Chapter 24 – The Hunt of Artemis
The mountains had hardly released him when the next summons came.
Ivar had descended from the Caucasus weary but unbroken, his scars from the spirit of Ares still burning faintly on his arms. He had delivered the relic, faced the god of war himself, and walked away with something rarer than survival — respect. But respect from one god only meant scrutiny from others.
And Artemis had been watching.
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The Dream of the Stag
It began as a dream.
Ivar lay in a tent pitched among soldiers outside Kandahar, listening to the snores of men too young to know how long war could last. His eyes closed, his body slid into the shallow sleep of one who never fully rests.
He dreamed of a forest. Impossible, in the Afghan dust — a forest thick with pines, their scent sharp, the air filled with fog. Through the trees walked a stag, its antlers glowing with silver light, its hooves stirring no sound. Its eyes locked onto him, ancient and knowing.
Follow.
He woke with a jolt. The desert night was still. The soldiers slept on. But outside the tent, he saw it — the stag, shimmering in pale silver, walking silently toward the hills.
Without hesitation, Ivar rose, strapped his swords across his back, and followed.
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The Encounter
The stag led him far from camp, over ridges and into a ravine where moonlight pooled like water.
And she was there.
Artemis.
Not cloaked in shadow like Hermes, not blazing with force like Ares. She stood tall and still, her bow resting in her hand, her eyes cool and sharp as polished stone. Moonlight clung to her form, making her both beautiful and terrible.
Ivar stopped a few paces away, his head bowing slightly in the respect she commanded.
"Lady of the Hunt," he said softly.
Her gaze swept over him, cold but not cruel. "You walk with men, fighting their wars, drowning in their blood. But balance does not live in cities or deserts, Ivar. Balance is here, in the wild."
"I have never forgotten that," he answered. "Though the wild is harder to find."
Artemis tilted her head, as if testing him. "Then you will help me restore it."
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The Task
She told him of a wolf. Not an ordinary wolf, but one of her sacred pack — silver-furred, born beneath an eclipse, tied to her hunt. It had been captured by smugglers, men who sold rare beasts on black markets, their greed staining the wilderness with cruelty.
"They cage my hunter like a cur," she said, anger sharp beneath her calm tone. "They sell the bones of lions, the hides of leopards, the tusks of elephants. Now they dare chain what is mine. Free it."
Ivar nodded. "Where?"
Her bow pointed east. "Follow the stag. It will not lead you astray."
The stag moved again, silent in the night, and Ivar followed. When he glanced back once, Artemis was gone, her presence folded back into the stars.
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The Smugglers' Trail
For three nights and days, he tracked them through the borderlands — smugglers moving between Afghanistan and Pakistan, their trucks heavy with cages. He saw the signs: scraps of fur caught on barbed wire, bones discarded by the roadside, fires burning in secret camps.
At last, he found them.
The camp lay in a valley, lit by oil lamps. Trucks were lined up, cages stacked one atop another. Inside them, creatures shifted and cried — snow leopards, falcons, even a bear too weak to stand. And in the largest cage, half-hidden under a tarp, the silver wolf lay bound in chains. Its eyes gleamed faintly even through exhaustion.
Ivar's blood ran cold with fury.
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The Assault
He waited until night deepened, until the guards around the camp began to grow lazy. Then he struck.
He moved like shadow, slipping between tents, his twin swords whispering death. One guard fell with his throat cut before he could raise a shout. Another collapsed with steel in his ribs. Ivar's fury burned hot, but his strikes were silent, surgical.
When the alarm finally rose, it was too late. He was already among them, blades flashing, steel meeting rifle barrels with sparks. A bullet grazed his shoulder, another tore through his jacket, but his healing burned away the pain as fast as it came.
He cut chains from cages as he fought, throwing open doors. Leopards lunged out, claws flashing against men who had tormented them. Falcons burst into the night sky, screeching. The bear, half-dead, swiped with enough force to scatter soldiers into panic.
And at the center, he reached the silver wolf.
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The Wolf Unchained
The animal was larger than any mortal wolf, its fur shimmering faintly as if moonlight lived inside it. Its paws were torn, its body scarred, but its eyes blazed with defiance.
Ivar cut the chains, pulled the muzzle from its snout. For a heartbeat, the wolf stared at him, as if testing whether he was hunter or savior.
Then it lunged — not at him, but at the smugglers rushing from behind. Its jaws clamped on a rifleman's throat, its howl shaking the valley like thunder.
Together, man and wolf tore through the camp. By dawn, no smuggler lived to cage another beast.
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Artemis Appears
The valley fell silent. The freed animals slipped back into wilderness, their cries fading. The wolf stood beside Ivar, silver fur streaked with blood, its sides heaving.
And Artemis appeared once more.
She stepped from the treeline, moonlight weaving around her. Her eyes lingered on the wolf, then on Ivar. She placed her hand on the beast's head, and it bowed to her before vanishing into the shadows.
"You did not falter," she said. Her tone was softer now, not praise exactly, but acknowledgment.
Ivar cleaned his swords on his sleeve, meeting her gaze. "It was never a question. They should never have been taken."
Artemis studied him, her eyes narrowing as though searching for the lie mortals so often carried. But she found none.
"You are not like other sons of men," she said at last. "Most see the wild as a thing to tame. You understand it as equal. You do not diminish strength when it wears another face. That is why I spared your mother. That is why I do not despise you."
Her words struck deeper than he expected. His mother — fierce, defiant, who had fought monsters until her last breath — had been touched by Artemis' hand? He bowed his head, voice low.
"Then I owe you thanks I can never repay."
The goddess turned away, her bow glinting in moonlight. "Balance will break again. When it does, I will call you."
And with that, she was gone, leaving only silence and the fading trail of the stag in the dawn.
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Return
When Ivar walked back into camp two days later, no one asked where he had gone. Soldiers assumed he had been scouting, or brooding, or fighting in some village beyond their sight. He said nothing.
But as he sat by the fire that night, sharpening his swords, he felt something settle in him. A bond, unspoken but real — not only to Artemis, but to the balance she guarded.
He had seen too many wars of men. But this quest reminded him of another truth: the world was more than cities and battlefields. The wild still mattered. Balance still mattered.
And the gods still cared.
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Do you want me to continue straight into Chapter 25 – The Oracle of Apollo (Ivar's prophetic journey to Delphi), or would you like to expand this Artemis quest further with a second hunt scene, showing him and the wolf side-by-side before it's released?