"You have an immediate assignment, Dawn."

Dawn blinked, startled at the rushed announcement from the teacher as they walked into the courtyard outside.

"An assignment this early?" She asked, turning to the teacher.

"Yes. Do you have a problem with this?" The woman answered testily, watching her from the corner of her eye.

Dawn realized immediately that she couldn't challenge what was possibly a direct order from the matriarch. Besides, she couldn't imagine waiting at the castle after already being Tested.

"No. I have no problem at all." She answered, though her mind caught on the thought that she would be in the black forest soon enough. She kicked the thought out of her head.

"Good. Your group is waiting for you outside the castle walls. You are to make your way immediately to Jartol, six miles to the north. When you get there, request horses and a messenger dove from the caretaker there. Make your way west to the border of the black forest. Send a message with the dove to captain Ferik. He will send back coordinates to you where you are to meet.

"You and the others will join his hunter pack." The teacher finished, her gaze asking if Dawn had any questions. Dawn did, but those were details she could sort out on her own.

"This is for you." The teacher said when Dawn asked no questions. Dawn looked to the side to see the teacher holding a folded piece of red cloth towards her.

Red for the Flame.

Dawn gaped in disbelief at it. The hunter's cloak. It was something only hunters wore; a sign of their status. It was hard believing it was rightfully hers now, after so many years spent waiting for it.

She took it from the teacher and unfolded it, slipping it on. The thick cloak was snug and warm, fitting perfectly to her body. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she wondered how she looked with it on.

The teacher walked her to the gate, stopping there with a clipped goodbye before immediately turning to return to the castle. Dawn watched her go for a few seconds before turning around and walking through the arch out of the courtyard.

The world outside was a mass of grassy hills and few trees, stretching out for several miles in all directions. A large road, grassy with disuse, stretched from the gates of the castle northward, disappearing behind the hills.

Dawn could see the group she was to be traveling with ahead of her, all facing north as though impatient to leave. She wondered who they would be, whether she knew them.

She jogged up to them, blinking in surprise when she finally recognized one of the figures as she neared them. "Alex?" She asked in surprise, slowing down. Was there a mistake?

"Dawn?" Alex whirled around at her voice, blinking in surprise as well. The person beside him stiffened, not turning around. The fourth person turned, a smile and a raised eyebrow his only facial expressions.

"Gideon?" She asked in surprise, recognizing the hulking dark-skinned man and his roguish expression. He had a large brown coat on, and it took her a moment to realize it was a hunter like hers. Alex was wearing a grey one that streamed almost to the floor, seemingly too large for him. It made him look comical and she would have laughed had she not been so confused.

What was he doing in the selected group? She'd expected the matriarch to separate them. Even she would have done so; they were a bit close to working directly with one another without their friendship disturbing their duties.

Alex looked about to say something, but he stopped, eyeing her coat. "You look good in that. I knew it'd be red."

"You sure you did not beat up whoever was supposed to accompany me and take his place?" Dawn managed to joke, her attention flickering to Gideon, who was glancing at the third person. She followed his gaze and her eyes narrowed with predatory intensity as she recognized the flowing blonde hair trailing behind the person's cyan coat.

"Oh, you've got to be joking." She growled as Jacqueline finally turned around, revealing a cold expression.

"Dawn," Was all she said, her voice low and nearly silent. Dawn felt herself involuntarily shiver as their gazes met and she realized Jacqueline's eyes were a frosty blue.

It was normal for hunters to develop colored eyes, depending on their element, but it was somehow strange and foreign to Jacqueline.

"Alex?" Dawn turned to Alex, whose eyes were a steely grey. He seemed more distant with them. "What's going on? Why is she here?"

"She was picked to join our team," Alex answered, and his voice sounded strange in his throat, more like a breezy rasp. She wondered if their elements were affecting them all, changing the way she saw them. Or maybe that was just her.

"She was picked to join our team?" Dawn repeated though she heard him the first time. She just couldn't help avoiding the thought, as she met Jacqueline's eyes again, that one of them would not survive the other in the next few days.

₪₪₪₪₪₪₪

The town of Jartol stood ahead of them, still behind many hills, but at least now visible.

The castle had long gone from view, hidden from them as it was from the rest of the world. Alex wondered how it would feel to never go back there, to be released into the world outside without anything familiar.

Except for Dawn, of course, he thought, glancing at her. She would always remain a constant as long as he could help it, hunter or not. Although he could not help but notice some strange things about her that he could not bring himself to mention, beyond her ruby red eyes, or the hot hostility she seemed to radiate. He found himself instinctively shifting further from her, images of her catching fire fresh in his mind.

He felt slightly ashamed for being afraid of her, but the emotion was slightly tempered by the fact that he wasn't the only one. Jacqueline had been staring frosty daggers at her all day - not literally, thank the lord - and even Gideon, stoic, solid Gideon, had been avoiding Dawn's burning gaze.

"What was your test?" Gideon asked all of a sudden, in an obvious attempt to distill the tension. For a few awkward moments, no one seemed willing to respond until Alex forced himself to if only to help Gideon.

"The mage put me in a trance." He answered. "In it, I was on a mountainside, racing up as several night-beasts chased after me. Had to get to the top, where this orb of light awaited." He left it at that, not willing to share the terrifying memories of himself climbing through the scalding steam of the mountain, defending himself with nothing but black rocks against dozens of night-beasts. None of those could have rivaled the sickness he felt when he looked down the side of the mountain and realized how high he was.

"I was put into a trance too," Gideon said. "I ended up in tunnels underground. All of them were filled with night-beasts. I had to dig my way out."

Alex shivered as he imagined himself digging through several feet of thickly packed earth, night-beasts snapping at him as he tried to hang above them.

"That's the funny thing though. I was more terrified of being underground than the night-beasts themselves." Gideon said, his voice rough. He cleared his throat. "But then I think the mages knew that."

Gideon had been terrified of being underground like Alex had been afraid of being high on the mountainside.

"What about you girls?" Alex found himself asking before he could catch himself. He wished he could swallow the words when Dawn turned a burning gaze on him that clearly told him all about her willingness to answer his question. He imagined himself smoking and catching flame under her stare.

His eyebrows raised in surprise when the hard line of her lips softened into a fond, exhausted smile. It seemed to apologize and reassure at the same time, as though saying she couldn't help the reaction.

"I was put in the black forest at night with dozens of night-beasts. Twin knife fight." She answered, breaking their eye contact. He had the feeling she wasn't saying something, but, not feeling like being roasted, he did not ask.

The group continued walking in silence for several more seconds, all lost in their thoughts. Jacqueline suddenly spoke up, her icy voice surprisingly brittle.

"I was put in an icy river. The bank was packed full of night-beasts, and the glowing orb was behind them. I drowned."

Alex flinched in shock at her words and the frosty nonchalance beneath them. He vividly remembered how realistic his wounds had seemed and he shuddered as he imagined the pain she would have felt, drowning.

"So in a way, you have died already," Gideon noted, his voice shaky.

"Haven't we all?" She glanced back at him, her voice broken like shards of ice.

At her words, Alex remembered the fierce bite of the night-beast as one of them pounced on him, jaws around his neck. The vivid pain of it snapping, and the nothingness that followed before he woke. From the expressions on Dawn and Gideon's faces, they had gone through something similar and were remembering.

None of them had made it to the orb.

He didn't know whether to treat that as an omen, but the thought of dying by the night-beasts terrified him.

₪₪₪₪₪₪₪

The southern gate of the city loomed before them, great constructions of wood and metal. They looked like they had been forged by the hands of dwarves, like the walls surrounding the small city.

The four companions stood a way behind on the road, hesitant to approach the town. The thought that once they entered, their paths would drastically change again, ran through Alex's mind. He supposed that was also what caused the others to hesitate.

"Well, staring at the gate isn't going to help us any," Dawn growled, forcing herself to begin marching forward. Alex glanced at her and smiled grimly. The Dawn he'd known had been a nearly silent, calm person. Dangerous of course, but now it seemed more obvious. He'd slowly become less wary of her as they journeyed, and now he found it almost amusing.

He agreed with her though, and he pushed himself to follow, Gideon and Jacqueline joining him.

"We're hunters now, with mage gifts and all," Alex said, attempting to dispel the building tension. "You think we would be able to scale that gate?"

"You became a hunter less than a full day ago and you're already planning to scale city gates?" Dawn asked in exasperation, twisting to glare back at him. He was surprised when Jacqueline gave him a similar gaze, though far more frosty.

The two were more alike than either knew.

"What's the point of having such great powers if you do not enjoy them?" Alex responded to Dawn's question. Life would be boring if all he did with his newfound gifts – which he had absolutely no idea how to begin using – was only used in battle.

"No one is going to be scaling any walls." Gideon quickly intervened before Dawn could begin arguing that their powers were great responsibilities for them to bear. It sounded like something she would say. Perhaps Gideon was attempting to prevent Dawn from setting Alex on fire.

Dawn gave a satisfied grunt at Gideon's words and turned back to the gates which were now swinging open to let a hulking man in a deep green cloak out. Another smaller, stouter man, in a grey cloak, followed. They both stopped before the gates, awaiting them.

"I assume you're the new recruits the Hunter school sent word about." The green-cloaked man called out once they reached hearing distance. Alex's attention stayed on the man in the grey cloak for a long moment before he tore his gaze away, turning to the man in the green cloak.

"We are, fellow Hunter," Gideon responded for them, putting a fist to his heart in the hunter's salute. "I suppose word was sent ahead of us?"

"Aye." The hulking man grunted. "A pigeon brought a short letter. You must be Gideon Meyer."

"I am, indeed," Gideon answered as they finally reached the two older hunters, standing before them. "These are my companions, Alexander Fischer, Dawn Lenz, and Jacqueline Banning."

"Good, good." The green-cloaked man muttered, staring into each of their eyes in turn. That was the way hunters identified other hunters. A night-beast in man form could put on a brightly colored cloak, but they could never replicate the odd eye colors.

"I am Braeden Pflug, and my companion is Botho Stroh. Welcome to Jartol." The green-cloaked man added.

"I have heard stories of you. It's good to have you in our ranks." The small man beside him, Botho, finally spoke, his voice almost a quiet whisper. Alex wished he could feel proud of the compliment, but he could not help but notice that the man stared at Dawn as he spoke.

"We have instructions to see the caretaker," Jacqueline spoke up, sounding impatient.

"Of course," Braeden said, turning back to the gate, which began to swing open again, seemingly without human influence. Alex grinned when he realized Braeden must have pushed it open with his mage gift.

He briefly wondered if he could do the same with a current of wind. Then he joined the group to follow silently behind Braeden into the city.

—————

What do you think about Alex's question? Should the use of mage gifts be permitted for things other than fighting night-beasts?

Don't forget - COMMENT, VOTE AND SHARE!

- Kevin