The Emerging Part I: Dream
CHAPTER XV

He glares through his hood as he gazes at the landscape before him. The mountains jut into the night sky. His eyes pierce through the air. He sees ripples, distortions caused by his own heat. He believes he can see future events materializing before his eyes.

He smiles sinisterly.

He reaches out with his aura to create a sensing hand of pure, raw sigo. Anything his sensing hand touches balks in fright. He can feel the fear of animals, travelers, even plants. He smiles sinisterly.

He glances from the peak of a nameless mountain. He sees Mount Titan stretching endlessly in the dim night, the dark stone of the mountain blending with the sky. He feels envy at the name that all of Munda Luna recognizes.

He turns from the tallest peak in all of Munda Luna to gaze at the western horizon where the sun has nearly set, only the smallest trickle of the sun’s light creep upon Munda Luna. He sees an eery white light begin stretching onto Munda Luna from behind him.

He does not look at the right crescent moon that rises but feels his apprentice has returned. He turns on his heels to glance at his apprentice. He watches as his apprentice collapses to her knees, exhaustion encompassing all of her aura.

He snarls at his apprentice sending heated fire through her aura in punishment for a display of such weakness. He watches as his apprentice then rises, fully composed. He moves to punish his apprentice even further, but pauses as he feels a blur just on the edge of his aura. He turns on his heels, forcing his sensing hand to focus on the blur. When he realizes he has finally found what he has long searched for, he allows his apprentice to rest for the evening with a wave of dismissal.

He feels the blur becoming a wonderful acquaintance, a warm hand guiding his aura to his potential doom. He cocks an eyebrow in defiance and sends a powerful scorch of fire through his aura to command the blur to his bidding. The blur cowers in fear just as he expected.

He smiles sinisterly.

The horizon snatches the last of the sun’s rays as Vaiqon, Hawk, Desert, Santhemum, Fox, and Pork dismount from their horses and erect their tents for their camp. Hawk glances around them into the forest that sprung forth only a few hours ago. He believes he can feel possible prey in the forest, his predator instincts overwhelming his mind.

Vaiqon can feel Hawk’s untrained sensing hand stretching into the forest. Vaiqon smiles as he realizes, not for the first time, how much potential the young man has within him. He forges a quick connection with his fellow Daijoks at the Injhihato where he allows the detection of Hawk’s sensing hand to worm through the aura connection.

When the Daijoks each agree that Hawk has quite an extraordinary potential, Vaiqon severs the connection and silences the children that have been enjoying Fox’s acrobatic feats of flips and mid-air spins.

“I do grow tired of dried meat and fruit and stale bread,” Vaiqon begins. He turns to Hawk, “Perhaps you could prove to us all that you really are the best hunter in all of Karacrross, Hawk.”

Hawk smiles widely, “Of course I can,” he says already gazing into the forest with his instincts overtaking his body.

“But do take one of your friends with you,” Vaiqon adds, “would not want you to become lost.”

Hawk raises an eyebrow, but nods his head nonetheless. He then gazes at Desert, Santhemum, Fox, and Pork. He sees Pork begin to rise from the ground as he and Hawk have always hunted together, but when Hawk shakes his head nearly imperceptibly and points at Fox, Pork cannot stifle his gape and slams back onto the ground.

Fox guises Pork’s disgust with an ecstatic flip to join Hawk, but Desert’s perceptive eyes behind the slits of his scarf notice all of Pork’s disgust in not being chosen to hunt with his supposed best friend. Desert smiles as he watches Hawk and Fox disappear into the forest.

Desert moves next to Pork where he then states, “Porker, you and Hawky are best friends.”

“So I thought,” Pork replies, shrugging his shoulders.

Desert smiles behind his scarf, “Maybe you aren’t as good a friends as you thought.”

Pork stares at Desert, suspicion growing in his mind. He shakes his head, “No, we are still best friends. He’s just always wanting to make new friends, that’s all. He even talked to Santhemum when there was almost no need to do so. Who does that?!” Pork exclaims a little too loud, provoking Vaiqon and Santhemum to break from their quiet stupors to glance at them.

Desert and Pork ignore the stares the best they can, but remain quiet as they stare at the stars in the night sky. Vaiqon pries his way into the boys’ auras for just the briefest of moments. He scratches his head when he feels nothing but a void from Desert’s aura and absolute disgust from Pork’s aura. He shivers involuntarily.

Hawk and Fox stalk through the forest, their steps barely making more than a scuffle along the fallen leaves. Hawk leads seemingly without a discernible path. Fox becomes agitated with Hawk’s meandering.

“What’re you doing?!” Fox whispers, his frustration clear in his voice.

Hawk turns his head to glare at Fox. Placing his finger on his lips, he says, “Doing what?”

Fox spreads his arms out wide, “This? Are you even hunting? Or just walking around like a fool?”

Hawk chuckles, “Fox, you’ve never hunted with me before. This is how I hunt. I don’t know how, I can’t explain it, but I don’t have to hunt like others. I just have this sense that leads to me to my prey.”

Fox rolls his eyes until he sees Hawk straighten suddenly, his eyes wide but clouded.

“Hawk?” Fox asks worriedly.

Hawk soon returns to himself. He merely points to his right where he stalks through a few bushes into a small clearing where a small boar sniffs the ground casually. Fox gapes but does not give Hawk the satisfaction of admitting he was impressed.

Hawk turns to Fox, points at the tree next to the boar, and motions for the dagger at Fox’s side. Fox nods as he stealthily creeps away. Hawk watches carefully for Fox to climb the tree and then out onto the branch overlooking the boar. Hawk gives a signal but just as Fox moves to jump on the boar, he brushes a few leaves to shake from the branch, causing some of the leaves to dance to the ground next to the boar.

The small boar begins to squeal in loud cries of protest. The small boar tries to rush off into the brush behind it, but Hawk moves quickly and strikes out with the dagger given to him by Vaiqon.

He makes contact with the small boar’s hind leg, forcing the boar to collapse to the ground with an even higher pitched whine. Hawk motions to Fox to jump down, but at that moment, a deep snort echoes from behind the brush.

Fox freezes on the branch as Hawk glares at the brush behind the small boar. At that moment, a gigantic, full-grown mother boar tears fro the brush to protect her offspring.

The small boar emits a sound of relief and tears into the brush behind its mother. The mother boar does not return to the brush, but instead glares at Hawk from behind tusks that have grown nearly a foot.

Hawk gulps as he watches the mother boar pound the ground as if preparing to charge. He nods to Fox just as he throws his dagger into the boar’s side as he dives to his right.

The mother boar squeals in pain and anger, but does not collapse. Hawk circles the mother boar until she is in prime position for Fox to pounce on the mother boar. Fox does not hesitate and drops from the branch with force, driving his dagger deep into the mother boar’s back.

The mother boar squeals and collapses from the combination of Fox’s jump and the pain of Fox’s stab. Fox does not hesitate to grab Hawk’s dagger that protrudes from the boar’s left side, then slices cleanly along the mother boar’s jugular vein.

The squeals of the mother boar end soon after, Hawk and Fox rejoice with pats on each other’s backs. They smile at one another, then frown as they realize they must carry the massive boar back to camp on their shoulders.

Hawk and Fox emerge from the forest shocking all with their kill. Hawk and Fox exchange another smile as Hawk then moves to gut the boar and ready it for the spit that Fox sets to create from the wood around the camp.

Not long after, the boar’s juices crackle and pop as they fall into the fire and the group’s unified sounds of chewing fill the void of the silent night. Vaiqon pries into the auras of the children briefly.

Vaiqon feels happiness and pride emitting from Hawk and Fox, as well as a growing bond that he is sure will be rather fruitful in the future. He feels a silkiness from Santhemum that shocks him given her past. And he feels that same void and disgust from Desert and Pork who both appear as if they are being punished.

Vaiqon shrugs. As the children stuff themselves, he pauses at mere contentment, then says to the children, “Well, we have yet another long day of travel ahead of yes. Some rest will be most invaluable.”

The children do not groan but rush into their tents and fall asleep almost instantly. Vaiqon smiles as he extinguishes the fire with ire and creates an air mattress in his tent where he soon falls into yet another restless sleep.