Legends of Belariath
Hesketh
Feast of the Unicorn - Part One
It was a cold night on the plains, the nearby forest sounds lulled many into sleep, all but one, the brisk wind against him caused his braided hair to shift, his violet eyes sweeping the moonlit land from his spot sitting atop a rock formation, his hood having been pulled down for the time as he contemplated many things. The only sounds in the evening air where those of an owl hooting in the distance and the soft shifting of clothing with the breeze. For many an hour he had sat atop this very rock, thinking of the future and things to come. His eyes started to drift closed as he drifted into a light slumber, but this was far from a normal sleep, this was a vision a calling to him, as he looked around slowly, his naked body gleamed with the tribal tattoos of grey upon his chest and arms and over his back, his mask having also seemed to vanish. As he looked about a mist began to form and stepping out of it an enormous pure white wolf, his protector spirit as he quickly dropped to a knee, his braids falling about his shoulders as he looked to the spirit, ears intent on listening to what it had to say. For a long moment they looked between each other then the spirit finally spoke, in a voice that was a thousand voices and yet one at the same time “My charge...no my child...there has been a great wrong this night, I bring you here now because I request your aid.” Hesketh nodded once “Anything for you...merely tell me what it is I must do.” The spirit nodded its great head once then spoke again “You will know what to do when you awaken, but I will aid you in the hunt that is to come, my speed and my strength will be yours, go now my child and be blessed in your hunt.....”
He started awake, blinking slightly as he looked to the stars, the moon would set and the sun rise in a few hours...then the memory of the vision leapt into his head and he nodded but once, standing and looking about, then the wind shifted, the smell of blood caught his nose, starting to walk against the wind, his footsteps silent in the night as he entered the forest. The smell of leaves and the dew of the early morning permeated the air but as he stepped further within the smell of blood grew stronger, and the scent of something else...dark elves...his eyes narrowed as he took more care, pulling his father's bow from his back and fitting an arrow into it Hesketh moved more cautiously, every footstep perfectly silent as he approached a small clearing.
Suddenly a wood duck burst from its hiding place, causing the Sheyka ranger to snap his bow up but then relaxing as he sighed before moving into the clearing, and what he saw all but made him shed tears, two bodies lay upon the ground, but far from any human, the heads severed and set onto spears like some horrid warning, the hollow glazed eyes of a mother unicorn and her colt, the horns severed from their heads and the bodies butchered for meat and hide, the cruelty of this made his hands clench, and one body which lay nearby confirmed what he had thought, a dark elven male, his head crushed by the hooves of the mother unicorn in defense of her colt.
The Sheyka man had seen many atrocities in his many summers of life but this was beyond forgiveness, beyond cruelty. He pulled the heads from the spears, taking great time and care to show these beautiful creatures honor in death as they deserved in life, as he moved about the forest, gathering wood together as he spent many hours building a pyre about the bodies, his eyes saddened every time he saw their cruelly mangled corpses. The sun had risen high into the sky before he finished his work, placing the heads as best he could where they should have been on the corpses he set the fire, his protector spirit was right, he knew what to do. As he raised his bow high screaming his vow into the wind, the crackling flame and the spirits about as his witnesses “I shall hunt those that did this till the ends of the world and even beyond! They shall pay for such a transgression!”
He waited until the fires has burned to ash, sinking to his knees as he rubbed two fingertips into the ash, painting a symbol of a unicorn upon his armor and streaking his cheeks and forehead with the ash to honor the unicorns deaths and to seal his vow of the hunt as he turned, everything seemed to suddenly shift, almost as if everything suddenly became unclouded, hundreds of scents assailed him, sounds he has never before heard, even his eyes saw things that he had never seen before the tracks of the dark elves seeming to almost glow as he started to follow them, his feet never even seemed to touch the ground as he began to run, feeling as if he rode the winds, every passing hour of his hunt brought forth rage as he remembered the unicorns, and his thoughts of what they had been in life.
For three days and nights he ran, not stopping once for food, nor even rest, each time he found the remnants of a camp, each time the signs fresher, he was gaining upon them, the winds seem to give him strength, and at night as he ran in the distance always the ghostly howl of a wolf was heard. Finally on the fourth morning he came upon coals still warm, they where no more than an hour gone, finally he was close. He stood again and began to run his footsteps guiding him upon the right path, and soon he stopped before the mouth of a cave, an entrance into the underdark, his eyes looked within, the stench of the dark ones caused him to growl low in his throat as he pulled up his hood. He moves forward, into the darkness within, some would call him mad, other suicidal, these thoughts crossed his mind but he paid them no heed, he has made a vow and was not to be discouraged so soon.
As he moved into the cave the sounds of two chatting dark elves was heard, his footsteps falling silent as he crept forward, the two standing guard to a door, which stood wide as they laughed with each other, speaking about the glories that would be held with the catch that the party returned with a while ago, the flesh and horns of two unicorns...Hesketh gritted his teeth and fitted an arrow into his father's bow and drew it back, letting the arrow fly catching one of them neatly in the crimson eye as he made a motion, the other looking shocked, reached for the warning bell only to have his hand fall short as an arrow found its way into the back of his spine crumpling him to the floor. The Sheyka moved forward then, retrieving his arrows as he kicked the corpses aside and looked to the door, within was his true task...he nodded once before he set foot into shadow.