He Runs (Part One) by Owen Seth

his head, slaps himself until it passes.
    Two minutes pass and he’s calm. The storm has passed, the earthquake of his soul is over. He fully expects the aftershocks.
    He opens his eyes to see Hound licking the sputum with enthusiasm, as if it's the best meal the dog has ever consumed. He knows not why this is still happening. That’s what the cutting is for. Each scar designed to purge him of his deeds. Pain for pain. Blood for blood.
    Man struggles to his feet and wobbles towards the step. Sees the burned out cigarette lying on dry dirt. He sits down and sips the coffee to relive his mouth of the awful, coppery taste of vomit. He thinks back to when these synoptic thunderstorms were common place. Occurred on a weekly basis until his mother took him to the doctor and he was prescribed some pills. The little capsules controlled his outbursts and up until the lights went out he was free from the irksome toll that they took on his life. 
    It took a while for the first storm to hit him. A few months at least. And since, they’ve become more frequent, although he couldn’t say how frequent. If only he could remember the name of those pills. His mother would always throw away the packet. He was not an easy child. He knows this. He grew up quickly and soon disassociated himself with the comforting reliability of his parents. From an early age he sought independence, learning to cook for himself, bathing and dressing himself. As a result his mother and father grew further from him. It was around the time his father started to drink every day. But as soon as those outbursts began he was delivered quickly back into their control. Without them he would have no prescription, no pills. Without them he would succumb to the mind storms of pain. He and his mother grew close once again but in Man’s juvenile eyes, his alcoholic father could no longer redeem himself. No matter how hard he tried. His father was a relic of an earlier time, a period of Man’s life where although he pushed his parents away, he wanted nothing more than for them to pull him back in. It was a time that primed him for the harshness and chaos of the New World. A time that taught him when and where to decide who and what he would trust.
    He just wishes that he could remember the name of those pills.
     
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    Horses grunt and hounds bark in a fast paced dash across grassy fields. Men shout to each other, egg each other on as the beasts between their legs and at their sides move speedily, muscular statures, hair covered, glimmering with each stride.
    The riders, eight of them in total, slow down as they approach a forest.
    ‘We should go around it,’ one of them says. ‘Too much vegetation. The horses will struggle.’
    ‘We should split up,’ says another. ‘Four in there, four out here.’
    ‘If he’s in there, I want you to flush him out,’ says the man who leads the band. ‘Chase him to the other side and we’ll be waiting.’
    ‘Why don’t we just kill him when we find him?’
    ‘Don’t even try it! He’s dangerous. He’s skilled.’
    ‘I can take him.’
    ‘No! No, you can’t! You four, go in on foot. Flush him out and we’ll catch him on the other side.’
    Four riders dismount without any more protestation, hand the reigns of their horses to the other riders. Two of them have shotguns. One a pistol. The other, a crossbow. Failing these they have an assortment of knives, machetes and hatchets. They move slowly, together in a line, into the dark mass of wilderness. They’ve three torches between them, six in total, but won’t use them unless they have to. Batteries are a rare commodity, not to be wasted.
    As they crunch the growth beneath them they hear the clattering of hooves in the distance, smashing against brittle earth. Their leader, a man called Smith, is certain their target is nearby. He claims he can sense his presence. And if anyone has a right