Chapter Five

Hunter sneered at the sound of the hooded figure screaming in pain, falling to his back and clutching his bleeding leg. The newcomer had been too slow to fire before Hunter had shot him first.

With their masters' mind in turmoil for the moment the gevaudan were confused and ineffectual, so Hunter took three steps for speed and launched himself into running up the trunk of a thick tree, gaining enough altitude to grab at a branch and haul himself up.

"Kill him!" the figure screamed. "Kill him now!"

Hunter settled for a moment and leveled his pistol to fire and strike down one of the gevaudan, quickly counting well over a dozen. He tsked in frustration and launched himself into a leap for another tree, landing neatly and tossing another steak to the forest floor.

'First rule of hunting monsters,' he recalled Evan saying in their first lesson, 'is always be prepared. Second rule, prepare double what you think you will need.'

The gevaudan, as planned, were distracted by the steak, which didn't last long under their lack-of-mercies. But it was long enough to put down two more before he had to reload, leaping between trees between loading each bullet, for a better angle. And to keep them from leaping the branches themselves and dragging him down to be mauled and eaten.

As he leapt, his heart raced and his pulse throbbed in his veins with fear for Willow. He tried to catch a glimpse of her, but couldn't stay still long enough. That stoked fury, focused by his unshakeable sense of duty, hardened his heart and his focus.

These beasts would be dead before day's end.

And then he'd come back for their master.

The hooded figure, now clearly a warlock, threw back his head to lower his hood and reveal a square face with hard eyes, between a bald pate and a thick, greying beard. A wide, pale birthmark discolored one half of his face all the way to his scalp, a condition that had distanced him from others since before he could walk. He gripped his leg with one meaty hand to try and keep himself from bleeding to death, spitting non-magical curses in the face of the pain of his wound.

He eventually wrestled up enough focus, forcibly ignoring the pain and the distant sounds of gunshots, to snarl an incantation that brought his other hand alight with scarlet fire, which he pressed onto the wound with a hiss, a plume of white smoke, and the smell of burning meat. He tried to bite back a scream, only partly successful. When the spell had done all it could, he removed both hands to reveal an angry burn in the shape of his fingers.

"Damned Shining Sun," he snapped, "butting in where they don't belong." He twitched his fingers with a snarled word and a branch tumbled forward as if caught in a wind for him to take hold of and lever himself up. He hissed as his wounded leg took part of his weight, but the improvised cane worked well enough.

As he sighed with vexation, he perked up at a distant moan of pain. He glanced toward it and his eyebrows arched at the sight of the young woman — the one who had taken the fire spell meant for the Shiner — having rolled onto her back and panting with agony of her wide burn. Her back was mindlessly bowed and … that was rather intriguing.

The warlock grinned darkly and limped his way over to a wounded and fetching woman. "Quite a pretty little thing, indeed," he said lowly, almost purring. He distantly noted the smell of sulphur, but dismissed it as coming from his scourge. Or what remained of it, at least. He'd have to open up Bachans's town wall and have his remaining gevaudan pick off the strongest men to replace them. The rest would make excellent feed for them. 'Oh brother,' he thought with a coarse grin, 'such a shame your territory had to fall so … brutally.'

The warlock grunted as he knelt to examine this woman in more detail, his birthmark turning from sickly white to deep red and the temperature seeming to drop a few degrees. She really was quite lovely, with a marvelous figure and fair skin favored by nobility. He stroked her soft, midnight hair and shushed her whimpers. "Fear not, my dear. I can have you healed up as soon as my business is taken care of. And then I'll bring you home and we can get you …" his smile turned into a leer, "settled. Hmm?" He leaned closer to examine her more clearly, but his leer dropped into confusion as the scent of sulphur grew stronger.

And like a flash, her eyes snapped open to reveal solid pits of poisonous green. He snapped a curse and lurched backward, shouting as he stumbled on his wounded leg and began to fall backward, but the woman grabbed his collar and jerked herself upward and him with her. From her back spread the leathery wings of a bat and a black tail with a heart-shaped tip unfurled from beneath her skirt while delicate horns emerged to curl backward from her forehead.

"Succubus," the warlock whispered as the air around them seemed to lurch from summer heat to bone-chilling cold. He began an incantation of binding, but the demoness's grip jumped from his shirt to his throat and cut off his airway. And he felt his body growing tense, one part of himself especially, as the power of the succubus rolled over him and flooded his brain with burning warmth that juxtaposed the chill around them.

"Hunter," the demoness moaned distantly, and then her eyes flared even brighter and her lips curled into a rictus of rage. "Hurt … Hunter!" she hissed.

In a last act of desperation, the warlock swung his stick at her, but she caught his wrist and squeezed, the bones splintering under the pressure of her grip. He cried out in pain before his face was forced into his assailant's ample bosom. He was stunned by the action before he began to relax and savor the softness that slowly ground against him, the pain in his wrist and his leg distant memories as he slipped into semi-consciousness. The cold outside and the heat inside melded together into a wonderful contrast that washed away his fear and he began to slip away.

Far too soon, he felt himself fall away from the warm embrace, only somewhat aware of his heaving for air as his body trembled with shock. His eyes slowly opened to reveal wide pupils that nearly eclipsed his grey irises, which flicked to find the woman staring at him, her eyes now a striking but natural emerald green.

And those glittering eyes were wide with horror and what he distantly recognized as shame. Why could that be? Before the darkness creeping into the edge of his sight covered him, he heard an anguished wail of grief.

Hunter panted as he slowly drew his knife from the neck of the last of the scourge. It had been a pain in the everything to keep ahead of the massive beasts who could jump high enough to threaten him in his perches. But he'd managed, picking them off with his silver bullets as they slowly lost themselves to the bestial rage from their fallen brethren. It was only the last that he had killed with his blade after distracting it with a splash of silver water.

Hunter gripped the creature's head and slashed cleanly through its neck before placing the head in a bag designed just for the purpose. He straightened and grunted at his sore muscles, but forced himself to ignore it as he sprinted back the way he had come.

As he ran, images of Willow being blasted aside flashed across his mind. With each vision, his breathing became harder and his eyes burned more sharply. She couldn't be gone. She couldn't! If she needed him …! He would do what was needed.

Finally he burst into the clearing and looked around to get his bearings … and was surprised at what he found.

Willow was sitting on her knees, upright and the skin beneath her ruined dress that should have been burned and blackened and raw … was whole and healthy, as if nothing had happened at all. Any joy Hunter might have felt at such a recovery was snuffed by the look on Willow's face. Her eyes were … dead … her posture was slumped and uncaring of her own fate. And her unseeing gaze was directed at the warlock on his back, limp as a ragdoll, eyes unfocused, and his mouth gaping and gurgling.

"Willow?" Hunter asked, stepping forward.

She didn't respond. Didn't even twitch.

Hunter knelt in front of her, trying to catch her eye. "Willow, what happened?" Same results. Hunter pressed his lips tight and thought furiously. Protocol dedicated that he tie up the warlock and drag him back to town to face justice for crimes against the people of Rasmos. But looking at Willow …

Hunter grimaced as his concern warred against his deeply ingrained sense of duty. He had a job, his life's work and purpose. But his heart roared at him to help Willow. He felt as if he would be torn apart with no way to do both …!

Then he thought about that. He ran the numbers and found them daunting. But he didn't care. This could work! He removed his hat and his coat, then unfurled leather bindings for the warlock's wrists and ankles. As soon as he was done, he cast a glance at Willow. "I'll get you home, Willow," he vowed. "I swear it."

The town guards of Bachans were ready to close up for the night as the sun touched the horizon, but one of their men on the wall called to halt the gate. The watch captain removed a spy glass from his vest and looked into the sun's glare to find a silhouette trudging along.

This silhouette soon resolved itself into the shape of the Shiner that had come to help them, the man grunting and sweating as he carried his companion in his arms like a bride. Sweat coursed over his face and stained his clothes, but the Shiner kept up his dogged, persistent pace until guards came to relieve him. As a small group of guards approached, the man snarled and turned away, shielding his partner and revealing what else he had been carrying.

A large, beaten figure was tied to the Shiner's waist by his bound ankles with the famed long coat of his position, countless scrapes and abrasions and large tears in his black robes no doubt inflicted by being dragged through the thick forest. The man's mouth was gagged and his wrists bound as well, and he glared with poisonous hatred tempered by obvious exhaustion. Oh, and the blindfold that covered his eyes.

"Warlock," the Shiner growled from behind his kerchief mask. "Take him to the jailhouse." The leading guard nodded meekly and ordered his men to take the prisoner. A few remained behind to escort the Shiner back to town.

"Sir?" one brave or foolish man asked. "The monsters? Are they-?"

"Dead," the Shiner bit out. "Every damned one of them."

When the group finally reentered the town, the gates closing behind them for safety's sake, the Shiner trodded to the wagon he and his companion had arrived in and disappeared inside. He reemerged a few moments later and singled out the captain to discuss details of the hunt and secure payment, his words terse and blunt.

"Thank you, Sir Shiner," the captain said. "Is there anything else we can do for you?"

The man thought it over. "Where's your nearest well?"

Grey nothingness.

That was all there was. No, that wasn't true. There was the face of the man she had killed, ripped away his life in her madness. Streaks of red lanced through the grey, memories of her fury and her hunger. They were smothered by the black of despair. Pressure surrounded her, weight pressing down upon her. It was less than she deserved. Then the pressure was gone and she was weightless again.

Nothingness persisted, and then the pressure was back. It lasted … not as long? Who could tell in this pit of nothing? Then she felt cold and waited for death … and warmth answered ...? Pleasant warmth ...

Willow's eyes slowly came into focus and she blinked slowly as she emerged from her haze. What was happening? Where was she?

The sound of pouring water drew her fragmented attention and she looked to the side to find Hunter — shirtless — wringing out a steaming rag into the wash tub they kept in the wagon. One she was sitting on a small stool in, the steaming water swirling around her feet as Hunter gently stroked her shoulder to remove dried sweat and dust. And ash.

She also belatedly noticed that she was utterly naked except for a towel she held clutched to her front.

Willow flicked her eyes from the tub to Hunter, who looked up at just the right time to be caught in her gaze. He paused in his ministrations for a heartbeat, long enough for a blush to rise from his collarbone and paint his cheeks, before he cleared his throat and carried on, washing her neck and shoulders with long, slow strokes before he rinsed the rag, wrung it out, and repeated.

"Hunter …" Willow whispered, her emotions in ruins that equated to nothingness.

"Willow," he said, his eyes warm and his tone careful.

"You're okay," Willow said in something like disbelief.

"Thanks to you," he said with the faintest grin. "You saved my life. Again."

"I couldn't just-!" Willow gasped as the fractured memory of what had happened next assaulted her. She retched and her face twisted with shame and self-hate. She shuddered as something inside her wailed to weep and sob, but the pressure of her emotions kept her from doing so. So she was wracked with tremors and whimpers as she felt her phantom embrace upon that man, as she forced him to lay with her and bear her rippling motions as she tore his life force from him.

All the while too blinded by rage for Hunter, and her own wretched hunger, to stop herself.

"Willow." Hunter's calm voice was like a lifeline that slowly drew her away from her despairing spiral. She looked up and into those warm, brown eyes. "He's alive," Hunter said. "You didn't kill him."

Willow's eyes shot wide and she turned that news over in her mind. But … she'd been famished, ravenous, starving! How could she have not killed him? She'd been unable to stop herself, at the utter mercies of her darker nature. "What?" was all she could ask, her voice weak and scratchy.

"He'll live," Hunter confirmed. "Well, I mean, he did live. But for his crimes, the townspeople just took it upon themselves to finish him off."

Willow blinked, her awareness slowly returning from the brink. "I don't understand."

"The warlock, as it turns out, was John Chastel. The Lord Henry Chastel's older brother. He was passed over for lordship due to his birth defects and occult interests. Guess he never got over it, because he apparently has been ready to take over by force for … quite some time."

Hunter went on to explain that it was not-Lord John who had summoned a broker demon and made a bargain for the venom of a gevaudan in exchange for some mystical trinket. He'd infected his younger brother's strongest and most loyal knight and used a binding formula from one of his grimoires — old books of magic and lore — to take command of the resultant creature and force it to infect the strongest guards and to slaughter the rest. Except for his brother and lord, whom he'd murdered with his own hands. Then he'd set his sights on the nearest town, only to be thwarted by the suspicious loss of the peoples' livestock from the ravenous beasts that had driven them all into the safety of the walled town. And naturally, not long after, they had arrived to deal with the situation.

"How do you know all of this?" Willow asked, her voice small as Hunter trailed his rag down her arms, sending shivers up her spine and a blush to her cheeks.

"Torture," he said flatly. "After what happened, he was in no shape to resist. He squealed like a stuck hog."

Willow's stomach turned and she jerked her arm back in shock. Hunter arched his eyebrows at the sudden movement, his head tilted curiously. Willow's heart thundered in her chest as she clutched her only modesty to her front and thought. Hunter, her noble Hunter, had delivered those words with such … blase dispassion. As if inflicting agonies upon another person were simply the way to approach the situation.

"You had him … tortured?" Willow asked.

"Yes," he said coldly. Hunter's grip on the washcloth tightened, the tendons in his arms and hands stark and visible. "He murdered people. He dealt with a demon for nothing but his own sick gain. He-" Hunter's teeth bared in a snarl, "-he hurt you, Willow!" He released a breath and the tension eased from him. "He confessed really quickly." He turned his face away from her, something like shame mixing with the cooling anger. "It was less than he deserved."

Willow wasn't sure whether to be appalled or flattered. To feel cold fear or burning desire. Hunter had had a man tortured ... For her.

"It wasn't just me," he added quietly. "The townspeople were baying for his blood when they realized who he was. They took the reins on it; I just got what I needed for my reports."

Willow's lips thinned at that. She wasn't sure if that made it better or not. She gave it some real thought, and the warlock's — Chastel's — words to her while she was for all intents and purposes on the edge of death came to mind. He'd meant to spirit her away and force her into servitude, just like the warlock who had first summoned her to Earth.

"I suppose it's for the best," she admitted, though it left a bitter taste in her mouth.

Hunter huffed a faint laugh. "See what I mean?" She quirked an eyebrow and looked at him curiously. He merely reached to place his fingers under her chin and lift it ever so slightly. "You're the furthest thing from a monster I've ever met."

Willow's heart swelled at the reminder of their talk that morning. She reached out to him and finally touched him, cupping his cheek in her hand and running her thumb over his thin stubble. "You haven't given up on me," she whispered.

"And I never will," he said.

They stayed like that for a long while before Hunter sighed and withdrew. "I, um, I thought you would want to do the more intimate areas yourself." He rinsed and wrung out the rag, the water now lukewarm, and passed it to her. "I'll get you some more hot water." He rose and crossed to the fireplace, where the cauldron hung and steamed with heat. He ladeled some of the boiling water into a teapot and returned to very slowly pour it in a circle around Willow, the hot water mixing with the cooled and bringing it back to comforting warmth. "I'll leave you to it," he said.

And then a towel hit him in the face.

Hunter sputtered and stepped back in surprise before he cleared his sight … and stopped dead in his place. Willow had her back turned to him, moisture shining on her skin to highlight her curves, and she was languidly cleaning herself off, her motions sinuous and graceful. She glanced backward at him, a mischievous glint in her eye. "Don't stray too far," she warned, her voice husky. "When I'm finished … it's your turn."

Hunter was unresponsive until he felt Willow poke his nose, and he returned to himself to find her dressed in her usual revealing nightgown, the tub steaming again. "Well?" she asked, just a little too innocently.

For the record, he at least kept his undergarments on.

"Again."

In a towered manor far to the north, a young woman dressed in a black dress and orchid tights focused upon a simple summoning circle drawn upon the stones surrounding a lidded cauldron. She brushed her shoulder-length auburn hair away from her face, a single mint streak shining in the light of the candles on the walls.

She focused her thoughts and the circle flared with pink-purple light. Energy like lightning arced and crackled for several moments and a ghostly wail emanated from the ground. A rush of wind rose up and whirled around the cauldron, but was bound by the confines of the circle that flared even brighter. After a few seconds, the wind slowed and the circle's light faded.

The girl strode forward and smeared the circle's edge with one stylish boot. The cauldron lid flew off and out emerged a sickly arm of gravelly clay. The arm was followed by the head and torso of something that was vaguely humanoid, its mouth gaping and rasping and its eyes a pair of stones that glowed cherry red. The entity's frame shivered and solidified, and it stepped from the cauldron before kneeling before its summoner.

"Greetings, Mistress," it rasped. "What do you wish of me?"

The sound of sharp, methodical clapping echoed through the chamber and up strode a tall, slender woman with ebony hair marked by a single streak of grey that offset her ivory skin and teal eyes. She was dressed in a black dress and charcoal corset, a grey shawl draped over her shoulders. A snow-white raven was perched on her shoulder watching with sharp, intelligent eyes.

"Excellently done, my dear," the woman said with a small smile.

"Thank you, ma'am," the younger woman said.

The elder arched an eyebrow. "I think your new lady friend will be very impressed when she sees this, Amity."

The young woman, Amity, flushed and fiddled with her hair. "Shut up, Lilith."

Lilith only chuckled, her familiar cawing in its own laughter.

And chapter five brings a resolution to the cliffhanger!

*For the sake of clarity, Willow basically groped the warlock to near-death. For those of you with minds way too deep in the gutter. I mean, c'mon ... this is Willow we're talking about!

*The lord's family, Chastel, is the French word for castle. The character was named for Jean Chastel, who is historically credited with slaying the Beast of Gevaudan. The beast was a historical massive wolf that caused mass hysteria in the French countryside in the 1760's. Stories of the time and since have evolved into interpreting it as a werewolf, and the beast inspired the name of this fic's "gevaudan". Some historians have gone on to theorize that Chastel trained the beast to kill so he could become famous for killing it - but we'll never know the truth.

*Broker demons are beings of mid-tier power unsuited for battle. They gain power and influence by trading favors and artifacts with humans with unbreakable oaths forged either by contracts or flaming handshakes. Their modus operandi is influenced by crossroads demons in "Supernatural" and general deal with the devil tropes.

*And we introduce Amity! Rest assured, more of our favorites from canon will be adapted into this work. And it has been very fun planning their powers and backstories.

I hope that you all enjoyed this. There is much more to come! As always, leave a review! I love hearing your thoughts. May your inspiration flow freely!