Demon-Killing Sword

A high-pitched yell made Muninn jump. The tall demon froze, then backed away. He shouted back, a weird sound somewhere between human and animalistic. There was a pause. Muninn held her breath, eyes locked into the hand pressing into the tree above her. The demon grunted, then sighed, a wave of icy air that sent a shiver down her spine. Then it turned and clomped away, hooves crashing through the leaves.

Deep breaths. So close, that was so close! Muninn only barely resisted the urge to gasp, but the quiet breaths she took came quick and deep. She huddled there, afraid to move on. Her heart was loud in her ears, so loud she could barely tell the difference between it and the demons' footsteps. What if the demons came back? What if this was a trap to lure her out? They knew she was here. They had to.

The ice melted. Her heart settled, and with it, so did her courage. Muninn closed her eyes and listened to the forest. Birds chirped, singing peacefully. Leaves swayed in the wind. There were no more footsteps. She took a deep breath for courage, then peeked around the tree.

The demons were gone.

Relief flooded through her, but a second later, it was chased down by frustration. She bit her lip. They got away! That was her dinner ticket! She'd let it go out of baseless fear. She looked around her. There were always the berries and mushrooms. Just to her left, in fact, was a patch of those orange mushrooms. Maybe I should give them a try.

A thick drop of red splattered from the mushroom's cap to the forest floor. She gulped and shook her head at herself. No, it was too soon to give up. She knew which direction they'd gone. Maybe it would be obvious where they lived when she got close to their den.

Leaves stuck to her boot. Muninn shook the leaves off, but more grabbed hold every few steps. Annoyed, she looked down. Tacky, half-dried blood was smeared over the leaves on the forest floor.

Her heart stopped. Restarted, relief followed by excitement. The kills! The demons' dinner! They'd been fresh enough to leak blood, and the ugly demon was dragging her kill! Eagerly, Muninn followed the trail. She'd have dinner tonight, after all!

She pushed ahead. Now that she had the blood to follow, she could almost pick out a path, a worn route through the woods. Every now and again, she stumbled across a patch of cobblestone. Was this once a road? It was no more than a deer patch now. Ahead, sunlight burned through the gaps in the trees, warning her of the end of the forest. Muninn drew quietly toward the edge. What stood beyond it? A meadow? A lake?

Around the last tree. Only a tall bush stood between her and the edge of the forest. Muninn pushed into the bush, climbing around the larger branches. At the front of the bush, she leaned forward and parted the branches just enough to peer out.

It was no meadow, no lake. The land sloped down ahead of her, and below stood an overgrown, rundown town. Almost no houses were standing anymore. Some had been abandoned to the elements, and stood crookedly, roofs sway-backed or fallen in, wooden faces worn to gray. Others had been built into dens, large, shapeless piles of sticks propped up within and around their walls, the dens absorbing them like the wasp's nest had absorbed the shed behind her house two summers back. The roads were obliterated, choked with weeds and young trees. As she watched, a young demon burst out of one of the half-collapsed houses. He laughed, a sound that sparkled like a creek in the woods, and kicked his hooved feet high. Another demon colt ran behind him, her feet big and floppy but her skin pale as ice. Motion from the back of the house caught her eye. The ugly demon from before had strung up the deer and the bird and was busy skinning them with her claws, offal piled on the floor before her. High above, smaller demons wheeled, part woman, part bird, part horse. They cried to each other, wordless scree calls that reminded her of vultures.