Chapter 13: Jo-Mel Of The Hunt

13

Pickle-Me-Jack left no track nor trail in his passage through the forest. Bealz and Monie, meanwhile, cut a wide swath as they made their way, crashing about in oblivious delight. Their trail vanished, though, just as the forest takes a turn, darkening, changing over suddenly from light to dark. The darkness wasn't just caused because of the density of the woods. This was something else.

Jo-Mel had tracked them at a distance, following them into the heart of the forest, and now silently contemplates the sudden disappearance of Bealz and Monie's trail. It was as though they'd simply vanished into thin air. Highly possible, but unlikely, given that Monie wielded her power with no subtlety, like a hammer. She would have simply torn a hole right through the barriers. Jo-Mel would have sensed it happening, would still feel its residual energies.

There was no scent, however. No displaced leaf, no stirred nor scuffed soil along the path, no broken twigs or branches. No sign of them whatsoever. Their trail simply vanished in mid-stride.

Jo-Mel had never been thwarted from pursuit, however, and knew that people left behind much more than physical evidence. Peering deeper, looking for the near imperceptible eddying wake of their passage, a curious void can just be seen swirling in and about the trees. Jo-Mel senses a weaving, a mystical working possibly concealing a larger threat.

This was the predator lurking amongst the trees that watched and waited as Bealz and Monie approached. Jo-Mel could sense its malevolence. The forest was sick with it. A curious sort of illness, though. The gangrenous rot grew from within, leaving the outer appearance of health.

Grown unchecked, this could have led to the death of, not just this place, but the entire glen and glade surrounding the woods, as well.

How could this have gone unnoticed? Jo-Mel is disturbed by the implications and wonders, far from the first time, just what had become of the Royal Family. So many of the duties of the House of Askai had gone unfulfilled, untended, since the disappearance of the wayward prince.

Could this too be evidence of the Royal Family's dereliction's?

Jo-Mel could not quite fathom the damage that could be done by the death of such a large and integral part of the Incata's magical landscape. Surely there had to be some who had sensed the festering blight growing within the very heart of this Elemental. And if not, that blight must be caused by a powerful and dangerous entity, most likely a demon or something like it, loosed from the dark places between worlds. Something capable of masking itself for some time. Only such as these would possess both the power and the inclination to even attempt such a lethal working.

Slowly drawing a razor sharpened katana from its sheath, Jo-Mel proceeds forward with extreme caution, tracking a nothing of a thing, an absence of space.