The Lost Bloodline 1 - Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Sienna was an able guide and led the way deeper into the village for Koda without hesitation.

They clashed twice more with the gnarled creatures, and Koda gave as good as he got with the clawed gauntlet. He could feel something guiding him as he fought, a sensation of someone watching over his shoulder and helping slide him into the right position, directing him so that his strikes would find their mark.

He blocked with the bone-reinforced forearm of the gauntlet. The knapped stones and thick femurs armoring it handily deflected the gnarled blades of his enemies without showing even a crack or a nick. The slapping motion needed to make the most of the claws on the gauntlet slowly became natural as he fought and killed.

They took down another half-dozen of the monsters and saved three more people on their way into the center of the village.

Emerging into the village square, he and the redheaded spearwoman hit another group of monsters from behind like a pair of rampaging bulls.

The shrieking monsters were driven onto the spears and arrows of the other warriors who guarded the huddled forms of the villagers, grinding against them until none remained alive.

In the echoing silence that followed Sienna hacking the head off the last of the attackers, Koda stared around him in grim horror.

Dead lay piled everywhere. But for every dead villager or warrior, four of the crooked monsters lay still. The only sound he could hear beside the thunder of his own heartbeat was the sobbing and moaning of the wounded.

Then again, that wasn’t entirely true. Distantly, he could hear faint cries and cackling laughter that drifted away on the wind that he guessed came from fighting in other parts of the village.

“Get a count on how many are here. We need to find out if the Crooked took anyone, and how many that is,” Sienna snapped to one of the bloodied village guardians, a rail-thin man with dark-gray ears and a bushy tail of the same color. “Tend to the wounded. Any injury needs to be seen to so that their hurts do not fester. The last thing I trust a Crooked to do is fight cleanly.” Several more nods followed her orders from the other fighters.

Koda grimaced at the mention of cleanliness and looked down at himself. Blood spattered his jeans and shirt, and there were a few rips in the cloth now where the chipped fingernails of the enemies he’d taken down had caught and tore them.

Enemies I killed. The thought wandered through Koda’s mind, and he felt his skin crawl at the wet sensation of blood on him before he shook it off. 

No, they threatened Thera’s people. They threatened those who she promised were my people, too. Clinging to that thought, Koda could push the bile back down his throat and fight off the urge to vomit.

“And you! Explain yourself. Who are you, and where the hell did you come from? I’d accuse you of being one of the Crooked, but your body does not show the twisted growth that they do.”

The sharp demand for information from Sienna brought Koda’s head up, and he stared at her in surprise. The suspicion in her tone hurt, even after they had fought side by side for the last few minutes. He guessed that ‘Crooked’ was the name of the monsters, given how Sienna had used it so far, and he was glad that she at least knew he wasn’t one of them.

Thera’s words before echoed in his mind.

They may not understand at first, but they will come to love you for the sacrifice you make.

Shoving his irritation away, Koda met the woman’s eyes with a straight spine. The pair of canine ears on top of her head flicked once as she watched him suspiciously, but Koda refused to be distracted.

“I’m the one who came here to help you. My name is Koda, and I was sen—” The sensation of a hand on his throat, not clenching or crushing but resting there, interrupted what he was about to say.

Does Thera not want me stating it out loud? he thought silently, looking down at his armored right hand.

No answer was forthcoming from the ghostly sensations that emanated from his gauntlet, or those pressed against his neck, but he felt that it was the right message.

Looking back up, Koda found Sienna watching him while other beastfolk from several different animal types moved back and forth to help the injured. The sharp wariness was still in her blue-green eyes, but she wasn’t menacing him with the spear again at least, so he’d take that as a good sign.

“I heard the fighting and came to help. You did need the help, didn’t you?” Koda said, changing his story with a shrug, not trying to expand on it this time while gesturing to the injured around them.

“Fine. Thank you for your assistance. I apologize if I come off as harsh, but monsters have raided my home and slaughtered or captured my friends. You can understand my lack of trust at the moment,” Sienna replied a moment later, the iron leaving her voice though she continued to stare at him curiously. Her slender features twisted into an expression of suppressed anger as she talked about the people harmed by the attack, but Koda could tell she did not direct it at him.

“What is the plan, then?” Koda’s question brought the wolf woman up short, and she glanced at him in confusion.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, what is the next step?” Koda gestured to their surroundings, including the damaged buildings, injured villagers, dead monsters, and the upright hunters. “You gave orders to tend to the wounded and count folks. But clearly you all still need help. What is the next thing you need help with?”

Sienna opened her mouth to speak, but an older, male hunter with the brighter red and black fur pattern of a fox interrupted her.

“Nothing, stranger. We don’t need your help,” the fox-eared man yipped, his voice surprisingly high for his size, though his features were hard with anger.

Whirling on the man, Sienna snarled at him in irritation, her lips peeling back in a canine threat that would have been more effective if she had fangs to match.

Several others among the hunters, both men and women, jumped into the argument a moment later, and the squabbling sounded to Koda like a pack of foxes arguing with a couple of dogs intermixed with words.

“We need to find those taken.”

“Don’t need the help of an outsider!”

“We need to set up guards.”

“Don’t trust him…

“Too convenient, I say.”

Koda sighed and pinched at the bridge of his nose with one hand. The squishing sensation of cooling blood against his face made his stomach roll. He grimaced when he realized that he’d used his gauntleted right hand to touch his face.

The one covered in blood from the fighting.

Well, at least I didn’t cut myself on the claws, he thought with a sigh.

Glancing around, Koda spotted one of the gnarled men nearby who was wearing a ragged tunic, and he walked over to wipe his clawed gauntlet off on that fabric.

The cloth of the tunic was a mottled gray-blue. It looked like someone had attempted to do a tie-dye pattern on it, but somehow, they had ended up with a most bizarre fractal of stains and color.

Koda’s instincts told him not to let the odd cloth touch his face. So, when he finished wiping his gauntlet off, he used the edge of his shirt to get as much of the blood off his face as he could instead. The garment was already stained with blood, so a bit more wouldn’t hurt it.

A shout cutting through the argument nearby drew his attention back to the hunters just as Sienna looked to be trying to establish control over the situation.

“Look! The most important thing right now is dealing with the threat of the Crooked! We drove them back, but we didn’t eliminate them. As long as they lurk in our woods, they are a threat to the village and all of us!” barked the redheaded spearwoman.

As if they had been waiting for a break in the argument, a short woman dressed in forest-colored clothes with a bow raced out of an alley nearby, shouting Sienna’s name.

The spearwoman whirled to the speaker and hurried over to talk to her. From the expression on their faces during the brief exchange, Koda knew it wasn’t good news.

Slipping closer, Koda listened to the discussion as Sienna relayed what she’d been told while the female hunter hurried off to check on something else.

“The Crooked made off with over a dozen people. The tanner and his family, the Oslo girls and their father, and a few others. They’ve taken them east,” Sienna said in a voice that trembled with fury.

Sienna’s grim words sparked another shouting match amongst the hunters as they all demanded the opportunity to be the first to speak.

The redheaded huntress grimaced as she fought to argue back with the half-dozen people complaining, even as the sounds of the injured and scared continued to rage in the background. The entire situation grated on Koda’s nerves, and he chafed at the desire to do something.

“Are you lot going to continue arguing, or are you going after them?”

Koda’s sharp statement brought silence to the group. Sienna shot him a confused, but grateful, look. Unfortunately, the more vocal of the arguers had a new target now and tore into Koda.

“Who are you to demand things from us?!” snapped the same fox-eared man who had barked at him initially. He yelped a moment later when Sienna cuffed him on the back of the head with an open hand.

“He has a point! You know what the Crooked do to captives. We need to launch a rescue mission—as I’ve been saying!” Sienna scowled down at the man, but another spoke up before she could continue.

“But we don’t know how many of them there are! We might be racing into a trap—” 

This was a signal for the entire group to once again dissolve into an argument over what to do next.

Sienna scowled and looked about ready to start laying around herself with the haft of her spear, but she restrained herself and began arguing for a rescue operation.

This is stupid, Koda thought to himself. They are so panicked that they don’t know what to do next. Whoever is supposed to be leading them is obviously not here. I had thought Sienna was their leader, but she’s only got a small handful of the hunters listening to her. How terrifying are these ‘Crooked’ that folk whose life should have hardened are so scared?

Koda glanced down at the corpse he’d used to wipe his claws off.

The dead man’s head sat on a neck so twisted by malformed growth that he actually looked in reverse. In addition, either the fight had broken his back and spun him about or his knees were also reversed to match his head.

“Okay fair, that is a good reason to be freaked out.” Koda chuckled darkly. The rolling nausea at the sight combined with the faint sensation of blood on his face again rose up, but he throttled it with a grimace. “I don’t have time to be sick. I can break down later. People need help. My people,” Koda muttered to himself, reminding himself of what Thera had promised him. Of what had driven him to choose to believe her words from the cave.

He repeated the chant two or three more times before his stomach calmed. Glancing to one side, he saw the verbal sparring raging still, though Sienna had managed to talk a few more onto her side of things.

By the time they decide anything, it might be too late, Koda thought grimly.

He caught Sienna’s eyes and nodded to her before turning and striding down the road away from the square and its squabbling and screaming.

He knew that he could have stayed and helped tend to the wounded, but the weight of the blade-fingered gauntlet on his hand pulled him into pursuing the enemy.

People needed help, needed protecting, and he was going to give it to them. He’d just have to be careful about it.

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Sienna watched the strangely dressed man leave, his long, straight, black hair billowing slightly as he stomped down the road, heading to the east.

Something about him tugged at her. A desire to follow after him in his decisive action. Those who would come with her would come. Those too afraid or confused would stay behind where they were safe.

Her tail bounced slightly, wagging at the thought before distractions intruded once more.

“Look at him go. Even this supposed ‘helpful stranger’ is fleeing.”

Sienna whirled to confront the sneering speaker with a snarl of her own, but one pointed ear remained tracking the stranger, this ‘Koda.’