The Ballad of Karhoun Esben
The Great Manticore Hunt Part II
If someone had told me that it was my fate to die while making polite conversation with the Manticore I wouldn’t have believed them. But there I was, waiting for the Manticore to see through my ruse, to discover a lie. If it weren’t for the fact that the beast likes to hear itself talk I would no doubt have been long dead already.
“…and the Oruk are just Orcs. They took the toughest and finest of the Orcs after the battle of the Second Age and bred them for strength in the breeding pits of the north. Oruks will never admit it but they are just Orcs, a mite taller, a bit tougher but only Orcs for that.”
It picked its teeth with one of its black claws, glinting in the firelight, smell of cooked man still lingering on the air.
“Do you know any Channelers who would be watching your party? Was a Channeler traveling with you?”
I lied, “No, Lord Manticore, none.”
“Lord Manticore, I do like that. Nice,” he purred but then his tone changed, grew more dangerous, “Are you sure, Esben?” He took out Elowan's, the Channeler’s Lorebook, tossed it onto the ground. I thought about Durgen, refusing to spare men to guard the Channeler.
I began to stammer out a reply, another lie to pile onto the other lies I’ve told but the words never came out. Its claws ripped past my chainmail into my chest, twirling me like a child’s toy. That its bite missed my neck was pure chance. I landed in the shallows of the pool, hitting the rocks, bleeding for the Manticore's claws.
I could hear the roaring of the falls, the cackling of the fire, the beating of the Manticore’s wings and Durgen let loose an inhuman battle-cry. His wordless roar called our Northmen to battle. Durgen ran across the shallows in front of me, drawing the beast’s tail spikes. His chest was a bloody mess as spikes made a pincushion of his armor. Despite his wounds he threw his spear. The barbed spear chased the Manticore through the air, rope tied to a tree in order to keep it from flying away.
The spear missed.
Arches erupted from the forest in formation and swords and spearsmen filed out of nearby pits. Durgen yanked on the rope meant to anchor the Manticore to the earth, returning the spear to his hand while I regained my footing. Again he let the spear fly and again he missed.
In fear and panic I wondered if he was missing on purpose, secretly in league with the monster.
The Manticore was in the air, letting spikes fly from his tail at our soldiers, hovering beneath where our Channeler was supposed to cast magicks upon the beast, tying its wings together.
All of the roped spears missed and now it hovered out of the rope’s range.
Cole’s archers let loose two volleys of arrows that wreaked havoc on the beast and Odannin and the other spears left their marks in the monster’s flesh.
Spikes had taken their toll on our men, a few had died or had fallen to his claws before he took flight.
As it hovered, in fury, I threw my Vardatch at it. The Orcish Cleaver was not meant for such use. My furious throw had no effect on anything but the cliff wall.
It turned and flew out of the gorge.
It is gone. We failed and now we will die.
Durgen began signing to Odannin who helped rally them men, “To the boats, it will make for our boats! To the ships, men!”
While the men made for the ships I grabbed Odannin and begged for men, “We can still hunt it. There are almost two dozen holes in the creature. It bleeds. I can track it.”
Cole volunteered himself and nine of his arches who can be rather quiet in the woods. I will track this bastard across the Pellurian if need be. We climbed the side of the gorge, up the cliff-face. Two men fell and we left them behind, not able to see if they were well or wait for them to climb again.
By torchlight I found blood on a rock, where it had stopped to lick its wounds. Now we were hunting the hunter.
We came over a hillock that gave a good view of the boats, where I expected to see carnage or a battlefield or the smashed remains of the boats. Neither were apparent. Durgen had arranged the men in a circle perimeter, shooting fire arrows into the night in search of the beast. I caught the creature flying a cautious perimeter, seeking a weak spot in Durgen’s defenses.
Torches extinguished we grew quiet and followed, waiting for the beast to strike.
Out of a copse of trees it took an archer out of Durgen’s perimeter but the other men drove it away. The death was swift and quieter than I would have liked. The Northman barely had time to scream.
It didn’t know we were here. We grew quiet and followed it to the tree where it hid and perched. We crept towards it, bowstrings notched with arrows, barely breathing. Like a thunderclap a twig broke under an archer’s foot. Spikes flew out of the night, going by my head like arrows.
Two more men fell to the Manticore’s spikes. Then it closed, flying low over my head in the midst of all of us. I cleaved it best I could, driving my hand and a half sword deep into its flank. Cole took his arrow and jumped on top its back, taking blood.
The Manticore’s words to Cole chilled me, “You want to ride the Manticore, little man?”
It flew away, giving us time to swing again, hoping not to hit Cole.
Cole corpse was dropped from a great height, broken, rended, half-eaten. But I knew where it had been, Cole’s body told me. Using that information, using slow outward spirals I caught its trail again. It was making its way back to the falls, our original ambush point.
It is bleeding heavily but so am I. We are both weakened. I can’t fall yet, the hunt’s not over. It has to rest, pull out arrows, lick gashes. My steel hit bone twice, I know. Quietly, I made my way down the falls to the pools below. We sent one man back to Durgen, back to the main body of men to explain our position.
I spotted the monster sipping water in a pool a step above where the beast and I initially chatted above the last of the falls. Careful not to kick rocks into the pool below, we made our way down. Stags drink the same way. I would give my Vardatch to be able to be in the cool water…thirsty…tired…bleeding. Time to finish this or good Dornish men will have died for nothing.
One of the tethered spears Durgen missed with was below, not twenty feet from the Manticore. Checked the barb head, coiled the rope and steeled myself. When I picked the spear up and he looked up at me, growling. The spear flew through the air, as it should have the first time, and found its target, buried deep in the Manticore’s side. It’s red fur was matted with even more of the monster’s own blood.
I gripped the rope and tugged. It pulled against me, trying to take me into the deep water, where I would have no footing. For a moment the rope went taut and I was sure its strength would overcome me. My feet dragged along the pool’s rocky bottom and I could hear its claws digging into rock.
Noises were coming out of my mouth that I had no idea were possible, horrible primal screams. With the last of my will I pulled and Lord Manticore fell. It came down hard on its own weight and there was a snap as one of its wings broke in the fall.
Die, you dark spawned fiend…you can’t fly away this time…DIE.
It layed there in a pile, only its tail swishing back and forth. I dove for cover beneath the water, fired spikes splashing alongside me, a few hitting my chest.
I dragged it to me. Where is my sword? The water was so fresh and cold. It would be so nice to just float for a while, heal. Come here, bastard. Come here, monster. You cut like anyone else. I felt my arm working, my dagger seemed to hit the beast independent of my arm. Then I heard it snarl and its paw splashed out of the water towards my bloody torso, claws bared.
Valkeries, please bring me mead aplenty. Take me to the Hall of my Ancestors. I’ve earned a place with them.
The Manticore Hunt Part III
Only a few words pierced the darkness, odd pieces of the night’s events:
“There he is. Over there.”
“Ancestors alive, he did it.”
“Careful, the spike’s in his lung.”
Odannin held me while they peeled my mail and clothes off of me and slapped mud on my wounds to stop the bleeding, “You’ve bled into this pool more than any man has a right to, Karhoun.”
My chest was burning but it was a distant feeling, as if this all were happening to someone else and I was doomed to only watch it happen to this poor fool named Karhoun Esben.
Elaylee, is this what it feels like when you are in your tree, all darkness and comfort?
I awoke on a swinging hammock, the smell of salt water and the sound of gulls in the distance. I heard a Northman say, “Get them, he stirs.”
Odannin came to see me, brought me a bowl of stew and a wooden vial. The stew was warm. I could’ve eaten Orc meat to stop this hunger. I shoveled in spoonfuls and said, “Did we get it?” I sniffed the vial, still wondering if it was poison, if Durgen was as noble as he claimed. Deciding that if he wanted me dead he would have let me bleed to death under the falls, I drank.
Odannin grinned, “They say you pulled it off of the cliff, played tug-o-war with the beast.”
I nodded, slurping stew and belching.
“The men put a few more arrows into it after it swiped you down but it had passed out from blood loss. Then we all arrived.”
I rubbed mouldy bread into the stew, soaking up the last remnants, “Is Durgen alright?”
The first mate nodded his scarred head, “He is angry about missing those first two throws but he’ll live.”
“Tell him the spear was where it needed to be in the end,” I responded. “How many?”
“Alive or dead?”
“Dead.”
“Fifteen.”
They gave me one of its claws, a Claw of the Manticore, informing me that to be caught with such a trophy is a death sentence but that I’d earned it. When I asked about what would be done with its body I was informed that it had already been broken down into parts, and would be sent all over Eredane, mostly to the Elves of the Erethor, to act as components for magic items, Covenant Items that would aid in our war against the Shadow.
Durgen came and signed, Odannin speaking his words. When I asked Durgen to write he looked ashamed, and told me that he couldn’t make runes, never had learned.
Durgen informed me of our alibi. He told me how Kylie had been killed in the cave and would be reported as having taken an insurgent arrow the throat, which was no lie. They would say that they met a ship with a Dire Lion aboard, as some insurgents have pacts with such creatures. They had never seen such a beast on board a ship but the lie was the only way to explain the scars the Manticore had dealt out.
They would head back to Port Esben and most likely word will have reached that the Bluff has accepted our overtures of peace and it will be safe for me to return to Unaros’s side again. Esben Pride will take me to the Bluff once that word is received.
On the way home I was ordered to heal and rest. I had more time to myself than I ever had in my life, as the crew was ordered to allow me to sleep. The time alone was sobering.
I thanked my ancestors and the Gods of my people, the true Gods of the North.
I thought about the very real possibility that perhaps Durgen missed his spear throws purposefully.
I wondered how much Manticore blood mingled with mine in the pool below those falls.
I realized how much I truly love killing the Shadow’s minions.
I understood that I still serve Unaros.
I hated to admit that I want to see Elayle, the Lady of the Black Oak.
I discovered that somehow, through all of this madness, I still have hope.
