The beast was close, he heard it with his acute senses, he felt how it stomped on the ground.
And he felt the scent.
Blood. Fresh, just spilled blood. He would find it even more energizing, if not urVa’s feelings slipping through the mind’s connection they had. urVa felt revolted and he felt that too, that cold rage, that anger.
But he was sure he would not trade his counterpart’s company for any pleasure he felt when blood was hot and his talons were stained with it.
urVa was giving him his vital essence, enfolding his body with an invisible net made of assured courage, and stoic strength, hard as stone.
He jumped on the tree faster than the urru’s eye could follow. urVa didn’t try to climb after him, even if he could do it, easily. He relied on skekMal’s eyes and skill.
The Hunter chuckled darkly.
“These gelfling were really stupid. To go on such a well-armed animal without any support.”
“That creature was bringing them harm for almost an unum, skekMal” urVa said calmly. “They are desperate. And when someone is desperate, they don’t think about danger.”
skekMal sniffed in the air.
“I feel blood, a lot of it. Intense scent.”
“I feel it too” nodded urVa.
“You possibly still want us to save the remaining gelfling?” scoffed skekMal but his green eyes glinted with amusement.
“If you will be that kind.” sternly replied the Archer.
“I am a forest beast, I am not kind” skekMal grinned wildly and jumping off the tree, he unsheathed his four blades.
urVa liked to see his counterpart that alert, that much enjoying his hunt. He himself felt the same – kind of surprising – elation, not only knowing that they can save this tribe’s lives, but also to witness how skekMal punishes the deadly creature for taking so many of them. To punish it himself, too. The Hunter sniffed through the overgrowth, indeed like a wood’s beast, a dark apparition stalking its prey.
Wasn’t he just that, though? urVa allowed skekMal to go faster, as his own bow relied on longer distance.
The remaining gelfling still tried to save themselves, but they were covered with wounds, blood trickled and gushed and flew and he could almost sense how much it moved his darker counterpart.
He would hate it if skekMal unleashed it once against the innocent ones. But it would not happen today.
Today he used his wild side to make justice.
skekMal moved like lightning, when he fell on the creature, using only two blades for now. He was testing its strength and aggression first. urVa helped the gelfling move from the battleground, they were too tired and too wounded to even care who drags them off.
They will possibly add to their legend, after it, he thought. Two mysterious creatures that fell off the forest to save their lives and disappear after it. He wasn’t against it, even if he found it really unnecessary.
skekMal work’s on the animal was calculated and precise, and at the same time wild and unpredictable. urVa noticed how something slips from under the beast’s lower arm and the Archer saw a claw, dripping with something telling. He aimed with his bow and shot an arrow, just near skekMal’s head, hitting the claw and pinning it to the animal’s chest.
skekMal didn’t turn to show that he even saw his help, but urVa knew that he understood what his counterpart just did.
urVa pulled another arrow, alert and patient. But skekMal didn’t seem to need any more help. The beast was bleeding from numerous wounds and was losing its strength fast and gradually.
urVa turned to the gelfling, one of them lost consciousness, the other looked at him with awe in his eyes. To an untrained gelfling eyes, he had to be just a silhouette in darkness. He spoke calmly, trying to sound as peaceful as he could.
“You are safe.”
“Who are you?” the gelfling rasped, trying to touch his body and see if he could feel his wounds. “Are you a shadow from the mist?”
urVa thought about it for a while and replied.
“One of them.”
He pulled a fresh and clean cloth from his satchel and started to secure the wounded arm of the gelfling. The beast behind them growled in death throes, when the Hunter finished it off. skekMal joined the agonal roar of the animal with his own, victorious one.
“And that? What was that?” the gelfling moved restlessly.
“That?” urVa smiled. He sensed the irony of the situation. skekMal just saved these lives, even if he didn’t care. He aided Thra in a way, that Thra will return, in another time. “That was the other one.”
The gelfling eyes widened and urVa felt a blood dropping on his arm. skekMal stood behind him, with a dangerous glow in his eyes. He had to look even more deadly to the gelfling, large creature, dripping with vital fluids of the animal that just almost killed them all.
“That was thrilling” he rasped, his neck and hands glistening with sweat and blood.
“You did something good today.”
“YES.”
“Not everything is good just because you like it, skekMal.”
The Hunter laughed gutturally and they both exchanged grins. And urVa felt how skekMal feels the battle, the blood and danger. How it stirs his dark soul.
And he had to admit that he prefers to see him that way, as long as he stays skekMal, honest to rawness and sharp as a blade.
Do not change, skekMal, he thought and sat on the ground, the gelfling already drifting off into a restless sleep, caused by loss of blood.
“So we eat meat tonight, again, eh?”