4Everlasting @byzarrrr - Tumblr Blog

Jul 16

Leuvis's Hunting [Fanfic]

The day Sonju was taken hunting in Goldy Pond was the day he finally understood his brother.

"Are you sure he'll be alright?"

Lord Bayon underestimated Sonju's hearing. The young Prince listened as the aristocrat whispered to Leuvis, his brother.

"I wouldn't have brought him here if I didn't think so, Bayon," said Leuvis, slightly irritated. Palvus the monkey-demon chittered on his shoulder.

"Well…"

Lord Bayon was nervous about more than just that. His eyes lingered on the young outsider. Sonju was a prince, third in line to the throne and Leuvis’s younger brother, and Bayon knew him well enough to know his loyalties, but the change to his centuries-long hunting party unsettled him.

Sonju understood. They hunted live humans, bought and shipped to Bayon’s doorstep, and ate them together with the finest wines the lord could provide. They stole the rightful property of premium farms for their own pleasure; had done for centuries. If his sister, the Queen, found out, her fury alone would kill them all.

The young prince grinned. Bayon had nothing to fear. Legravalima disapproved of many things, including Sonju himself. An opportunity to defy her was the most delectable meat of all.

He recalled the night he left the palace. There Leuvis stood, shrouded in the darkness of the doorway, the glow of his lamp flickering in his black eyes.

“Come,” he said. “Tomorrow you hunt with me.”

These words echoed in Sonju’s mind as the hunters ventured underground: Leuvis, Bayon, Bayon’s servants, Luce, Luce’s servants, Nous, Nouma and himself. The party left Bayon’s estate far behind, their eyes trained on the paradise below.

A forest awaited them up ahead, deep and dark. The artificial sun had only just risen, glimmering red between the trees. It got Sonju’s blood pumping.

“So, when the music starts, the hunt begins?” he asked, drawing his brother’s attention.

Bayon was looking at him again. He could feel his eyes on the back of his neck.

“Exactly,” Leuvis replied, idly scratching Palvus behind the ears. “And when it ends, so does the hunt.”

“I can’t wait!” hissed Luce, slavering uncontrollably. “I can’t wait - hurry! It’s starting soon, hurry!” He was a runtish, yapping demon with a rabble of underlings clambering at his heels. Sonju looked down at him and questioned Bayon’s wisdom.

“I want a juicy fat one!” cried Nous, licking his thin, black lips.

“A young one!” said Nouma.

“What about you, your Highness?” Bayon asked.

"Uh…"

Sonju hadn’t been particular about his targets before. It was arrogant, it was wrong.

“Whatever Brother decides,” he replied finally. This seemed fair - Leuvis was the one who had brought him here, after all.

Leuvis chuckled. “A good answer, indeed.”

“He shall teach you much,” said Bayon, nodding appreciatively. “I daresay you could not find a better teacher.”

“Please, Bayon, no flattery,” Leuvis sighed. “I hear enough of it at court.”

"I mean it."

At that moment, a high, jangling tune pierced the air. It was faint and distant, but unmistakable to their sensitive ears. Luce let out a rebel yell and bounded away with his gang.

Nous and Nouma split away too, their wiry black forms melting into the darkness.

Bayon and Leuvis stood very still, listening.

“There shall be several out at this hour, gathering food,” Bayon mused. “With any luck, there will be prime cuts amongst the offal.”

“One can hope,” said Leuvis. “Good hunting, Bayon.”

Bayon nodded and took a right. “Good hunting, Leuvis, Prince Sonju."

He disappeared into the forest.

Sonju felt Leuvis’s bony hand on his shoulder.

“Come, little brother. Our time is limited.”

"Yes, sir."

Leuvis strode purposefully forward. Sonju followed, eager to keep pace with him. The young prince had been excited with many a tale of Leuvis’s part in the war, long ago. The Grand Duke could not replace the teacher Sonju lost, but no hunter alive was his equal.

Screams echoed from the direction Luce had gone, tangled with the lord's ugly laugh.

"He's fast," said Sonju.

"The fool would dine on blind newborns if he found them," Leuvis muttered.

The young prince wasn't surprised.

“Almost all the humans that live here are rabbits, Sonju,” his brother went on. “Weak, frightened things, unable to do anything but run on feeble little legs. What passion can a hunter find in that?”

They walked further through the forest. A screaming female child shot across their path without even noticing them. Sonju started forward, but Leuvis pulled him back. Seconds later, Luce and his band came shrieking after her.

"Get her! Get her, boys!"

Leuvis sighed and let go. “For heavens’ sake. Come, Sonju.”

The brothers continued on for a few minutes in silence before Leuvis slowed to a stop. He lifted the brim of his hat as he cast his eyes to the dark canopy above.

“How many do you sense, little brother?”

Sonju concentrated. Four. No, five humans. Their presences were mildly sensitive to the demons’ sensation, coming stronger from the left. They were perfectly immobile, each spread a certain distance apart from one another - except for one.

“Five, Brother,” said Sonju. “Waiting.”

A grin creaked between the plates of Leuvis’s mask. “Not hiding?”

“Unlikely,” said Sonju, frowning. “They're too evenly spread out - almost a perfect circle. There's one I'm not sure about - it's further away.”

Leuvis pressed his shoulder, showing all his teeth in a fierce grin. “Wonderful. We may hunt tigers yet!”

He nudged the prince in the direction of their targets.

“Surprise them, little brother."

“What about you?”

“I’ll be along,” Leuvis replied. “Good hunting.”

Sonju beamed. “Good hunting, Brother.”

Slipping into the undergrowth, spear in hand, the young prince trained his senses on his yet-unseen targets. None of them had budged an inch from their positions, and he was convinced that they lay in ambush.

He took a deep, slow breath. He had to treat this like any other hunt. Forget what his brother was doing, what the others were doing.

They were close now. Strangely, one human remained much farther than the others.

Sonju frowned. If this was an ambush, why would one detach themselves from the group? Was it just a hiding child, unrelated to the others? No. Sonju stopped and focused. No, this human was still in the immediate area. Yet its presence was faint.

He twitched. No. It wasn’t distance that made it faint - it was height. A lookout, perhaps, or a sniper.

Anticipation bubbling in his gut, Sonju crept forward. If he got this one first, their plan would suffer a heavy blow. Maybe even collapse.

A bony hand pressed his shoulder. Sonju turned slightly to see the Grand Duke crouched by his side, keeping to the shadows of the trees.

“What’re you waiting for, little brother?” he whispered.

Sonju lifted his head and pointed. “There’s one up high, right there. If I go any closer, it’ll spot me.”

“Very good,” said Leuvis. “Now what will you do?”

“I’m going to bring it down.”

“Oh?” Sonju could hear the amusement in his brother’s voice. “From this distance?”

“Yeah. I can do it.”

He reached behind to take his bow, but stopped. Under his brother's watchful eyes, he lifted his spear.

"I'll use this."

“You will be giving your prey a weapon with which to hunt you, little brother,” Leuvis warned, but there was a gleam in his eyes.

He was right. Not only that, but an arrow would more surely and easily find its mark.

Sonju smiled. His brother's excitement was infectious. “Well, that’ll make things more interesting, won’t it?”

Leuvis stared for a good few seconds before stifling a laugh. “I like it. Go!”

The prince shifted his position, shuffling left and right as he peered through the thick foliage for his target.

Finally, he saw her. A female - young, no more than ten years of age - perched on a high branch up ahead. She held a rifle in her hands, poised and ready.

Sonju took aim.

The girl never knew what hit her. The spearhead sliced through the trees and cut straight through her neck, severing the head. Screams filled the air as her body tipped and fell.

Sonju dashed forward, the thrill of success pumping through his body. He heard the girl’s body hit the ground and the panicked scattering of feet.

She was key to their plan. Now they have nothing.

He reached a clearing, where the girl’s body lay headless and bleeding. The surviving children were spreading out in all directions. No matter - Sonju would find them all.

Charging forward, he heard a snap. In the seconds it took to react, his leg was snatched out from under him and his world flipped upside down and he was yanked into the air.

Sonju forced his head up, dizzy from the shock.

“What the--?”

His leg was tied by a long piece of rope, fastened onto a spry tree branch bending overhead.

He was snared like a rabbit.

There was a terrible howl, and Sonju looked to see a dark-skinned boy running full pelt towards him with Sonju’s spear in his hands. The hate in his eyes shocked Sonju into action.

Using all his weight, Sonju swung himself as hard as he could. When he was high enough, he threw out his arms and slashed the rope with his nails. He dropped and landed hard on his side, coughing as dust flew up. With the boy steps away, the prince kicked up dirt and used the seconds it spared to rise and lunge.

The boy screamed, but not from fear. Hatred, anguish, the cry of victory lost. He knew it was over.

The battle, if it could be called that, was over. The boy lay dead at Sonju's feet.

The prince inspected his prey curiously. He could be no older than the female he killed. His hands were bloody, and the blood stained the shaft of Sonju’s spear.

Leuvis came out from the trees, chuckling. “That was quite the spectacle."

“I was careless,” Sonju muttered, his face reddening.

“Indeed," said the elder. "But you’ve hunted nothing but rabbits since you could throw a spear. It’s no wonder.”

Sonju knelt and rummaged in his pouch.

“The others are getting away,” said Leuvis, merely pointing out a fact rather than urging his brother on.

“It’ll only take a minute.”

Sonju picked out a Vida flower, its petals closed and pale. He looked at the boy and remembered the murderous look on his face. He had aimed to kill. Abandoned by his friends, he alone stood to fight.

The stem pierced his heart, and the flowers opened, flushing red with the life the gods had created.

In the quiet, he remembered his teacher’s words: “Never forget what it means to hunt life.”

“It’s been a long time since I’ve seen anyone do that,” Leuvis remarked. “How nostalgic.”

“I’m returning what I borrowed,” said Sonju, standing.

His brother came closer, circling the body. Sonju could see the pure, animal glee in his face. “You saw his eyes too, yes? That was a tiger you killed.”

Leuvis bent down and put a hand on the boy’s still chest. “It was short-lived, and foolish, but you showed my brother human spirit. My thanks.”

Sonju, who had never seen this brother thank anyone sincerely before, could only stare.

“Come,” said Leuvis. “Your prey is escaping.”

The prince resumed the hunt, but as he picked each child off, one by one, his suspicions were confirmed. Without their leaders, the sniper girl and the boy, their camaraderie disintegrated. They sabotaged one another, screamed and cried, and ran as fast as their legs could take them. It was so easy, Sonju had time to plant a Vida flower in each body before the music stopped.

Leuvis followed Sonju without a word. He didn’t bother to do more than hang back, in perfect view of the fleeing prey. He didn’t care that the children soiled themselves at the sight of him and ran half-mad into the arms of death. He didn't care for their screams, or their desperate acts of self-preservation. They didn’t even reflect in his eyes.

The last boy dropped to the ground and buried his face in his hands, unable or unwilling to move. Sonju stepped forward. Leuvis, who was reclining against a nearby tree, turned his face away.

“Watch me, Brother,” said Sonju, annoyed.

“My own blood, putting down a half-dead rabbit? Spare me the sight.”

Sonju raised his spear and struck. The boy never moved again.

As he prepared the Vida flower, Leuvis spoke. The weariness in his voice made Sonju pause and listen.

“See what we’ve been reduced to, little brother,” he said. “Hunting mewling infants. In my youth I battled warriors. I was feared and hated, but my foes fought me for everything they had and everything I took from them. I responded in kind, and my very blood sang with joy. I am feared and hated still, but if my infamy cannot return the thrill of those days - what good is it? Damnit boy, put that away!”

In a rush of wind, Leuvis closed in, snatched the flower from Sonju's fingers and crushed it under his foot.

“Stop!” Sonju screamed. “Brother, stop!”

Palvus hissed. Its master was unrepentant. “How can you have pride, bestowing such a thing on lives so pitiful?”

“It’s not about pride!” Sonju shouted. “It’s about humility!”

“You feel no shame? That one you killed wasn’t even a rabbit. It was fodder.”

“It was a life!” cried Sonju. “All life has value - and deserves respect!”

Leuvis laughed a short, bitter laugh, and Sonju realised how angry he was. “Oh, dear, pious brother of mine, how I disagree!”

“Remove your foot now!”

“I suppose your teacher taught you these things,” said Leuvis. “The old ways. That’s why he died.”

Sonju’s hands shook. “He was murdered.”

“He was a fool,” said Leuvis quietly. “Now you practise a dead religion in the stead of a dead man, on unworthy fodder, in a world that rewards faith with death! Do you not see how pointless it is?”

That’s when Sonju struck. Howling, he lunged, spear-point for his brother’s eyes. Leuvis sprang back laughing out of Sonju’s range. He stood like the shadow of death itself in the red sunlight, smirking.

He had the Vida flower in his fingers.

“Take it back!” Sonju panted.

“Hum?”

“Take back what you said about him!”

“What’s this? A brother’s quarrel?”

It was Bayon. The lord approached from the trees between the two brothers, casting curious glances at their faces.

“'Tis indeed,” said Leuvis. “Stay back, Bayon. My little brother is quite angry.”

He turned his attention to Sonju, slowly twisting the Vida’s stem between his fingertips. He then pierced the stem through his cloak until only the flowers were visible.

“How about this? If you manage to take this flower from my person, I will retract my words.”

Sonju set his jaw and readied his spear. “Fine. And what do I give you?”

His brother’s eyes gleamed. “A fight.”