Through the Flames (4 page)

As suddenly as the figure and the sword appeared, they were gone without a single trace.

It was also at that moment that the pain that had surged through Caleb was completely gone and not simply lessened.

I don’t feel so good…
Caleb thought as he slowly rose to his feet.
What in the world is going on?

Shaking his head, he once again began to make his way to his camp. The entire time, he could not help but try to figure out what the spectral images that he saw were. It seemed that he would not receive an answer anytime soon, much to his dismay.

* * * * *

A short time later, Caleb entered the small clearing that he had set up camp in, which really just consisted of pitching his small canvas tent and setting up the campfire.

It was at that moment that he cursed how he was taught to set up the fire. After all, Hector had told him never to actually start a fire and then leave camp without anyone to look after it.

One of the most fundamental rules of being a hunter, Caleb had been taught, was that fire had a tendency to scare off predators.

The lack of a fire explained the black bear that was standing next to the shredded canvas tent.

All the information that Caleb had been taught about black bears came to mind as soon as he saw the animal.

Hector had not taught him that much about black bears since he still had two years of his apprenticeship left, but he had made two things quite clear about them. The first was that they were generally the smallest type of bear, normally only three to four feet tall when on all four legs. The second was that they had the best tasting meat of any bear.

With that information in mind, Caleb glanced down at his right hand, which would have immediately gone for an arrow in normal circumstances.

This isn’t good,
Caleb thought with his eyes focused on the dead rabbit that was still in his grip. He then looked up towards the bear. It was staring right at him.
This definitely isn’t good.

The nose of the narrow jawed predator twitched as it took in the smell of the rabbit and Caleb. Both were sources of meat, one larger than the other. Through the thick, jet black fur of the bear, its muscles tensed, prepared to take down its prey.

Caleb’s heart beat so hard that it felt as if it would burst from his chest as he noticed the visible tensing of the animal’s muscles.

Despite how calm he acted, he truly did not feet calm at all. Inside, he was panicking, unsure of how he should react. There were several different courses of action he could take, and only one of them was dismissed out of hand.

As much as he would have loved to turn around and take off running, he knew better. Despite his youth, he was not that foolish. He knew that a black bear was much faster than any human, and the odds of it giving up chase for the dead rabbit were non-existent.

The bear knew that it could catch him if he ran, so it would clearly go after the bigger source of meat, even if it meant giving up the smaller one.

Taking a deep breath, Caleb swung the rabbit in a large circle, building up momentum. As his hand began to cross his leg with the completion of the circle, he threw the dead animal underhanded.

Throwing objects had never been his forte. When he wanted to hit a target, he generally missed. The opposite seemed to be true as well, as he was learning first hand.

Instead of having the rabbit land directly in front of the bear in the hopes that it would make the large animal hesitate, it smacked the bear directly in the face.

All earlier thoughts of the spectral images that had stayed in the back of his mind vanished as the three hundred pound animal began to run towards him.

The instant that the bear had begun to make its move, Caleb’s first arrow had cleared his quiver. Twenty yards stood between them by the time his arrow was nocked. The distance was closed to ten yards by the time the turkey feather fletching of the arrow touched his cheek. The distance was a mere five yards when Caleb released his grip on the bowstring, sending it flying forward.

With incredible force, the bow shot the arrow forward. The distinctive sound of the arms of the bow taking the impact of the forty pound pull of the string could be heard for only a few moments, but it was followed by the sound made only by the cracking of bone as the arrow’s metal broad head slammed into the skull of the bear.

Despite the arrow that had buried a good eight inches of its length into the animal’s skull, the bear was still subject to the laws of nature. Simple killing something did not stop it, especially when it was running that fast.

Fortunately, Caleb was prepared.

But unfortunately, he had taken too long to make his shot to come out of it completely unscathed.

With a quick jump to his right, Caleb had managed to get out of the way, but his left arm and his bow were still in the bear’s path. It was only with great regret that Caleb let go of his bow and brought his left arm towards his body as fast as he could.

Slamming into the rough ground without any physical injuries except for the bruises that would form the next day from landing on a few rocks, Caleb looked to the bear. It was lying on the ground, not moving in any form. He could see that its breathing had already stopped, but that was not his major concern.

With a grimace, Caleb saw half of his longbow in front of the bear. The bowstring went from that half of the bow to somewhere underneath the predator.

Well… the hunt’s a success, I suppose,
Caleb thought with a heavy sigh.
Now I just have to figure out how I’m going to explain that the very valuable longbow that my master gave me has been snapped in half. There’s no way it can be fixed either.

Though his surface thoughts were on how he would explain everything, he actually had a different main concern at the moment.

The longbow held great sentimental value to him. It was the only thing that his master had ever given him, and Hector had been more than just a teacher. He had been a mentor and a friend.

Closing his eyes, Caleb’s mind went to the one possibility that he had been trying not to think of for the past several months.

What if he never comes back?

At that moment, he realized that the thought could be taken two ways. He had gone through the experience of losing two good friends for an indefinite period of time, and both experiences had occurred within the last four months.

“This isn’t the time for moping around,” Caleb said aloud. He shook his head fiercely. “What would Dad say to this? He’d probably be easier on me than Hector would.” He let out a small laugh at that last part. “I guess I just have to look on the bright side. I survived an encounter with a bear, and I actually get to eat good tonight. Now, I guess I have some work that needs doing.”

With that, he slowly rose to his feet and walked back to the shredded tent where he had originally planned on sleeping that night. A single glance told him that it could not be salvaged, but that was not his concern at that moment. Sleeping on the ground was the same, tent or no tent.

It did not take him long to find the hunting knife that his father had given him two years earlier for his birthday. It had a finely made blade that was as reflective as a mirror and a handle made from the antler of a deer. A long piece of thin black leather had been wound around the handle to give him a good grip, no matter what.

Slipping the knife into the black leather sheath that he normally kept it in and attaching it to his belt, Caleb began to prepare for what he had to do.

Between starting a fire, extracting the meat from the bear’s carcass, and cooking the aforementioned meat, Caleb knew that his night would be busy.

* * * * *

As the sun lit up the horizon of the next morning, Caleb began his trek through the forest from where his camp had been set up to one of the nearby trails.

As a result of the loss of his bow, the only thing that he was carrying in his hands was a canvas sack that was slung over his left shoulder. Within it, he carried the little bear meat that he had managed to obtain, outside of what he ate the night before.

It seemed that being uneducated about the proper methods of field dressing black bears had made his actions the night before largely ineffective, but he had to admit that his father had made an excellent point the day before he left after all. It would be a good experience.

A gap in the woods up ahead caught Caleb’s attention immediately. Peering through the brown and orange leaves of the trees that surrounded the gap, he recognized the trail up ahead.

As he reached the edge of the woods where the gap was, one thing stood out that had him frowning.

That trail connected Kirakath to the road that went from Caldreth to Vendae. Though the road that the trail was connected to was frequented quite often, the trail itself was not.

“There must be a hundred of them,” Caleb muttered as he saw the impressions of more footsteps than he could readily count. Looking in the direction that they appeared to be going towards, Caleb’s throat became dry.

There was no good explanation as to why so many footsteps would be leading towards Kirakath.

With fear in his eyes, he began to run to his home village as fast as he could.

By the time that Caleb reached the end of the trail that led to Kirakath, he was breathing so heavily that he felt as though he was going to pass out, but all thoughts of his physical condition faded the instant that he reached the edge of the clearing that Kirakath was built within.

The collection of wooden houses that made up Kirakath was gone.

In places of the houses, piles of wood had been left. It was as though someone went to each house and hacked them with axes until they had taken too much damage to remain standing.

Despite the love that Caleb held for the village itself, such were not the thoughts that dominated his mind at that moment. If the village was destroyed in such a way, then there was only one thing that really mattered: the villagers.

Caleb was frozen in that spot, trying to make himself go and investigate the remains of the village. Fear plagued him though. He knew his father, and he knew Andrew Silver. Neither man would have retreated. They would have stood their ground and fought any force that tried to cause them harm.

Sophie Sullivan’s image came to his mind suddenly, snapping him out of his daze. With worry for his mother and resolve in his eyes, he released the canvas sack that had still been slung over his left shoulder and began to run towards his house, or where it should have been.

It did not take too many steps towards the village for fear and inner doubts to plague him again, but they made him continue running.

He had seen already seen several bodies.

Who could have done this?
he thought as he began to run faster, trying to ignore the bodies that he occasionally saw on the ground on his way there. It was a futile attempt though. When he was nearly halfway to where his house had been, he had already seen move of the villagers.

His frame of mind froze completely when he reached the halfway point between the edge of the clearing and his house.

Michael Sullivan and Andrew Silver were lying in a fairly large pile of blood. A sword had been stabbed through Andrew’s chest and was keeping him pinned to the ground.

His father had no less than seven arrows stuck into his torso, along with a long cut across his abdomen.

“Caleb… you made it.”

Caleb’s eyes widened when he looked at his father. He had a small smile on his face, and his eyes were focused on his son.

“Dad… you’re alive?” Caleb asked, unsure of what to fear more. On one side, he considered the possibility that he was imagining things. On the other, he considered the possibility that his father was actually alive, but suffering.

“Dead men don’t talk, so I am… for now,” Michael said wincing. “The blood of Kirakath is the only thing that’s kept me alive so far.” He smiled fondly at his son at that moment. “I can see why now. It was fate that you would be out of the village when we were attacked. You have a grand destiny before you. Why else would you still be alive?”