Chapter 19

"Does not wisdom call? Does not understanding raise her voice? She takes her stand on the top of the hill beside the way, where the paths meet."

-Book of the Healing Church 8:1-2

Sore was an understatement. Achiness enveloped his person, especially squeezing his former injuries. His forearm, which was once embedded with teeth, lacked even the faintest scars.

Fredricx let out an uneasy breath before observing his surroundings again. Stone stairs led up to a brick and wood house. The house was yarded by pinprick snow flowers and aged tombstones. Some of these had not aged well. In fact, most were cracked all the way through, but kept together by grime.

The woman still stared at him with cream colored eyes. She was dressed whimsically unlike a working woman in dirtied, starchy clothes or unlike an aristocratic woman in ruffles and pettiskirts.

Instead, she was adorned in a dark ankle length dress with modest boots. Her gray hair was tucked into a Sunday bonnet, and slender palms were concealed by a touch of lace.

"Good Hunter," she repeated, soft lips barely moving with the words.

Fredricx gave a sideward glance as if to catch the eye of another. However, he only caught sight of the cane instead. He was the Hunter. A halfway grin crackled his lips as he reached for the cane. It already felt familiar in his palm.

He used the other hand to smooth out his mangle of coarse hair. "Good evening, ma'am," he breathed as he approached her.

"Hello, Good Hunter. I am a doll, here in this dream to look after you," her voice was smooth.

"Dream?" Fredricx rebuttaled, "What do you mean?"

"Did you speak with Gehrman? He was a Hunter long, long ago, but now serves only to advise them. He is obscure, unseen in the dreaming world. Still, he stays here, in the dream such is his purpose."

He shook his head, "I need to find my wife, Ettie. Which way is Central Yharnam?"

"Good Hunter, since this is a dream, you need to awaken. Locate your headstone and return. May you find your worth in the waking world."

His eyebrows pulled taunt. The blood vessel twinged. Sighing, he repeated, "Tell me how to get to Central Yharnam."

"Good Hunter, since this is a dream, you need to awaken. Locate your headstone and return. May you find your worth in the waking world."

Fredricx's grip tightened around the cane. He forcibly chose to still it against his carnal desires. Huffing, he attempted to still himself with little success. "Woman, do not speak cryptically with me. My wife's life is in danger." Fredricx could feel his insides tighten. His jaw was set tight.

Her head tilted to one side, expression lacking any particular conviction. With hands clasped together, she started to speak again, "Good Hunter-"

He could not hear this riddle again. She would do nothing, but waste his valuable time. Fredricx allowed his feet to pick a direction. Passing the headstones, he tore through the garden. He gave no kindness to the landscaping as he stomped through the plants, which shriveled underneath.

At once, Fredricx found himself at an edge. A small wrought iron fence made all of the difference. The moon suspended itself in the sky, but that was the end of the earthliness. White fog or clouds or something spanned the distance as far as the eye could see. From the white, pillars of solid dark. Eyebrows scrunched tight. Where was he? Where was here?

He surveyed the scene again. There was white, endless white sky with seemingly nothing below them. This was not Yharnam.

Fredricx turned, attempting to dislodge his attention from the fantastical imagery. Stranger events had occurred already. For starters, his nearsightedness had been cured with miraculous blood. The blood vials were plentiful and powerful enough to fade away gaping wounds. What had the woman said? Perhaps, she was being forthright with him.

He made his way through the garden and back to the woman. She stood perfectly still. It was almost eerie. Her cream eyes watched Fredricx as he gave a slight bow, which was graciously returned. "I apologize for how I spoke earlier. How do I get to Central Yharnam?"

"Good Hunter, since this is a dream, you need to awaken. Locate your headstone and return. May you find your worth in the waking world."

How could Fredricx have a headstone? He reconsidered his personage again. He was not a religious person, but this did not quite seem like the afterlife. The Healing Church promised something about gates of pearls. However, this also did not seem like the eternal punishment for the unrighteous. "Where am I?" he asked her.

"We are in this dream, Good Hunter."

Although this did nothing to alleviate his question, he inclined his head respectfully. Fredricx glanced over the many headstones, searching for, of all things, his name. There were no dates engraved on any of the stones. They even lacked years.

Helewys Brickenden

Allister Fletcher

Dayton Gregory

Ada Rolfe

Fredricxon Vinge

A chill spanned his body. Bumps involuntarily raised hairs. The headstone was new, shined with fresh lettering. It did not carry dirt and cracks like the others. Worst of all, he felt a sort of calling to it. Fredricx knelt in front and ran his fingers over the letters. His eyes closed on their own.

XXXX

When he blinked again, Fredricx found himself by the lantern he had lit near the ladder. His head shook as he let out a dismissive deep breath. Surely, he had just been rendered unconscious, hallucinated the dream ordeal, and woke here. That did not explain his presence at the lantern. Surely, he had stumbled back here after his fall in order to escape the beasts. Surely, that was correct.

As if on cue, the small skeletons waited for him, grasping at his clothes. The unconsciousness was not the only reason for his hallucinating. As he raised his shoe to dismiss them, they let out an audible cry before shrinking away. At least, his hallucination was learning, and he started the way he had already been.

Fredricx wondered how much time had passed. How long had he been fainted on the chimney sweep access? How had someone not come by and end him? Regardless, he needed to find Ettie and Lucas in his apartment. Ettie would greet him with angry, but relieved eyes. She would probably leap from her seat, quilt falling to the floor in a heap. She would swat him in anger before embracing him. Fredricx would smell the lye soap on her collar. Lucas would be smirking, shaking his head and commenting that he would have to pay a woman to hug him with such fervor. He would cough with small spots of red embedding into his sleeves. They would wait out the Hunt. Fredricx would pay his blood debt and emerge a wealthy man. There would be enough gold to move to London. Good-bye, Yharnam. Farwell, rotten city with its rotten shipyard and rotten people.

There were new corpses on his route. Ashamedly, he dug around their pockets. Finding paper scraps to pence, he decided to keep the coin. It was not as if they required it any longer. However, he did not locate what he desired. Blood would make the difference. One stray axe swing could determine his and, well, Ettie's fate.

Now, he was on his fifth or sixth corpse. Some were beasts. Some had been still human. Fredricx parted the coat, searching for a hidden inside pocket. His fingers met a barely visible seam, but his eyes met the corpse's own eyes. This corpse was not that. The beast growled, thrashing wildly. Its head started to lift, but Fredricx could not have that. Using his cane as a skewer, he pinned the beast to the street through its own eye. It shrieked. The movement gradually stilled, and Fredricx went back to the search.

This time, he was not disappointed. He hastily latched two blood vials on the buckle of his coat. Satisfied, he approached where he had been rendered senseless, bleeding and stumbling off of the stairs to the ground level below. The beasts that threatened him once before were reduced to rubble. Their corpses were littered with cuts and holes.

He touched the skin of one of them, which was still blazing to the touch. Their killer was close. However, was this killer another beast or a Hunter? Did beasts even quarrel among themselves? Regardless, Fredricx was no fledgling. He knew he was likely in the bottom ranks of beasts and Hunters. Also, he knew Hunters were usually not friendly with one another. Unless he crossed paths with Adullam again, Fredricx could only rely on himself and his cane until he could figure it into a whip again.

He made a mental plan. First, find Ettie and assure her safety. Second, acquire a pistol or two. Third, acquire some shoes worthy of combat. Forth, live until morning. This plan was simple enough. Most likely, it was more difficult in its execution.

He descended the stairs. He knew this road led to the fountain in the center of the marketplace. It was lacking in population, but was still crowded. Abandoned carriages lined one side of the street. On the other side, incense lanterns dotted the way, concealing hidden citizens. Fredricx could hear noises from behind the doors. A man was cursing the Hunt and the Hunters. A woman was crying over the absence of a child. There was coughing and sputtering from another person in between fervently praying from yet another.

However, what caught his attention above all else was the crucifix. A gnarly beast, completely covered in hair with long claws, was tied and nailed to two beams, which stood about double Fredricx's height. It was no longer alive, but the fire beneath still consumed it with no mercy.

As he admired the sight, a gun fried. The bullet kissed him, scraping the side of his neck. At once, Fredricx could feel blood seize the opportunity to vacate his body. He gasped and turned. A beast had been lurking in the shadows of an abandoned carriage. Fredricx had mistaken it for a slouched corpse.

This beast wasted no time as it loaded another bullet into the chamber. The weapon was cocked, and the second bullet was released. Red flashed from inside the barrel of the weapon.

It was fast, but something made Fredricx faster. Maybe, the blood had done more than overcorrect his vision and bolster his hearing. He ducked and dashed from the line of fire. Fredricx lunged at the creature, using his body weight instead of the cane. They both fell, colliding into the stairs that led up to second story shops.

The pinning of the creature to the stairs was not as advantageous as Fredricx had hoped. The burning metal from the gun attempted to scorch him through the sleeves of his coat.

Struggling against the Hunter, the beast yelled and squirmed, fighting and scratching to regain control. One of the beast's hands flew up, and nails scraped skin from his cheek.

Fredricx landed a center blow to the creature's skull with his fist. The crackling was sickening. The blood was slickening. He backpedaled to scoop up his weapon. Before the creature could clamber upwards, Fredricx brought the cane through the creature until it was still.

Fortunately, the cries had attracted some additional beasts. He heard their footsteps first. Then, from the periphery of his vision, three advancing creatures with pitchfork and axes. They were stunted by the looming, striking bonfire in the middle of the street. A larger creature than any he had ever seen or dreamed to have seen was suspended far into the air. Unlike the last beast crucified, this one was still hanging on to scraps of life as it roared, fighting against its bondage. The growling tore through Fredricx's ears, sending headache ringing through his brain and back out again until he could only see the advancers.

The hooded one's mouth opened into an angry scream, thrusting the pitchfork forward. However, Fredricx did not hear the cry.

It would have seemed out of fear, but Fredricx dropped the cane as the prongs came at him. He sidestepped and snatched at the base of the fork's head. The creature tempted to kick him, but this only allowed Fredricx to pry the weapon away from it, wrenching the pitchfork from its hands. Disarmed, the beast backed away to allow its companions a go.

Fredricx got lucky sometimes as the pitchfork was longer than either axes. He flipped it over in his hands, so that the dangerous end would no longer be facing himself. Staring down the three of them as if daring one to advance, Fredricx could feel the blood loss catching up with him. The effect of the blood loss would soon outweigh the euphoria of the adrenaline.

Finally, one of the creatures broke rank and swung its ax at the Hunter. Fredricx jabbed his current weapon into its soft abdomen. The other one saw its chance and came at him. The pitchfork was removed and used in the same manner on the other.

Planting his foot backwards, he slid slightly on something. Giving a momentary glance, it was his cane, but it was no longer that. With all of his momentum, Fredricx smirked and daggered one of the creatures with the pitchfork before scooping up the metal whip.

He brought it across all three of them at once. The one with the farming utensil lodged in its sternum was finished, falling backwards. The other axe wielder or the hooded one could not make up the distance as Fredricx brought it across them again and then once more.

His luck had ran out, however. The original owner pried the weapon from its fellow beast's body. In mid swing of the whip, the pitchfork came for him again.

Truly, he could not have been any less lucky. The pitchfork made contact in his ribs, almost perfectly finding their prongs between the bones. He coughed at once, sputtering liquid down his beard and gasping at strands of air. The whip had nothing to stop it, and Fredricx could not jerk his wrist back around to hinder its movement. The shards continued their trajectory, flinging behind Fredricx and sticking themselves into his back. Shards pricked about his spine, and he shook.

Either thankfully or regrettably, the pitchfork was removed with a twist. Fredricx gave a half grunt and half cry with the movement. His eyes flickered closed for a moment until he could muster the resolve for his next action.

Still gripping the handle of the whip, he gave a swift yank. The shards were not friendly to their master. They tore free, taking flesh with them. It hurt far worse going out than in.

Bloodied, the whip turned its course, slicing and tearing at the beasts rather than the Hunter. The second ax wielder fell.

It was now whip versus pitchfork. The second was raised and brought down in a hammer like motion. This was easy to avoid, but not with the corpses littering the street. Fredricx dashed, but fell, tripping and scrapping the stone. The beast turned around and thought to finish him. Fredricx was not ready to be finished, so he lashed the whip upward blindly, hoping for contact. The shards condensed sharply as not to have any gaps between them. The cane speared through the beast's chest.

The beast fell, but not backwards. The pitchfork dangerously teetered, handle knocking the breath from Fredricx's lungs. Then, the beast came after, matching up with the Hunter's body on the street. This was too much for his person, and his consciousness slipped away again.

XXXX

"Oh, a Hunter, And an outsider? What a mess you've been caught up in. And tonight, of all nights," murmured a gentle voice with the face of a beast.

Author Note: Thanks for reviewing.