Free The Hollow: At The Edge by Andrew Day Page A

would I say that?”
asked Brant innocently.
    “That’s the
question.”
    “Sergeant Pretty Hair
went that way,” Dogbreath said, pointing north-east.
    “This thing went that
way,” Caellis point due east. “More than a day ago. They probably
never saw it.”
    “And hopefully neither
will we,” said Holly.
    “We probably won’t.
It’s a big forest. Pity,” she said wistfully. “Looks like a hell of
a thing. Oh, well, let’s keep moving.”
    The trees were getting
older, and bigger and bigger the deeper they went. Soon they
dwarfed anything that Serrel had ever seen in his life. One tree’s
base was wider than his family’s house. One tree had its branches
grown into the shape of a house, far above their heads. There was
no obvious way up to it, apart from scaling the tree’s thick trunk.
Caellix stared at it for a moment, then decided it was currently
uninhabited and led them silently past.
    Unexpectedly, Dogbreath
stopped. He paced back and forth across the ground, then
crouched.
    “Shit,” Caellix
hissed.
    Serrel gave her a
quizzical look. She held up an arrow. A quick search turned up
more, spilled from someone’s quiver.
    “They ran into someone,
or something,” Caellix explained. Her eyes swept across the ground.
“The ground’s torn up.”
    “Blood,” Dogbreath
whispered from up ahead. There were splatters of red across the
nearest trees.
    “Come on,” Caelix urged
them forwards, her attention focused on the trail before her. “They
increased their pace... being chased, or chasing someone...?”
    “Chasing someone,” said
Dogbreath. He showed the others new tracks. Someone barefoot. “They
were bleeding.”
    They pushed ahead,
their pace faster.
    Dogbreath stopped.
“Ooo, sod, that’s nasty,” he said.
    Caellix took in the
scene, the trampled undergrowth, the churned up earth and the
arterial spray across the trunk of one tree.
    “Looks like an ambush,”
said Caellix. “The person they were chasing led them here, where he
had friends waiting. They came out of the trees. There was a fight.
Someone went down here... then...”
    She fell silent, then
stooped down and picked something off the ground. It was a human
ear.
    Serrel looked away
quickly.
    “Well, that isn’t
good,” noted Holly. She and Brant both unslung their bows, and
strung an arrow.
    “Someone went down,”
Caellix went on. “Then they were hacked to pieces... no. Those are
claw marks...”
    Serrel spotted
something in the undergrowth. When he picked it up, he found it was
a small throwing knife. It’s curved blade and handle made it into a
crescent shape. The handle was made of bone. “Look at this,” he
said to others.
    Caellix took the knife
from him and frowned. One of her dogs lifted its head and sniffed
it, and bared its teeth.
    “Ferine,” Caellix said
in a low voice.
    “A what?”
    “Feral elves,”
clarified Brant.
    “I didn’t think they
still existed,” said Caellix. “And this far south? Gods damn
it!”
    Dogbreath pointed. “One
went down here. They dragged the body away... But the other five
ran that way.” He gestured eastwards.
    “Come on,” Caellix took
off along the trail.
    They ran quickly though
the forest. Serrel saw deep scratches in the tree trunks, and
another throwing knife knife embedded in another.
    “Someone fell here,”
Caellix noted, pausing at one spot. “They got back up and
ran...”
    “That way,” said
Dogbreath, pointing.
    “But the other four
went... that way,” Caellix pointed in the opposite direction.
    “And the elves?” asked
Serrel.
    “They split up. One
followed the straggler, three more went after the larger group.
This way. Quickly.” She followed the trail of the larger group.
    The group ran, stealth
forgotten. But they needn’t have bothered. They found the bodies
not long after. For a moment, they all just stood and stared.
    “Shit!” Caellix
snarled.
    “Looks like someone cut
around them,” said Dogbreath impassively. “Took them by