Chapter 2

  A Brother’s Funeral

  The first snowfall continued as the Winter Hunters stood in a circle around the shallow grave they had all pitched in to dig for Brother Gregor.

  Those telling snowflakes, the symbol of the changing season. No longer could man rule the land and farm as he pleases and wants. Now when the monsters came, the land would have to turn to the Night family Gailech, the bloodline chosen by the Goddesses to protect the people in these trying times. Protect them just long enough for the Sun King Giran to bring the world right again when the Goddesses saw the seasons changing back to the warmth and the light that would push the monsters back into the depths of wherever holes and deep woods they had emerged from.

  Baltair stood by Gregor’s headstone, a simple stone that one of the brothers carved the simple runes marking a resting brother.

  “Brother Gregor saw four changes of winter in his time as a Hunter. He died fighting a Wood Scraper, a deadly opponent for even the most seasoned of hunters.”

  Cailean kept his head down but his eyes up. A Wood Scraper was nowhere near the deadliest beast that a Winter Hunter could find himself in conflict with. It was tradition to speak highly of the monster that fell one of your brothers. His eyes scanned the circle of Winter Hunters, of his brothers.

  Look at me damn it, judge me, he thought. It’s because of me he’s dead. Punish me, reject me, chastise me, goddess damn you. It’s my fault he’s in the ground. It should be me you’re burying. A Winter Hunter would never blame one brother for another’s death. Death was just part of a Winter Hunter’s life.

  “The Red Lady saw fit to give another of our brothers a glorious death in battle. If he did see her in his dreams, he would die knowing his destiny was fulfilled. To die in the glory of battle is the highest honor a Winter Hunter can receive,” Baltair said, reciting the last resting rites of the Winter Hunters.

  “Brother Gregor did see glory in battle, and now may he be rewarded in the next life, may he lay with the Red Lady and call her his woman. The goddess of war and death will smile on him. We pray that her taking of Brother Gregor from us would bring him a final reward and pleasure,” Baltair took a deep breath, “I’ve seen over a hundred brothers under my command in my twelve winters as a Huntmaster and served as rank and file with even more than that.” Baltair straightened his shoulders, looked to Cailean,

  “I’ve lost many brothers in my time, brothers in battle, brothers who looked up to me, brothers I looked up to. Every damn winter, it’s my wish I could save them all,” he took a deep breath, the steam bellowing from his nostrils, “But winter is cruel. Winter is reckless in its barbarism. It’s the goddesses who have the last say in who wins and dies in this world. The most we can do is fight, fight with everything the Goddesses allow us to arm ourselves with,” Baltair turned back to the fallen Hunter.

  “I quote the Goddess of the forge, the first who showed us the force that ancient metal bronze had against monsters in a world that thought itself righteous and unbeatable after our hubris in the discovery of steel,”

  “Do not mourn for brother Gregor. Give thanks that the Red Lady saw to bring one of our righteous brothers to her in the next life. When a man dies, only what his strength has brought to this world remains.”

  “Only strength remains,” the Winter Hunters, including Cailean, chanted in unison as they bowed their heads.

  With the Wood-scrapper dealt with and the woods as safe as they could be in these first days of winter, the procession that Cailean’s battalion had been charged with defending was able to safely traverse deeper into the woods and catch up with their protectors.

  In addition to the Winter Hunter’s leading the way, the caravan itself was protected by the Steele-armed guards of the holy Giran clan. The King of the Sun, his two daughters, and their various attendants and handmaidens. They needed an escort from the high green mountains of the southern capital for the ceremony of the season’s turning. The Sun King would officially cede his power over the land so prosperous in spring to the more capable hands of the Gailech Monarch.

  The King of Night, the descendant from the family that won the first winter dozens of generations ago. The descendant of the man that saw the spring come again to the land that had seen fifty years of winter. The descendant of the man who promised that once the sun had risen and the winter was over, he would hand his power back to the Druids and the rightful King Giran.

  The land needed a harsher hand to survive winter. It didn’t need a politician. It didn’t need a benevolent man of the people to rule with kindness and sincerity. It needed the King of Night, a man who knew what needed to be done to survive. The land would have many sacrifices to make in the coming season, and blessed king Giran lacked the training or temperament to make them.

  With the woods safe, no thanks to Cailean and his cowardice, the Caravan was able to take its last night of rest before they arrived in Mythis. It was that mild last night before the ending of Spring. The Giran family knew that while Winter Hunters did not do their work for gold, taking payment for their sacred duty was against their creed. That said, ale could be a reasonable reward to provide and show thanks for the stewardship the Winter Hunters provided the family that would see the Spring come again.

  Cailean took his share of the ale, trying to soothe the sting of his brother’s death with the balm of alcohol. Cailean tried to avoid the other Hunters. Though they may not have ever shown it, they knew that Cailean was responsible for Gregor’s death. That it should have been him they buried with honors he could never hope to deserve.

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  You’re a coward. You can’t even face them, the voice in his head said as he downed his nearly endless glass of mead. He forsook the fun the other Hunters were having and wandered into the woods.

  He pulled his cock out and took a piss. After relieving himself and putting himself away, he heard a voice, a woman’s voice. A voice that carried on the wind as if to flow right in his ear and no one else's.

  “Your battle is yet to come,” the voice said.

  Cailean buttoned his pants and turned, trying in vain to find the source of the voice, it came in his left ear, but he couldn’t discern exactly where it came from.

  It was a tradition for the Winter Hunters to celebrate a death, not mourn it. It was tradition to not blame themselves for it. Just as the resting rights said, a glorious death in battle was the highest honor a Winter Hunter could obtain. Winter Hunters cared not for their name or the titles some were lucky enough to be rewarded with earned after a hard-fought season of death. A Winter Hunter was a Winter Hunter, first and only, not a servant of this or that king. He was a servant of the Red Lady. The Goddess of war and death. The truest religion one could cling to in this word. After all, what could be more true than the plain fact that all men will die someday? If you were a Winter Hunter, you would have a death much sooner and more glorious than most.

  When Cailean returned to camp, he was met by Baltair. He expected dark eyes of blame but was instead met with a hardy pat on the back. Baltair had more to drink than the young Hunter and lacked the judgments that Cailean was foisting all on his own. “I know seeing your first brother die can be hard. It’s a pain we all share. The true mark of a Winter Hunter is not to mourn but to celebrate. The Red Lady has called another one of our brothers to her beddings. I’ve not had the pleasure in my twenty-seven years as a warrior of seeing her myself, but I’ve met brothers who have, brothers who died in glorious battle, they say no earthly woman could compete with her beauty. Praise any lucky enough to meet her. It’s your first winter, boy, let the scars of it callous you up now, while you’re young,” he said, “If you want to drink, drink, if you think can sleep it off, then sleep it off,” he said.

  Cailean took his master's advice, found a tent, and laid down, waiting for sleep to come.

  When his eyes finally gave way, he found himself in a field, a field far too green for the winter season. In the field, cutting through its middle, was a great sapphire blue river. Cailean looked up the river and saw a woman sitting at the edge of it.

  The woman wore a red dress, a dress finely tailored, a crimson shade that very much mirrored that sick kind of red that Gregor’s blood shaded the snow with barely a day ago. Her hair was the same color, a blood-red that clashed with skin so pale it could only belong to a ghost.

  Cailean took a careful step towards the woman. She was bent over, holding something in the river cutting through the stark green field. She lifted it out of the water, and Cailean could see that it was a suit of chain-mail armor, not just any armor. Cailean recognized its shape, its fit, even that small section that had to be repaired after taking a hit in training. It was his armor. He looked down to see if he was still wearing it himself. He was. This was a vision. A woman in red cleaning his armor in the lake. It was covered in blood that washed away in the river as the woman in red took care to rinse and clean it.

  The Red Lady.

  This was the legend spoken about by soldiers, Hunters, and any man who was in a life that saw combat. That most ancient legend. The Red Lady was cleaning his armor.

  Sensing his presence in this world of dreams and visions, the woman dipped Cailean’s armor back into the lake and then turned to face him. Her eyes burned with this bright kind of fire that clashed with misty surroundings.

  “Your battle is yet to come,” the voice was this kind of ethereal echo that pulsed all around him.

  “No, no, no,” Cailean shook his head, trying to deny this mark of destiny, “It can’t be. You’re only supposed to visit men who deserve glory, not men like me, not me,” Cailean said.

  “So much blood that will be shed,” she smiled at him, then turned back to her work and lifted his armor out of the lake, giving it another shake as she cleaned it, “Most of this isn’t even your own,” she turned her fire red eyes to him, smiling as she dipped his armor back in the lake to give it another rinse.

  “You can’t want me. I’m a coward,” Cailean said, pleading, “You don’t want me, I can’t fight your wars, I can’t even protect my brothers, I’m not fit for you,”

  In an instant, the Red Lady was gone from the riverbank and face to face with him. She reached out her hand and slowly ran it up to his abs, to his chest. Cailean tried to back away, but she seemed to follow him without even stepping.

  “Come, Winter Hunter, know your destiny. You are chosen,” her smile grew, the fire burning in her eyes.

  “I’m not the one you want. I don’t deserve this,” Cailean didn’t know if it was honor or humility that made him say that. You’re not good enough for the Red Lady’s reward, the voice in his head said, you’re not good enough for her touch.

  The Red Lady continued to follow him as he tried to back away. Her step was so confident, so knowing. A slit in her dress showed off the skin of her pale leg. She was barefoot and came to him, sensually running her hand up to his chest. Her touch was so cold, all the fire she gave off, yet her hand was so cold. “Winter is upon you,” she leaned into his ear and whispered so softly, “You’ve seen me in your dreams now. You know what you have to do,” she smiled.

  “I was already ready to die, damn you for telling me it’s an inevitability now,” Cailean closed his eyes, trying to force the image of the Red Lady from his dreams.

  “Death will only be a part of your journey. You’ve greater glories ahead of you than death,” she leaned in and gave him a warm, almost uncomfortably warm, kiss on his cheek.

  “Stay away from me!” Cailean pushed her away and jumped from his bed mat, his breath gasping for air. He let it sit with him for a moment. The more seasoned hunters would talk about the destiny of one who met the Red lady. If you see the Red Lady and she does the honor of cleaning your armor for you, it only means one thing. It meant you were going to die, die a glorious death in battle.

  No, that’s not it, that can’t be it, Cailean tried to reason out his vision. That wasn’t a vision, just a dream, a dream and nothing more, he said to himself. All this talk of death and the Red Lady’s tie to the death of a hunter. It just put a dream in his head. He couldn’t possibly have been chosen by the Red lady. Not a coward like him. There was no chance the Red Lady would see him as a worthy warrior to enter the gates of the eternal paradise he was told the Red Lady gave men who died bravely in battle. There was no chance Cailean would ever die bravely in battle. When the battle of a Winter Hunter took him, he would most likely be cowering behind his shield and his brothers. He would most likely be killed crouched with his shield up in a desperate attempt to escape the coward’s death he would repent himself as the proper Hunters were fighting the good fight against the evils of this cruel world.

  Just a dream, he said to himself again.