CHAPTER 3

Loch felt as if he had just whispered the word, even though it seemed to echo in the run-down, silent street; the well-dressed man who had just recollected his billfold from the dead thief snapped his attention upon Loch's emancipated form. The man's dark grey eyes looked almost beastly, while they narrowed as he looked to be scanning Loch. With pins and needles rising over his skin, as if something was lightly grazing it, the man's gaze felt violating, as if all of Loch's secrets were being laid bare. With the street's fleeing residents vanishing, Loch felt an arresting stillness in the world, as if only he and the Hunter remained. The Hunter's gaze appeared to land on the wrapped bundle in Loch's right arm, and as if he could see through the tattered material, the Hunter's thin lips slightly curled up as one of his eyebrows raised in question. 

Loch subconsciously tightened his grip on the covered squirrel once he saw where the Hunter's attention had fallen on, even though he knew in his heart that if the Hunter before him wanted to take something from him, it would be as easy as taking candy from a baby. Still, his years living within the Shambles society always kept him on guard at the potential of losing what little he had. A small, more rational voice in Loch's mind then spoke out, 'What the hell would a Silver-Badged Hunter want with a dead squirrel anyway?' Making the boy's tense face flush in embarrassment. 

The slight curl to the Hunter's lips became a full-blown smile after seeing Loch's actions; his face now appeared to carry a hint of roguish charm with his neat mustache and slicked-back dark hair. Along with the smile, Loch felt as if the world had returned to its normal state while he released a heavy breath he didn't know he had been holding. Whether because his previous shocked state distracted him or by some other unseen ability from the Hunter, before Loch could get his bearings, he found the Hunter standing only a couple of steps away from him, causing him to freeze up once again. A gust of wind blew loch's mop of sandy colored hair back even though there appeared to be no wind stronger that day than a gentle breeze. Loch had to raise his head to meet the man's now green eyes, which didn't seem to carry the hidden depth they previously held and appeared softer. 

Just like a proper gentleman that Loch read or heard stories about, the Hunter took off his top hat with an elegance that looked unborn and gave the now nervous looking boy a slight bow. "Good evening, young man. Are you a resident of this neighborhood?" The Hunter asked, his voice carrying a deep but not overbearing quality to it. As the man spoke, Loch's usually confident demeanor faltered, his mind seemingly stuttering. Following Loch's skinny finger, the Hunter saw the orphanage, along with a rusted sign hanging over the entrance that read Earth's Embrace Orphanage, and a small frown couldn't help but fall on his face before disappearing as the Hunter returned his gaze to the malnourished but spirited youth before him. 

"Very good. Would you kindly tell me where Mr. Kapers lives? I believe he runs a butchery in this neighborhood." The Hunter asked as he took out a handful of dark grey colored coins with the engraving of a tree visible on one side. They were shaped in a square and were more commonly known as iron chits, the lowest form of currency. 

At seeing the flash of familiar but also foreign colored metal pieces in the man's hand, Loch's usually active brain finally turned back on, and he regained the ability to talk with only a minimal of stutter. "Yes, um... Sir. Mr. Kapers usually supplies our orphanage with meat allotted to us by the council. But I heard he has been sick for a little while and hasn't been at his shop." Loch pointed to a shop a little further down the road that stood out as it looked to be the only one that wasn't open. The Hunter, seeing the shop, frowned at the sight of the closed doors and dark interior. Seeing the man's displeased look at the sight of the dark shop and began to feel his pulse rise; he then gritted his teeth and started to chatter as he tried to stutter out, "I do know where Mr. Kapers lives, though, if that helps." 

The Hunter's frown once again turned into a full smile after he heard what Loch said, and with practiced ease and a speed that the young boy couldn't see, he placed the coins he was holding in the breast pocket of Loch's shirt. "That'll be grand. Consider this a little reward for helping me." The Hunter said. The sound of several coins jangling as they landed in Loch's pocket seemed to make his brain explode. Without taking a breath in between his words, he explained the directions to Mr. Kaper's house from their current position so quickly it almost sounded like one word. The Hunter, who seemed to take in all the rushed information with no trouble, only nodded once Loch finished before he placed his top hat back on his head and strode towards the closed butcher shop as if to double-check no one was there first before checking the butcher's home. 

The man's graceful departure left Loch standing in the same spot, still feeling a little shocked at the entire experience. From as far back as he could remember, he had idolized the famous and mysterious Hunters, even though he had never met one in person. Finally, seeing one in the flesh left his more mature but still childish mind in a buzz. It was as if witnessing one of the story book heroes just sashaying the street. 

The sound of scurrying feet and angry slurs coming from in front of Loch seemed to bring him back to himself. The previously raggedly clothed thief was now almost entirely naked, as a group of rough-looking people had converged on his still-warm corpse like a pack of vultures and begun to clear the man of everything he had. They had soon started to argue with each other over a piece of something another managed to grab; Loch, seeing the familiar sight, felt a sense of tension at the thought of his newly gained wealth. With a quick walk that was almost a run, Loch crossed the street while trying to tear a piece of cloth from the wrapped blanket under his arm. After awkwardly trying to do it with one hand, he tore a piece the size of a handkerchief off the blanket, which he shoved into his breast pocket. The clinking of coins ceased, the slight bulge now resembling a soiled rag. 

Feeling more comfortable now with his newly gained wealth disguised, Loch swept his eyes over the surrounding crowd of people and noticed only a few people looking his way, but no one was paying him any special attention. 'I suppose I could barely make it out when that man put the coins in my pocket, let alone people who were further away.' Loch thought to himself as he tried to distance himself from the previous street as quickly as possible without bringing attention to himself. Walking to the end of the street, Loch passed by an older man with a trimmed salt and pepper beard and bald head, standing upon a crate, wearing a simple coarse brown robe near the intersection of several streets. He looked to be reciting something from an old thick book in his hands with a gentle smile on his face. "After the Divine Evergreen reached ascension, instead of flying into the heavens above, he used the divinity gifted by the Gods above to bless the land and was the first Monarch to..." The robed man's gentle but powerful voice rang in Loch's head, but it looked as if what the man was saying went in one ear and out the other. Loch made eye-contact with the smiley faced man for a moment before he looked away and walked past, not paying any more attention to the robed man, much like many others passing by. The boy especially was far too focused on the recent scenes he had seen and his heavy chest pocket to care about any preaching. 

After passing several more crisscrossing streets that didn't follow any normal pattern, Loch felt safer and slowed down his pace; even though he felt an almost unbearable itch to take out the coins and count them, he resisted, as he knew it was never truly safe to reveal any wealth in the Shambles. As he made his way to his destination, Loch thought over the previous encounter with the Hunter, 'I wonder what someone of his status wants with Mr. Kapers? What could an ordinary butcher of the Shambles have to offer a Hunter? Is it because he's been sick recently, but people always get sick in the Shambles? Why should a Hunter care?' The more Loch thought about it, the more it didn't make sense until he started thinking about the famous stories of the Hunters, what they were actually tasked to do, and where they got their name from. 'Could there be an actual Tainted Beast inside the Shambles? I thought they couldn't step on blessed Soil?' Loch's mind began to whirl with descriptions of the Tainted beasts he had heard about while growing up and the supernatural creatures some of the older kids who worked near the outer wall had seen. The shadows cast across the streets and the darkened places in between houses began to take on a scary hue to Loch's overactive imagination. His steps began to speed up, as his head was on a swivel, trying to look everywhere at once; before he knew it, he was almost running, and while looking in another direction, he nearly rammed into the back of someone exiting his house. 

The man quickly managed to step out of the way as he left his house, but a few choice curses followed Loch as the young boy apologized. Calmed by the sudden distraction, he unknowingly saw his destination—a couple of houses away—which he'd aimed for at the journey's start. Heading towards the house, which more resembled a hut with a rounded roof. Clearly abandoned for a long time, the two adjacent houses were in a dilapidated and ramshackle condition. It was an odd sight in the Shambles; because of the large population and the many unemployed people living in the area, any plot of land was filled with people. Compared to the noises coming from all the other houses Loch passed, with the adults who hadn't left for work doing chores inside and out or the sound of children running around playing, this hut-styled house and its surroundings appeared eerily quiet. 

As Loch approached the hut, he could spot a bit of darkened smoke coming out of a small opening on the roof. A smile graced Loch's worried face, seeing that the occupant was home and awake. Even though the house resembled a hut, it dominated the plot; its ten-foot-high, forty-foot-wide, rounded roof dwarfed the land. As Loch whistled, he paused momentarily before the stick-entwined doorway. After a brief wait, Loch heard a bird caw before Jack the Raven dive-bombed from above. 

After giving his companion a quick scratch on his feathered head, Loch knocked on the door and called out, "Granny! It's Loch; I hope you're dressed cause I'm coming in." Turning the handle and pushing open the door, Loch was first greeted with a loud cackle and the rough, throaty voice of an older woman retorting, "You wish I were undressed, you little pervert. I see the way all the boys of the Shambles peek through my windows, trying to sneak a peek at my gorgeous figure; they are." After Loch entered and closed the door behind him, he took stock of the room; it was sparsely furnished and had a lit fire pit in the center with a cooking pot hanging over it. On the left side, near the only window of the house, was a small cot with a set of covers and a straw-filled pillow on top. On the right was a simple wooden desk and two chairs with a scattering of kitchen utensils and random foodstuffs. The hut's owner was standing behind the fire pit, slowly stirring the pot that was bubbling with some odd grey-colored gruel. The owner was a particularly ancient-looking woman, with a hunched back and one wrinkled hand leaning on an old gnarled cane that more resembled a thick branch of a tree or a club. Her long, almost blindingly white hair fell down the sides of her head in matted twines, with bits of small bones and feathers. Her face was an absolute smorgasbord of wrinkles, but her bright blue eyes and gap-toothed smile twinkled of someone with a lot of energy. 

Loch laughed in response to the old woman's statement of peeking toms, "Don't be crazy. The local kids might have been missing their pets or siblings and were checking if they had fallen into the Evil Witch's cauldron for her supper." 

With a shake of her cane/club, the old lady retorted, "Who you calling a witch, you little bugger? See if I don't chuck you in with my morning porridge if you keep up with that smart mouth of yours. You're lucky I don't want to ruin the flavor." With another chuckle, Loch came over to the old lady's side and gave her a gentle hug, which she reciprocated before he began to give her bony shoulder a gentle massage after he placed his wrapped bundle on the floor. "Don't be angry, Granny; I was just joking. Everyone knows you're the most beautiful lady in the whole Shambles." Loch praised with as an earnest face he could muster. 

"Try the entire city." The old Granny replied with a cheeky grin. Leaving the wooden spoon in the pot of gruel, she turned to face the young boy, who was almost the same height as her stooped figure, breaking off his impromptu massage. Looking at the boy up and down and then at the wrapped bundle on the floor, the old woman raised one snow-white eyebrow as she asked, "So what do you want? I haven't seen you for over a week. What if I passed away, and you only turned up because you wanted something just to find my beautiful body being eaten by the rodents, hmm?" 

"Ah, come on, don't say that, Granny. You know, I don't just visit when I want something. I wanted to come, but that horrible Mother Leanne, locked Randall and me up for the last week. She only fed us twice." Loch complained while trying to put on the best kicked-puppy look he could muster. The old lady looked like she was having none of it and struck the boy on the side of the leg with her cane while reprimanding, "Well, you must have done something wrong then, you little devil." Loch cried out in pain and rubbed his leg while explaining, "I swear, Granny. This time, it wasn't my fault. The Bakers boys..." With a wave of her club at his head, Loch stopped his overacting and cut off his excuses. "I don't want to hear your nonsense. Be careful; one day, your cheeky brain doesn't return you to the Earth too early. Now grab those bowls off the table and serve this lady here her breakfast." Granny scolded as she headed over to the table to take a seat. 

Loch broke out into a large grin and ran over to the table, grabbing two bowls before filling one bowl and bringing it to the old lady. Then, he served himself one and rushed to sit on the other chair across the table. Loch grabbed a wooden spoon but didn't dig into the porridge yet; he looked at the old lady across from him who had her head lowered over the food with both hands clasped in a triangle in front of her; she appeared to be muttering, "Thank the Earth for the meal. Let the Soil bless us and keep the taint away from our souls." After finishing the prayer, the old woman acted like she was sprinkling something in front of her face before looking up to Loch, whose spoon paused above his bowl as if frozen in time. "Go ahead and eat you, little heathen." The old lady said with a smirk. With no other words, Loch dug into his meal with the speed of a tornado, finishing the whole bowl in under a minute. 

Loch patted his stomach in contentment and sighed in relief as the dull throbbing pain in his core that he had gotten used to over the last few days eased. Grabbing a wooden mug off the table, Loch went over to a barrel filled with water near the fire pit and filled the mug. Returning to the table, he placed the water in front of the old woman, grabbed a cup, and got some for himself before he sat back down. Waiting for the old lady to finish her meal, Loch just enjoyed the quiet of the hut. Having placed her spoon beside her bowl and wiped her face with a rag from her pocket, the old lady looked up at the tired-looking boy opposite her. A trace of adoration and grandmotherly love danced in her eyes as she took Loch's state in before asking with a more reprimanding tone, "Well, boy. Now that you've eaten me out of the house and home. Tell me what ya want. I'm guessing it has something to do with that bundle over there." 

Seeing the old woman point towards his bundle, Loch stood up and grabbed it before bringing it over and laying it on the table. Loch unwrapped the blanket with a deft hand and revealed the blotchy squirrel. "Ah. So, you're not just a user then. You've brought me some meat." The Granny said as she saw the animal on her table. Loch didn't say anything in reply and just put his hand into the squirrel's pouch, grabbing the dried-up berries and opening his palm in front of the old lady's face so she could see the berries up close. Eyes narrowed in clear concentration, both eyebrows raised in surprise at the proffered fruits. After a moment of looking at the berries, the old woman looked back up to the grinning Loch and questioned, with her previous joking gone, "Now, how on the blessed Soil did you get those boy? If you tell me you went outside the walls, watch how I'll put you in my pot for real."