Hunters

6. Hyperboreans

Just a (VERY) small warning for readers with a dislike for death/gore:
I would recommend to avoid the latter parts of this chapter.

Have fun :)

"I still fail to see how a polar bear qualifies as a mythical beast.", Kora whisper yelled at her brother, throwing a quick look towards the client a few feet in front of them who had insisted on tagging along with the whole lot of his expedition team.

It thankfully seemed as if he hadn't heard her.
Her outburst had been quite a bit louder than she had intended.

"A job is a job.", Eren repeated for the x'ed time. "Not to forget that he insisted on doubling our usual fee."

Kora sighed and pulled her scarf just a little bit higher to help against the raging snow.
She noticed that, despite their slow pace, quite a few people had fallen behind.
After a moment of contemplation she hastened her step to catch up to the front.

"Sir Eregwin, how much longer till we reach the campsite? Quite a few of your companions seem to have fallen behind."

The man looked up from his map as he heard Koras voice and, after listening to her question, turned to his guide.

"If I'm not mistaken it shouldn't be much more than an hour before we reach today's destination.
What do you think Caran?"
His guide nodded.
"That should be about right."

He turned back to Kora.
"No worries Miss Kora, we'll slow down a bit more and wait till everyone catches up. I will personally inform the rest of the group.
They may seem rather lethargic now, but wait until it comes to our actual purpose of being here.
You will not recognize them."

"I'm not worried about that.", Kora replied. "My brother's and my concern lie's with the safety of this expedition and its rather risky to let parts of group fall apart, especially with the low visibility. We probably wouldn't even realize that someone went missing before we gather to set up camp."

One of Eregwin's companions said something in a language Kora had yet to fully understand and Eregwin turned to him, seemingly remprimating him, occasionally throwing Kora sidelong glances, probably to find out if she had understood his words.
She hadn't but neither did she care. Her brother and her were here to do a job and nothing else. She only hoped the group wouldn't make to much trouble when their prey appeared. The dead did not pay particularly well.

Kora returned to Eren's side and they all waited together for the rest of the men.

The rest of the day passed by peacefully. Nothing out of the ordinary appeared and they sat up camp at the preplanned destination.

Kora took the first night shift together with one of Sir Eregwin's men, the oldest of the lot if looks could be trusted. She had to wake him multiple times after he had managed to fall into slumber even while standing up.
After it had happened for the sixth time she didn't bother to wake him up again but sat him down next to the fire and covered him with blankets.

It remained quiet until the wind started to pick up and snow started to fall once more. By the time she went to wake Eren it had developed into a full blown snowstorm.

Eren, unsurprisingly, was already awake.
Wind and snow were strong, even though the camping side was protected on three sides and Kora decided to stay up till the morning to make sure nothing happened. She wouldn't be able to sleep anyway, not in this storm.

A few others of the group came out as well, woken by the howling winds and together they sat at the small campfire. Eren occasionally went off to patrol the campsite, but found nothing out of the ordinary, not that he could see much with the now heavily falling snow.
As he reunited with the rest, he caught the last few words of a story Sir Eregwin had started just after he had left.