Chapter 15

Chapter 15: Familiar of Mine (part 1)

“D*mn it! I should have known!”

Cursed Horden, he untied the restless horses and tried to calm their nerves. He looked around to find a place to hide them. Horden settled the horses behind the bushes while chanting a protection spell around the area.

“Horden?” Said Anne from behind him.

The old man turns his head immediately. “Anne, what are you doing? Go back inside!”

“I can’t, there was... something was wiggling my feet.”

“What?! don’t tell me you run?”

“No, of course not, I was screaming just a bit, and then crawling as fast as I could to find you!”

.....

He looks at her terrified face and understands the terror that she had been through. His hand goes to her shoulder, and a smile adorned Horden’s face.

“You did an excellent job, coming here, without making any noises.”

“Uhm... yes, so what can I do?” Asked Anne towards Horden.

“How about staying here with the horses, I cast a protection spell, so you will be safe.”

“Alright, but what about you?”

“I need to find whatever monster that... uhm... took our carriage driver.”

Anne’s eyes get wide, “Oh my God, the driver...”

“He’s gone. There’s nothing we can do about him. Now, remember to stay inside, alright?”

“Horden, please be careful.”

He smiled at her, trying to convince her that everything is going to be alright, although, he wasn’t sure about it. Horden put the blade pin on his palm, and in an instance, a beautiful crystal blade appeared. Horden holds the blade, with his eyes looking around the place.

“If only I wasn’t giving my beautiful sword to that unfilial grandson of mine.” Grunted Horden.

After looking around for a while, finally he saw a trail of blood, fresh blood. He followed the trail until he found a huge cave. A sound of tearing flesh, and broken bone, can be heard from inside the cave. Horden prayed that the driver is already dead, and nobody could withstand the torture from a monster.

As a former commander of the magic knight, Horden knows how deathly the monster that comes into this mischievous dark road, they have been called such, from the moment the dark road begins to invade every path in the kingdom. At first, it was just small darkness that loom, but then it becomes bigger, and it gets worse, monsters crawling out from the dark, invading people all around.

“Panthera, are you here?”

A pair of eyes, come from the inside of Horden’s shadow.

‘I’m here, what do you need?’

“Go check out, what kind of feral that we are going to fight, here.”

‘On it, commander.’ Said the pair of eyes, that disappeared on an instance.

“You should stop calling me that.” Gruntled Horden.

In a mere second, the pair of eyes now become a silhouette of a big red fur panther that looks directly at Horden, and said, ‘It was a demon cat, the victim already gone, down to her stomach, although she kept big pieces of his body on the corner.’

“She kept some of the meat?”

‘Yes, and she is coming into us, right now!’

Horden turns around to see a black fur with red eyes, a colossal cat shape creature, looking and growling at him. He run as fast as he could, with Panthera jumping back into his shadow.

“Really? You’re going to hide? Some familiar are you!”

‘No, you need to give me an order, so I can launch at her, you see her size? She is a demon cat!’

He could feel the breath of the monster, closer to his nape, when he sees an opening, he jump and scream as loud as he could.

“Now, Panthera, now!”

The red panther lunges herself to the demon cat, while Horden, stabs the demon cat from below. Horden struggled, all he got was a blade, his long sword, already been given to his grandson, and now, the blade couldn’t penetrate well to the skin of a demon cat. All he could do is to injure the feral monster and try another way to defeat the demon cat.

The demon cat almost lost consciousness, Horden and Panthera, tried to go away as fast as they could, but it was too late to go away, the demon cat throw Panthera to the ground, and with her massive paw, she locked Horden as her next target. Thankfully, before the demon cat slice into Horden’s body, black dust is thrown into the eyes of the demon cat.

“What the?”

Horden saw Anne, frantically throwing the black dust into the demon cat.

“Anne! Anne! What are you doing!” Horden shouted at Anne, trying to calm her down.

She turns around to see Horden, “Oh, thank God, you’re alive, I... I’ve heard the screaming and the...”

“It doesn’t matter, go away from the feral, right now!”

He pulls Anne away, right before the demon cat begins to stand, but strangely, it just fell to the ground, while her paws scratched around her face.

“Nettleroot ashes, it stings and itchy, but, good for a cut wound if you mix it with water.” Said Anne, smiling.

“Bloody hell, girl, you’re genius, now stay back, let me end her suffering,” Said Horden, he called into his familiar, “Panthera, lock into her neck!”

Horden’s familiar jumped into the demon cat, and bite into the back of her neck when she got distracted, Horden then stabs into her neck, and then cast a wind spell, making the wound get larger, tearing the demon cat’s neck. It dies not long after.

“Poor creature.” Muttered Anne.

He couldn’t say anything to her, Anne doesn’t know what a feral monster could do, if they let loose on the resident area. For Anne, it is the loss of an amazing creature, for Horden, it is the them or us, situation. He took a glance into a small shadow beside Anne, Horden is ready to attack the creature, but then, Panthera stops him.

‘Horden, don’t!’

The small shadow appeared in the light, it was a small cat, a kitten, with fluffy white fur, and red eyes.

“Oh my God, the meat, she kept the meat for this, her kitten.”

‘He is a hybrid, I can sense it, a powerful one, nonetheless.’ Said Panthera.

“What should we do?” Asked Horden.

What appeared in front of them is like a magical thing, the demon kitten, meowing in front of Anne, she turn to the demon kitten, and kept it in her arms, both of them glowing into a harmonized rainbow light. It was an imprint.

Panthera’s turn to Horden, ‘I guess, we don’t have to do anything.’ She jumps back to Horden’s shadow.

“Yes, the demon kitten has chosen his master.” Said Horden, looking at the astonishing scene in front of him.