Chapter 1937: The Decisive Shot

The human lord was taunting her.

It was the only explanation that Khorijin could come up with.

The wind through the trees had grown strong enough that Erling no longer posed any danger to her from great distances. He’d shot at her twice, and both shots had missed their mark by at least two full lengths as the Ice Fruits swayed in the wind or he over-corrected for the breeze.

By her count, he was down to eight arrows, at which point he’d changed his tactics yet again.

Instead of aiming at the fruit that hung on branches near her, he aimed at fruit that were within twenty or thirty lengths of himself, triggering the mostly harmless snow flurries and vanishing into clouds of drifting snowflakes before she could make her shot. He’d done this three times already, and each time was more frustrating than the last.

The pain of her wounds dragged at her, and her flanks trembled with the effort of keeping herself steady each time she lined up a shot. Her aim was just as true as it had ever been, but the idea of shooting and moving at the same time filled her with unease.

Her body was clearly warning her that it had reached a limit, forcing her to stop moving each time she needed to line up a shot, and when she did, she lost all of her forward momentum. She’d fallen into a broken, staggering rhythm, and it was one that Erling clearly controlled.

If not for the faint, lavender line along the path she followed through the Frozen Forest and the occasional glimpses of the stars overhead, she would have been convinced that Erling was trying to lead her off course.

Already, the path had narrowed considerably. She had to duck and bend to avoid the sharp ends of the icy trees and several new tears in her padded coat stood as testament to how difficult that had been.

The path had curved almost due west, and if she wanted to leave the forest, she would need to turn south again, but unless she found a new opening to do so, she’d have to turn back the way she’d come to do that and backtrack by at least fifty lengths for the last branch in the path that seemed to go in the right direction.

-CRACK!-

Another fruit burst into a flurry of snow almost directly in front of her, and Khorijin frowned as her hooves clopped to a stop. Her tail swished several times in agitation while she stared into the snow flurry, trying to figure out what kind of game Erling was playing.

The last three times, he’d let her at least glimpse him before he vanished into the snow.

This time, she hadn’t spotted so much as a corner of his cloak before he detonated a fruit, so what was he trying to hide?

Her head swung from right to left, and she twisted her torso as much as she could, looking for any sign of motion to either side of her. Her ears strained for the faintest sound of her opponent moving to attack her from her flanks, but she heard nothing. Nothing but the faintly musical tinkling sound of icy trees swaying in the wind.

"What are you up to, Lord Erling?" Khorijin muttered as she made her way slowly forward into the snow flurry with her bow drawn. "Where are you hiding?"

On the far side of the snow flurry, Erling crouched as low as he could behind the trunk of the largest ice tree he’d been able to find in the small hollow where he’d set his trap.

There was no rhyme or reason to the arrangement of the icy trees and explosive fruits that Erling had been able to discern. Paths curved and twisted; some were wide and others narrow. Intersections were scattered, and some routes narrowed down to nothing.

Each tree was as varied as the paths were. Some were thin and sparse with only a few small fruits. Others were large, and their branches were covered with enough Ice Fruits to be terrifying in their destructive potential. Thus far, whenever he’d encountered such a tree, he gave it a wide berth.

Not anymore.

With the wind blowing and fatigue that extended far beyond anything a half-hour hunt could account for, Erling no longer had the confidence to shoot smaller targets. Not precisely anyway. But if there were enough fruit in a close enough space, then missing one might hit another, and when they were that dense, hitting one of the hail storms might be capable of setting off a few others.

Now, he had three arrows left, and he intended to stake everything on a last stand here. If he could land one shot, right when he was certain Khorijin was in range, then he might be able to trap her here long enough that he could escape across the finish line.

Three arrows, and then his only option would be to run.

The moment he heard hoofbeats on the cold, frozen ground, every muscle in Erling’s body tensed and it took a tremendous act of will for him to make himself relax enough to aim his bow. He’d been staring at the same medium sized fruit for what felt like an eternity, one that he didn’t need to expose himself to Khorijin in order to hit, but he’d only get one chance at a surprise.

Deep breath in through the mouth.

Slow exhale through the nose.

Calm, just like the hunters of Fayle taught him when he first took up the bow.

The sound of his bowstring drawing taut seemed unnaturally loud in the quiet of the Frozen Forest, but Erling refused to rush as he listened to the clop of Khorijin’s hooves and the pounding of his own heart.

Suddenly, the hooves stopped, and Erling released his arrow.

One chance at surprise because he was certain that the only reason she’d stopped was that she finally emerged from the snow flurry and recognized the trap she’d walked into.

One chance...

And the shot went low, missing his target by at least two handbreadths.

The arrow continued on its path, sailing past a small, plum-sized fruit before glancing off one the size of a man’s hand wrapped around his fist.

-CRACK!-

The arrow only barely struck the fruit, but evidently that was enough to unleash a fresh flurry of snow.

"Damn it," Erling swore, fitting another arrow to the string and firing at his chosen target as quickly as he dared.

-PFFEEEEET!-

The arrow whistled uselessly through the air, missing every fruit along its path before slamming into a tree branch and embedding itself there.

"Damn it," Erling swore as he heard the rapid clopping sound of Khorijin turning around to run away.

With one arrow left, he stepped out from behind the tree and drew the arrow to his cheek.

-PFFEEEET!

She’d finished her turn by the time his arrow left his fingers, and she’d dashed at least three lengths away when his arrow found its target, a medium-sized fruit the size of an apple packed with large hailstones.

-CRACK!-

The fruit exploded before his eyes, sending out more than a dozen hailstones the size of walnuts, moving even faster through the air than his arrow.

Two of them struck Khorijin on her already wounded flanks, staggering her as she ran, but while her speed dropped by a hair, it changed nothing about her decision as she fled from his trap, backtracking to whatever path would take her to the finish line without passing the madman who, as far as she knew, still had one arrow left.

At least eight of the hailstones spent themselves against nothing, thudding against the frozen ground or ricocheting off tree trunks or branches.

Three of them, however, found fruits of their own...

-CRACK!-

-CRACK!-

-CRACK!-

A flurry of snow exploded from one of the fruits, blanketing the hollow with a dizzying storm of snowflakes. Those snowflakes mixed with hundreds of pellets of ice, hailstones the size of peas that bounced off branches, tree trunks, and even a few other fruits, though none of them seemed to impact hard enough to trigger other explosions.

It was the third -CRACK!- that doomed Erling.

The sound of a branch breaking and the icy tinkling of the twigs at the end of the branch shattering filled the air, followed by not two or three but six more explosive -CRACK-s.

"Light," Erling swore, dashing back behind the tree he’d used for cover and praying that it would be enough to shield him from what was to come. He’d hoped to keep the tree between himself and the unfolding chaos, using it as a shield to buy enough time to run, but his wounded leg gave out beneath him, sending him sprawling to the ground.

He barely had time to roll on the ground to reach the spot he’d crouched while waiting for Khorijin before chaos enveloped him.

Shards of ice flew past him on both sides of the tree, and Erling covered his head with both arms, wrapping his cloak around his body while he drew his knees up to his chest. With his back to the tree trunk and his legs in front of his heart, he’d done everything he could to survive the storm that quickly washed over him.

A sound like rolling thunder filled the hollow as more branches broke and gave way under the torrent he’d unleashed, and now snow, ice, and hail started to pelt Erling from the sides. Two shards of ice cut through his cloak, one slicing his left forearm while the other grazed his shin.

Worse than the cuts, at least five or six large hailstones slammed into his legs and sides, including one that missed the wound in his leg by less than the width of three fingers.

Then, pain flared in the back of his skull as a hailstone bounced off the tree trunk before striking his head and robbing him of the light of the world...