Flight

Laren staggered through the thick underbrush, blood seeping from a wound in her thigh. Blood pumped in her head as she launched into a desperate sprint, her feet slipping on the soggy, leaf-covered earth. Several times she felt her clothing snagging on a tree branch or a sharp twig, but she paid them no mind; time seemed to slow down as she dodged between trees, jumped over roots, using every ounce of her skill to stay ahead of her pursuers. Her face burned not only with the flush of exertion, but of deep, overwhelming shame. Tears rolled across her cheeks, calls of pursuit sounding in the distance behind her.

Only hours before she’d abandoned the battlefield, discarding spear and knife and sacred oath as if they were nothing to her, leaving her friends to die. Only a hide buckler, still strapped to her arm, remained. How proud she’d been, back then, how firm. Comparing that person with the terrified, teary-eyed ruin that now shambled through the forests was impossible. But it was too late, now, to regret her decision. The Hunters were after her now. And nobody escaped from the Hunters.

         She leaped across a small crack on the ground, beginning to feel her strength waning. Then she spied a clearing up ahead, a patch of earth free of trees. Avoid it! Her muscles groaned painfully in protest as she tried to suddenly change course, feet skidding on damp, rotting leaves.

It was too much. Laren’s wounded leg gave in and she crashed to the ground, panting heavily. The thigh felt numb, but soon a tingling sensation began to work its way up her leg. She screamed when the pain hit. A searing pain exploded there, leaving her writhing on the ground in agony. Her vision swam, her mind was only capable of acknowledging the pain, and her body was too weak to do anything about it. She could only wait for the Hunters to finish her off.

“You! Hey! Get up!”

Laren felt two pairs of arms dragging her up, trying to right her into a standing position. At some point, they’d dragged her to the clearing. Vision blurry, she almost lost consciousness again. Her leg burned like the seven suns combined.

Pain was good. Pain she could use. Laren’s vision snapped into focus.

“We won’t... get far...” she mumbled, listening for the unmistakable gait of the Hunters’ beasts. She heard only the wind. That could only mean one thing.

“They’re close...”

The pair placed themselves in front of Laren, a male and a female. They nonchalantly eyed the woods, weaponless.

“It’s been a while since we crashed a Hunting, eh, Maya?” the male rescuer said to his companion, never taking his eyes off the forest. There was a faint impish quality to his tone, she noticed. For some reason, he didn’t seem the least bit worried. The Hunters would be on them at any moment, now.

It began abruptly. The first arrow whizzed right past Laren’s ear, and she saw her death approaching in the second one. But then the female suddenly jumped, catching the arrow in mid-air even as the male one disappeared from sight, only to reappear right next to a charging Hunter and tear its head off with his bare hands. Laren sat back on the ground, barely even feeling the damp. She regarded the slaughter happening before her eyes with fervent disbelief, blinking rapidly as years upon years of lived experience suddenly crumbled into lies.

The Hunters were supposed to be immortal warriors, blessed by the One Above. She watched as a Hunter was disarmed easily and ran through by its own sword. They were supposed to be undefeatable. She saw a Hunter being thrown several feet into the air, propelled by an impossibly powerful kick. They were supposed to"gah, it doesn’t matter! They were supposed to be indestructible, and they were being utterly demolished. That was all that she saw, all that she could comprehend, and everything that she could have hoped for " and more. She began to feel slightly nauseated. Then, in a sudden rush, unconsciousness took her again.

Reviews

[Jacob Clifford]

Interesting story. I enjoyed the brevity, starting off already in the thick of things, followed by the little twist. I almost wish this was a larger story, one that got into the backstory of the world, but the end result is fine as is. There was one little typo I caught, something that was probably writerscafe's fault: twice in the last paragraph, there were quotation marks instead of dashes: "They were supposed to be"gah it doesn't matter!" and "...everything that she could have hoped for " and more."

[Mikael Malmberg]

Hi! Thanks for reviewing.

About that typo - I write with Microsoft Word, copy-pasting the end result onto the submit writing page here. As it happens, WritersCafe doesn't recognize thought lines - (

[Jacob Clifford]

That's precisely what I thought it was! I write in other word documents all the time, and I've had more than my fair share of WritersCafe not recognizing things I paste into it.

[Mikael Malmberg]

Huh. Apparently the site deleted the lower portion of my reply...

Anyway, the gist of it is that WritersCafe turns thought lines into quotation marks.

About the story, I never meant to delve too deep. I tend to just write fantasy and create fantasy worlds. This might eventually end up as a part of Khobos, the fantasy world I've most recently put work into.

As for the story, it's still not as polished as I'd like. I still want to learn better turns of phrases and how to make my action scenes - like the running scene in the beginning - feel more urgent and lifelike. I tend to suffer from the "dead description" syndrome.

[Laura Almeida]

Very casually written, easy to follow, but still intriguing. I liked this piece alot and I got my mind racing to find out more details about this story..
Very nice.

[Mikael Malmberg]

Thanks for your feedback! It's very motivating to receive it. It kind of makes me want to write again.

I suppose I should ask this, since several people have commented on the same thing: should I write more about this character, or more about this setting, or both?

[Shannon]

I love a story with a good twist. You have set up the world this takes place in well, giving the reader enough information, without weighing down the story.
I have a few small suggestions, if you are interested in that type of feedback?

[Mikael Malmberg]

Feel free to!

[Shannon]

Good to know. Not everyone wants that.
Sometimes word repetition adds power and draws attention. Other times it becomes disengaging. The use of "now" twice in the second paragraph us an example. As is "supposed to be" in the last one. I think that usage is meant to show incredulousness. But maybe if the first line read "The hunters were immortal warriors..." that way the reader hears the firm belief before the new and growing disbelief?

[Mikael Malmberg]

Yes, I was notified about the nows - it's something I don't like about this text either. I like your suggestion about "supposed to be" changing to "were" - it has a better natural ring to it, not to mention being shorter and more digestible as a sentence.