Soul Caller 1 - Chapter 15 (Patreon)

It was a marvelous tool, and Merrick was fascinated by it. He had the distinct impression that he had used one before himself, despite having never seen the device, and the feeling wouldn’t leave him, no matter how silly it seemed. It didn't take him long, however, to realize that he had, in fact, seen one of these manatech maps twice now. In the faint memories that he received when he dropped from the cliff on Sky Mountain, and then again during his level up, he had seen the warrior using a similar device.

Vale also had another device, this one, round and circular. He called it the compass, and occasionally he would get it out and look at it, turning until he found North. As one of the people, Merrick had an innate sense of direction, and it was impossible for him to get turned around and lose his way, thanks to the song of the world. But the strangers seemed to lack this connection with the land, and so they required devices like this compass to figure out where they were going.

It was clear after another day of travel that Vale had a specific destination in mind. There was something he was looking for, and it appeared that he knew the rough location in which they would find it. His problem was he didn't know how to get there, and that's where Merrick and Barak came in. Working together, they scouted ahead to find the best path through the rough terrain, finding animal trails when they could and forging a new path when they could not. Often, it was Barak who led the way forward, but occasionally he would allow Merrick to come with him. They would range in front of the others, passing the steep ridges of the mountain range as they scouted for the best way forward and more often than not, their path led through rocky canyons and up the side of steep slopes.

The strangers moved slowly, despite the fact that Merrick was carrying most of their gear. Their inability to access the song of the world was curious for Merrick, but he thought it might have something to do with the fact that they were not from this world. That thought should have been unsettling to him, a fact he understood on an intellectual level, but somehow he was able to simply accept it as the truth. He assumed that it was the influence of the memories he had seen.

On the third day of travel into the mountains, the group made camp, setting up on a small knoll overlooking a deep gorge. From what Vale had said, it appeared that their destination was only two more days away, but they were now high up in the mountains and the weather was starting to turn cold. Winter was on the way, and in the mountains it could come swiftly. Barak kept looking at the sky, worried that a storm might blow in, but Merrick felt with certainty that they would have clear weather for at least a few more days. When asked why, he could only shrug and point to the sky.

While Evan and Dugan set up camp and Vale fiddled with his devices, Merrick and Barak went out hunting, hoping to scout the next day’s path while adding to their food stores. All of the food that the strangers had brought with them had been eaten, and so now they were relying on the two spirit warriors to provide food for the party. While the mountains were pretty desolate, the two spirit warriors had seen tracks of mountain goats a ways back, and Barak thought that they might be near.

Jogging along the mountainside behind Barak, Merrick paid careful attention to the way the older spirit warrior moved. He could see in the way that Barak positioned his feet and paced his strides a wealth of experience and knowledge, and as he watched it, he found himself beginning to adopt similar movements. Coming around the side of a boulder, Barak suddenly stopped, raising his hand and crouching down. Merrick mimicked his action, crouching in silence as Barak peered around the boulder. Though he couldn't see what Barak was looking at, Merrick closed his eyes, focusing on his hearing, and soon picked out the subtle clack of hooves against the hard stone that littered the side of the mountain. Speaking softly, Barak didn't turn his head as he spoke.

"Two rams," he said, "facing off against each other."

Mountain rams were powerful creatures with massive curling horns that they used to batter their foes to death. They were fiercely territorial and, on a steep mountainside, getting struck by one could mean instant death as you were thrown dozens of feet down the mountain. Furthermore, the mountain goats were surprisingly swift and unbelievably nimble on the treacherous slope. Lifting his spear, Barak measured the distance.

"I'll take the first, you take the second."

In order to get eyes on his prey, Merrick crept quietly up the slope and around the boulder from the top. Soon he could see the two creatures that Barak had spotted a good fifty feet away. The idea of throwing a spear accurately at that distance with enough strength to kill one of the rams would have seemed ludicrous to him had he not seen Barak do something similar with the jaguar in the peach forest. Lifting his own spear, he wondered if he would be able to do it. Down below the boulder, Barak spoke quietly again.

"Rams are powerful creatures, but most of their power is concentrated in their shoulders, chests, and neck. If you can hit them from the side and pierce their heart or their lungs, they'll die quickly."

Taking another look and nodding to show that he understood, Merrick took a closer look at his target. The goat was pawing the ground with its hooves, lowering its head threateningly as it snorted. It was facing off against another goat that was slightly downhill from it, getting ready to throw itself into battle. It had not yet seen them, and its side was to him. Suddenly, his eyes narrowed as he noticed a spot right behind its foreleg. He had the feeling that if he could hit it there, piercing through its thick fur, he would be able to slip his attack straight through its ribs and into its heart.

Slowly, almost unconsciously, his spear rose as he readied his throw. Barak seemed to be waiting on his signal, and so with a short breath, Merrick hurled his spear as hard as he could. The action was surprisingly smooth, and as soon as the spear left his fingertips, he knew that it was on target. Next to him, Barak hesitated a moment longer, waiting until Merrick's spear had crossed half the distance. While Merrick had thrown his spear in an arc in order to get the proper distance, Barak now unleashed his own spear, which shot in a perfectly straight line through the air, twice as fast as Merrick's throw.

The two spears hit almost simultaneously, stabbing into the mountain goats. Merrick's throw was true, and the bone tip of his spear sank deep into the mountain goat's side, slipping through its strong ribs and piercing into its heart. With a loud bleat, the mountain goat jumped from the shock, taking a few steps in confusion as blood began to spurt from the wound. It looked around, only to find that its one-time opponent had been pinned to the side of the mountain, completely pierced through by a short spear with a stone tip. Jumping up, Merrick raced forward, hoping to cross to the mountain goat's side before it was able to realize what was going on.

His feet naturally found stable positioning on the treacherous mountainside as he raced towards his prey. His biggest fear was that the goat would take a step forward and tumble down the mountain. If it were to do such a thing, it could take him hours to recover the corpse from down below. Beside him, Barak closed in as well, though he moved slower and his other spear was in his hand as he scanned the environment for potential threats.

Merrick crossed the distance quickly, reaching the side of the goat that was still staggering. Turning towards him, it finally realized that it was under threat and tried to charge. But the damage to its heart had been too severe and it lost its strength, tumbling to the ground. Just before it began to slide down the side of the mountain, Merrick reached out and grabbed the end of his spear, holding the body tight against the ground. With a heave, he pulled the large creature up, securing it so that it wouldn't tumble down into the abyss below.  Barak arrived a moment later, collecting his own prey.

"That was a good throw," he said, looking at Merrick. "You said your gift is of the eyes, right?"

Nodding, Merrick concentrated on removing his spear without damaging the bone tip.

"That surprises me. I would have guessed a gift of the hands from the way you threw that," Barak commented casually.

Pausing, Merrick looked up. Barak was right. His accuracy was surprisingly high. He didn't know exactly why it was, either. Sellie had a gift of the hands, giving her incredible accuracy and hand-eye coordination. But Merrick's gift was simply an observation. Yet when he took action, he often found himself able to smoothly do things that he had never done before. It was just as mysterious as the strange windows that kept popping up.

[Ding! Two experience points.]

Dismissing the window informing him that he had gained experience, Merrick used his knife to quickly cut apart the mountain goat as he field dressed it, packing up the meat in the goat skin. Beside him, Barak was doing the same thing and when they had finished, they lifted the bundles to their shoulders for the return trip. It didn't take long for them to get back to the camp where everything had been set up. Getting out the pot that Evan provided, Merrick added some of the goat meat and some water and started to create a stew. He had spotted a number of wild vegetables on the trip back but there was no way of telling if they were poisonous or not. Thankfully, with the two goats, they had enough meat for at least the next few days, and in the cold mountain air, it wouldn't spoil too fast. That would mean that they wouldn't need to hunt for at least a few days, which was good. The mountains were teeming with predators, and ranging away from their camp could prove dangerous.

That night, as they settled down, Barak elected to stay in the camp, not wanting to get caught out in the wilds alone. Sitting at the edge of the camp, his eyes closed as he began to meditate. He had no blanket and wore no shirt, but faint steam rose from his body as the cold air hit it. Merrick, seeing Evan's curious look, explained, "He's meditating."

"Meditating?" Evan asked.

Clearly the word did not translate.

"Yes, by doing that he can keep himself warm," Merrick said.

"Do you know how to meditate?" Evan asked, curious about the strange practice.

Merrick smiled ruefully, showing his canines.

"No, but I am trying to learn."

After practicing meditation for a few hours, Merrick went to bed, but close to midnight he suddenly awoke, his senses tingling. Lying there in the darkness, he didn't move at all. With his eyes still closed, his ears strained to hear whatever it was that had woken him up. A whisper of movement at his side caused him to clutch his dagger, but then he felt Barak's hand on his shoulder.

"Get up. Wolves are coming."

The veteran warrior's words sent a shiver through Barak's spine, and he sat up immediately.

"Wolves?"

"Yes. There is a pack that likely followed us from the kill we made. There are at least a dozen, maybe more."

Breathing out sharply, Merrick threw off his blanket and gripped his spear.

"Should we wake the others?"

Barak nodded. "We have to. The two of us will not be enough to defeat them."

As quietly as he could, Merrick walked over to Evan's tent, scratching against it. After a minute, Evan stuck his head out, looking around with bleary eyes.

"What? What is it?"

Crouching, Merrick made a motion for Evan to stay quiet.

"Wolves. They're coming."

Cursing, Evan scrambled to his feet, nearly bringing his tent down on top of him. He hurried to grab his weapon and then crawled out of the half collapsed tent. The commotion had woken Dugan, who stuck his head out of his own tent, looked around grumpily. When he saw Evan readying his weapon, his eyes hardened, and he grabbed his own, coming out of the tent as well.

"What is it?" he asked.

"Wolves," Evan replied, looking into the darkness.

The fire had mostly died down, the coals casting a faint red light over the camp. As he hurried to get wood, Evan looked up at the sky. There was heavy cloud cover that night, hiding the moon and the stars and blanketing the mountains in thick darkness. The camp was set up just below the top of a knoll that was steep on one side but could be approached on the other three sides freely. The wolves wouldn't be able to get to them from the steep side, ensuring that they wouldn’t be surrounded, but with three other directions to guard from, it was going to be a tricky fight.

As Evan got Vale out of bed, Dugan began readying the staff that he carried with him. Curious about it, Merrick watched him. When Dugan saw him watching, the bald man grinned.

"You wanted to see how our weapons worked? Well, you'll get to," he said.

Returning Dugan's smile with one of his own, Merrick nodded happily, as if he understood, and then tried to mime that there were wolves coming out of the darkness. Dugan, who had no idea what Merrick was trying to communicate, just shook his head and gestured toward Evan.

"If you want to talk, talk to him," he said, turning away.

Crouching down next to Barak, who was staring off into the darkness, Merrick stayed silent. After a few moments of listening carefully, Barak shook his head.

"This is not a good position," he said. "Packs in this part of the mountain often number in the 20 to 25 wolf range. Whatever you do, stay close. We may have to flee."

Merrick nodded. He knew full well that ranging out into the darkness while a wolf pack hunted was a recipe for certain death, but if they allowed themselves to be surrounded and isolated, they would die even faster. Gripping his spear tightly, he checked to make sure that his dagger was within easy reach. Looking back over his shoulder, he was surprised to see Vale, Evan, and Dugan didn't look that concerned as they stood together in the middle of the camp, chatting quietly.