but it’s not what she expects.

Even for a logging village in the middle of nowhere, the jail was tiny. Just next to a house belonging to the town’s sheriff was a squat building about the size of a shed, with iron bars mounted over its lone window. It was still raining, but Sheriff Darshan remained seated in a rocking chair in his porch, smoking pipe in hand, quiver of arrows at his side, and a longbow strung and ready to use across his lap. His mustache twitched as Valerie and her escort approached, and he set his pipe aside.

“Do you people never get fucking tired? I told you, no one touches the thing until I say so.”

“Are you the sheriff?” Valerie asked, raising her voice to be heard over the rain.

When the sheriff realized he didn’t recognize Valrie’s voice, he tipped up his own wide brimmed hat to get a better look at her, and narrowed his eyes at what he saw. “Who are you?”

“Valerie Waymire,” she introduced. “I was sent here to help with your monster problem.”

The sheriff raised a bushy eyebrow. “Sent by who?”

“My instructor,” Valerie said. “Dr. Arden Lee Siren of the University of Olwin.”

“Never heard of him.”

Valerie wondered if the man had heard of anything outside the thirty square miles surrounding this village, but kept that to herself.

“We’re not really from around here.”

The sheriff grunted like he readily agreed with her.

“She came into the pub a little bit ago, asking about the attacks,” Valerie’s escort explained. “She said she rode five days to come help.”

Valerie stood rigid straight, her hands neatly folded behind her back and her chin held high as Darshan looked her up and down. Young, but confident and collected, the girl carried herself like a professional. And he’d caught the glint of metal on her wrist before she’d folded her hands. If nothing else, the girl knew how to look the part of a monster hunter. And five days' ride alone in rough weather was nothing to scoff at either.

“What exactly do you know about monsters?” the sheriff asked.

“With all due respect, Sheriff,” Valerie said. “More than you.”

Darshan grunted again, but got up out of his chair, slinging his quiver onto his hip and his bow onto his shoulder. “Well, let’s just see about that, why don’t we?”

He fished a ring of keys out of his pocket as he led her over to the jail, unlocked the door, and ushered her inside. After a bit of fighting with a damp book of matches, he managed to get the oil lamp inside the shed burning. It was even less impressive on the inside; a single room with a barstool in one corner and a large cage that took up most of the space in the other. Inside it, huddled in a corner with a chain collar around her neck, was a girl.

She was about Valerie’s age, unhealthily lean and pallid skinned. Her dark hair was frizzed and frayed, with dried mud caked into it in several places. Her clothes were ragged, stained with a dozen different things and roughly repaired or held in place with twine in several places. Her short sleeves exposed a series of intricate tattoos snaking up her right arm, though of what, Valerie still couldn't tell.

When the lamp came on, the girl instinctively shielded herself, and then, when she saw Valerie and the sheriff, she let out an angry, snarling hiss while glaring at them with whiteless, solid red eyes. Her pointed ears flattened against her head, and a devilish tail flicked out from behind her.

She was a hellborn.

“Fucking hells!” The man from the bar jumped back, muttering a prayer under his breath. Even Valerie winced, but Darshan barely batted an eye.

Valerie was incredulous. “You can’t be serious.”

“We’ve had volunteer patrols since the attacks started. Two nights ago, one patrol caught her skulking at the edge of town,” the sheriff explained. “She attacked, and nearly tore a man’s throat out before help got there. It took five people with ropes to get her into that cell. And by morning, she’d chewed through the rope.”

“She’s not a monster,” Valerie said. “She’s hellborn.”

“Call her whatever you want. She’s not human.”

Basic scholarship disagreed with the sheriff, but Valerie got the impression he wouldn’t care.

“She’s still a person.”

“Something’s been attacking. If it is her, and just about everyone’s sure it is, locking her up is the least we should do to her.”

The girl growled again from inside the cage, and Valerie frowned. Hellborn might have profane blood in their veins, but it rarely amounted to much beyond an off-putting appearance. The girl couldn’t be the monster she’d come here for, not if the stories she’d heard were even half true. And yet, the constant, near feral sounds weren’t exactly helping her case.

“What about you?” Valerie asked.

“What?”

“You said just about everyone is sure she’s your monster. Are you?”

The sheriff’s mustache twitched again. “I’m not taking any chances. It could be her. That’s enough to hold her until I know for sure, one way or the other.”

“Is the chain necessary? You’ve already got her in a cage.”

“If you want to take it off her, you can be my guest. See if you keep all your fingers for your trouble.”

“Fine.” Valerie held out her hand. “Give me the key.”

Darshan raised an eyebrow. “What?”

“The key to the chains. Unless you want me to break them.”

The sheriff looked at her like she’d just grown a third arm. She waited expectantly. Shaking his head, he sifted through his keys and plopped one into her waiting palm. Valerie looked from it to the girl in the cage, who was still glaring like an angry housecat, bared teeth and all. All rational notions about hellborn being as human as anyone vanished in favor of what Valerie’s own eyes told her—that anything she stuck into that cage would not come back out.

What did I just get myself into?

“I need the room.”

Darshan shook his head. “What?”

“As long as you’re here, she’s going to be on edge. Just give me five minutes, you can wait right outside.”

He narrowed his eyes, but with a grunt and a shake of his head, the sheriff left, leaving Valerie alone in the jail with the girl. She hadn’t stopped glaring.

Valerie took a deep breath, and tried to start simple. “Hello.”

“Fuck off.”

Okay. At least she talks.

The girl’s accent took Valerie by surprise. Besides just being surprisingly posh sounding for someone covered in filth, it was the first Valerie had heard in months besides her teacher’s and her own that didn’t sound like it was from around here.

“I’m trying to help you.”

“I don’t need your help.”

“You could have fooled me. Unless you like that thing around your neck.”

Valerie held up the key in offering once again. The girl’s glare wavered, softened, then faded to a light scowl. Valerie took that to the closest thing she was going to get to an “okay,” and stuck her hands through the bars.

The girl tensed for a moment before offering her neck. The instant the lock was undone, she pulled away from Valerie and tore the collar off with a growl. After hurling it off into one corner of the cage, the girl retreated to the other, sitting down as far away from it as the small space would let her get.

Valerie let her calm down a moment before speaking. “So, do you have a name?”

“Why do you care?”

“I told you, I want to help. I know monsters, and you aren’t one. You shouldn’t be here. But I can’t get you out of without finding out what’s really going on. I just want to know who you are, and how you fit into this.”

The girl folded her arms and dragged her knees up to her chest, curling up to shield herself from Valerie’s gaze. As she stared at the now discarded collar, what spite was left on her face softened away, until all that remained was a forlorn frown. She let out a sigh.

“. . . list.”

“Sorry?”

“My name. It’s List.”

“What kind of— is that like your scavenger name?”

“It’s just my name, alright?” List snapped.

“Alright.” Valerie threw up her hands. “List. I’m Valerie. It’s nice to meet you.”

List rolled her eyes and scoffed, but didn’t actively tell Valerie to dig a ditch and die in it.

“Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?” Valerie asked.

“You were going to ask them anyway.”

She had her there. “They say they found you skulking around the edge of town. What were you doing out there?”

A sullen silence preceded her answer.

“I was hungry,” she said without meeting Valerie’s eyes. “I thought I could find some garbage to go through.”

Valerie tried to hide the brief spike of revulsion she felt in the pit of her stomach at the thought of eating garbage. She imagined the level of desperation it would take to look for your next meal in other peoples’ refuse, and the things that must have happened to a person, especially one as young as List, to end up that desperate. She frowned.

“Are you . . .” she looked for the gentlest way she could think to broach the subject. “Alone?”

“Yes.”

“For how long?”

“Two years.”

“How did that happen?”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“Nothing. I was just—”

“Then shut up about it,” she hissed.

Sore subject. Obviously. Valerie cleared her throat. “Sorry.”

“Whatever.”

List shifted, turning more of her back to Valerie, and the monster hunter cursed herself for overstepping. Her window was closing, and she hadn’t learned a damn thing yet.

“Did you see anything?” Valerie asked. “While you were out there?”

“Trees.”

“I meant anything like a monster,” Valerie retorted. “Or signs of one.”

List stayed silent, and Valerie mentally kicked herself. Understandable or not, List’s constant need to be difficult was annoying, and Valerie had let her annoyance leak into her tone. Which was the last thing she needed to do with someone who was already looking for an excuse to dislike her. But just when she thought it was over, List answered.

“. . . there was some kind of shed.”

Valerie’s ears perked up. “What?”

“In the woods. I was looking for somewhere to sleep, and there was a shed, just sitting in the middle of the forest. Or what was left of one,” List said. “It was broken down, covered in claw marks. I thought maybe an owlbear or something was using it as a den, so I left, and ended up here.”

“Where was this?”

“Sort of outside of town? Maybe half an hour’s walk?”

“Which way? North, south . . . ?”

“I don’t know.” List pointed vaguely off to her left. “That way. Away from this side of town.”

“That’s west.”

“Why does it matter what it’s called?”

Valerie stopped herself before she got caught up in a pointless argument. “I guess it doesn’t.”

She sighed, recentering herself. “Half an hour west in the forest outside of town. I can work with that.”

List stared Valerie down, her solid red orbs locking with Valerie’s flat gray eyes. No, they weren’t quite solid, actually. When Valerie stopped and really looked, she could see little flecks of lighter and darker red in List’s eyes. Those red orbs looked her up and down, searching for answers in her neat, prim, slightly drab ensemble.

“Why are you doing all of this? Looking for the monster? Helping me?”

Unconsciously, Valerie straightened her posture and held her chin high as she answered, mimicking the demeanour of the one who’d taught her the answer to this question. “Because it needs to be done. And no one else will do it like I can. I’m going to find the real monster terrorizing this place. And I’m going to get you out of here. I promise.”

List gave a half-hearted scoff, like she didn’t believe her. “Sure.”

It was alright if List didn’t have faith in Valerie. She was going to do her job just the same. For the time being, she left List some of her trail rations, bid the girl farewell, and forced herself not to bother arguing about the personhood of a hellborn with the sheriff again. Searching for List’s forest shed was going to be an inefficient mess in the rain in the middle night, especially with so little direction to go on, so for the time being, Valerie retreated back to the saloon, paid to have her horse properly stabled, and rented out the storage closet under the stairs to sleep in.

It was about as comfortable as it sounded, and yet Valerie fell asleep almost instantly. It had been a long night just getting to this town, and come morning, she had work to do.

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xykesh · 2 years ago

Text

The Girl in the Cage, Part 1

Genre: New Adult Fantasy, D&D-esque Fantasy Wordcount: 1,146 Summary: On a cold night, an outsider comes to the town plagued by monster attacks to lend her expertise.

A trail of mud spattered footprints and puddles of water followed Valerie as she staggered into the tavern, finally out of the rain. The warmth of the fireplace stung her cold, wet skin and made her wince. She hated riding in the rain.

Her eyes swept the tavern as she took off her hat and emptied the brim of collected rainwater. There were a number of people here—half the village, if she had to guess. A few of the patrons hadn’t bothered to look over at her when she came in, but most had. And they were staring.

She wore mostly muted colors, a gray riding coat, black tricorn hat, and dark pants, letting her pale blonde hair and dull gray eyes get lost in her outfit. The single splash of color in her appearance was the bright amber brooch and ribbon she wore at her neck, and on her wrist, glinting in the lamplight, were the folded down metal arms and springs of a wrist-mounted crossbow.

Valerie ignored them all for now, and made her way to the closest open table. After tossing her coat and hat onto a hook, she sank into a chair, let out a sigh, and crumpled face first into the table top.

Almost immediately, the whispers and mutterings began.

“Where did she come from?”

“She’s a scav—she’s got to be.”

“Didn’t know they could be that young.”

"They're always that young, you dultz."

“Is she breathing?”

If she heard them, she didn’t give any indication. She simply sat, still sopping wet, with her face buried in her arms and a puddle forming under her chair.

With trepidation in every step, a waiter approached Valerie’s slumped over form, and cleared his throat.

“You alright there, miss?”

Valerie responded with a dull groan, not bothering to raise her head. It had been a long, drenched, freezing ride through the forest to this town. Every part of her body ached. Her head felt too heavy and her limbs felt too light. Her fingers and toes were numb.

She was here for a reason. But that could wait for a few minutes. She just needed a little rest. A few minutes. Or hours.

Or days.

“Miss?”

Or seconds, apparently.

With another groan, Valerie sat up in her chair and brushed her damp hair out of her face. Between her dull eyes, pale skin, and flaxen hair, she almost looked like a ghost.

“What?” she asked. It came out a lot snappier than she meant to. She was even more tired than she thought.

“Is…is everything alright?” the server asked, his mouth suddenly dry.

Valerire gave one last groan, willing herself to exhale her exhaustion along with her breath. “Fine.”

“Do you…need something?”

“A hot drink. A towel.” She paused, trying to roll a kink in her neck. “And someone who can tell me about the monster that’s been attacking this place.”

The waiter’s eyebrows just about jumped off his forehead, and he immediately started looking around for someone to save him. When no one did, he cleared his throat again, and nodded. “Is cider fine?”

Valerie told him it was, and he quickly took his leave before she could remind him about the towel. She sighed again, as something in her gut told her she wasn’t going to be getting it, and something else in a deeper, more pessimistic part of her gut told her trying to dry off was going to be pointless anyway.

The pair of men in the next table over got brave enough to stop whispering and actually talk to her. The one closest to her, a short, portly fellow with a thick beard and hairy arms jerked his head in her direction to get her attention.

“Where are you from, girl?”

Valerie cocked her head, considering the man for a moment. “East of here.”

“Brightree?”

“Further.”

“The city then.”

“Little further than that.”

If the man knew of any other place to the east besides Brightree and the city of Lochmire, he didn’t bother guessing them. He might have correctly guessed Valerie wasn’t actually going to give him an actual name and given up.

“I’ve never met a scav before,” the man said.

“Who said I was one?”

“You’re wearing that,” he said, pointing at her wristbow. “And you’re asking about monsters.”

“I’m not a scav.”

Freelancer. Scavenger. Same kind of person, just a different name for different levels of respect. They were the itinerant trouble makers who made a career poking around in ruins and war camps and monster nests, trying to find a profit and more often than not finding their deaths.

“Then why are you asking about a monster?”

Valerie paused to allow the waiter to come back with her cider and, as expected, no towel. She wrapped her hands around the tankard, trying to get a bit of feeling in her hands. She took several, deep swallows, letting the drink send warmth radiating down through her body. She let herself get lost in the sensation for just a moment, savoring it as long as she could. But in time, it passed, and she was left just as damp and cold as she had been before.

Nothing good lasts forever.

“I’m here to kill it,” she said.

“Well, you’re a bit late then,” the man said. “We already caught it.”

Now it was Valerie’s turn to give a look of disbelief. “You caught it?”

“Well, not me. Some of the other folks around here. But I saw them bring it in. Two nights ago, kicking and screaming on the end of every rope in town.”

Valerie felt oddly undercut. Five days hard ride, on her own, through the rain, and the monster she’d come here to kill was already taken care of. She couldn’t believe it. Literally, she could not accept it. The rumors that had led her to this town talked about a monster that tore livestock in half, that ripped the doors off of homes, and that had shrugged off every attempt to kill it. Fighting something like that, let alone capturing it, took a lot more than rope. It took very specialized tools, training, and knowhow, none of which she could see anywhere in this bar.

This man was lying, or confused. He had to be. Because if he wasn’t, she was quitting her current life right now and becoming a waitress.

“What did you do with it?” she asked.

“It’s still locked up in the jail.”

“Why not just kill it?”

The man looked suddenly uncomfortable with the subject, glancing off to the side. “Well, it’s. . . it’s different than some people were expecting.”

Valerie pushed herself out of her chair, and downed the last of her cider before wiping her mouth and placing her hat back on her head. She’d been right. She wasn’t staying dry for long.

“Show me.”

#fantasy #fiction #web serial #webfic #outsiders of xykesh #asher #webfiction #dnd #writing #episodes #blood hunter #writeblr #creative writing #original fiction

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