Hunter's Beginning (Veller) (38 page)

She climbed out of bed and threw open the window, the cold night air brushed past her as she looked out
onto the compound. It only heightened the fact that she didn’t have enough time. She had to go, she just didn’t know where.

Grabbing her woolen
cloak she paused, only for a moment, to close the orb of fire back in its little metal box before rushing out into the hall. The dorms were all but deserted as most of the cadets were now sleeping in the dinning hall, although there were a few like her that decided to brave the cold, the number was dwindling fast. She moved as quickly and as quietly as she could past the rows of closed cell doors and out into the cold of the night.

Once outside, everything
seemed to slow down, except the urgency that had gripped her. Only when her eyes focused on the darkened silhouette of stables did she have a direction. She still didn’t know why, but at least she knew where as she ran as fast as the snow would allow her, across the field and up the hill. She could only hope that nobody was out and about at this time of night, the last things she needed was to run into one of the instructors. They may be lax on how late they allowed cadets to stay up in their own cells, but they wouldn’t tolerate them running around the compound at night, that was in direct violation of the rules unless you had a very good excuse. What excuse did she have, that she had to get to the stables before… before what?

She found the
stable doors were bared as she tried to open them. She thought about pounding on the doors, but what good would it actually do other then attract unwanted attention and worse, unwanted questions. Kile looked to see if there was an easier way in, but she knew she couldn’t waste time trying every door, every window and every hatch the over grown barn had. She pulled at the door handles again; sometimes there was an advantage to being small as she managed to squeezed thought the narrow opening.

Once inside the stables, the feeling stopped, the urgency wasn’t there anymore.
Was she too late?

The only sound she could hear was the soft breathing of the horses as they slept and a whisper of the wind through the upper hay loft, there was nothing else, no motion, no other sounds, nothing that should have attracted her here.
She stumbled forward in the darkness, the only light was that of the moon as it filtered in through the cracks around the door, the rest of the stables were cloaked in shadow, a gentle hazy gloom that made it difficult to see. She should have brought a lantern or a candle at the very least, but she had come with nothing. The urgency that had driven her here was now gone. Why was she here she wondered. She could think of no reason, and the thought of going back to the warmth of her cell was more enticing by the moment, but she couldn’t just ignore the fact that something brought her here. She waited until her eyes adjusted to the dark before venturing deeper into the stables, and that was when she saw it. Small, black and gray it moved from underneath one of the gates. It turned to her and the eyes caught a bit of the moonlight as they floated in the darkness and she knew what it was.

“It’s a cat.” She said to herself as she slowly moved toward
s it.

The cat shifted its position, crouching down as it prepared to run, and gave a defiant yet muffled growl, and that was when Kile realized it had something it’s
its mouth, something small and white. Her heart sank as the site and fear gripped her again. She ran at the cat, leaping to grab it as it darted away and she came up with a handful of straw.

“Don’t run, come back here.” She pleaded
, but it was no use, the cat was going for the upper loft and she had to cut it off. She ran to the ladder and had only managed to reach the second rung when something caught her cloak and pulled her back, she hit the ground hard and lost sight of her quarry.

“What are you doing in here? Cadets are not allowed in the stables after dark.”

Kile looked up to see the thin willowy frame of a man draped in an ill fitted long coat still holding onto her cloak. The lantern came up and she stared into the ageless face of the man she had only remembered as Luke.

“I ask you a question cadet
. What are you doing in here?”

“Please, I have to go, I have to catch that cat.”

“Cat? Why do you want the cat?”

“Please I just have to catch it.” She cried as she pulled
at her cloak, but for a small framed thin man, he had a grip that was as strong as iron.

“I guess we’ll see what Sir Oblum has to say about that.”

That would just delay the inevitable Kile thought as she loosened the ties of her cloak and slipped out from under it. Luke stumbled backward without any resistance on the other end of the cloth he was pulling and Kile used the difference to gain a head start as she quickly climbed up the ladder to the hay loft.

“Come back here!”
He yelled after her.

That was not likely to happen Kile thought as she made her way across the loft to where she had last seen the cat. It didn’t take her long to flush it out as it darted from its hiding place, its prey still in its mouth. It moved toward the thick oak beams that spanned the distance over the open floor below. Kile didn’t hesitate to follow.

“What are you doing you fool.” Luke called out from below. “You’re going to get yourself killed.”

She
wasn’t paying any attention to what Luke was yelling as she followed the cat to a center platform where she made a near successful lunge, grabbing the cat’s tail. It swung around and dug both claws into her, ripping her hand and forcing her to let go. It jumped from the platform to a shelf on the center wall, then to the top of the stall, onto a table and then finally onto the stable floors where it looked back at Kile as if daring her to follow which is exactly what she did.

Her leap to the shelf didn’t go as planned as it gave way beneath her, she grabbed hold of the wall to keep from falling and landing hard on the table instead, and from there she rolled to the floor. Kile scrambled back to her feet but Luke was on her again as he grabbed her from behind.

“You’re going to hurt yourself.” He said as he wrapped his arms around her.

“I have to stop that cat.” She yelled as she struggled, but Luke was far too strong for her. She tried kicking him in the shin with
the heel of her foot, but it was like kicking a rock and she did more damage to herself than to him.

“What is the matter with
you child, calm down.”

“Please, let me go.”

The cat gave one last mocking look at Kile, and if she didn’t know better, she would have sworn it was actually laughing at her. It made a final run for the gap in the door, if it got away now, there would be no way she could catch it.

“Stop.” She screamed at the cat, and much to her surprised, it did. It didn’t exactly stop like a cat should have stopped, with the grace that cats are known for, it kind of fell on its face, and Kile was gripped with this strange feeling that something wasn’t right.

“Get over here.” She demanded with as much determination and malice in her voice as one could muster while being held by a wiry stable hand with strong arms.

The cat turned and kind of stumbled forward, there was a look of
confusion in its eyes, as if the last thing it wanted to do was to approach the girl, but that was the only thing it could do. It wobbled back and forth like a drunkard until it came to stop at Kile’s feet.

“Drop it.”

The Cat opened its mouth, and the ragged form of Vesper fell onto the ground. Upon seeing the yarrow Kile lost all interest in the cat and it bolted for the door.

-
This isn’t over.-

Were the parting words she heard in her mind, as the cat disappeared into the shadows.

Luke must have known the situation had changed as he released Kile, who just fell to her knees. She couldn’t bring herself to touch Vesper’s body, she just knelt there, staring at it, hoping that he would just jump up and greet her, but it didn’t happen.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t know.” Luke said as he knelt down beside her. His long slender fingers slid under the yarrow and he cupped it in his hands.

“He’s hurt pretty badly.” He said as he held him.

At first Kile didn’t understand the
significance of what he said, but then it hit her. If he was hurt badly, then he was still alive.

“Wait right here… please.” She pleaded as she jumped to her feet.

“But child, there’s nothing you can do for him.”

“Not me, no. But I think I know someone who can. Please, just stay with him.”

She didn’t wait for Luke to answer, she just ran to the front of the stables, slipping through the crack in the door that the cat had just passed through and back out into the snow. She was half way to the dorms when she realized that he wouldn’t be there. She turned quickly, slipping in the snow as she ran to the dinning hall.

It was the last place she wanted
to go, but she had to for Vesper’s sake. She entered through the side door as silently as she could. It looked completely different in the darkness. The tables had been moved up against the walls and stacked one on top of the other, to make more room in the center of the floor for the rows and rows of sleeping cadets, along with the coal burning stoves. It was like the aftermath of some grizzly battle, the bodies laid out for the next of kin to claim, the only thing missing were the candles, which was unfortunate, because she could have used a the extra light. She moved down the lines slowly, trying to look at each face without making any noise, It wouldn’t do to wake the entire room.

“Psst… psst.”

Kile turned to see one of the figures waving her over. As she got closer she noticed Alex sitting up, a blanket wrapped around him.

“Couldn’t stand the cold any longer?” He said in the quietest voice she had ever heard Alex speak in.

“I’m trying to find Daniel, do you know where he is?”

Alex reached over one body and began to prod another but managed to wake both of them.

“Knock it off.” Carter grumbled as he turned over in his blanket.

“Hey, some of us are trying to get some sleep.” Somebody yelled a few bodies
down the line.

“What’s going on in here?” A voice bellowed from the other room as the sound of heavy footsteps echoed through the hall.

Great, from bad to worse, he was the last person Kile wanted to see, or the last person she wanted seeing her. She rolled over Carter grabbing his blanket and wrapping herself up in it as she covered her head. Carter was now fully awake as he looked around rather confused.

“You got a problem cadet?” Master Boraro asked in a not too
quiet voice as he stopped in front of Carter, his hands on his hips, staring down at the young man.

“No sir.” Alex quickly replied before Carter could. “It came from somewhere over there
I think.” He said, pointing toward the far wall.

Boraro wasn’t that easy to convince, or he just didn’t trust anybody, but he did glance over at the far wall that Alex had pointed to before
turning back to Carter, who was still a bit confused about what was going on.

“I asked you a question cadet? Who’s making all the noise here?”

“Nobody sir.” Carter replied.

“Nobody.” Boraro repeated. He was not a man that enjoyed being woken in the dead of night for any reason, but he did enjoy chewing out cadets. One could only wonder if the two canceled each other out.

“Who’s this then? Is this Nobody?” Boraro asked as he prodded the covered form of Kile with his iron shod boot.

“
That’s Cadet Leary sir.” Carter quickly responded.

“What about me?” A
bleary eyed Daniel asked as he looked up from where he was sleeping on the other side of Kile.

“Nothing Bobby, go back to sleep.” Alex said, motioning for Daniel to put his head down before Master Boraro could identify him.

“What’s going on here, who under there?” Boraro asked again, this time he reached for the blanket.

“It’s Eric.” Alex added quickly, and both Carter and Daniel looked at him as if he had gone mad. “He’s really
quite tired and doesn’t want to be disturbed sir.”

“I don’t care how tired he is, if I ask a question I expect it answered.”

Master Boraro yanked the blanket off of Kile and looked down at a greasy haired boy who was staring rather blankly back up at him.

“You got a problem Cadet? Too good to answer a simple question?”

Eric just shook his head.

“What’s your name cadet?”

Eric just shrugged his shoulders.

“You don’t know your name, when I ask you your name cadet I expect an answer. What’s your name cadet?”

“Eric Rimes sir.” Eric answered with a rather raspy but feminine voice.

Boraro stood there for a while staring at the vacant eyes of Eric. He knew something was up, he just didn’t know what it was, and without knowing what it was, he couldn’t do anything about it. It wasn’t as if he could punish the son of Lord Rimes for being noisy.

“Keep it down and go to sleep, the next time I have to come back here, it won’t be a warning, I’ll have you all on snow duty until the spring thaw.” The weapon’s master said as he dropped the blanket and walked off.