The Last: Chapter Seven

PART ONE:

“Why is he saying that?” Roger asked Greyleaf at the point of the silver sword. His voice trembled a bit at the possibility of betrayal from someone he would consider a friend. Greyleaf said nothing, and instead let his shoulders slump down a bit as if he were a dog being scolded. “Greyleaf, what did you do?”

Osric was slipping in and out of consciousness, and only able to make small mumbles. Any hope Roger had for his fellow witcher to shed light on the situation had dissipated. 

“Say something!” Roger commanded, careful not to completely turn his focus away from the surrounding treelines, as the smell of blood was still present. 

“I don’t know what he means,” Greyleaf said in an uncharacteristically sheepish tone. 

Roger looked down at Osric again, and saw an empty vial of Black Blood next to two full, still quarked, bottles. 

“Did you poison him?” Roger asked, “He mentioned the Black Blood, Greyleaf!”

Greyleaf said nothing. Instead, the old druid took a nearly imperceptible pivot forward in his foot. 

Ivar Evil-eye was standing in front of him in the training grounds, speaking to his select group of adepts. 

“The old Gryphon taught you the adjust-step. It works, but it is obvious. Not all of your opponents will be monsters. Some of them will be people. They will understand things that monsters don’t. One of them is strategy. The adjust-step is small but can mean the difference between defeating your opponent and being defeated. If they see it and understand it, then you have lost. If you can hide it, then you might win.”

Roger watched the grass bend under Greyleaf’s shifting weight. He understood its intent, and he felt his heart ache. 

“Greyleaf,” Roger said calmly but with a clear threat in his words, and not just his blade, “What are you doing?”

Roger saw the old man’s fingers twitching nervously.

“You need to say something,” Roger said, shifting his own feet to prepare. However, even his witcher-trained reflexes were not expecting the agility that was displayed.

Greyleaf’s body spasmed to a leap, and at once the druid was gone from sight. Roger’s adrenaline soared as his fear connected the dots before his logic could. He instinctively moved closer to Osric, and did his best to try and track where Greyleaf had disappeared. The stench of blood became overpowering. 

“Damnit,” Roger muttered, and took a measure of his body’s energy. He didn’t have much left to perform even a minor sorcery, so he was left to his own combat prowess to try and defend against what he now understood was a higher vampire. It would explain why his medallion never hummed around Greyleaf, and it would explain how Greyleaf knew so much about Packy and his location. It did not, however, explain much else. If anything, it created many more questions that Roger felt a desperate need to have answered. He was not certain that was a possibility. 

“Greyleaf! Enough! Talk to me!” The red-haired witcher could hear Greyleaf moving around them, seemingly trying to discover an opening for an attack. Roger debated drinking a vial of Black Blood in case he was taken by surprise, but he was quick to remember that it was this vampire that made it. He detested the panic he felt in his chest and how vulnerable it made him feel. He had to focus.  

“You’re scared,” Greyleaf’s voice suggested over the wind. 

“Yes. I am,” Roger replied, moving around Osric at-the-ready. “And disappointed.” 

“Disappointed?” Greyleaf’s voice no longer held the ethereal tone that it did when it was dancing on the wind. The old druid was now standing a bit down the path with his hands clasped together with a slight smile. “Should I feel shame at your crushed expectations?”

Roger brought his sword to his shoulder at the ready, “Disappointed at myself for somehow missing this.”

Greyleaf hissed a laugh between his teeth, which Roger had noticed looked a bit sharper. Roger’s former friend took small, barely noticeable steps towards the witcher. “You and your kind are out of your depth. The waters here are deep, dark, and full of predators.”

“Why?” Roger asked, sounding more pleading than he intended.

“Why, what?”

“Why not kill me earlier? Why now?”

Greyleaf’s laughed rose to more than a hiss and for a brief moment was a cackle. “You ask as if I saw you as a threat that needed to be dealt with - someone whose presence would have me worried. Look at you, Roger. I feared you as you would a rat at your feet.” 

Hearing Greyleaf say his name was a painful reminder of the relationship they’d shared since the witcher had first found himself on the island. Greyleaf continued:

“A mercenary who hates his vocation, and desperately wants to become something else. You kill because you have to, not because you want to. But you kill beings that are inconsequential. Scavengers. Bottom-feeders.”

“Does that include Packy?” Roger asked, hoping that his mention of another vampire’s death would somehow reciprocate the hurt he was feeling at this betrayal. 

“Yes, it does. Nothing more than a dog. You should be able to relate. ‘Red Hound,’ they call you? Fitting,” Greyleaf’s fingers had grown and expanded into claws. Roger had counted three more steps since the druid began his response. The old man removed his hat, and slowly began removing his coat. 

“Greyleaf,” Roger warned through gritted teeth. “Is this the only way?”

Greyleaf feigned a moment to ponder the question, “Yes, it is.” 

Roger caught a glimpse of Greyleaf’s naked frame just before he disappeared from sight. The wind around them was too strong now for his nose to catch any scent on his location. Although the light from the morning sun was peeking through the trees, Roger felt completely blind. 

Roger’s cat-like eyes were doing their best to try and track the sound of Greyleaf’s movement. One noise landed close to him, easily within striking distance. Roger instinctively brought a shielding slice down with Osric’s sword. 

The edge of the blade caught the vampire’s unseen attack and stuck into Greyleaf’s now-visible palm. Roger had been lucky. However, it wasn’t just his palm that was visible. Roger could see the morphed face of his once-friend now gazing back at him through sunken eyes, wide nostrils, elongated teeth, and pointed ears. 

The vampire jumped back with a howl and disappeared into the wind again. Roger’s heart felt like it was going to beat out of his chest, and he did his best to calm himself after realizing that Greyleaf wasn’t just a higher vampire, he was what the witcher trade referred to as a “Mula.” It was a vampire only told in rumor: a male version of the infamous Bruxa. Roger was indeed scared. 

The gentle thuds of Greyleaf’s movements continued to move and disguise the direction where he was going to attack from. Again, Roger heard a landing behind him near Osric, and he spun in time to see Greyleaf’s monstrous form nearly on top of him. 

A series of chain links jingled, and Roger watched as “Hilde,” Osric’s silver bolas, wrapped around the Mula’s neck and shoulders. Osric also landed on the vampire’s back covered in his own blood. 

“Cunt!” Osric exclaimed through his raspy and damaged vocal chords. Greyleaf shrieked in pain and lunged his hand back, digging his claws into Osric’s leg and severing his femoral artery. 

Osric echoed Greyleaf’s cries of pain and with whatever strength he had left managed to trace the sign of Yrden. A soft glow encircled the two and made their movement slow to a near halt. Greyleaf’s sinewy muscles swelled and pressed against his worn skin, and the bat-like visage that hid under a once friendly face displayed a ferocity that Roger could never have imagined lurked just under the surface.    

Roger took in a small breath and held his sword overhead. With a snap of his hips and a turn of his shoulders he brought Osric’s silver sword down towards the higher vampire’s neck. Greyleaf’s strength was too much, even for the silver, and his writhing diverted Roger’s attack and sent the blade through the abdomen instead. Both the monster and Osric spun to the ground as the immobilizing sorcery broke. The higher vampire kicked like a mule and bucked the blind witcher’s motionless body to the dirt. Greyleaf disappeared again into the wind, but not without giving Roger a brief glare from his sunken eye sockets. 

Huge gasps of air flooded into Roger’s lungs through his nose and mouth. The scent that had polluted the air for the entirety of the fight was moving back in the direction of the druid’s hovel. He knew he would have to give chase, but not before he checked on Osric. 

Roger knelt down and gently cradled the scarred head of the bear-witcher. His face was barely recognizable after the damage Greyleaf had done to it in Roger’s absence. He suddenly remembered the parcel he’d grabbed from inside the cave, and pulled it from the satchel attached at his hip to one of his sword belts. 

The contents clanked and jingled together as he pulled open the drawstrings, and he felt his medallion just barely start to hum and tap against his lamellar vest. Inside were three jade figures, but none of them had any distinguishing clothes or characteristics that would showcase any kind of profession. Instead, they just appeared to be naked humans. 

“Hound…” Osric wheezed, “Is that you cradling my head like an old nan?” 

“Yes,” Roger replied softly, wrinkling his forehead and averting his gaze from Osric’s marred face as he placed the bag on the dirt. 

“Killed him?” Osric could barely whisper. 

“Almost. Working on it,” Roger replied softly again, “With your sword.” 

“Your sword…” Osric corrected.

Roger understood what was implied. Osric’s weak fingers started fumbling with his own satchel, and retrieved a small glass bottle with something quarked inside of it. 

“Our reward,” Osric did his best to smile, which took the last of his remaining energy. His body seemed to lighten in Roger’s hands. He placed the vial in his own pocket, then removed the silver medallion in the shape of a bear’s head from Osric’s neck. He knew that before he could spend any time mourning the death of a brother-in-trade, he would need to finish the hunt - contract or not. 

A few feet away lay the tangled silver bolas that Greyleaf had managed to free himself from in his fits of anguish. Roger scooped them up and hung them from a hook on his belt normally reserved for posting the heads of his bounties. He then tied Osric’s silver sword and scabbard to the sword belt on his back, and began tracing the trail of blood that not even invisibility could hide. 

PART TWO |||

Roger stood far away from the open door of the once hospitable home of Greyleaf the Druid. The warm light that flickered and beckoned him over various months of low-grade witcher work around the islands had been extinguished. Now, only a dark corridor stood between him, a higher vampire, and an alchemic stockpile that - even now - Roger was hoping to leave with. His head gave a small shake as he tried to refocus on the task at hand. 

In the blackness of the doorframe two glowing eyes stared back. They bobbed up and down and displayed the physical state of the recovering vampire. 

“Well?” Roger asked impatiently. “You were pretty confident before. Now you’re hiding?”

“Before what?” Greyleaf grumbled back through heavy breaths, “Before I carved up your friend?”

The comment carried a sting, which surprised Roger. Despite their brief partnership, Roger had felt a bond between a fellow monster-slayer. Without knowing Osric’s specific history, there were certain similarities that could never be replicated, or experienced by others. Roger was determined to not share in the same fate. 

“Stalling,” Roger replied and wrinkled his forehead. He let his eyes drift against the treeline around them as the sun pushed through the trunks. It was a feint: something that Ivar had always instructed him not to do. 

“If you are going to strike, then strike. Never waste an initiative.” 

It wasn’t a feint, he told himself. It was misdirection. And It worked. The glowing eyes disappeared from the doorframe and Roger saw the grass in front of the home bend and sway. The witcher pretended to look at the door and extended the tip of his sword into the air towards the house in a defensive longpoint. A gust of air rushed past him and he smelled the blood on the hidden vampire move to his left. Roger spun on his heels and attacked with one hand. The blade hit nothing, and in the over extension he saw Greyleaf materialize as he lunged for Roger’s face. 

Roger’s other hand, the one he’d dropped from the hilt of Osric’s silver sword, followed the witcher’s momentum and slammed into Greyleaf’s open jaws with a heavy punch. The sound of silver scraping against enamel rang out as “Hilde,” wrapped tightly around Roger’s fist, forced its way through Greybeard’s teeth and down his throat. The remaining mandibles snapped shut on instinct and sunk into Roger’s armored forearm. The lamellar plates strained and bent at the force, so much so that Roger was afraid his arm would break in spite of the protection. 

Greyleaf’s eyes watered and turned red. An otherworldly scream began manifesting deep in his belly, and was expelled with gargled blood and saliva. Roger slid the silver sword and tried to pry the vampire’s jaws open with no luck. Now it was Roger’s turn to start to panic. Greyleaf’s throat began to darken in color and bulge with a painful reaction to the silver. Claws thrashed and tore at the witcher’s body leaving deep cuts in his arms. Warm blood soaked into his garments and over his skin, alerting him of the need to put some immediate space between the two. However, the bite on his arm was only strengthening as the pain from the silver bolas intensified. 

Roger unclenched his fist and drew a symbol with his fingers. He felt a coldness sweep over his body as the energy needed to perform the minor sorcery drained whatever he had left. The air popped from inside his hand, and he knew that his last hope lay in the strength of the Aard he was finally able to cast inside the skull of his old friend. Darkness enveloped him. 

----

“We were waiting for you, Master Ivar,” Helmut called nervously to the older witcher’s armored back. “We waited for some time.” 

Helmut may have been a bit older than Roger, but he wasn’t any braver because of it. Roger could hear the tremor in his voice, even over the strong wind of the night’s sky that soared from the valley below and up to the cliff’s edge they were standing at. 

All of the adepts - and even some of the older, practicing witchers - had a fearful respect for Ivar Evil-Eye, and not without reason. In addition to his prowess with what some members of the Order of Witchers considered unconventional blades, he was known for losing himself in odd visions or hallucinations. Sometimes he would disappear for days with no contract or training planned. Other times his screams could be heard echoing against the stone walls of the keep. Tonight, he was tracing some invisible path with his fingers in the sky. 

Helmut nudged Roger with his elbow, to which Roger responded in kind but with a bit more force. Finally, Helmut sighed and relented. 

“Master?”

Ivar’s hand stopped and his fingers curled back into a soft fist. 

“No training today,” Ivar said without turning around. 

“But -” Roger started.

“No,” Ivar interrupted. Roger knew better than to speak again. All five of the boys were now looking at each other. “Just go for tonight.” 

The five disappointed orphans kicked dirt, spat on the ground, and made silent curses as they turned to walk the long path down back to the castle. All except Roger. 

“You can’t keep doing this,” the other boys spun around, horrified at the fate that would await Roger for his comment. “You can’t keep having us waste time ignoring what the others are learning, and then not replace it with any ability or knowledge. You can’t -” 

Roger’s breath caught in his throat. Ivar’s head had turned slightly to reveal his misshapen, purple eye. It danced around in the socket as if it were trying to follow the movement of a fly.

“Please,” Ivar said in a calm and direct tone that contrasted the erratic behavior of his eye. 

Only the wind spoke again. Roger's eyes traced the ground and avoided the gaze of the other four boys as they went back down the dark path to their cold rooms and empty minds. 

A hacking and wet cough started from one of the other boys. Roger couldn’t remember the names of the others, only Helmut’s. His head turned as they loped over rocks and tree roots with only their elevated vision enhancing the moonlight to navigate. Who was coughing? 

“Finished me,” a voice as damaged as Osric’s floated through Roger’s ears. “A shaggy, red hound…”

Roger opened his eyes and felt the ache in his entire body. He could feel every ligament strain and every muscle tighten with his attempts to move. Dark clouds hovered around the edges of his vision and his balance shifted like a boat in a storm as he stood. 

“Greybeard?” he asked as he rubbed his eyes. 

Roger sprang to his feet and instinctively reached for the sword on his back. Not only was there no sword, there was no balance under his feet. He tumbled and slid on the floor like a man on a boat for the first time during a storm. The taste of dirt spread through his teeth and mixed with the iron flavoring of blood. 

“Ek’nar, vietz gal madroth,” the voice grumbled in a tone Roger did not recognize. There was something wrong with the voice in the way the air pushed the words. The distance had not seemed to change since he first awoke. Reluctantly, he calmed his breathing and slowly stood.

Before him was not the monster he just fought. Neither was it the man he’d considered a friend for the last two years; shared drinks with, stories, and the occasional laugh. Before him was a bloody heap of a mangled body, covered in blood and staring directly at him. 

“Red hound…” Greyleaf’s mouth poured crimson spittle through a painful smile. “...Roger.” 

The witcher reached down and clutched the hilt of Osric’s silver sword. The edge of the blade scraped against the dirt, and Greyleaf’s eyes followed it without anxiety. The vampire almost seemed to welcome its presence. Roger took three steps and was within striking distance. He wrinkled his forehead, looked to the side as the sunrise cascaded over the grove, and ground his teeth. 

“Is there any point in us talking?” he asked as he twisted the hilt in his hand. “Like we used to. As friends?”

Greyleaf said nothing and only peered at him with a sense of delusional amusement. Blood continued to pour from his mouth, and his neck showed the damage from the cast Aard sign. Greyleaf

“So be it,” Roger sighed, closed his eyes, and hoisted the sword above his head. He twisted his feet into the dirt and bowed his knees as he readied his strike. 

“El’goth…” Greyleaf hacked, “...here we are.”

The words stayed Roger’s swing, but his muscles remained tense. He waited for the druid to continue. Moreover, he waited for some kind of explanation as to how they got to where they were. 

“...Our roles, reversed,” Greyleaf strained to get the words out. “How long has it been. Two, three years? You helpless on the rocks, strug up in the lines dangling from the mast.”

“Alive. You merely untangled me.”

“Is that what you think?” Greyleaf made a noise that could have been interpreted as a chuckle. “Just pulled you down? You still don’t understand. You were on a plate, served and ready. And not just for me. You’ve seen the scavengers that roam these shores.”

“Why then?” Roger interrupted, wrinkling his forehead and avoiding Greyleaf’s stare. “And don’t waste my time about ‘not being a threat.’ I think that notion has clearly been proven wrong.”

Greyleaf’s smile weakened a bit, but his eyes remained locked on Roger’s. A gurgling began in the vampire’s belly and moved towards his mouth. It stopped for a moment in his neck and pushed out the loose skin that was caused by Roger’s Aard blast. Blood trickled from broken teeth and cracked fangs. 

“You were...useful,” he finally answered after searching for the right word. “You were a dog I could set upon the rats. The other vermin that preyed upon my carriers.”

Roger’s eyes narrowed and he shook his head. 

“And Packy?”

“A different pet. One used to shepherd, but ultimately one that had to be put down. Became too tempted by the cargo, it would seem.”

“Come off it,” Roger replied. “This whole operation was yours? You want me to believe that some old mystic in a cabin has been running a shipping site?”

“A vampire,” Greyleaf corrected. “One that you never detected. One that has only been revealed to you recently. I’m not sure you’re in any position to question the validity of anything right now…”

Greyleaf closed his eyes for a moment. 

“You aren’t very good at this witcher business, are you?”

“Doing alright from where I sit.”

“And what about where he’s laying?” Greyleaf looked over in the direction of where Osric’s body was.

Roger lifted his head and lowered the sword. 

“I just had to feed you the scraps from my table. A shared meal. More than a few drinks. A hint about a job from time to time. Jobs that would ensure the safety of our operations.”

“Our?” Roger asked. 

Greyleaf laughed. It was a throaty and wet laugh that garbled in his damaged throat. 

“Finish me ... you mangy mutt.” 

Roger took a moment’s hesitation, and in that time relived countless blurry memories of wine, food, and friendship.

“Fine,” his voice cracked.  

Osric’s silver sword flashed in the low light of the rising run and tore cleanly through Greyleaf’s already damaged neck. Roger didn’t break eye contact once. Neither did the sunken eyes of the higher vampire. Even as the head began to tip and the jaw began to slack, the dark pools that held the vampire’s gaze remained fixed upon the witcher. It rolled onto the grass that had been stained red with the remnants of their battle, and sat on its ear peering in the direction of the once welcoming hovel.