"He's an Outcast." The man who had been brought to him said breathlessly. He had been found in the rubble, one eye missing and his left leg mangled and squashed like it had been pressed through a juicer. They had only managed to make him talk and stop screaming since Markus had applied some sort of ointment to his nape. It would wear off in a few hours, and then the pain would come back worse. No matter- he thought. He's used up.
"Name of Bastard, no others. I saw him enter the city carrying a young boy, starting great fires behind him. I can only assume he had kidnapped the boy for some malignant purpose, I took him in to be detained but he brought down my superior, so I had to look after the Lieutenant."
The man had a way of speaking through his nostrils that long ago would have irritated the Colonel, but no longer. He had a job to do.
"And this man," the Colonel spoke, "You say he was the one who destroyed this city, Ardorf."
Wulf- if that was what he'd said his name was- nodded eagerly, "Yes, I'm sure of it! Only a mage could do this, he had to be in control of the-" He stopped, his head darting around as if he was looking for someone or something- and the Colonel saw everything, how he was hoping to be useful to him, he wanted to receive a reward for helping his nation, and most of all he saw how profoundly lost he was. A weaker man would have found Wulf pitiable, even have wanted to help, but if there was one thing the Colonel was not, it was weak.
A word had caught his attention, 'mage'. He'd known a mage had done this, even he, a non mage, could tell how the smell of the fire was tainted with something else, something furious, and Markus could smell it so strongly he had been forced to stumble away from the bridge holding his nose in his hands and reaching for the bag of spices Dendra had brought to cook with. Indeed, some of the flame did not die even when buckets of water were thrown over them, which the Colonel knew as a telltale sign of mage work. "Markus, the book." He held out his hand expectantly, and a small red book, freshly printed each year, passed from the mages manicured, powdered and clipped hand to the Colonels own, scarred with the memories of the war and yet no older than 50. He only had to look for a second, he found who he was looking for under the first page of the B section. The page was surprisingly empty of detail, the picture was old as well, showing a young boy with a tear stained face, brass cuffs and chain around his neck. 'Bastard, son of Anna and unknown father' his title page read. Even his secondary magic was unknown. Later down the page read his crimes. 'Unknown number of murders, thirteen confirmed'.
This would not do. How would he perform a hunt without a lead. He didn't have the mans face, let alone his direction of travel. The Colonel had a pang of faint displeasure, which he made sure to quash instantly. Feeling was the killer of minds. He would not let it kill his. "Markus," he said evenly, reaching the conclusion that his questions had reached their natural end, "take his mind." The man standing behind Wulf smiled slightly, pleasure hidden behind his eyes that sometimes reminded the Colonel of a cows in their dewy peacefulness, and put his soft, well taken care of hands on either side of the sargeants head. And inside his brain they went. The Colonel walked out then, as Wulf started to scream, his mind being invaded and used. He knew that Markus would find everything he had to know about their prey, this 'Bastard'. Markus, who the Colonel knew had been given the affectionate nickname 'the Psycopath', had only been on the Colonels unit for a short time, but he had proved himself usable, if not trustworthy. The Colonel only had one person he found himself able to trust. Himself.
Outside the tent he marched, through the ruins of a town once called Ardorf, watching the men under his command carefully as they sat around their hastily built fire. They knew the Colonel would not have them stay long, 2 days camped at the most before he began the hunt and they could finally stretch their predatory muscles. 4 men and two women, aside from their leader. He had chosen them meticulously, only taking the best, and if the Colonel had been capable of feeling pride, he would have felt it only for the strength of the unit. He took in everything as he marched, the unnaturally smooth walls that surrounded them, the blackened houses and the blackened piles of ash next to them that might once have been people, and a market that smelled peculiar. The Colonel stopped and raised his head high, inhaling deeply through a hooked nose.
Not magic, not the same magic as before at least. Different and overpowering, the air itself smelled as if it had been scorched raw and made anew, and it burnt the Colonels nostrils, but even that would not deter him. This was the second sign of the trail, and very welcome. He sniffed the air like a hound to find the origin of the flavour, and took two steps forward. Stronger here. Two steps forward again. Stronger once more.
He found himself at the bank of a canal, next to a broken water gate and a section of the wall that was out of place compared to the rest. Where everywhere else was smooth and devoid of any signs of wear, this was covered in cracks and looked a thousand years older than the rest, even with the old Empire Stone used here, a thousand years was noticeable. He laid his hand against it, and felt it burn white hot, hotter than anything hed ever touched. He drew back immediately and stared at it. His right hand was wrinkled and decrepit, aged just like the wall and now unusable in any fight. No, he thought. Not magic. It felt familiar somehow, the feel and footprint of the energy, and the Colonel found himself reaching up to touch his eye.
The man he'd given to Markus had thought he would be rewarded for his loyalty to Orman. Perhaps he'd wanted money, or a promotion, perhaps both. He might have been given it, thought the Colonel, if they had been Orman themselves. No, maybe he wouldn't. The Ormans were famous for their poor treatment of the commoners or anyone deemed subpar. Unilt Illum, as the saying goes. Illum calls, and all nations had decided to follow, each in their own special way. Ormans own special way was possibly the most distasteful, not that the Colonel much cared about how they decided to torture their citizens. A conscience wasn't good for much in the bounty hunter business.
He turned on his heels and stalked back to where his unit was camped, whistling an old tune he'd been taught as a boy all those years ago. He stepped over rubble and wood and all sorts of civilian knick knacks that used to belong to someone on his way back, not once looking down. The Colonel was a man of few scruples, to be sure.