The Great Darkening (Epic of Haven Trilogy) (13 page)

A small elm snapped and hit the forest floor not one hundred paces in front of him. He heard the sounds of heavy footsteps breaking branches and crunching leaves as something made its way towards him. Yasen patted the neck of his horse and kissed the leaf-shaped flint that hung around his neck, easing closer to whatever creature awaited his arrival.

Yasen’s horse stepped upon a fallen branch, causing it to crack loudly under the weight of horse and rider. Its sharp noise rang loudly and Yasen cursed under his breath. For a moment—just a moment—all was silent. Yasen kept his mount still, waiting in the faint amber light beneath the trees of the retreating forest, hoping that whatever was out here had not heard him.

That hopeful thought was quickly interrupted as a deep growling roar woke the hairs on the back of his neck and sent ice through his blood. The thump and crack of something large moving deliberately through the underbrush of the forest played in harmony to the loud and anxious thumping of his own heart.

Thump and crack, thump and crack, the sounds of the charging beast grew louder by the second. His ears were filled with dreadful noises as the small clump of birch trees, not twenty paces from his position, exploded in a brown fury.

In an instant, the largest brown bear that the great hunter of the North had ever seen rose strong and angry on his hind legs. The monster of a beast stood at least thirty hands high. His large, yellowed teeth were bared in a horrifying snarl as he let loose a roar loud and dreadful enough to empty a grown man’s bladder or stop an old man’s heart.

The horse that Yasen was riding snorted and bayed loudly, obviously frightened and ready to run. Yasen secured his grip on his axe and his reins, ready to defend himself while doing his best to keep the frightened horse under control, but knowing full well that it was a rather futile effort.

The bears of the North were formidable enemies. Aside from the rows of bloodthirsty teeth and their soul-chilling scream of a roar, they had razor-sharp claws affixed to their mountain-sized paws. Yasen had heard the stories and seen the aftermath of those unfortunate enough to rouse the anger of the northern brown bears. Legend had it that they could part a grown man’s head from his body in a single deadly swipe. It would not take a mathematician to calculate that the reach of this angered beast out-spanned the swing of Yasen’s axe.

He knew that he could probably outrun the bear, as his horse was swift and more than eager to put as much distance as he could between them. That, however, would leave this monster loose to freely hunt his comrades as they unknowingly felled the trees of the forest. He could not leave his brothers to such a fate, so Yasen raised his horn to his lips and blew once—but before he could purse his lips again to sound the horn for the second time, the huge bear attacked.

With a violent roar, the bear took a swing at Yasen. It was in those brief moments, in the split seconds between the movement of the claws and contact with flesh, that a great and valiant act of sacrifice occurred. Yasen’s horse, Filip, reared up in defiance, kicking wildly with his hooves at the face of the bear. The horse’s body blocked the deadly swipe and took the full brunt of the vicious claws. Blood rained from the neck of the brave horse, showering both bear and rider in his sacrificial offering. His piercing scream echoed through the forest with horrific finality.

The horse toppled backwards, the life now gone from his huge, grey frame. He fell on top of Yasen, pinning his rider between the ground and his own dead body. The collision combined with the crushing weight of the beast stole the very breath from the great hunter. And so it was with what little awareness and whispers of breath that he had left inside his crushed lungs that Yasen blew his horn for the second time.

Chapter Fifteen

M
oa’s
ears perked up, and Cal could instantly sense that her feelings of dread mirrored his own. He had heard the horn of Yasen only once, but he could not shake the feeling of danger. The sounds of the woodcutters felling trees in the distance created a constant din, but Cal could have sworn he heard something like a roar out there amidst the noise.

Just then, a second blast sounded, and horse and rider moved into action as one. Cal gave the large horse her head, and Moa wasted no time as she took off towards the bellow of Yasen’s horn. Cal quickly brought his own horn to his lips to signal twice for danger. Almost immediately, he heard the horns of the nearby woodcutters sounding back their response.

It took just a few moments for the swift and determined pair to reach Yasen. Cal knew that he could not have gotten far in the forest, so he was not surprised that he quickly found the North Wolf. What he had not counted on was the horrifying shock he felt at the sight of what his eyes beheld there in the shadows, under the cover of pine and oak. The largest bear that Cal had ever seen was standing tall and angry, covered red in blood and towering over his fallen comrade. Yasen, the hero of the North, lay crumpled beneath the mangled frame of his prized steed.

Moa reared and snorted with fury as Cal blew his horn again, desperately willing the woodcutters to hurry to his aid. The bear lowered his gaze and stared into Cal’s eyes, growling a deep and angry growl. That is when Cal saw it. The bear’s eyes! They were the same color green as the shadow cats’. The same unnatural, godforsaken green as before.

Cal yelled in panic mixed with anger. “You cannot have him!” He raised his axe and shouted again, “You cannot have him!”

Cal circled around the beast, doing his best to draw the attention of the demon bear away from his trapped friend. The bear swung at them, but Moa leapt backwards, just out of reach. The jolt nearly unseated Cal, but he held fast as his mount did her best to save them both.

The two of them ran in a wide circle, hoping to drain the monster’s energy from its huge frame, but there was something unnatural that drove this beast. Cal could hear the sound of the woodcutters approaching, and in an effort to draw them faster, he reached down to sound his horn again, letting go of the reins for just a moment.

It was in that moment that the bear swung. Moa reared to miss the razor sharp claws, sending Cal toppling off her back and onto the forest floor. Cal was dwarfed by the size of the brown bear; it was at least two, maybe three times his own height. Moa ran wildly, almost begging the bear to divert its attention so that Cal could strike, but the bear was not distracted. He stood up on his hind legs and roared loudly, ravenously hungry and ready to make a meal of the young groomsman. Cal prepared to do his worst to the monstrous foe. He took his axe in both hands and began to lift it up into the air.

Then, unwelcome and unforeseen, a hauntingly familiar voice screeched out from the tops of the forest trees.

Calarmindon
.
Be not afraid
.

“No!” screamed Cal “Please, no!”

He froze with his axe caught in mid-swing, immovable once again as the words of the Owele echoed inside his mind.

The large bird of prey descended and perched himself upon the handle of the axe that was held fast in the hands of the statuesque groomsman. His violet eyes fixed their stare defiantly into the green gaze of the demon bear. Somehow, though the beast roared with fury and swung its lethal claws with a wild rage, neither the Owele nor Cal were harmed.

Moa snorted and bayed with fear, stamping her huge hooves in the dirt, mad with desperation, too stubborn and loyal to flee and save herself.

The Owele spoke in words that Cal could not understand. He had never heard a language like this; it was uttered with an unmistakable magic. The rhythm of the cadence was intense and full of wrath; the words fired like the arrows of archers with ruinous accuracy. The bear screamed and flailed, felling trees and uprooting shrubs with his maddened fury.

Cal, still frozen, was helpless to do anything but watch the struggle of power unfold mere paces from his unprotected frame. It was then that a deeper and somehow
brighter
magic was used. Cal could feel a welling of power, greater in size and severity than anything he had ever felt from an Owele; it came from somewhere or something beyond the strength of the terrible bird of prey.

The brown bear spun wild in circles, swinging at Moa, then at trees. His jaws unfurled in frustrated wrath, revealing rows of yellowed and bloodstained teeth as he bathed Cal in his noxious breath. The nightmarish tone of his enraged screams resounded throughout the forest.

The Owele spoke but one last word, and the green eyes of the demon bear flickered. He blinked them once, twice, three times … and then the evil color faded. The bear sat back down on all four legs, and the Owele flew swiftly to the branches above.

Just then the woodcutters arrived to see Cal, with axe in hand, standing over the mangled and bloodied body of Yasen’s horse. Among them were Goran and Oskar, who looked completely enraged at the sight of their friend and leader crushed under Filip’s lifeless frame.

The men were screaming at the top of their lungs as they charged with axes swinging. The bear roared in protest at the onslaught of assailants. One of the woodcutters let loose his axe, throwing it with all his might at the bear. It flew and found brief purchase in the left shoulder of the beast. A pained wail rang loud and long. The men charged again, swinging their trusted blades at the brown monster. The two made contact, but not one breath later the great bear sent the men sailing hard, crashing and breaking their bodies against the very trees they spent a lifetime harvesting.

The men pulled at Yasen’s body, hurriedly cutting away the leather straps that held him stubbornly to the saddle. Frantic and desperate were the deeds of these men as they tried to save their hero, their captain, from the hungry evils of this cursed place. Once Yasen’s body was finally freed and out from under his lifeless steed, the men carried him away as fast as they could to the waiting timber carts.

Others stood brave, willing the bear to turn and run, to leave their fallen comrades alone. Goran grabbed Cal’s arm, saying, “Come on, man, we must get out of here now!”

But Cal could not move. Though Goran was strong and desperate, the hold of the Owele would not allow him to budge.

Goran screamed again amidst the roars of the bear. “We must go, now!”

Cal could not respond, he could not signal his friend or explain his frozen state. A single tear fell down his cheek as he thought about Yasen’s bloodied body, about the men losing their hero, and about those who had died just to recover a corpse.

Oskar yelled out, “Leave him! If he will not come then his fate is in his own hands! I will not become another meal for this monster!”

“What about the horse?” another woodcutter called.

“That horse is mad! Leave her, maybe the bear will eat her and not one of us!” Oskar yelled in response.

And so the woodcutters gathered what wounded they could carry and brought them to the timber carts. They were laid alongside their fallen hero in one of the smaller carts and rushed as fast as the mules could pull them back to the encampment, straight to the tent of the healers.

Cal stood frozen and alone, surrounded by the bloody carnage of the bear attack. The bear still howled out his anguished roar, but he did not come near Cal. In fact, it looked to Cal as if the bear was beginning to retreat into the shadowy forest; somehow the volume of its rage and hunger had all but faded into a quiet, fearful anger.

Cal’s mind was racing as he tried to make sense of all that had just happened there in the clearing of the forest. He knew the evil, green eyes of the bear were the same eyes of the shadow cats.

But what about the Owele? What sort of magic forces the green-eyed evil to just … fade away like that?

Moa paced between the retreating bear and her statue of a rider, ready if the need arose to defend him once again. She was a black wall of motherly protection, and was bent on letting none pass.

You really are like a mother, aren’t you, Moa? I am not sure if you are brave or mad, or maybe even both … but I thank you, nonetheless,
he thought.

She turned and faced him, meeting his gaze with her worried eyes while slowing her anxious pacing, and he knew in that moment that somehow she knew how he felt. For a moment Cal relaxed, feeling as safe as one possibly can in a bloodied, frozen state in the middle of the darkening forest with a hungry monster of a bear just out of sight. He breathed as deep as his stone-like frame would allow, but even as the air filled his lungs, a new fear crept into his thoughts, infiltrating his momentary peace with a sense of foreboding.

He had never been to this part of the forest before, had never encountered a demon bear the size of a watchtower before, and yet all of this felt
too familiar
to him.

Moa came close to him now and did her best to help him get free. She nudged and licked, and even tried to push him over, but it was of no use. Cal remained frozen, his axe still in hand. A sinking realization crashed into the forefront of Cal’s mind, and the last remains of peace fled the moment. He knew why he had the eerie sense of the familiar.

The nightmares that had haunted him for months had taken place in this exact clearing.

As he tried to wrap his mind around what this could mean, the strangeness of the moment took another turn. One after another, Oweles began to descend from the tops of the trees, where they had apparently been watching, or maybe even orchestrating the day’s events. He could not move his body, but his eyes flew wildly back and forth as he did his best to count the massive birds of prey. There were at least twenty that he could see, not counting the ones behind him. Cal’s heart began to pound wild.

Scores of violet eyes encircled the fearful and frozen man.

What do you want with me?
he screamed without a sound.
What did I ever do to deserve this?

He was about to give himself fully over to panic, when he noticed something completely out of place for this terrifying moment. Moa was not pacing back and forth. She was not rearing up on her hind legs, and she was not snorting wildly as she attacked the birds of prey. Rather, she was doing the exact opposite. What caught Cal’s attention was that his horse, his protective mother of a horse, was grazing on the ferns and foliage found inside the tightening circle of Oweles as if she had not a care in the world.

Dumbfounded, Cal thought to himself,
Just what in the damnable dark is going on here?