Though it took many days to reach the red hills, they passed in no time at all.
The closer they got, the more arid the plains became, until they gave way to the rising red rock. Louis and Hawk approached on hoof. The ridge extended in both directions as far as they could see, but it did not look so difficult to climb. However, they would have to continue their journey on two legs rather than four.
Louis shook off his mane and shrank back into the orc. He’d mastered the change down to a matter of seconds now, and was almost immediately splayed awkwardly on his hands and knees. He righted himself and took a deep breath, enjoying the warm sun against his naked, olive skin. The orc in his head purred.
He heard movement behind him and turned to see Hawk the dun stallion bellow into Hawk the minotaur. Like Louis had done, the beast stretched in the sun. Louis had seen this body countless times by now, but he still couldn’t help licking his lips.
He was considering suggesting a moment’s rest and “recreation” before the climb, but was distracted by an odd feeling. His eyes were drawn back to the hills, as if guided there by a magnetic force. It was a feeling he recognised, though it took him a moment to remember where from. Stonewater arena, when he first looked at the dragon, like he was looking at something he shouldn’t see, something out of place that had to be put right. That same something was pulling him onwards and up those hills. Had it always been there, since he first landed in the plains?
‘Do you feel that?’ he said.
‘Feel what?’ Hawk grunted.
Louis didn’t reply. He began to climb.
It was not a taxing climb, though it was slow going. There was no discernable path and the size of the rocks made it necessary to climb with his hands as much as his feet. But his body was well adapted for this work and by now he was well accustomed to the exercise.
Hawk’s body, however, being larger and more muscular, found the climb even easier. He soon made a game of it, overtaking Louis and waiting patiently for him every time he gained a good lead. Periodically, Louis would almost catch up with the grinning minotaur, who would scurry onwards before Louis could quite reach him. This part, Louis didn’t mind, as it was not a bad view of Hawk’s swaying rump.
‘I’ve never asked,’ Louis called, after the third or fourth time, ‘where did you get that?’
‘Get what? This bull-man?’
‘Mm,’ Louis grunted.
‘Uhh…’ Hawk stopped, unable to focus on both remembering and climbing. ‘In a village somewhere. It stomped into town and was breaking walls. I scratched its eyes out with the hawk and then poisoned it with the snake. It took many, many bites to fell it.’
‘But minotaurs aren’t real, are they?’
Hawk shrugged. ‘This one was.’
‘Yes, but before. It’s a monster, right? Like my dragon?’
Hawk shrugged again.
‘What compelled you to fight it?’
‘I wanted its body,’ Hawk said matter-of-factly. ‘Don’t you?’
He turned to Louis, arms raised behind his head in a sultry pose, something the minotaur had surely never done in its own body.
Louis smiled but did not laugh. ‘You weren’t… drawn to fight it? You didn’t feel like you were supposed to kill it?’
A blank expression played across the minotaur’s face. Hawk didn’t know what Louis was talking about and Louis didn’t have better words to explain it. So he patted Hawk’s thigh as he passed and the conversation moved to other things. Nevertheless, it continued to trouble Louis. Surely, Hawk should be the only other person he knew who would understand what he meant? So why didn’t he?
They climbed. And the closer they got to the peak, the stronger the feeling became. There was something at the very top. Something that Louis needed to slay.
By the time they reached the summit, the sinking sun had burnt the edges of the sky. From the peak, they could see that the rocky hills marked the end of the plains, separating them from a vast, golden desert, shining and glittering under the reddening sunset.
‘That’s going to be tough to cross,’ muttered Hawk. ‘Maybe we should fly?’
‘Mm,’ Louis grunted, noncommittally. His sense that there was monster nearby had not abated.
Giving no explanation to Hawk, Louis turned to walk along the top of the hill. It was close. He was certain.
‘Yeah, let’s camp up here for the night,’ said Hawk, following. ‘Oh! Seems somebody else had that idea first.’
Louis looked back at Hawk and saw he was using a meaty arm to point. Louis followed his finger to a small, flat plateau a little ways down on the desert side of the hill. There, Louis saw a tent and the remains of a fire.
He suddenly felt very exposed, aware, for the first time in days, that he was naked and how strange it might look to a human to see a bare-skinned orc travelling jovially with a minotaur. But before he had much time to worry about it, he noticed a large tear in the side of the tent. And there were a number of dark stains upon the rock. Blood?
‘...Hawk.’
Hawk sensed the concern in Louis’s tone. ‘What is it?’
‘I think a monster was here,’ said Louis. ‘I think it’s still here.’
Hawk looked at Louis. Louis looked back. Hawk’s snout bared a toothy grin which suddenly vanished behind a beak. The minotaur broke out in feathers, threw his bulk into the air and Louis felt the air rush to fill the space he left when his bulk shrunk down into the hawk, flying down towards the camp. Louis quickly leapt after him, hands first, which became paws as he tucked the orc beneath grey fur.
The hawk and the wolf were on the prowl, hunting for a monster.