Excerpt from Alexan’s Third Journal, Tour of the Shadowed Depths

Canines the world over tend to make good companions if properly domesticated, but the winghounds of the Underlands provide the most advantages in their native lands.

Having a hound that can also fly and even carry lighter Erlkin has already proven extremely useful for scouts and messengers. They sure are a lot of work though, every single winghound I’ve encountered has been cantankerous and territorial.

Unnamed Talkarn

“Split up!” Nolsa shouted.

She ran left; Tal ran right.

The beast, the winghound, let out its grumbling bark and jumped from its perch on the wall. The wood gave way under the sudden increase in force as the creature launched itself towards the bigger and slower meal.

“It’s coming this way!” Easil shouted.

Tal skipped more than a few smaller branches that wouldn’t have a hope of providing protection.

“Dive!” Easil shouted from Tal’s shoulder.

Tal dived.

He felt the gust of wind as the monster swooped just over his head. Easil swore, but his exact words were lost to the buffeting wind. Judging that the moment of danger had passed, Tal resumed his scramble toward a much heavier branch just in front of him.

Tal whipped around to the other side of the heavy branch, his right shoulder thumping against the wood as he took partial cover. “Where is it?” he hissed, scanning the trees for the winghound.

“It flew that way,” Easil replied, pointing towards the main trunk of the Hollow Home from which they’d come. “Get a bullet ready, it’ll be back soon.”

“I won’t be able to hurt it,” Tal argued.

“Distracting it for Nolsa will still help.”

Tal nodded. He pulled his hollow wand from the wrist wrap and started circulating aether, pushing it through the focus and pulling dark mana from the wood. He held the wand in front of him, the wood nestling between thumb and first finger of each hand, palms held forward.

The mana circulated through his body and he pushed it back out of his palms to form the dense ball of dark mana. The core of the little spell formed first, followed by little shoots of mana growing around it to solidify the thing. His concentration slipped as he worked on splitting his aether from channeled mana, and lost aether slipped through his fingers to dissipate into the air.

Across from him, Nolsa was pulling a black mass from one of the gem fruit pits. Tal was having a hard time creating something that might fill his palm. Nolsa’s creation was as big as Tal’s torso.

He’d like to be able to do that one day.

The thought gave Tal focus and the ball of mana was soon large enough for him to grasp.

They waited.

“Where is it?” Tal whispered.

“I don’t know,” Easil whispered back.

Nolsa was ready with her big ball of a spell, scanning the air above them. Tal looked around as well, trying to peer through the trees around them. He could feel the tickle of Easil doing something behind his head, but he couldn’t see anything in the darkness beyond the tree itself.

Tal had gone to the difficulty of making the little nugget of darkness in his hand, but he could feel it slowly unraveling. He spared a moment’s attention to tighten up the creation.

Easil had started mumbling quietly under his breath while concentrating on whatever spell he was building. “Run!” Easil shouted into Tal’s ear, the sudden shout spurring Tal to motion.

Tal took off straight ahead as a gust of wind from a passing wing hit him in the back. There was a crunch and a scrabbling of something heavy against wood behind him.

To Tal’s right, Nolsa shouted and threw her spell.

He dared a quick glance behind him. Seeing the winghound on its feet and charging for Tal only lent his feet greater speed.

Unfortunately, Nolsa’s spell hit an intervening tree and splashed like warm sap. It wrapped around the wood, and the tree bent over with the weight of the black mass. A couple splashes of liquid struck the beast as it chased the men, but not enough to slow it down.

It was closing on him.

Tal hooked his arm around another of the trees and used it to turn hard and run somewhat close to Nolsa.

As Tal’s arm let go, the claws of the monster’s wing arm sliced into the branch, lopping off the top of the limb.

“Slice!” Easil shouted out. Tal wasn’t looking so he didn’t see the result, but it must have been a good one. The winghound yelped in pain and veered off to Tal’s left, retreating into the bush. The crashing of it moving through the the foliage echoed for several long moments.

“What did you do?” Tal asked as he jogged back to the first tree he’d used to hide that had withstood the impact of the beast’s pounce.

“Got it in the face with a blade of wind,” Easil replied with worry. “It wasn’t deep and I didn’t hit anything important I think. It’s not done with us.”

“It likes to fly in low,” Nolsa warned from where she was standing. She was holding another mass of black elevated above her shoulder, even as she tucked a now empty pit into the pouch on her left hip.

“Like a kite maybe?” Easil called back. “If it flies low,It probably needs a run up to really get airborne.”

“You think it had to dive off the branch before it could come back?” Tal asked.

“That’s likely correct,” Nolsa called back.

Tal looked at the dilapidated hut, considering taking cover there. The winghound wouldn’t be able to skim the trees to get to him in the building. But it could probably trap him.

He was still holding the small black orb in his hand. The edges of it had started to fragment again and Tal was forced to concentrate in order to pull it back together.

This time it was Tal who saw it first. “Nolsa! Behind you!” Tal shouted, winding up and pitching the thing in his hand even as he shouted.

The monster had flared its wings as it came in with intent to grab Nolsa with its hind legs. Tal’s dark bullet, far heavier now that it was active, struck the left wing of the beast, hitting a spar of bone. It deflected off and tore a hole through the wing. The pain of the sudden injury caused the creature to flinch and it drew back the foot that was a hair’s breadth away from catching Nolsa.

She ducked around to the other side of the tree as the winghound touched down. Having come to a momentary stop, the beast gave her the perfect opportunity to hit it with the big mass of black mana. Again it splashed like thick sap, this time successfully, strands of it snapping out and snarling up the same wing Tal had already damaged. The creature snarled in pain and tucked in its wings.

The fur on its back stuck out as its chest seemed to grow larger. It bared its fangs at Nolsa and prepared to lunge.

“HA!” screamed into Tal’s head. Easil’s enhanced shout was tightly focused at the winghound but inevitably caught Tal as it passed by his left ear. His right ear didn’t even hear the shout, giving him the momentary sensation of feeling like it was plugged.

The beast thrashed in surprise as the spike of sound distracted it from Nolsa.

It reared up and tried to flap its wings, but Nolsa’s entanglement spell rendered the attempt useless. It flopped back to the ground, the winghound’s left side landing both heavy and awkward. It made to pursue Nolsa yet again.

Tal shouted and stepped into its field of view, successfully drawing its attention. But this did put him in lunging distance. Tal watched it carefully in case he needed to move, only the spell weighing on its wing giving Tal any confidence.

The beast was bigger than Tal, bigger than the body of the Sentinel, although not as large as the wyrm. Tal had no doubt it could make short work of him if it caught him. He pulled the worn bush knife from the sheath on his belt while holding the hollow wand in his left hand. The wooden knife was still dark with the mana that had gone into its creation however long ago. Tal had tested the edge himself when they’d found it in the roots. The edge of the knife was nicked, but still sharp.

Tal pushed aether through the wand and pushed the resulting mana into the knife. It grew heavier in his hand with the clumsy enhancement.

He wasn’t a trained fighter. If Tal hit the monster with his knife, it wasn’t going to be with skill. He was better off making sure any lucky strike hit harder.

The winghound peered between Tal and Nolsa, looking back and forth between them with wild aggression and caution. Tal took a step forward and it snapped at him. Nolsa didn’t miss the opening. Bullets of dark mana lanced out, striking the winghound several times in the chest and once in the head. It recoiled and lunged towards Nolsa.

Tal didn’t have a chance to say anything at all as it moved, almost seeming to blur as it made for Nolsa. Fear churning in his gut, Tal chased after the beast.

Nolsa did exactly what Tal had done, hiding behind a large branch and dancing around its narrow protection to avoid the reaching claws of the winghound as it tried to get its hooked claws in her. Bullets of dark mana streamed from the pit in her hand, striking it repeatedly in the chest and face. Now furious, it barely flinched as it snarled and swiped at her with outstretched limbs.

Tal jumped on its back, sinking the heavy knife into its shoulder with ease. The winghound reared up in pain and anger. Tal gripped the ruff of its fur with his left hand, the hollow wand now lost. Once he had some purchase, Tal withdrew the heavy knife and plunged it in again, closer to its head.

"Tal!" Nolsa shouted in fear.

“Keep hitting it!” Tal shouted back.

“By what Incarnation?!” Easil shouted from Tal’s back.

Even with its left limb buckling slightly with pain, the monster dropped heavily to its forelegs and started to shake back and forth. Tal dug his knife in deeper and held on as tight as he could while the beast under him thrashed around. The beast growled as it shook.

It stopped for a moment to breathe. Tal simply held himself in place, arms and legs shaking from the effort of not being thrown off.

Then it reared up again.

Tal was almost too late to realize what was happening. He turned sideways as the winghound tipped over backwards, just barely preventing Easil from being crushed against Tal’s back.

It landed heavily but slowly, expelling the air from Tal’s lungs as it crushed him against the wood underneath. Tal’s head smashed against the ground, a result of him letting go of the winghound. Both winded and stunned, he couldn’t move as the monster rolled off with Tal’s knife still embedded in its back.

Tal flopped onto his stomach, body wracked with pain.

The winghound turned to face Tal, mouth snarling before opening wide. Blood from an earlier wound trickled down its face to paint one of its fangs a deep red.

Tal blinked, woozy and dazed.

A thick spike of black sunk deeply into the side of the winghounds head. It had just enough time to realize there was something happening and start recoiling. The winghound attempted to jump sideways, but instead just flopped to the ground.

It’s last breath weezed out of its body, and it moved no more.

“Winghounds are dangerous at any age really,” Nolsa told Tal as she nursed his wounds and he nursed his misery. At that moment he had his shirt off as she wrapped a cloth around a particularly nasty gash on his arm. He would have to mend his shirt later. The warm fire cast a slight orange tinge on her white skin, black horns and black hair. Tal glanced at the end of the braid hanging along her chest.

Tal replied slowly, still sore from head to toe. “I can believe it.”

He had settled down in the kitchen with a chair scavenged from the common room.

The combination common and sleeping room of the hut was bare to the air, the beds ravaged to form the late resident’s bedding. Only a couple chairs had remained intact, for the sole reason that they were tucked against the wall and out of the way.

At least that was the only room in such poor shape. There was a second bedroom still intact, along with a small workshop, a kitchen and an empty storeroom.

The smell of cooking stew tickled Tal’s nose. Easil’s rat stew was simple, but tasty.

Properly butchering the winghound was beyond the three of them, but with Easil’s guidance they had been able to harvest a couple of its legs for meat. Those legs were now hanging at the back of the kitchen over a drain that seemed to be made for that purpose.

The corpse of the winghound sat outside. It would probably attract other predators, and would certainly bring scavengers, but it was too big for them to deal with right now. In another time and place, its hide and the leather of its wings would be a great bounty. Today, the corpse of the monster was a burden.

“Alamia ran into a winghound cub once, you know.”

Tal twitched and looked at Nolsa, surprised she’d decided to tell one of the stories now. Nolsa gave him a look full of meaning. Tal pulled the hollow wand from the wrist pouch. It was a relief the wand hadn’t gone far when he’d dropped it. Tal took a deep breath and began pushing dark mana slowly into the air.

“I can’t imagine that went well,” Tal replied.

Easil glanced at them both from where he sat on the tall stool, pushing a big spoon around the stew pot.

“Alamia was always clamoring to explore the lost regions like this one,” Nolsa said softly as she tied the bandage off. “I would certainly never take her to such a place as this deep limb, but there were still plenty on the surface to explore.”

“And explore she did, because of course she did,” Tal mused.

“Indeed,” Nolsa replied, mirth creeping into her voice. “With the slow changing of the tunnels, the closest limb to visit wasn’t a surface branch. I had thought it would be safe enough as the area was still fully lit. Not dark like here. But while the area might be called less dangerous, that didn’t mean it was safe.”

“How long did it take her to find trouble?”

“Almost right away!” Nolsa’s voice rose in indignation before dropping again. “The little scamp has a nose for trouble, I swear to the gods.”

Tal laughed, then grunted as strained muscles complained.

“It was lucky for us that she found a newly fledged winghound, still small and growing, perhaps having become lost on its first flight.”

“But still dangerous.”

“I killed that one,” Nolsa paused for a moment to take a breath. Tal could see her hair smoking more than usual, just like during the last few stories. “I killed it much like I killed the one we just met. With a black spike through its head.”

“But no one got hurt?”

“Not entirely. The winghound managed to sink its fangs into Alamia’s arm. She still bears those marks today.”

“Oh, that’s where those came from,” Tal replied.

A look of patient exasperation sipped into Nolsa’s face. One Tal had seen when she was teaching a student who didn’t want to learn. “The real regret of that day however, can you guess?”

“She didn’t learn anything from the event?”

“Worse, it gave her a taste for excitement.”

“Oof,” Tal grunted. “That sucks.”

“Food is done!” Easil called.

“Well that’s enough of that for now!” Nolsa said cheerfully, standing up and giving her arms a stretch. “I’ll grab you a bowl.”

“Thanks Nolsa.” Tal watched carefully, and this time he saw what he’d been looking for with worry in his heart.

The end of her beautiful black hair had turned dull grey.

End Chapter