Hunter didn’t raise his eyes from his grim handiwork. Biggs and Wedge had spotted Aumir from half a mile off and given him a heads-up. Not that he’d needed it; the huntsman had been singing one of his bawdy songs at full volume the whole way up the trail.
Skinning the rabbit wasn’t hard—not after everything Aumir had drilled into him over the past week. Hunter had made a careful incision along the belly, then worked his fingers between the skin and muscle, peeling it back in. Once the pelt was off, he removed the organs, setting aside anything usable and discarding the rest.
It was messy work, but Hunter was slowly becoming desensitized to it. What still weighed on his mind wasn’t the blood or the guts, but how defenseless and innocent the rabbit had been.
He knew it was silly, maybe even a little pretentious. He was a city kid through and through, and he’d never really thought much about where his food came from. Chickens were one thing; chicken nuggets, another entirely. But taking a small life, even if it had technically been his ravens that struck the final blow…
That part, he still found hard to stomach.
Everything else he’d fought and killed since the day he first set foot on Aernor had felt different. One way or another, every single one of them had seemed monstrous, twisted, hostile, corrupted. That made it easier to justify putting an end to them.
Even when he’d stood over Yuma in the Blood Grove, a hair’s breadth from taking his life, it had felt… well, not exactly right, but definitely earned. A consequence of his own choices and actions.
But the rabbit…
What had the rabbit ever done to deserve such a fate?
Oblivious to Hunter’s brooding, Aumir crouched beside him, poked a finger at the rabbit’s discarded guts, and gave it a quick lick.
“Ah, good. It’s the right one. Well done, sirrah.”
Hunter just shrugged and went on with cleaning the rabbit’s corpse, saying nothing.
“Something weighing on your mind, then?”
Hunter figured he might as well share his thoughts. Aumir could dismiss them, maybe even tease him, but he didn’t care. He’d rather have misplaced empathy rather than none at all.
To his surprise, the hardbitten huntsman did neither.
“I know it’s part of nature and all,” Hunter concluded, wiping his hands on a rag. “But it still makes me feel a bit queasy. Does that make sense?”
Aumir gave a slow nod. “Aye. More than you think. Taking a life is still taking a life, however small. You honor the kill by making sure its death serves a purpose—that nothing goes to waste. And if that helps settle your stomach any, rabbits are vicious little shits. Don’t let those cute tails fool you. They’ll kill each other over territory, maim their own does, even eat their young when food runs short.”
“Really?”
“Really. And there’s another thing, too,” Aumir went on, tone a touch more serious now. “Since you marked it as your chosen prey with your hunting rite, if you properly honor your kill, its spirit won’t just fade. It’ll live on in Herne’s realm—the Hunting Grounds. That’s how you keep to the Old Ways. The circle of the Hunt continues, even beyond death.”
Hunter wasn’t sure what to make of that, but nodded anyway.
“So what do I do with all that, now?” he pointed to the tiny carcass with the tip of his knife.
“Make sure no part of it goes to waste,” Aumir said firmly, crouching beside the remains. “The pelt’s in good shape. Clean it properly, and you’ll have a fine wrap or lining for your kit. The bones, you’ll want to keep for your spirit charms. The feet can be turned into good luck charms. Old superstition, sure, but there’s power in that kind of belief. The flesh—Aumir will show you how to make stew. Simple, but if you do it right, it’ll be the best thing you’ve tasted all week.”
Finally, he pointed to the rabbit’s tiny skull. “That, you’ll clean and keep. Mark it with the ruces of the Hunt and keep it as a talisman. First kill in the Old Way always deserves a place of honor.”
That was right. Rite of the Hunt’s description mentioned something about it, how it would allow him to create special trophies from the remains of his marked prey.
“Should I present it to Herne as an offering?”
“No,” the huntsman shook his head. “This one, you should keep yourself. If you treat it properly and bind it with care, it will be steeped in the memories of your first Hunt, and grow with every Hunt that follows. In time, it might grow into a powerful mystical artifact indeed. Aumir will show you the way.”
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Hunter raised an eyebrow. That sounded interesting.
“I’m all ears.”
“Later, later. We are in no rush, yes?” Aumir waved the question away with a grin, then cocked a thumb at the roughly stoat-shaped lump shifting in the inner pocket of his greatcoat. “Klothi wants to hear about your hunt first. And spare her no detail!”
***
“When Aumir set you on that hunt, sirrah,” the huntsman said, a glint of surprise and amusement in his eyes, “that… that was not what Aumir expected.”
“What did Aumir expect, then?”
“Well… the likeliest of outcomes was that you wouldn’t be able to track down your quarry at all, to be frank. It was, after all, one specific rabbit in a forest full of rabbits, yes?”
“So I was meant to play the fool, then?” Hunter said, his voice flat. “Apologies for the disappointment.”
“And even if you did manage to realize you were meant to conjure the Rite of the Hunt and track your quarry, one would have expected you to rely on more conventional methods.”
“In my defense, I did try to shoot the damn thing with a bow before resorting to the shock and awe approach. Three times. In any case, I completed the hunt. Does the method really matter?”
Aumir narrowed his eyes, considering it for a moment.
“Hmmm… No, but also yes. A bairn is meant to learn to walk before they learn to run, you see, and to learn to crawl before they learn to walk.”
“In that case, apologies for skipping straight to the running part.”
“Running, sirrah?” the huntsman flashed him his gold-toothed grin. “As hunts go, that was an awkward gait at best.”
Hunter had to roll his eyes, which only served to make Aumir’s grin wider.
“There really is no winning with you, is there?”
“Do not be like that, sirrah! Just learning to hunt at Aumir’s side is winning, after all! Come now, let this old huntsman show you how to properly honor your kill, yes?”
And so the lessons resumed. Hunter had to hand it to the man; he was learning a lot. If he ever felt the urge to go full survivalist or vanish off the grid once all this was behind him, he’d already have a solid head start.
One thing he hadn’t expected to learn at Aumir’s side was cooking, but the man was adamant about the importance of keeping oneself well-fed. Hunter had helped him prepare meals more than a few times by then, but this time, Aumir had him do everything from scratch on his own.
Aumir had shown him how to clean and dress the meat first, always fresh and lean, never wasteful. He taught Hunter to render the fat slowly in a cast-iron pot over low flame, tossing in chopped wild onions and slivers of foraged garlic root until they softened and browned. Then came the chunks of game meat, seared until crusted, followed by shaved tubers and bitter greens dug from the forest floor.
Water was added sparingly, just enough to cover, and a pinch of salt from Aumir’s pouch. They let it simmer low and slow, the broth thickening as starches broke down and marrow seeped out. Unlike other times, Aumir insisted on no spices and no flourishes; just honest, hearty food meant to keep a body strong. He had Hunter taste it at every stage. By the end, the stew was rich, earthy, and satisfying in a way no processed meal had ever come close to.
Just as he was ladling the stew into bowls, a notification popped up in the corner of his vision.
Your Cooking has increased to 1.
Not a great reward, but it was the icing on the cake, as it were.
“What about Aether-infused food?” Hunter asked as the three of them wolfed down the stew. Fyodor had joined him and Aumir, and had demanded a bowl of his own. “Can I prepare that, too?”
“That’s a good deal trickier, sirrah,” the huntsman said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “There are artifacts that can do that, as you know, though they are rare and come with limitations. To truly be able to prepare Aether-infused food, in terms of Ascension, it would require one to reach the peak of the Rung of Gold. “And that, well... more often than not, simply isn’t worth the risks.”
Gold, Hunter mused. He felt like he was light-years away from that. From what little Fawkes had shared on the subject of core formation, that was where she and Wroth stood—or at the very least, at the peak of Silver.
“What kind of risk are we talking about?”
That question made Aumir frown, his gaze dropping to the smoldering hearth beside them.
“Gold, sirrah, represents the absolute peak of what potential a human possesses. Or an áeld, for that matter—you know, an elf. The tiniest step beyond that is an affront to nature itself, and it would instantly draw all kinds of terrible attention.”
He left it at that, and Hunter didn’t push. The huntsman didn’t look too eager to elaborate.
After a moment, though, he glanced over.
“What about you? What Rung are you on?”
Aumir looked surprised.
“That’s a very rude question to ask, sirrah! You’re lucky Aumir doesn’t mind, because Aumir isn’t on the Rung of Ascension. If he were, though... the mid of Gold would probably be where he’d stand. Just far enough from the peak to stay safe.”
“And doesn’t a mid-Gold have anything better to do with his time than babysit a humble Transient, still struggling to reach the modest Rung of Iron?”
Hunter was only half-joking; if what Aumir had just told him was true, the gulf between them was more like an ocean. It also cast Wroth and Fawkes in a new light—though he had to admit, for being so close to the peak of human potential, all three of them still felt oddly... well, human.
“You jest, sirrah, but your words ring truer that you realize. Let’s just say this mid-Gold has a vested interest in you and your growth, yes?”
Despite Aumir’s grin, Hunter found his words vaguely ominous.
“How about Herne?” he changed the subject. “What Rung of Ascension would he be at?
“Irrelevant,” the huntsman said, shaking his head. “The whole concept of Ascension and its Rungs only has meaning on Aernor. In his Hunting Grounds, Herne is a god—the be-all, end-all. The very act of him setting foot on Aernor would be grounds for war among others of his caliber. Which, for us humans, would mean apocalypse. To answer your question, though, Lord Herne would dwarf even those at the peak of the Gold Rung.”
Despite himself, Hunter let out a short chuckle. The sheer scope, the sheer absurdity of it all was almost too much to take seriously. And yet, here he was, stew in hand, listening like it was the most natural thing in the world.
“Something funny?”
“No, just… I just realized I’m planning to straight up walk into Herne’s court with a list of demands. And you’re going to help me.”
He shook his head, still grinning. “That’s insane.”
“As I said before, sirrah,” the huntsman smiled and gave a shrug, though to Hunter, it seemed a bit mirthless, more resignation than amusement.
“I have a vested interest in you.”
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