The Chase

His footfalls came quickly one after the other, churning the damp ground of the forest floor. The signs were unmistakable now, she had not only come this way, she had travelled this route in just the last few moments.   His pace now picked up further as he bore down on his prey. His breath was becoming labored the longer he kept up the pace, weaving between thickening strands of trees and hopping over rotting logs along his path. It didn’t matter though - what mattered was the hunt.
He lived for this.
His quarry was finally cornered and there was nowhere left for her to run. A smile involuntarily crept across Galor’s face as he came to the end.
A small rocky ridge blocked her escape to the front, a small clearing to the left would reveal her to his sight, and a small creek would hamper her escape to his right.
Two ways out exposed her to his arrows, and in the third she had no way to leave except climbing several steps high up a nearly vertical rocky cliff. That wasn’t something Galor expected her to do.
The Forester had been hunting her for days, tracking a rumor and shadow through the emerald beauty of the Arlian. At first she was nothing more than a whisper, hearsay and gossip on the lips of old men in a tavern and children playing near their watchful parents. Something haunted the small village tucked under the boughs of the Arlian, but what?
Rumor became fact as Galor and his Witchcat Lirsin made their first investigations. Talking to the locals and following the clues they found all the signs of a demon incursion around the small hamlet of hunters and herbalists.
The duo took to the woods. The Arlian was a beautiful place, but it was mysterious and often deadly. The Queen’s Foresters spoke sacred oaths to hunt the demonic interlopers that broke through into Faelon under the Arlian’s vast canopy and beautiful vistas.
A few days later and he had identified his quarry: a saryad. It was as he suspected, but many years of hunting and killing demons in the Arlian had taught him to not place much faith in suspicions, even his own.
A saryad’s trickery and deception had led many an unknowing and unmindful individual to their doom over the years. Those without a bond to a witchcat were unlikely to see the false reality the saryad’s foul magics laid before them, making them both amenable to the lure and temptation of the evil creatures.
Knowing this it wasn’t long before Galor’s patience and investigation paid off. One of the villagers, a young herbalist, had been roving into the forest without his companions. Given the danger abroad it had immediately struck Galor as odd. Galor trailed the young man at a distance for a few days, looking to confirm his suspicions.
Galor’s perseverance paid off. He was not at all surprised to find that the teenager was under the influence of a Saryad.
He felt bad for the young man. Though he could not see what form the creature took to the boy, it was obviously someone dear to him that had been lost. Galor’s life and profession was hard, and sometimes he had been accused of being bereft of feelings. It may have been mostly true, but he was not above pity for those that fell under the spell of demonic creatures.
Without the witchsight it must all seem so real to him. The young man would be heartbroken when death brought an end to the creature’s influence and reality settled where the illusion had been.
Now he had seen her with his own eyes and the chase began. Saryad were not necessarily the fastest of creatures, but the thick forests gave a demon advantage when they were inevitably discovered. Advantage over humans - but not over witchcats.
In a few short minutes it would be over. Galor stopped at the confluence of the creek, the clearing and the forested area beneath the rocky bluff. There he found the one place where he could still get a bit of cover but see and command any way the demon could try to escape.
Lirsin reluctantly stopped and looked expectantly at her master, waiting for the order to attack. Galor gave her a quick look and held his hand down to signify “hold.”
“Soon” he whispered to his faithful witchcat. She looked up at him for a moment. He met her gaze, saw the amazing intelligence in her eyes, and wondered not for the first time if he was indeed the animal and she the keeper.
Lirsin bent low in anticipation but kept her back end in the air. For all the otherworldliness of a witchcat, Galor still recognized behavior from the housecats his wife kept around in their cabin back in Valselekar. Focused on where she believed the saryad was hiding, the front half of the witchcat remained completely still while her raised back half wriggled and her tail swatted violently from side to side.
For her this was where the real work began. With the saryad cornered and moments from destruction all that was left was to flush her out. Lirsin was born for that work.
Flushing out your prey was always risky. Going to ground, even in such an untenable position, meant the Saryad would fight all that more viciously.
He contemplated for a brief moment which direction to push her. Flushing her into the clearing to his left gave him a better shot but was more dangerous for Lirsin. To Galor’s right was the creek and more forest beyond it. He’d have less time to bring the saryad down with his arrows but Galor could still cover Lirsin as she swept the demon into the open. If the saryad made the woods beyond the creek he could easily lose her again in the deep undergrowth.
He looked down at Lirsin, who returned his gaze. She was just as ready to take this demon down as he was.
“Flush her into the clearing Lirsin.” He whispered.
“Go.”
The Witchcat bounded off to his right, splashing into the creek. She then suddenly turned and disappeared into the underbrush. This part of the Arlian was younger than much of the sprawling forest so well known for its demons. Instead of huge towering trees that blocked the sunlight and kept the forest floor clean of much growth the trees were much shorter here and not as full. The floor was covered with smaller brush and thickets, making it harder to track his prey and more dangerous to hunt them through.
Galor nocked an arrow and tried to peer into the thicket. Somewhere in there was a saryad with a witchcat close on its woody tail.
Movement in the brush drew his eye. His bow followed it. He drew the string back, waiting for his target to show herself.
More movement: he couldn’t make it out well, but a small tree moved as though something had caught on it.
He tried to focus. Unseen, Lirsin roared defiantly as more brush moved back and forth deeper in the thicket.
Apparently the saryad has decided to fight instead of run. Galor released the string of his bow slowly and grabbed the arrow putting it back into his quiver.
Standing up he grabbed the hilt of his long sword and drew it from the scabbard. The thicket ahead was moving wildly now as Lirsin battled the saryad unseen in the green undergrowth.
Lirsin screamed and the forest became still. Galor waded into the underbrush at a run, swiping wildly with his blade to knock the thick undergrowth out of his way. He caught a glimpse of Lirsin through the leaves when something struck him from behind.
Pain seared through him. He reeled around to face his attacker. Whatever had struck him ripped from his flesh as he turned. Galor screamed in pain as he came face to face with his assailant.
It looked like a thicket but had a leering face. It swung its branch limb again, thrashing wildly at Galor trying to finish him. Galor parried the attack, slicing the limb from the creature’s body before another swing cut the thing in half.
Vinelings.
Small demons that looked so much like trees that they blended into the forest. Galor had only encountered them a few times, and never alone.
He realized then he had been played by the saryad. He wasn’t the predator. He was the prey.
Galor began to back away from the trap but it was far too late. The underbrush around him came alive, grasping at him and slashing with thorny limbs. The vinelings hissed and leered at him as they swarmed him.
He desperately swung right and left, trying to deny them their victory. His sword had chopped down four before they had wrapped his arm in woody vines. Both arms were constrained and bloodied.
Screaming in pain he dropped his sword. Without defense he was swarmed by the vinelings. They wrapped him in their branches, trapping him and forcing him to his knees.
The saryad melted out of the brush, smiling amongst the gibbering demons.  She patted their gnarled heads as though she was praising her children. She kept her leering smile as she stared Galor down. She slowly approached him, stopping to pet and offer praises to the vinelings that had caught and ensnared him. They seemed to enjoy the praise, rubbing back against the gentle pets and even more gentle words.
Though he couldn’t move his head against the Vinelings’ limbs, Galor looked up at her as she let out a laugh that was both condemning and seductive. She extended her hand toward him, slowly releasing a fleshy vine that wrapped around his neck. She tightened it just as slowly. Galor fought for air. Unable to move, his body on fire as he strangled, his very soul fought the inevitable as the Saryad enjoyed her kill.
The vinelings leered at their captive in his last moments. Their large dark eyes stared him down as the Saryad’s sharp vine flexed again and his world went dark.