The Templar Chronicles: Freedom's Price
Chapter 2: The Hunters of Men

Gawain slowly swam out of the fog of his fevered sleep and opened his eyes. He immediately shut them again because it was bright and shiny, wherever he was. The second thing he noticed was that his head was pounding, and his muscles ached and burned from his head to his toes. His initial reaction to these observations was confusion, if I am dead why do I still feel so bad? Surely, the afterlife wouldn’t start with pain. He looked around and saw that he was lying on a bed with a wet towel lying against his forehead. A bass gravely chuckle came from his right hand side followed closely by, “Medicine may have advanced far over this past millennia but not in a pinch with limited supplies. I am sorry that I had to resort to the old methods to break your fever.”

Gawain’s eyes popped open and he snapped his head to the right. He immediately regretted this decision as it caused a wave of electrifying pain beginning from the base of his neck to shoot through his entire head forcing his eyes closed again. When the pain had subsided once more to a dull throb, he opened his eyes and looked to see a large armored man sitting on a small chair that barley seemed to be supporting his weight.

He was a black man, and he appeared to be in his mid to late thirties though his eyes and expression seemed far older. He had the beginnings of a beard and looked as though he had just woken up as well, though in a much better health. His hair was short and well maintained; it clashed with the dark, scruffy hair growing on his face. The man appeared incredibly well built with massive rippling muscles across his whole body, and he must have weighed at least two hundred and fifty pounds if not more, and that would not include the armor he was wearing on top of his already sizable frame. Gawain took in these details quickly. What held his gaze and confused him the most was the symbol on the man’s chest. Why do I know that tree? Gawain wondered to himself about the importance of the symbol. His fatigue and pounding headache were responsible for his colossal lapse of memory, and it kept the answer floating somewhere just out of his grasp.

“How are you feeling?” The large man leaned forward and looked more closely into Gawain’s eyes. The chair gave a reproachful squeak under the motion.

“Tired, and my head hurts” Gawain responded truthfully, he was still wondering who this man was, he looked nothing like the doctors Gawain had visited his whole life, where am I exactly?

“That is to be expected after what you have been through these past few days.” His eyes expressed his genuine concern.

Gawain closed his eyes again as the horror of the last night and the days before came rushing back to him: his capture, the cruel march across the open country without proper footwear, and the chase that came later. It had all congealed into one big blur of pain and confusion in his mind that now was difficult to sort out. “Who are you?” Gawain asked opening his eyes, suddenly intensely curious as to how this man came to be by his bedside, and why he seemed to know what had happened to him when he clearly had not had the opportunity to tell anyone.

The large man sat back in his chair, “An excellent question and probably the first thing I should have told you, but I was concerned about your wellbeing and decided to inquire about that before introductions could be made. My name is Jericho and I am a Templar Knight.”

Gawain was confused and enlightened in the same moment. He now remembered why that red tree looked so familiar. The symbol of the Templar was everywhere in the Kingdom as were the trees themselves. It represented the strength and endurance of the Templar, and they were the government of the greatest nation that had ever come to be, or so I have been told. They lived incredibly long lives, had powers outside the bounds of nature and were incredibly skilled both on and off the battlefield. They were rarely seen in the provincial towns like Gawain’s and had become almost like mythical creatures to those who lived in places like Kent and never left their hometowns. Though truth be told, if one went to any major city there was always a substantial presence of Templar Knights throughout, and they were always well known amongst the local populace. What Gawain was really confused about, was why he was lying next to a Templar Knight rather than the doctor that he would have expected to see. Why would they have someone so important waste their time on me? I haven’t done anything interesting enough to be the focus of someone like him.

Jericho was studying the Gawain’s face. As far as he could tell, the knight was trying to gauge his reaction to this news. Gawain was sure that all he would see was confusion, for that was a large part of what he felt. Jericho sat content to wait for him to respond, and, though Gawain had forgotten, he had not yet introduced himself.

Jericho was using the time to reevaluate the boy now that the strain of keeping him alive was over. Gawain’s hair, which had appeared dark in the night, was actually a reddish brown color that fit well with his tanned body. His eyes were a light green, a color oddly reminiscent of white grapes, which stood out greatly against his sun-darkened face. His face was angular with a heavy jaw. Though he was unmistakably handsome, there was something wild about his appearance that would put most people off when they first met him. Jericho later concluded that it was Gawain’s eyes that disturbed him the most. Gawain knew well how disconcerting they could be, for not many people had been able to maintain eye contact with him for long.

After the silence had stretched out for almost a full minute, both men studying the other, Gawain could no longer stand the pressure, “My name is Gawain, I live and work in the town of Kent as a common laborer for the Southern Lumber Company.” His voice was soft and tired but it had an edge of pride almost as if he felt he had to defend his common life to this uncommon man.

Jericho chuckled again, amused as he always was by the young and brash, he composed himself, “And well met indeed, Gawain. I am sure you are wondering why I am here.”

That is an understatement, Gawain thought to himself.

“And the answer is quite simple. The first reason, and the least interesting, is that I am here because I was assigned to be. The second, and the more interesting, I am here because you are. You may not realize it but you are the first person to have escaped capture from a situation like the one in which you found yourself.” Jericho’s tone was flat and even as he spoke, as if it were all very matter of fact even though the nature of the conversation was much graver. Though for Gawain, the new information was getting more and more interesting, they had finally sent someone to clean up the mess.

He had actually known that he was the first to escape from one of the collection squads that attacked the fringe towns infrequently. The fact that in the past whosoever the enemy captured was never seen nor heard from again was part of the reason that he was so determined to escape. He was not ready to disappear. However, he was still confused as to why the Knight was taking such an interest in him, the tale of his escape was not that difficult to understand as it was not that hard for him to have gotten away in the first place.

Jericho was still speaking as Gawain thought all this through, “Last night you were saved first by the men of the Garrison where we are now; and secondly by me. If I had not been on site shortly after they found you, you would have died there on the fields close to our border. By the arts of the Templar, you were brought back from the brink, and I have stayed with you for the rest of the night to ensure that you would not relapse, which does sometimes happen, though rarely. But now if you are feeling up to it I must ask you a few questions.”

Gawain felt a wave of gratitude descend on him, he was grateful to the merciful heavens and to the man when he realized that the Knight had actually taken the effort to perform one of the healings of legend upon him, a commoner from Kent. No one from home was going to believe it, not that he would have been likely to tell any of them anyway. “I am sure you do, and I’ll be happy to do answer what I can.”

This was the first time that Gawain spoke at a normal volume; all his previous comments had been in whispered tones as he was replaceing his voice again after having been silent for almost three days straight, not to mention the horrible abuse his throat had taken in last night’s chase. His voice sent a shiver down Jericho’s spine. It was a cold, sardonic voice, though he meant all he had said with perfect sincerity.

Jericho’s face fell. Gawain could practically see the wave of pity that all those who were unaccustomed to his bitter voice first heard it. Jericho quickly hid the expression, but Gawain had seen it. Instead, the knight pressed on, “Well Gawain I really must know all of your experience that I might be better able to put an end to this business once and for all.”

“Well, the story is not a short one, and I do not promise that all I saw was real. I have no idea what they may have hid from me or made me think while I was with them. I will tell you the most complete version I can.”

“That is all I ask for.”

“Very well, then here it goes…” and with that Gawain launched into his story starting back in his town of Kent in the province of Granada. Gawain began by describing the lumber mill at which he had worked for the past year or so. The lumber mill was the only major industry in Kent. Kent was a small town. So small, that there was not even someone who needed a horse much less who owned one. The next town over was almost thirty kilometers away, but that did not matter, as like every town in the Kingdom it was connected to the rail network. Not that many people from Kent actually used the trains to travel much, most everybody was content to stay in Kent for their whole lives. Nevertheless, every town in the Kingdom was connected to the lines in order that troops and supplies might be readily moved at any given time. It was on this rail network the day before that Jericho and his horse had ridden in from the city of Granada itself to arrive in time to save Gawain’s life.

A company that ran the entire lumber industry in southern Granada owned the lumber mill. The company operated by a set of rules that they used in all their branches throughout Granada. They began by dividing the labor pool into work teams, then dividing its work teams into squads who each had a quota for the day. Gawain and his squad mates had been competing against the rest of their team to see who could be done first that day and they had been doing well. They almost had finished their quota two hours after lunch when the attack came.

Gawain described how they had been unobservant as the enemy slowly and stealthily surrounded them and the other two squads who were in the work area. Before they had known what was happening, somewhere near forty men came charging from every direction. They were wearing all black and each of them was carrying a sword and shield. The lumberjacks tried to fend them off with their tools and the heavy equipment, but the element of surprise was against them. They were quickly overwhelmed as the enemy cut down almost half of the men who had stood against them. Gawain, who had been in one of the trucks at the time, was captured as he jumped out to make a break for it.

Had Gawain been paying more attention, he may have heard the man moving behind him, but before Gawain could react, the man struck Gawain on the head with the pommel of his sword. When he came to, he was tied together with rope behind the rest of those who were still alive. There were twelve or thirteen still breathing and he was the end of the train; next to Carl, who had lost the last two digits of the index and middle fingers on his left hand in the struggle. Gawain remembered that they had bled the whole march. They had stripped him and the others of the majority of their clothing, leaving them barefoot and in shorts. The men who had attacked them moved quickly expecting a counter attack at any moment and quickly led them out of the forest at a quick trot. As they were leaving, the edge of the camp Gawain saw, something glimmer in the sun. Quickly and without breaking stride with the rest of the group, he scooped down, grabbed the object off the ground, and stuffed it in his pocket. He held onto the one hope that he had, and prepared for the long march before nightfall when he could make his move. At this point, the story became confused in Gawain’s head, and only after many pauses and heavy thinking was he able to sort out the actual time span of the rest of the story.

He faltered for a moment in the retelling. The march had been difficult and exhausting. That, combined with the rather large bump on his head, had left his memories of the interim was fuzzy and confused. What he did remember was that they did not move quickly during that first day only covering around ten kilometers. It was harder than Gawain would have believed to keep a dozen men who were roped together moving at a constant pace. They had constantly pulled each other off balance, and if one of them fell the entire column had to stop so that they would not all get tangled together further delaying the process.

Gawain related how it had occurred to him and the others that this might be the way they could be rescued. If they could stall long enough maybe the company would inform the local garrison and they would not already be too far away to be helped. Their captors would have none of it however, viciously pummeling anyone who fell until they had risen to their feet once more, quickly encouraging the lumberjacks to stay on their feet.

When night finally fell, they were separated and placed under guard. This made escape impossible for Gawain, he was being too closely watched, and did not want to lose his chance to foolhardiness or impatience. He had to wait out another long day of marching under the sun through open fields before the opportunity presented itself. At nightfall, they met with another group of these strange, cloaked men coming from another direction. Gawain’s captors stopped to communicate with this other group, leaving only two guards to watch the still roped together men. Gawain took out the pocketknife he had been hiding and cut his bonds in a few short seconds. Before any of the darkly clad men knew what was happening Gawain was off and running on a hard northerly path directly towards the forest where he had and the others had come from. He had run through the night falling and passing out a few yards from the edge of the forest, and the rest Jericho already knew.

Jericho had sat passively absorbing all that Gawain had to say, not wanting to taint or interfere with Gawain’s first retelling with questions or comments. When he was sure that Gawain had finished all that, he had to say, Jericho intoned, “That is an interesting story Gawain and I am glad that you managed to be so resourceful, but I need to know some more specific details if I may?” Gawain nodded, permitting Jericho’s inquiry. “What did your captors specifically look like, how did they move, how did they speak, what did they say, and what gear did they have?”

Gawain thought back and suddenly came to a startling conclusion, “You know they never spoke to one another the whole time I was with them!” He sat up and stared at Jericho as he suddenly appreciated the extreme strangeness of this fact. His voice and heartbeat rose together. Why hadn’t they? That was strange even to someone who was usually quiet like Gawain. How did they stay organized? His mind reeled and he was starting to hyperventilate as the fear of the previous nights and days returned to grip his heart and chest.

“I need you to calm down Gawain, just start with a description of what they looked like.” Jericho pa mailed hand against Gawain’s body forcing him back into a lying down position. “Breathe slowly and regain your calm, when you are ready you may answer the question.”

Gawain grimaced at the patronizing tone and at the cold touch of the metal on his bare skin, but realized that he was losing control and slowed his breathing. When he had fully composed himself, he answered the question, “They were all the same height around a meter and a half tall. They all wore the same heavy black cloaks with hoods pulled over their faces. They had mail under their cloaks, and wore heavy shod boots. Each of them carried a sword, dagger, and a shield.” Once again, Gawain was struck by his memories, he had not thought much of it at the time, but reflecting back on it now it was also very strange that the men all seemed to be exactly the same height.

“And how did they move, was it what you would call normal human motions, or did they appear strange to you in any way?” Jericho’s voice was barely above a whisper, his dark eyes lost in thought.

Gawain thought on this a moment, he remembered the way they moved was odd, too fluid and too graceful for normal men. “They moved like cats, like the predator cats from the hills. Fluid and fast is the best way I can describe them. I noticed it most when they were chasing me. It was terrible; they never seemed to get tired. I started out with a big lead on them as they got themselves organized to track me, but even still they were able to keep up and then gain on me with ease.”

Jericho nodded; he had gotten most of the questions he wanted to have answered out of the way. Gawain had grown weary and wanted to go back to sleep, but Jericho had one more question for him, “Did they seem to have a leader of any sort, was there one with them who looked nothing like them. Maybe even spoke to them to give orders?”

“Not in the group that had captured me, but when our group met up with the other. I remember seeing a short, bald man. He had a sharp, nasty voice. I do not remember anything of what he said as I was getting ready to run at that point.” Gawain tried to reach back to the smallest details that he could remember. It taxed his tired mind.

“Thank you Gawain, you may not think it, but you have been a great help to both me and to your country today. Now I must insist that you get some sleep. Tomorrow you can return home when you are ready.” His voice was firm but kind. He got up to go but was stopped when Gawain asked him another question.

“Sir?”

“Yes Gawain?” Jericho turned to face him now standing over him.

“I don’t think that I can go home yet.”

“And why is that Gawain, do you not want to see your family?”

“It’s not that, I just don’t know how I can go back to town and face all the people whose family members are still imprisoned. I don’t think everyone will be thrilled that I cut and run.” As Gawain spoke, his voice broke and his eyes filled with moisture. He was afraid of facing more ridicule from a town that hated him. Gawain silently cursed his weakness in front of this man who had probably not cried in the past thirty years, but worse still was that he felt anything for or about those people at all. As far as he was concerned, they did not deserve it.

Jericho’s heart was already heavy after that conversation. Nevertheless, he sighed and he sat back down; he was hoping to have avoided undue stress on the young man until he was better recovered. Jericho’s voice shifted into a flowing, practiced cadence. It was one he had used on several occasions when talking with distressed soldiers new to the travails of combat. He pronounced this first sentence slowly with great deliberation. He stressed the significance of his words, “That is not your fault.” After that, his flow returned to normal but his tone was laden with care, “No matter what any man or woman says to you, Gawain. You escaped and the others did not. That does not make you any better or worse than me or anybody. In fact I know without the shadow of a doubt that if you had tried to help your friends that you would be dead right now. Do not for an instant believe that what you did was wrong. You brought your story to me, and with it, I may be able to save many more lives; if for no other reason than that, your flight across the plains was well worth it.”

Gawain looked at Jericho with new respect. This man knew most of what he had been thinking, as if he had opened his mind and read the thoughts that lay there. Whether or not he knew it, this Knight had just won Gawain’s admiration. Something no one else had earned in his nineteen years of life, something he thought no one could earn.

Jericho watched in some puzzlement as Gawain fell silent. A new flame awoke in Gawain’s chest in that moment, that confused him at first. He was intensely curious about this human being; he wanted to know why this man was so special and what made him choose the life that he had. Perhaps most importantly, he wanted to know if all Templar were like this. Gawain decided that if he could, he would replace out before he went home.

However, Jericho could not take the time to replace that out right now. He had pressing needs elsewhere. This time when he stood up, he spook with a finality as he moved to the door, “Now if you will excuse me Gawain I really must begin my day, and you really need to get some rest.”

“Thank you Knight, for saving my life.” Gawain called to Jericho’s retreating figure with all the gratitude he could, it did not come easily though he meant it.

Jericho turned and came back to the door. He looked straight into the young man’s eyes, “I live to serve all believers.” And with that, he shut the door and walked away down the hall leaving Gawain to his thoughts, which at that point were spinning.

Jericho closed the door as softly as he could. He turned down the hall trying to be as quiet as possible; this effort was somewhat hindered by the mail boots that he wore that rattled and clunked no matter how soft he attempted to make his footfalls. He was going to speak with Captain Grom in his office. However, when he arrived at the Captain’s room he was just waking up and Jericho was content to wait with his thoughts outside.

Jericho was impressed with the boy’s fortitude. It was not every man, woman, and child who could get up and hold a solid conversation after having run numerous kilometers only five hours before. He was reminded of what he had been told about the Granada province when he was just beginning his education as a knight: these people were hardy. Granada was the southwestern most province of the nine that were in the Kingdom, and though all of them experienced a constant demonic presence and threat, Granada’s was the worst. They shared the largest and warmest border with the no-man’s-lands to the south. As a result, there were demons and their thralls in far greater numbers than anywhere else in the Kingdom. Not to mention that old Mexico City was close, in geographic terms. It had become the North American stronghold of evil and it was generally agreed amongst the citizens of Avalon that the farther the distance from that accursed place the better.

The people who lived and worked in Granada had to be tough and gritty in order to live near such dangers. Though, it was also commonly said that this quality made it impossible to befriend a Granadan; they were far too standoffish and cold. This belief had also lead to a series of ironic jokes involving how the people of Granada could be so cold and live in such a warm place. However, the strength and fortitude of the men and women from the small and dusty province of Granada was widely regarded as the cornerstone of the empire, theirs was the first gate that had to fall if any major demonic offensive was to succeed in harming the Kingdom. The Captain, his troops, and now this Gawain were testaments to the fact that Granada would never fall easily.

Jericho smiled again as the Captain burst out of his room. “My apologies Knight, I had no intentions to keep you waiting though it seems that I have overslept some.” His words were quick and apologetic, though when it looked that “overslept” could have lasted a few more hours without complaint.

This man will never relax around me, oh well it will not have been the first time, Jericho thought to himself and he could not keep the amusement out of his voice. “And Good Morning to you Captain. You have not kept me waiting long, in truth I was not really here, my thoughts were elsewhere.” With these words, his face darkened, for he now had to confirm this man’s worst fears about what they were to fight. “Captain I spoke with our ward this morning on the subject of his capture and escape.”

“Oh?” The Captain looked up from buckling his belt around his waist with sudden and fervent interest in his eyes.

“Gawain, as that is his proper name, was most informative, and based on the information he provided me,” he sighed heavily, “I am now able to accept the conclusions you drew earlier this morning. We are indeed dealing with the hunter seeker androids that you feared. Worse still is the fact that there is almost certainly a demon leading them, though what degree of demon is still unknown. Based on Gawain’s shaky description, I would surmise that it is no lesser demon, but perhaps not more than one of the middle ranking variety either.”

“Blast and damnation!” The Captain exclaimed his eyes growing wide first at the concept of another demon loose in the land, and second at his language in front of this man of God.

Jericho smiled again, “My, my Captain, remind me never to anger you when you have just woken up I would not want that bile turned against me. I would be interested to see your reaction if I had to have had to inform that we were up against a greater demon or some of the more horrifying things in their arsenal.” He broke out into his deep bass laugh again.

His laugh was contagious and soon had Grom chuckling along with him glad that Jericho had decided not to address the outburst, and to ascribe his spleen to early morning irritability and nothing more. “What are your orders, sir?”

Jericho stopped laughing all traces of his smile vanished from his face, his expression becoming hard and set, as he was ready to get to business. “We must try to capture one of the androids if that is at all possible, I doubt after last night’s escape and subsequent hunt that the original party will have stayed in the area. I believe the best policy may be to set a trap for the next group that is sure to continue this spree. Do you have any soldiers who are more mobile than foot soldiers Captain?”

“I have a few who know how to ride, and there is an APC at our disposal should we need it.” The Captain’s voice was gruff as he realized the implications of setting a trap of this magnitude.

Jericho read the Captain’s expression, knowing that he had doubts about his or perhaps his troops’ ability to fight a demon or his petty machines; he also saw that under that there was something more. He would have to work him up to it, “Captain I have every confidence in your abilities to stop the attacks on our borders, but if you have doubts about any one of your soldiers going out of their territory to fight you should tell me now.”

“It’s not that sir.”

“Then what is it, are you concerned for your equipment, you should know that the Templar would happily replace any equipment the Army may lose in this endeavor?”

“No sir, it isn’t the men or the equipment which we will most certainly lose,” the captain sighed knowing already that to take either an APC or horses out of the Kingdom carried with it guaranteed risks, “It is that I am not sure that the enemy we are going up against can be contended with by mere soldiers.” He did not meet Jericho’s eye, making the Knight even more interested in what the Captain was holding back from him.

Jericho surmised that he could ask now, “And why not Captain, what are you not telling me?”

“Those androids, these hunter seekers that we saw last night, I have encountered them before, they give me… well the willies, sir. I have run into the type twos and the type threes but never anything this advanced, and I am afraid that they will be able to easily avoid any ambush or trap we might set for them.” Grom met Jericho’s eyes now trying to impress upon him the seriousness of what he was saying. “They are incredibly deadly adversaries Knight; they have thermal imaging and built in radar that can cover a two kilometer span around them. They are faster and stronger than any normal man, or woman for that matter, and to make the situation worse they cannot be harmed by our conventional firearms and will have to be engaged in close quarter combat unless we ship in the energy weapons that are reserved for major engagements. Even then, they are tough as nails, made of steel and reinforced wire. I just can’t see my sixty soldiers capturing any significant number of those things.”

Jericho sighed, he recognized the wisdom in those words, but he was not sure how else to proceed. His mind worked furiously, would those lives be worth it if they could get the central processor out of the android? If it were successful, we would have an exact location of the enemy base and would be able to save any survivors who were there and put an end to these raids for at least another year, maybe two. Then again, if these androids were as advanced as the Captain is suggesting, would it not then possible that they would have built in defenses against any attempts against hacking, maybe even a self-destructive device? Perhaps the traditional methods would not work here at all. But what else is there ... Jericho looked down at the Captain with solemn eyes. “Very well Captain, the point is conceded. However, until you or I can come up with a better plan, we are going to have to work with this one. And, I still want that meeting with your more mobile troops. We will have to come up with something creative to thwart these hunters of men.”

The Captain smiled a fierce and eager grin, “I am sure that something a little unconventional will catch those demons off-guard long enough for us to put a stop to this.” He stalked away to rally the five or six that he had in mind to speak with Jericho.

I hope your right Captain, I really do. Jericho thought as he watched the Captain march off with a renewed spring in his step, having his advice taken by this Knight of God seemed to please him greatly. Jericho sighed another heavy sigh. Already he was missing the time he had spent off rotation. Sleep was a precious commodity only absent when it was needed most. There was always too much to do and he was not even close to resolving this issue. He grimaced as he realized that he would just have to get by on the hour or two’s meditation. It was almost like sleep and it did refresh his body, but it just was not the same as spending a recuperative night in a bed. Jericho set his jaw and followed the Captain.