The shadow was not dramatic. It did not summon dazzling spectacles or smash the world under its feet. It simply raised its hand.
And the forest bent to its will. Pressure slammed into Pluto from all sides as if he had been thrown into a pressure cooker. The immense force drove him to his knees.
Even the ground beneath him cracked as gravity grew tens of times heavier. The air buzzed with tension and the mist struggled to flow. He tried to inhale, but his lungs refused to spread. His blood locked. He armed flattened uselessly. Even the eel wriggled painfully beneath his sleeve. It coiled round him like a strap bag, as if trying to shield his organs from collapse.
The shadow took another step, crossing the border between moonlight and darkness. Its figure did not sharpen under the twinkling light. Instead it remained as it was, as if it resisted reality will to grant it full shape.
The pressure tripled. It pushed inwards on the edges of Pluto's consciousness, tunneling his vision. Slowly, the weight narrowed, to a single point –
His left shoulder.
His blood seared, boiling and condensing all at once. His heat signature flared, pulsing out of his body and sphering around him. It felt like his skin was being pressed between two industrial pistons, branding him with something that transcended ink.
His fingers twitched. He could not stand, he could not fight. His mind was locked out, unable to exert control over any part of the body. He heard his bones creek and then the shadow dropped its hand.
The pressure seized. But its ruthlessness still lingered.
Then the darkness took him.
***
He woke in motion. The world was tilted slightly and looked like a smudged sketch rather than something stable.
His stomach flipped as his body bounced against a moving shoulder. He forced his eyes open.
Blurs. Things streaking past. Low rumbles behind him. And then–
Saul.
Pluto was slung across his back as he ran at full speed. His breath was hard, but forced to steady.
Behind them heat signatures followed. They were familiarly hound shaped. Not one, a pack of them. And they were chasing.
"Put me down," Pluto said hoarsely.
" You were unconscious," Saul replied flatly. Another roar bounced through the canopy, closer than the rest.
Saul huffed, veering right the moment a predator burst from below. It narrowly missed them, Pluto could even smell its horrid breath as it grazed by.
The creature had lice mapping out the edges of its skin, with unusual swellings and depressions on its skin. Saul shifted his weight fluidly, drawing his blade along the neck of the beast.
He did not stop to confirm the kill, but the weak thud that sounded below shortly after was enough consolation.
Pluto winced when his numb body finally gave room to feelings. His shoulder was still burning with great intensity, releasing wisps of smoke in brief intervals.
Through the rip in his cloth, black swirled around. It was a parasite that didn't suck blood. Slow, bubbling. Currents threaded through pale flesh, corrupting the veins that laid near it.
The pulsing heat was eerily synced with the roars of the predators. He realised immediately.
"They're following me."
"Yes, your shoulder precisely," he replied flatly. He had already figured out that much. He shifted his grip and finally allowed Pluto to drop to his feet. There was no warning.
Inertia pulled him forward, stumbling him towards the thinner branches that would most certainly break if his weight rested on them even for a spilt second. Pluto shuddered as he regained balance, he had never been this high without railings edging them in. To be fair he had never done any of this:
Fleeing from devilish creatures along with a person who had threatened to kill him, two and a half storeys into the air with no ambulance coming if he fell.
Two more predator broke through branches, lunging at them fanatically. Pluto felt their heat more clearly. Their heat signatures had always been a different from that of humans, but now it seemed aligned with his.
The eel tightened along his forearm, warning him a second earlier. A third predator hopped in from the side, snapping at his head.
Saul did not waste a second detesting its cruel physique. He stepped into the choke point of their charge and flashed his blade like someone waving a banner, only with much more skill.
One fell, then another. But the third slipped through. There was only so much he could do. As it blitzed at Pluto, he instinctively grabbed a branch, swinging below the table of branches they ran untop of. The beast missed, jawing bark instead of flesh.
Saul finished it off just as Pluto pulled himself back up. By the time they had landed back on half solid ground, three bodies lay at their feet.
Saul sheathed his blade. "You attract them," he said. "I kill."
More roars tore through the mist. The predators were still trailing.
Pluto nodded a bit. His face was torn between scowl and grimace. "You promised to kill me."
Saul glanced at him once. His eyes said one word: foolish.
"I did."
Pluto gritted his teeth, fearing his own question. "Why haven't you?"
Saul turned and advanced a step towards him. "Because currently, your value isn't flat lined at battle seed. You are... useful."
The words just dropped when Saul turned again, decapitating a predator with a fluid arc of his blade. Pluto had barely seen him draw it.
He continued. "Useful, until it ceases to benefit me." He tone wasn't malicious, it was professional. He wasn't playing morals, he was playing chess.
Pluto shivered subconsciously, but he tried to articulate his voice as well as possible. "Understood."
Another wave approached. Six this time. Saul engaged before they even saw him. Pluto could almost swear that he had teleported to strike them, and maybe he did.
Pluto followed behind, watching Saul rather than the abominable creatures that longed for his head. Saul was fast, barely pausing and always killing. His momentum never stopped until the battle was over, and that was his blind spot.
He did not harvest when the first two fell, he did not even glance at the cores glowing dimly. He continued. And in that moment, Pluto crouched quickly and reached in-between the ribcage of one and took the core out.
He stood and pocketed it before Saul was done slaughtering. If Saul caught him, it could be disastrous. But yet again, his worth was larger than what he had stolen. And if he was bait–
He would not remain poor.
***
Elsewhere, beneath a cluster of thick and tall trees, a single entrant knelt before a fallen beast. The predator had not been large, but it had been determined.
The scuffle had taken over an hour to resolve itself, and the winner was almost collapsing from exhaustion. His crude spear remained thrust into it, waning slightly as the beast's skin contraction weakened.
He laughed noiselessly as he felt around for the core of the beast. He found it quickly, then held it up. It was warm, it was pulsing. And it was the only proof of his victory. That, and the thousand wounds that littered his body.
He exhaled with relief as he closed his hands around it. He had successfully survived half a month like this. Getting just what he needed and retreating into his hideout.
Then a tremor passed his knees. Too loud to be the forest rearranging, to close to be someone else's problem.
He turned in time to see the predator's face.
It knocked him flat as he reached for his spear. He was too slow. The beast clamped down and his scream travelled with the wind.
The forest nodded in satisfaction, accepting the exchange.
BLOOD FOR BLOOD.
The predator didn't revel in its victory like its meal had done. It knew that their was always danger lurking. It licked his skin, tasting blood and then dragged him into the depression nearby. It returned for the other beast too.
No triumph. Just continuation.
***
Mira woke with the dawn. There was no crowing cock or chirping birds, so the illusion she had of being in her bed was quickly shattered. Cold winds never hit her this hard.
She sensed absence immediately. Pluto was gone.
All his morning routine should have already been completed, so he would have been sitting on a log nearby. He wasn't.
She stood at once and scanned the perimeter with increasing anxiety. No blood, no sign of conflict, just a peaceful trail that led somewhere. Her jaw tightened. Pluto had proved her right. She hoped not.
She began to follow the trails, and they led deeper. By routes they had already taken to get there. Past fresh battle sites. It reeked of blood. Human blood. Someone had died.
Her pulsed jerked. She hoped it wasn't Pluto. The scene was messy, exactly as he would fight if threatened. But it lacked a key detail that would prove it beyond doubt.
'Maybe Saul found him,'
"But what was he doing alone?" She muttered to herself as she followed the increasing blurring tracks.
She searched for nearly an hour. Searched while the forest quaked around her. Thumping steps drummed through the mist, signalling that the forest was not peaceful in the distance.
That wasn't her problem at that moment. It could be later. Fear seived into frustration. She had looked for signs of Pluto everywhere, everywhere except one place. One she distrusted.
But necessity narrowed choices.
***
The owl was undeniably larger. Subtly, but unmistakably. Its wings covered a little more than it did earlier. Its feathers seemed darker, or maybe it was just the dim lighting. But its eyes, those were definitely brighter.
"What brings you here, young fledgling"
Mira would have shuddered, but she wasn't in the mood. She stepped forward. "I need his location."
"Exchange sustains balance."
She didn't argue, she just dropped at battle seed at the base of the tree. The owl looked down and shook its head.
"Insufficient."
Her gaze flickered with desperation. She searched her clothes and dropped the second seed beside the first. It would have to accompany her, so it would charge for workmanship.
The owl studied her. Then lifted off the branch. It didn't take the seeds, not yet. As far as she knew, it was safe there.
It glided quite lazily, not radiating the same apprehension that Mira did. She followed behind obviously.
They crossed terrain quickly. As they moved on, paths seemed to become less congested, trees seemed to curtain things less effectively. Something was starting to become wrong. It hadn't fully manifested, but it whispered.
The owl finally circled downwards, perching above a clearing. Mira stopped before she reached it.
It didn't say anything, so she still approached, carefully. Below, three figures moved carefully through uneven ground.
Ronan.
Khalifa.
And a new member.
They had simply replaced the old. Mira couldn't blame them, they had only come together on the basis of survival, no real connections.
They were all fatigued. Khalifa at times even had to find balance on Ronan's shoulder, gripping it anytime she felt the ground calling her.
They were still hunting, reluctantly though. Forced by need and hunger. They did not know she was perching above them, along with the custodian of the forest's knowledge.
Her breathing slowed. Two things hung on her mind. Firstly, was how persistent the idea of murder was. Had she learnt to shut off her conscience this much?
The second one was something more practical. If she struck first, she could eliminate one before the others adjusted.
She shaped the log a bit more. Her breathing slowed.
The owl flapped silently above her, knowing her intentions but silent about it opinions. It just observed.
Opportunity stood below her. Three in number. Ignorant of her presence. Fatigued terribly.
She shifted her placing, preparing to take a life. But was that a good idea?