Gilded Family
Rating: Teen and Up, Gen
Ch 5 /?: No One Else
Ch 1, Ch 2, Ch 3, Ch 4
In which none of the previous golden guards or wittebro died, actually, they're all fine and living happily together as one big dysfunctional family
Ao3
“—and then when he makes it to shore, he finds out Clerval has been murdered, and he’s suspect number one! He ends up getting sick for some reason? He’s just weird like that, he’s kind of a wimp, actually, not my favorite protagonist, but—”
Hunter sprang to his feet, scattering discarded weeds everywhere, as he spotted a glimmer of movement in the mysterious section of house, disrupting Jason’s ‘summary.’ “There!”
Jason jumped. “There what?!”
Hunter gestured with his trowel. “There’s someone in there!”
“Oh. Yeah, it’s probably Mom. Or Dad. They go in there to cry sometimes.”
“What’s in that room?”
Mole scooped up a pile of weeds and stomped away, towards the compost, throwing each plant in one by one, a little more aggressively than Hunter thought was necessary.
Jason gave Mole an uneasy glance. “Oh. Nothing. It’s… an empty bedroom.”
Hunter frowned. “Why’s it empty?”
“Because no one lives there,” Jason replied matter-of-factly.
Hunter reached out, tousling his hair and getting dirt from the garden in it. “Alright, smart-alec.”
Jason ducked away with a yelp. “Hey, kind of an obvious answer! That’s on you! Anyway, as I was saying—”
He was interrupted by yells for help from the forest. Hunter and Jason glanced at each other, then ran for the gate, opening it just in time to see Meleager, Horus, and Hamlet stumble out of the trees, carrying Venari between them. Hunter ran to meet them, scooping the Grimwalker out of their arms. They were bleeding from their side, and their eyes were already closed.
“I’ll get Mom,” Jason said, dashing off towards the house.
Hunter hefted Venari in his arms, moving as quickly as he could towards the house. “What happened?!”
“It was a demon,” Hamlet half-sobbed, “It came out of nowhere, and—and—”
Mrs. Wittebane was waiting for him at the door, rushing them into another room and directing Hunter to a bed where he gently lay the injured Grimwalker down. “Will they be okay?”
“It’s not the worst injury I’ve seen.” She held out her hands, drawing a circle to make them glow with healing light.
The original burst through the door, and Meleager turned to face him, face pale. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, it’s my fault, I should have—I should have been watching better, they’re my responsibility when we’re out, I’m sorry—”
Wittebane reached out towards him, then stalled when Meleager flinched. “It’s not your fault,” he said in a low, steady voice, underscored with what Hunter was pretty sure was barely-contained panic, “Meleager, it isn’t your fault, okay? You couldn’t predict or prevent this, it… things just happen sometimes, but this isn’t your fault.” He knelt next to his wife. “What’s the rundown?”
She shook her head, glancing back at the grimwalkers. The others were all crowding around the door, peering in at Venari. “It was venomous,” she said in a low voice, “They need an antidote. I can delay the venom with my magic, but without an actual cure…”
Wittebane stood up. “Okay,” he said in a firm, businesslike voice, “Meleager, Sam, you’re with me. Grab a couple of concealment stones, we’re going to town. Meleager, can you describe the demon you saw?”
He nodded. “I can do that. I can—yes. I can do that.”
“Okay. We’re going to visit every potion brewer, beast keeper, and healer until we find an antidote. If you two can piece together what that thing was, we’ll have a starting point, but even if not, I’m sure a beastkeeper will know. In the meantime, no one goes out past the fence.”
“Couldn’t we make an antivenom from the venom of the thing?” one of the grimwalkers (Chryses, if Hunter remembered correctly) piped up, “If we could find it, then… never mind,” he broke off hastily as Wittebane turned towards him.
“No, it’s a good idea. But I don’t want anyone else getting bitten, not for a maybe. Everyone stays inside the fence.” He nodded to Cherry. “You’re in charge while your mother and I are busy. No one goes into the woods.”
The one-eyed Grimwalker nodded seriously. “Yes, sir.”
Wittebane nodded to Meleager and Sam. “Let’s go.”
Mrs. Wittebane jumped up to follow them as they swept out, and Hunter followed, pressing himself against the wall outside a door as she pulled her husband into the room.
“Be careful. Be safe. Please. Make sure they all come home.”
Hunter peered around to get a glimpse of Wittebane gently pressing his forehead to hers, holding her face in his hands as she squeezed his wrists. “We’ll make it back. All of us. I won’t fail another kid. I won’t.”
He took Petro’s condition hard, Hunter realized, The only one he couldn’t completely save.
If he loses another one, it’ll kill him.
I have to do something.
He peeled himself off the wall, sliding back into place with the other grimwalkers outside of Venari’s room. The two Wittebanes walked out of the room, but went opposite directions down the hallway. The door slammed, and just like that, they were gone.
Mrs. Wittebane wiped at her eyes, then shooed the grimwalkers away. “Okay, okay, all of you go back to what you were doing before, they’ll be fine.”
Hamlet and Horus planted themselves firmly in the room next to Venari’s bed. “We’re staying,” Horus announced.
“Of course. But the rest of you.”
They filed off, gathering silently in the kitchen instead. Cherry gave all of them a stern look, then went outside. Through the window, Hunter saw him plant himself where he could watch the major points of exit from the house.
“You think they’ll be able to find an antidote in time?” Jason asked in a small voice.
There was a chorus of “yes”s and “of course”s from the other assorted Grimwalkers. Steven waved his hands at Jason frantically. “Mom’ll keep the venom from killing them, Dad’ll get the antidote, it’ll be fine, don’t worry about it.”
The other Grimwalkers chimed their agreement, then looked at each other, and wandered off in separate directions, leaving only Mole, Jason, and Hunter behind. Jason rested his elbows on the counter, putting his chin in his hand. “Bunch of liars,” he said gloomily, “Sometimes they act like I wasn’t a golden guard, too. I’m not stupid, I know the situation’s bad, I just...”
Sometimes I kind of forget that you were, too, Hunter thought, fidgeting with his hands, You don’t exactly look the part. “Yeah,” he agreed softly, glancing towards the door, “Situation’s bad.”
Jason perked up, his eyes flicking back and forth between Hunter and the door. “You’re going after it,” he breathed, “You’re—”
Hunter put a hand over his mouth, glancing around to see if anyone heard.
“Mrgh!” Jason protested, tugging at his arm.
“Shhhhhh,” Hunter hissed, “Look, I can’t just sit around and—” something slimy touched his hand, and he yanked it back from Jason’s mouth. “Did you just lick me?!”
Mole snickered.
Jason made a face, then spit in the sink, rinsing it away. “Your hand tastes like dirt,” he complained.
Hunter washed his hand in the sink, scrubbing. “That is disgusting!”
“Anyway. How are you planning on getting past Cherry? He might be half blind, but he’s really sensitive, he’ll know.”
“You’re not going to try to stop me?”
Jason twisted the bottom of his shirt in his hands. “It’s bad,” he said softly, “There’s no guarantee Dad and the others will be able to find a cure, or that they’ll get it back here in time. If you think you can get its venom for an antidote…” He shook his head. “Don’t get bitten?” he pleaded.
“I won’t.”
“Can I…”
“No. You need to stay here.”
Jason sighed. “Okay. Figured it was a long shot.”
Hunter glanced out the window at the silent sentinel that was Cherry. “Any ideas?”
“Mmm… I could distract him, so you could sneak out?”
“That’ll never work, he’ll suspect you in a heartbeat. Darius got scouts to help him sneak out at night by being a distraction all the time, and I always caught him.”
“Yeah, alright, that’s fair.”
Mole tapped the table to get their attention and jerked his head towards the dining room window.
Jason’s eyes lit up. “If I made it look like I was really attempting an escape, he wouldn’t realize it was a distraction! I’ll go out the window, and you wait for him to follow! Don’t worry, I’ll be quiet enough he thinks it’s real, but not so sneaky I actually get out! Mole can go out a different window, just in case! That way, if he does figure it out, he’ll think it’s just a distraction for Mole! You just have to be sneakier than the two of us.”
Hunter bit his lip, thinking. “You two won’t get in trouble, will you?”
“From Cherry? Pflbt. Nah, he’ll just make us come back inside. It’ll be fine. Venari needs this, come on, it doesn’t matter.”
Mole nodded in agreement, and the two of them split up, Jason clambering out the dining room window and Mole going down the hallway to try a different one. Hunter took a knife and a discarded broom handle, watching as Cherry suddenly sprinted off in the direction of the dining room, yelling something that sounded like “JASON, I CAN SEE YOU”. Hunter shook his head with a small smile, opening the door and slipping out, carefully sticking to the shadows of the house and keeping an eye out for Cherry. He reached for the gate handle, and with the sound of a deep inhale, Cherry appeared on top of the fence.
“I can’t let you leave.”
Hunter’s head whipped around as he looked backwards to where Jason had gone. “How—?”
“Jason and Mole aren’t conceited enough to think they can beat some monster that took out Venari, and they’re not stupid enough to try. I knew they wouldn’t actually be trying to get away.”
“Then who…?”
“Dagger’s on it. He’s wearing one of my eyepatches.”
“I’m not Jason, and I’m not Mole. I can handle this.”
Cherry shook his head. “I can’t let you. Dad said to keep everyone out of the woods until he came back. So I am.”
Hunter threw his hands up. “You’re not even a little worried?!”
“Of course I’m worried about Venari,” Cherry replied, his voice aggrieved, but still even. “But I can’t just let you run off and get yourself poisoned, too. I can’t risk more of us dying.”
“So you admit it, then?” Hunter asked in a low voice, “You know Venari is dying, but you won’t do anything about it?”
“We just have to trust Dad. He’ll come back with the antidote. I just have to believe in him, and make sure no one else gets hurt. He trusted me to do that, it’s my job, and I’m not going to let him down.”
Hunter ran a hand through his hair. “You’re not at all thinking maybe you just replaced Uncle with someone else? Following his every order, worried about messing up? Believing that he’s some higher being that we can trust to fix all the problems, we just have to trust him?!”
Cherry shook his head again, still deadly calm. “Dad is not Uncle Belos. Even if I did fail to keep one of you from running off to kill this thing, he wouldn’t punish me. They are not the same.”
“Prove it. Let me go.”
Cherry glanced at the woods behind him. “I can’t do that. This is to keep the rest of you safe.”
“I can take care of myself. I won’t take any unnecessary risks. Is it really worth Venari dying to keep me from maybe getting hurt?!” Hunter took a deep breath. “You guys saved me. You took me in. Let me do this for you, let me save them.”
I can’t just sit by and do nothing while someone dies.
Cherry looked up towards the house, then gave Hunter a long look, and hopped off of the fence, leaving the gate free. “Be quick. Be safe. Like you said, no unnecessary risks.”
Hunter opened the gate, slipping out. “Thank you. I’ll say that I slipped past you so that you won’t get in trouble.”
Cherry just shook his head as the gate swung shut.
Hunter quickly found the trail of blood leading into the woods. It’s not much, but it’s a starting point.
The trail wasn’t a direct line just splotches of blood here and there, but they were relatively consistent in their spacing, and he was able to find each one easily.
“Look, see, there it is!”
Hunter pricked up at the voice, ducking behind a tree.
“Oh, yeah, you’re right. Good eye!”
“Thanks.”
Grimwalker voices. Hunter came out from his hiding place. “What are you two doing out?”
The two (Cyrus and Matt, if he remembered correctly) jumped, whirling to point weapons at him.
“Oh,” Cyrus said finally, without lowering his knife, “It’s you. Hi. Here to get some of the venom from the big bad whatever it is?”
Hunter crossed his arms. “How did you two get past Cherry?”
“His room is slapped right up against the fence,” Matt said casually, “We figured that if he was outside watching the main exits, he wasn’t in his room, so we snuck out that way.”
“You weren’t worried he might have set up a trap in there?”
“He did,” Cyrus responded, equally casually, “We disarmed it.”
Hunter shook his head. “This is dangerous. You need to go back.”
“Bit hypocritical of you,” Matt shot back, “What are you doing out here?”
“I’m going to get some of that thing’s venom so they can make a cure for Venari, and I’m going to kill it.”
“That’s what we’re doing, too. Why don’t you just team up with us?”
Did they think this was some kind of game? “This thing took out Venari, and Meleager couldn’t do anything to stop it. It’s too dangerous for you.”
They both stared at him, as if they couldn’t quite understand what he was talking about. Then Matt slapped a hand to his forehead. “Oh! Oh, you thought…” he turned to face Cyrus, who still looked confused. “He thought Meleager, Hamlet, Horus, and Venari were the strongest in the family.”
“Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.”
Hunter felt like the rug had been yanked out from under him. They were the hunters, they were the ones that went out into the world—of course he’d thought they were the strongest. Sure, he’d bested them easily, but he’d just assumed they were out of practice fighting another witch.
“Are they… not?” he ventured tentatively.
Cyrus laughed. “Nah, they’re just the angriest.”
“In terms of strength and combat prowess, plenty of us are stronger,” Matt explained kindly, “We don’t use that often, because we don’t have need to. They’re competent, to be sure, and they can handle themselves just fine, but they’re far from the strongest.”
“Oh,” Hunter said faintly, “So you really think you can take on this demon?”
“Oh, yeah, absolutely.” Matt blinked at him. “Did you bring a jar to collect the venom in?”
Hunter shook his head. “I just figured I’d bring its decapitated head. Or rip out a venom gland.”
“Gross.”
“Violent,” Cyrus agreed. He handed Hunter a jar with cloth covering the opening. “There, now all of us have one. Just get it to bite on the cloth!”
Hunter blinked at the jar. “Did you see the size of Venari’s bite?! If it bites on this jar, it’ll shatter it!”
“Well, we’ll restrain it first,” Matt commented, “Don’t worry, we have traps.”
“And I grabbed some sleeping nettles,” Cyrus volunteered, “We’re going to go to where it attacked Venari, set up camp, and wait. We’ll surround the area with traps, wait for it to come for us, knock it out, get the venom safely, then kill it, just to be sure. If the sleeping nettles or the traps aren’t strong enough for it, we’ll have to fight it, but it should be—”
“Um, Cyrus?” Matt interrupted faintly, looking over Hunter’s shoulder, “Do we have a plan for if it ambushes us?”
Cyrus froze. “Hunter, don’t. Move.” He slowly pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket, then lunged forwards with a war cry. Matt grabbed the front of Hunter’s shirt at the same time, yanking him forward. Hunter heard teeth snap in the air behind him, and then a hiss of anger. He whirled around to see a lizardlike demon with sharp teeth and eyes all along its back get tangled up in vines from Cyrus’ glyph. Cyrus brought his leg in a furious kick that cracked into its jaw, making it shriek.
Matt jumped forward, slapping down a glyph of his own. Hunter eyed their surroundings, and the beast, and clambered up into a tree, swinging down almost immediately and landing on the creature’s back. He started smacking and poking its eyes with his makeshift staff, making it shriek with pain. Its tail whipped around, and too late, Hunter realized there was a scaly hand on the end, one that grabbed his arm and threw him to the side. Hunter made himself go limp and rolled with the impact when he hit the ground, then sprang back up. Matt threw a crumpled piece of paper at him, and Hunter snatched it out of the air, spreading it out and smacking it. Vines pinned the tail down, and Cyrus opened a pouch, throwing a handful of sleeping nettles into the demon’s face. It dropped almost immediately to sleep.
“Hah,” Matt panted, “Well, that was closer than I wanted it to be.”
Hunter nudged it with his foot. “How do we know this is the same demon? Or that it’s venomous?”
Cyrus gestured to a yellowish liquid dribbling out of its mouth. “Pretty sure that’s the venom. You hurting its eyes probably pushed the glands down and forced it out. Or something. I don’t know how biology works. Does the jaw look like the same shape as the bite?”
Hunter examined it, tracing the shape. “Yeah.”
Cyrus pressed the monster’s jaws to the cloth of the jar, and venom streamed in. He repeated with various section of the jaw, until the jar was full. “That should be enough.”
There was a glint in the creature’s eyes, and Hunter grabbed Cyrus, yanking him backwards. “Watch out!”
It lunged out of the vines, and Hunter brought his broom handle swinging with an almighty crack down between its two face eyes.
The broom handle splintered and broke.
“Uh-oh,” he said in a small voice as it turned its attention on him. He dodged a swipe of claws, pulling out the knife he’d taken to replace the broom handle. Matt created a spear out of ice, hurling it as hard as he could. It shattered against the creature’s skin. The demon lunged out, and Matt dodged its bite, only for the thing’s claws on the end of its tail to slash across his chest.
Matt dropped with a scream, and Cyrus leapt forward with a scream, driving a knife right through its tail, pinning it to the ground.
“KILL IT!” he hollered, “KILL IT NOW!”
Hunter jumped forward with his own knife, dodging a snap of the jaws, then stabbing it in the eye with the splintered broom handle. He dodged a half blind shriek and clawing with its leg, then lunged, bringing his knife home in its throat. It dropped with a gurgle, thrashing and twisting weakly until finally, it just stopped.
Cyrus knelt down next to Matt. “Are you okay?!”
“Just a scratch,” Matt wheezed. Blood had already spread across the front of his shirt, and Hunter hissed in. Those scratches looked deep. And who knew what this thing had in its claws?
Cyrus handed the jar of venom to Hunter. “Take it to Mom. I’ll get him home.”
“Are you sure? What if—”
“Go, before it’s too late for Venari!”
Hunter gave him a brief nod, and sprinted back in the direction of the house, vaulting over logs and rocks. He burst in the gate, shooting past Cherry and all the way back to Venari’s room, holding out the jar to Mrs. Wittebane, panting.
“Oh! Hunter is—is that what I think it is?!”
“Venom,” he panted, “Antidote. Hurry. Matt injured.”
“Matt?! Oh—never mind, tell me later.” She took the jar from him, shooting to the kitchen.
Hamlet and Horus blinked at him from Venari’s bedside. “You… you killed it?” Hamlet asked slowly.
“With help.”
They both nodded, then went quiet again. Hunter let out a deep sigh, then stretched, wincing. Ow. Getting tossed around by that thing had hurt more than he’d thought it would. He checked for injuries, spotting a couple of scrapes on his elbows and legs. Cyrus limped in, hauling Matt with him. The injured Grimwalker had vines securing scraps of fabric to his injury. Hunter wordlessly helped carry him to his room. The first Grimwalker Hunter had ever spoken to (Auric, if he remembered the name correctly) came in with bandages, a washcloth, and a bowl of water. He shooed the two of them out and closed the door. Cyrus sat down outside with a whump. Hunter slowly lowered himself down to sit next to him.
“No one knows you were gone. You don’t have to…”
“Nah, I’ll own up. Can’t let you and Matt take all the blame, huh?”
“Is he going to be okay?”
“Sure.” Cyrus’ voice wobbled ever-so-slightly. “Auric’s great, best doctor we’ve got, besides Mom, of course.” He cleared his throat. “Anyway, how are you coping with losing your kid?”
It was an obvious change of topic, but it still threw Hunter off guard, making his heart clench at the thought of his student. “I—I mean, he’s not dead, I—”
“He’s not?”
Hunter played with a new hole in his shirt from the fight. “No. Thank titan. I thought for sure Belos would kill him after I attacked him.”
Cyrus ‘hm’ed in agreement. “I’m surprised he even let you have an outside friend in the first place. A witch friend? Man. Guess he’s gotten more lenient.”
More lenient?
“He used to be stricter about it?” Hunter’s eyes widened as he started connecting the dots. “Oh. You had…”
Cyrus rested his chin on his knees. “Mmm. Wasn’t the same as you and your kid.”
“I’m… I’m sorry.”
“Yeah. It was… I just wanted to check, because I know it can be… tough… at first. Pain fades eventually, though. I guess.”
Hunter thought of the bittersweet feeling he got whenever he remembered Darius. Maybe he wasn’t dead, but he’d never see him again. Never talk to him again. It was almost like he WAS dead, except with that melancholy some day that echoed in his mind.
“I guess,” he echoed softly, then, after a moment of hesitation, “Tell me about them?”
A brief smile. “He was… smart. And sweet. And he felt… safe. If I got hurt on mission, or by Belos, I’d go to him. To crash for a bit. To be healed.” Another soft smile, this one staying. Hunter watched with a smile of his own playing at his lips, watching Cyrus’ tension fade, remembering. “He’d always give the wound a little kiss, always said it made it heal faster.”
“He sounds wonderful.”
“He was.” Cyrus brushed at his eyes. “Guess I was kind of an idiot for thinking I could hide him from Belos, huh? If I’d really loved him, I would have made him go away, I would have…” He swiped at his eyes. “Ah, what does it matter. Can’t change the past, right? In the end, I wasn’t enough to protect him. I got left injured on a mountain to die. Belos said that if I could make it back in time to stop him… But I collapsed, and when I woke up here, I was seventy years too late.”
A shock ran down Hunter’s spine, and he jolted upright. “What?! You mean they prevented you from…”
Cyrus twirled his forelock between his fingers. “Ah, I would have died on that mountain anyway. I wasn’t making it back, Belos knew that. He just wanted me to wallow in my failure for a bit first. You know, the usual.”
“The usual,” Hunter repeated.
Mrs. Wittebane ran back towards Venari’s room, carrying a new bowl. Hunter scrambled to his feet to follow. Cyrus didn’t get up, his eyes fixed on the door, fingers still twisting his hair.
“Hey.” Hunter offered him a hand. “Venari’s going to be okay, thanks to you. We’re not going to lose anyone else.”
Cyrus grasped his hand, hauling himself up to his feet. “No one else.”
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