Part I: http://www.youngwriterssociety.com/viewtopic.php?p=173382#173382
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Part II
The sun had already passed its zenith by the time Sasburas found time to satisfy a malignant curiousity that had been gnawing at him since the evening before.
Slaying the phadipaph was a concern for the demon hunter. Who he was, however, was something that Sasburas considered personally important. As the mayor of Leurs--therefore an unofficial lawkeeper--it was his jurisdiction to ensure that unsavoury and potentially dangerous characters were not permitted.
Yet Sasburas had allowed Saigot passage without argument. Had he been that mesmerized?
There was only one woman from whom he could hope for answers: Mirabel Aseze.
Her husband Joln had passed away almost eight years ago from the dreaded "red sickness", the same wasting disease that had claimed Sasburas’ own wife and youngest daughter. Whether from grief or loneliness Mirabel had become estranged from the other villagers, often wandering away from Leurs for reasons only she could know, and sometimes for weeks on end—several times she had been believed dead.
What benefit these voyages had for the woman Sasburas did not know, but each time she embarked she always returned with a book, relic, or sometimes just a tale concerning the history of the Federation. He judged that if anyone in Leurs was knowledgable on demon hunters, it was her.
Joln had built their cottage well beyond the outermost of the northern fields in order to study his weather data undisturbed. Although it was in truth only a short distance away, Sasburas did not enjoy leaving town for long for fear that some catastrophe would occur in his absence.
Finally, he spotted the house beyond a copse of apple trees growing in one of Hannis Vise’s fields. It was slightly larger than most of the other single-story cabins in Leurs, but in the years of Joln’s absence it had grown dilapidated and forlorn. The grass here was knee-high like in the surrounding plains, and weeds were growing from between the cabin’s sideboards nearest the ground. One of the windows had been poorly boarded up and others were completely caked in dust and dirt, reminding Sasburas strangely of a blind man.
Sasburas climbed the small flight of stairs leading onto the verandah.
Wooden boards creaked beneath his weight as he eclipsed the stairs onto the verandah. He rapped briskly at the door and waited. His fist was poised to knock again when it creaked inwards several inches and the shadowy face of Mirabel appeared in the gap. Keen blue eyes stared at him from above a sharp nose. He noticed her graying black hair was in disarray.
“Mayor?” she asked feebly. He nodded.
“May I come in? There’s something I need to talk to you about, Mirabel.” The door quivered in her unsteady grip as she considered the question. Her face sagged as she reached some conclusion.
“Do you want me to leave town?” she asked. Sasburas suppressed a laugh. His wife Jayna had always said he was handsome when he laughed.
“No, Mirabel. It’s about a stranger who came to town yesterday. I figured if anyone would know, it’d be you.” Suddenly her face lit up and reclaimed some of its lost beauty, a thing that Sasburas found reassuring. Mirabel swung the door wide and beckoned him inside.
The bedraggled woman ushered him into the spacious living room. Mirabel had not taken advantage of the size; the room was minimally furnished. A broad, flat table sat in the middle of the room, adjacent to an old leather-bound couch. A solitary chair lingered in the corner next to drawer, atop which rested a black and white photo of Mirabel and Joln when they were young.
Mirabel did not offer him a drink or food, although Sasburas supposed he had never expected her to.
Likewise she did not ask him to sit, yet nevertheless he sank into the heavy cushions of the couch which creaked in protest as the leather stretched. Mirabel opted for the chair in the corner, leaning forward in it with the enthusiastic expression of a child eager to please.
“What’s your question, mayor?” she asked. Sasburas almost told her to call him by name before conceding it was pointless.
“As I said, a traveler arrived in town yesterday. He’s a demon hunter. What do you know about them?”
Mirabel reclined thoughtfully. In the heavy silence Sasburas casually glanced around the room. Golden shafts of light filtered in through spaces in the walls, highlighting the dust suspended in the air like a tiny blizzard. The thick smell of rotting food caught his nostrils. He tried not to let his distaste surface.
Eventually Mirabel spoke.
“They were introduced by the first Imperator in the year 0 of the modern calendar—the year of the Federation’s birth. There were countless demons and abominations plaguing the new nation such as hyracaliphs, tofezens and camnauls, but much like now the army was needed in defending its borders. Originally, demon hunters were contracted by the Imperator himself, and their ranks were comprised particularly of rogues and outlaws who received conditional amnesty for their service.
“After a while they discovered they could make more money working independently. Their order—for lack of a better word—survives to the present day, although their numbers are few because these days there is so little work.”
That answer, while informative, was of little use in satiating Sasburas’ hungry concerns. It explained nothing of the indescribable sensation he had felt beneath the hunter’s gaze at first meeting.
“That doesn’t help, I’m afraid,” he told her. “There’s something about this hunter in particular that’s strange. It’s hard to find the words…
“Well, let me tell you a short story. When I was a boy I was playing on my own out in the southern fields. I was running along and tripped on something in the high grass, and when I stood up I discovered it was a metallic ball of blue metal, unlike anything else I’ve ever seen. I picked it up and examined it, but there were no outstanding features except for two buttons on opposite points of the sphere. Like any curious boy would, I pressed one of the buttons, and suddenly a voice started raving in my head in a language I’d never heard. It terrified me so much I dropped the thing where I was and ran home.
“The point I’m trying to make is that I’ve come to the conclusion over the years that that metal ball didn’t come from Earth. Neither did the voice. It was… otherworldly. Unsettling. That’s the way this demon hunter makes me feel.”
This information seemed to weigh more heavily on Mirabel than his original question. Her brow furrowed as she sorted through the myriad of information stored in her memory. Sasburas waited patiently.
“I don’t know,” she sighed. The admission seemed to disappoint her. “I’ve heard vague and unreliable rumors about extra-terrestrial activity prior and during the Revolution, but that was over half a millennia ago.” Sasburas made an exasperated shrug. Mirabel returned the gesture. An awkward silence passed between them for a moment, then Sasburas thanked her and turned to leave.
Something must have finally clicked in Mirabel’s mind.
“A demon hunter, mayor?”
“That’s right.”
“Why is there a demon hunter in Leurs?” A truly perplexed expression manifested itself on her face.
“The nearby bridge crossing the Eskas—I’m sure you know the one—has been hijacked by a phadipaph.” Sasburas had partly come to terms with the concept and remarked without any hint of concern, but Mirabel’s reaction was the reverse. She leapt from the chair as if unable to contain her horrified shock.
“One of them!?” she wailed at him. Those three words said perhaps more than anything else could have, driving stakes of despair into Sasburas’ heart. He felt like a prisoner who hears the rattle of the torturer’s keys.
“You’ve hired a single hunter to slay a phadipaph?” she asked. Before he could answer, she had already ignited a rambling explosion of disbelief. “Impossible! They are too quick and powerful for one man to kill! And with that bridge over its head, it’s invulnerable. The only way he could even hope to assail it is by drawing it away; and it will never do that.” She seemed at the end of her tirade and so Sasburas, in spite of knowing that the knowledge would only serve to torment him further, reluctantly spoke:
“Why not?” A mild species of educated contempt appeared on Mirabel’s face. She sighed as if speaking to a child.
“Phadipaphs universally possess a behavioural phenomena in which they are obsessed with the sense of importance humans attach to their beloved objects. Hence why the phadipaph, as you would know, claims such items from those who try to pass. The phadipaph won’t be lured out because of its obsession with guarding its stolen treasure. Perhaps it could be driven to the dilemma of having to choose between its existing lair and another, but fortunately for it that bridge is the only one for leagues along the river. If that were not the case, it might be driven insane, a condition in which it would feel no compunction about abandoning its spoils and could therefore be lured into open ground, because if travelers were crossing elsewhere and the phadipaph missed the opportunity to dispossess them, it would be forever tormented.
“Under these circumstances, howevever," Mirabel shook her head, "your hunter is doomed to perish."
As he had suspected, Sasburas experienced more misery than benefit from this lecture. His spirits utterly ruined, he retreated and departed Mirabel's cottage, feeling cold even in the sun's warm caress.
*
