Mark of the Beast

[Ordo]

Mark of The Beast​

The Beast fled through the mountains and the hunter followed. Sunlight filtered through the forest canopy and illuminated the dust and pollen that hung in the crisp morning air. Fog rolled in patches along the rocky outcroppings higher up the mountainside as the hunter walked across the pineneedle padded forest floor. The smells of rich black loam mixed with the heady pine and subtle scent of giant ferns as he moved like a mountain cat along the creature's trail.

Split branches and disturbed pine needles made the trail so clear a child could follow it. The beast was moving at a run, more concerned with escape and gaining distance than it was with stealth. It would run and circle and try to hunt the hunter. That was the way with predators, and it was exactly what Faeroth needed the beast to do. It had slain ten, rent them with tooth and claw until even relatives could barely recognize them. It had also evaded multiple attempts to be captured. The people were afraid, defeated, and desperate. Only when they could find no other alternative did they turn to the old way, the ones who dedicated their existence to this work, the Dunaan.

He quickened his pace, the trail so clear he could have followed it with his eyes closed, the creature hadn't turned yet. That was unexpected. Had he misjudged the beast’s traits? The teeth marks on its victims were clearly from a large carnivore, the tracks were of a clawed quadruped with heavy forefeet and long stride. All signs of an apex predator.

He slowed to a stop and bent low to smell the tracks. He pressed his fingers to the ground and touched it to the tip of his tongue. No excess salinity of any kind. It wasn't even breaking a sweat. He spit the grainy black dirt from the tip of his tongue and stood as he peered down the torn trail that seemed to go on for miles. It was already hunting him. It was leading the chase deliberately in an almost perfectly straight line from the town and into the wilds but for what, he couldn't say. He had a feeling it wasn't a result of fear. The creature wanted to be followed.

He stood, his eyes scanning the ground as his mind went over the details of the hunt. The beast had killed another only days before but had been interupted when Faeroth had arrived while it stalked another. The result was where he stood. A chase through the wilds that had lasted these past few hours.

Something was very wrong.

 

[Ordo]

The muscles in his jaw worked as he clinched his teeth together. Those yellow cat like eyes looked back along the trail and then scanned the trees on both sides. Callus adorned hand slipped into his shirt and removed a small vial of pungent alchemist potion. The stopper slipped between his teeth and he bit the soft cork from the vial and spit it to the ground before he drank the green-black potion down. He could feel the potion immediately meld to his alter physiology and pain spread through him like spilled milk on a counter top.

He groaned against the searing sensation and began to run back along the trail. Mud sucked at his boots where the tree needles and leaves had left the rich black soil exposed. His legs pumped beyond the natural and the forest moved passed in a blur as his feet devoured the distance. He had to skip stalking for this prey and try to snare it instead.