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The day had not been kind to the Fugitive. The summer heat had beaten him down as much as the soldiers had. The only thing that had kept him on his feet was the thin treeline at the edge of the steppe. If only he could reach its shade and find a thin stream among the roots and get some water, he would have the strength to continue on.
But, continue on where?
How does a man find his way out of the Deep Wood? He started out the summer with nine others, two riding back and away from the group intermittently to deliver letters and newly drawn-up maps. Two had been taken when they came across a devil in the woods. He still recalled their wet-gurgling screams as the monster tore through their chests, dragging them out of the camp.
They left the forests then. It was far better to take the long route than to perish in the swamps among the trees. The Fugitive did not know how one could live in these lands at all. Danger waited in every shadow, Nothing-touched or not. He’d never been this close to a Wound before, but if this was how it always was - he’d not planned to ever return.
The tree line was close.
Where was he now?
The unit had moved the entire day prior, and he was not familiar with the landscape.
As he fell into the shade of the first weeping willow, he turned onto his back and looked up at the shimmering leaves above.
Should he die here, in the woods, would the Nothing block the All-Father from ever seeing him? Taking his mortal soul? Or should he instead crawl into the field and breathe his last among the stars?
A bird chirped somewhere, a nightingale. It sounded peaceful, like his mother’s orchard on a spring day. He heard the buzzards around him, and felt a bug crawling on his arm - across his arm hairs. But he did not move. Closing his eyes, he thought, just an hour. Maybe two. He’d rest and then get up and go again. He’d walk along the border of the wood, wherever that would bring him. Were he to always look to walk south-southeast, eventually he would make it out of these treacherous lands.
And so, he fell asleep, sharp sticks poking at his back, the root of a tree beneath his head.
The Fugitive’s dream had been a pleasant one. In it, he had not been exhausted or beaten. He was not far from home like he had been. Sweet as hibiscus honey, a woman played the harp and sang to him. The song had no words, and yet it flowed as her voice was smooth and glided over his skin as gently as a breeze of a hummingbird’s wing. He tasted it on his lips, and it, too, had tasted sweet. The harp had begun to fade behind it, so beautifully she sang.
His eyes opened slowly to the pain in his joints and muscles. He felt the stiffness of his resting legs. But he could still hear the song of the woman that held the harp.
It promised him that he would make it home. It promised him that he would be loved, missed, and celebrated when he returned. And yet, still, it had not said a single word.
Pulling the very last bit of life within himself, he stood. He was feverish. He dragged the scimitars up from the ground and slung them over his back. The Fugitive listened carefully as the song sounded as if it were leaving him.
Farther away. So clear in its direction, he knew that if he were to run he could catch up to it. To her. He had to go to her.
He stumbled, his body not as eager as his heart to follow suit. Every rock, soft forest floor, and protruding root had been a mountain he had to climb, but his will did not falter.
It hummed and rolled and coaxed him forward. Every tree had begun to look the same, and just beyond the next was her song. He fell and tried to get up but his body failed him.
“All Father, give me the strength to keep going…” He whispered, looking all around him as the song waned even more. He crawled forward, the scimitars on his back dragging against brush and tree trunks. A light ahead broke through the trees, so soft and soothing. The song seduced him and ran over his skin, sending chills up and down his arms, legs, and back. It caressed with a woman’s touch. He felt his blood rush the closer he got. She was right there. He could not see her but he knew, he heard how clear her voice sounded now.
If only he could reach.
Shaking legs, he braced against a tree - with weakening arms, he pushed himself to his feet. He would not meet her from the ground, not as a beggar, but in all his pride, he would step forward into the clearing as a man. He would meet her at her lover’s call.
He trembled and took another step, again bracing himself with an arm. And another.
He fell into the clearing, the winding ferns tangling his feet. And it was on his knees that when he looked up - he saw the Witch.
She stood on the porch of a rugged hut, her mouth thin and tight in a slight frown, eyes looking down at him. Her hair hung long beneath her waist, in it tangled plants, flowers, and sticks. Her back was straight and proud, her arms at her sides, her brows only slightly raised at him kneeling in the grass.
He heard the song again; it’d stopped for just long enough for him to see her. But when it started up again, it came from his left - and not from her.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
The Fugitive turned his head, and it had swooped down to him so loud he clenched at his ears lest he go deaf. In front of him, a horror’s wings spread, blocking out the sun. Its large claws flew up and sunk into his right shoulder and arm. Its head, a monstrous perversion of a woman’s, had beaks instead of eyes. It screeched, a sound so ear-splitting and rough that he barely heard the voice beyond its call.
“No! Let him go!”
His vision blacked and faded, but before it had gone, he felt the talons withdraw.
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Sirin had flown away hours ago, but Val sat on the steps of the porch, unmoving, for a long time. She still hadn’t washed her face or brushed her hair, Sirin’s words having overtaken all thought.
The bird-woman had not elaborated on her words, and no matter how much Val had shouted into the air the pleads for her to explain, no answers came as the bird left the clearing.
Her words had chilled and twisted her stomach. So sure, so pragmatic was Sirin that there had been no room left to misinterpret the meaning. She’d become Nothing-touched here, in the Glade. And, worse yet, she had no idea what that meant.
Clink. Clink.
She heard again. She was so sick of the clinks.
She stood straight, taking a deep breath. That’s when she heard the horrific shriek. It grew into a rolling scream, so scratchy and offensive that, again, Val’s hands had unconsciously covered her ears. It was as if a song was being sung by a hundred dying crows until they fell dead one by one out of the air.
Val rushed to the edge of the porch, her eyes scanning the bottom of the hill and beyond. Her gaze stopped on a curious shape, doubled over, it almost looked as if…
A man.
And he had been looking back at her. His sandy hair was caked with dirt, as was his face. His breathing had been hard, and his entire body heaved. His eyes had been terrified, ghastly, and on her.
From the side of her eye, she caught a whoosh of red and blue. The following squawk told her all she needed to know about the source of the dreadful, ongoing noise.
Sirin had dove down with such force that she knocked him off his knees, her claws digging in.
“NO!” Val screamed. “Let him go!”
Surprised, Sirin dropped the man, already mid-flight. He fell as dead weight on the ground as the bird-woman circled around.
“Leave him be!” Val yelled to her. Sirin glanced at her but did not acknowledge her words with her own.
“Sirin! This isn’t your hunting ground!” Val shouted louder.
At the sound of her name, the bird-woman turned, her face full of rage, and she flew to the top of the hill.
“How dare you use my name against me!” She hissed at Val. “Not only rude but you are vile, Nameless One! By what authority do you take my kill?”
“You will not hunt in my Glade,” Val said, her voice shaking, and she did not think she sounded very convincing at all.
But, it was enough to make the bird-woman doubt herself momentarily. Val’s hand searched for anything within reach, and it had been a rotten piece of wood, no bigger than a matchbox, breaking off the already ruined fence. She pulled at it and launched it at the bird-woman. It hit her in the chest. Sirin flinched from shock more than the puny impact.
Affronted and enraged, she flew higher up, her mouth twisted in a scowl. Whatever she had thought then, she turned and went higher still, disappearing beyond sight among the treetops.
Val rushed down the hill and through the meadow to the man crumbled in a heap on the outskirts. She lowered herself down by him and looked at the wounds that Sirin had left.
Thankfully, only his arm bled - his shoulder was protected by a thick leather vest. He breathed still, but it was strained, and his skin was hot to the touch.
Far too hot.
“Sirin, you brute pigeon…” Val muttered as she went to drag the man into a better position to haul his arm up and over her shoulder.
It was a long and strenuous task to get him to the hut. It took a little over two hours and five stops so Val could breathe. At one point, he woke up but only moaned in pain and his glazed-over eyes widened at Val, and he was out again.
When by evening time she had finally dragged him onto the porch, she was completely spent and plopped down next to his body. She looked him up and down carefully. This had been the first human she had seen in… how long had it been? Years?
He was a fairly sturdy man, a detail that did not escape Val as she had to haul him up the sloped path. His brows were straight, and his nose was just slightly too big - but slender. He was fair, although his face had shown long months - or even years - outside under the sun. His hair was shorter and sandy colored, dirty like a child’s. The fever had significantly reddened his cheeks and left a glassy look to his face –otherwise one might think he was only sleeping.
Getting him to a cot was easier. It was only then that Val had smelled him. Such a human smell; it was intoxicating. He had not recently bathed by any means, and his skin was not fragrant with oils. But, it had been almost familiar. Comforting. It made her miss people when, for so long, her only company had been that of creatures and trees.
She worked all night by lamplight.
The man was aflame with fever and shivered violently as sweat poured down his brow. Val tended to him, setting cold linens on his forehead, giving him water in his delirious state, and carefully slipping medicinal powders under his tongue - the taste of which made his face contort in disgust.
She’d treated malaria before.
This had been something she learned long ago, working at an apothecary. All she had on hand here was willow bark and wormwood, but milled together, they would break the fever and reduce the inflammation.
How he had gotten as far as the Glade was hard to say. He would have had to travel for quite a while. Even with the help of the Bandureek, it had taken her what felt like days - and she was in perfect health.
At sunrise, she heard taps on the door. Val stood up but did not open it right away, listening. She had felt a certain danger about and did not feel good about how Sirin and her left off. But, hearing nothing further, she opened it and peeked out.
Before her lay a carpet of red, fresh pooling blood, ribboned and shredded, guts were strewn about the porch and the shabby fence. On the fencepost sat Sirin, her face still as if chiseled in stone. An eye was stuck within the nail of her claw, bits of muscle still hanging on to it. As the bird-woman shifted, it fell with a wet and soggy thud.
“You took one, so I took two.” She said grimly. “And their blood soaks your Glade now.”
With that, she raised her wings and flew, leaving Val standing frozen on the threshold, her face dark with abhorrence, somewhere between fright and hatred for what she should have known to be an untrustworthy monster.
The gruesome scene had already begun to smell and attract flies. Val could not stand the smell of death, it had been vile and repugnant in a way that nothing else had. Begrudgingly, she got a shovel and did her best to at the very least centralize the mess. By mid-morning, before the sun had gotten too hot, she was able to bury most of it behind the hut - far from the garden. Where blood had soaked in, the dirt had remained wet and discolored, but she had been too tired to do anything further. The next rain would wash it away.
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