Tomorrows hunt.

“Stupid thing,” Caleb muttered as he bent down searching the ground. Ciri stood beside him looking out towards the meadow. The sun had just peaked over the horizon, painting the sky with a soft warm orange glow. A single wood post stood in the grass-covered field. It was taller than a man and a dead goat was hung on it, neck slit, blood pooling from the open wound and seeping into the dirt below. Another goat, this one alive stood with its head bent down sniffing that pool of blood, taking the occasional lick.

Caleb threw a rock, hitting the standing goat square in the haunches and it immediately lurched backwards, turned then ran. It made it all of three feet before the rope tied around it went taunt stopping it dead its tracks. It struggled, pulling against its bindings before it ran to the left, then the right. The rope and post held firm and the goat continued to dance in a panic.

Ciri watched, her thumb lazily drawing circles over the hilt of her sword. She felt on edge, a feeling that was becoming far too familiar. She could use a good fight, monster or man, she didn’t really care, but she knew she wouldn’t get one here. The goats were bait, and this was a live capture mission. The Professor had plans for this creature, plans she did not wish to think of.

Patiently they all sat unmoving, waiting, as the goat calmed slightly but continued to move around the pole pulling on its leash occasionally. its hooves dug into the ground as it tested its binding. It was stuck, ignorant of the fate waiting for it. Trapped, with no hope of escape.

“I wonder sometimes if you even understand what is being done to you?” Caleb whispered breaking the silence beside her, he gave her a sideways glance. “What Professor Hoat has done to you?”

Ciri turned her attention to the goat, she did not wish to think of this.

“I was there during your first show you know.” He had turned to face her now, seemingly bored of watching and waiting. Ciri did not look at him. “That was almost two weeks after you first came to the estate, he had trained you well by then. Bringing you up to the stage to show you off.”

He took an almost delicate step closer to her, careful not to move to much or make to much noise. “I wonder what goes through your head when your down on your knees with a drowners cock in your mouth? Do you enjoy it? Do you enjoy serving him, fucking him and the men who buy you? Do you enjoy having those vile creatures fuck you while other men watch? Being sent out here to the middle of nowhere to help catch the thing that is going to defile you?”

Ciri gritted her teeth but remained silent. The truth was she didn’t know what she was doing, the last few months were a haze to her, it was like looking through a forest blanketed in fog and unable to see the trees. She remembered doing things, horrible things, disgusting things and she remembered enjoying them, loving them. Men and women and monsters, it was all there, foggy, hard to hold on to but it was there and so was the pleasure, the need. And then there was the lack of control, she seemed to be unable to stop herself from acting. It was like she was in a dream floating from one thing to the next without being able to stop.

“I’d take you away from this if I could. These men don’t deserve you, the rich fucks back at Karlik’s certainly don’t, but I can’t help but feel as soon as I ran out of that potion you would try to kill me.”

“I wouldn’t try,” she stated coldly without looking at him.

“There,” she said softly nodding her head towards the field, happy she could end this conversation. In the distance she could see the knee-high grass tilt slightly. Then again slightly closer, she followed the movement as it came closer and closer to the bait.

Ciri glanced at the men beside her, making sure they were ready.

The goat stilled, then screamed as the ground beneath it exploded upwards, kicking up rock, dirt, and dust, the massive centipede burrowed up from under the ground. A dozen pincer-like legs immediately wrapping around the live goat, then twisted up around the post and the dead goat before its fangs sank into the corpse.

She tensed, rising to the balls of her feet as she watched the monster’s carapace covered back flex and move as it constricted around both goats and the pole. The dead goat had been dosed with a near-deadly amount of sedative before it had been killed, they had hoped it would be enough, If not--

She watched the men beside her begin to swing bolas above there heads. Weighted balls connected by long lengths of chain and rope. Thrown just right they would-- the first one went, flying through the air, it hit square in the center of the monster halfway up the pole, the heavy ends twisted around wrapping the chain around the monster tying it to the post. Then another followed, then another and another, all but one successfully tangling itself in the monster.

The giant centipede twisted, and Ciri watched warily, her hand on her blade, she would kill it if it escaped, she wanted to kill it. She needed to kill it before-- The creature stopped moving the sedative taking effect. Ciri released her blade.

“Nets and chains and shovels men!” Caleb ordered.

The men went to work quickly, wrapping the creature with a heavy iron chainmail net as others began digging the post free on one side until they could lay it on its side. Orders were barked, a cart was rolled closer to the trapped monster, it was taller than a man, its torso the size of her own. Two men watched swords at the ready in case the beast came to its sensed, others not busy pulling it onto the wagon watched with disgust and fascination.

“One. Two. Three. Haul!” A man standing on top of the cart cried out before tugging on ropes tied to the beast. It twitched slightly but barely moved as it was dragged up and onto the cart, within seconds more ropes were lashed around it by men wary of having a twelve-foot long centipede so close.

With each new rope and chain that was secured the tension once present lessened. Most of the men here had never seen anything like this before, a centipede twice as tall as they were, an odd sight to be sure.

Confident the cargo was secure Ciri herself began to relax and the men began to shuffle away from the cart, some tending to the horses, others heading to camp. She couldn’t stop staring at the monster. It was longer than she was tall, dozens of small legs ending in sharp points lined its frame. Those points would need to be covered or dulled as they would pierce skin, her skin. She shuddered at the thought.

Unwanted thoughts of men watching, lights on her, that thing curling its body up and around her naked form, digging into her skin. Caleb was right, she captured this thing, she would return it to Hoat and for what? so he could devise some way to let it fuck her?

“Does it even have a dick?”

Ciri glanced sideways, two men stood on the other side of the cart watching as the centipede was secured. They looked at it, then to her, then back at it.

One of the men shrugged, “don’t know how it will work, but I hope I get to see it,” he said before looking straight at her, “Excited are you a monster hunter?” he asked with a knowing grin.

Ciri turned and walked away.