There was a chilly, nightly mist, fit well for carefree pondering or ambushes involving knives. It was a calm place – not serene, for there was chaos in the bug-noises and birds chirping, the leaves rustling in the chilly but comforting wind in very bright moonlight. It was as if the night, usually a fairly frightening creature that children instinctively fear, stopped bearing its fangs for just one instance of its arrival and enveloped the forest path in a pleasant and cold hug.

Palace gardens do not take kindly to giants stampeding the carefully-designed architecture into bits. In a similar fashion, the forest stirred rather violently when a human stumbled through it. He was dizzy, though he experienced just a fraction of it, given that he was in a peculiar state of mind where the only words he could hear were of the all-resounding soup of “Keep moving forward.”, the scattered mind taking the place of his tired, heavy muscles. Admittedly, like a man possessed, he barely noticed this and barely felt the impact.

If his muscles had a say, they’d say that he was burning. Sweat was pouring and the forest seemed to move away from wherever his feet fell. He ignored this subconsciously. Walking almost straight on the path in single-minded determination, treading through the soft and light dust that wasn’t supposed to be displaced as high as his feet displaced it, he continued to unknowingly burst his way through the frail greens, blues, greys and browns.

He was vaguely aware that the ground path ended up ahead, and only in stepping on this different shade and elevation did he realise that it was a bridge. That is not to say he came to his senses fully, not seeing the decrease in the greens or the fact that there was a river. For all he knew, there was a bridge, but his mind was focused on staying determined in the most dull and strong sort of way right now, and shifting attention beyond the faint bubble-like confines of this singular conviction would break the bubble. He was almost aware of this.

The body was very aware of its weakness, and so was he. Like a robot determined fully to do what it was meant to do, with the battery dying out but the machine pressing forward fully with what remains, like a child being put to bed and falling asleep as the youthful vigour subsides smoothly but filling the little head until no strength is left, his back began to bend more, his legs too, and his arms were lifeless rags. He only noticed subconsciously.

His consciousness was controlled by his subconsciousness, and so of course it stabbed through the hazy, delicate bubble when the consciousness was instinctively thrust back behind the wheel as an abnormally big and bright light filled his view. He didn’t have enough energy to feel pain or discomfort, but he almost flinched. The white filled his view completely, and the final muscle gave in.

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When the man awoke hours later, he found himself laying comfortably on a hay pile on the floor of what appeared to be a library. He saw a wayward spider striding along the floor away from him, towards what seemed to be the centre of the room. There were dark planks with dust and cracks galore, but there were also wooden pillars that held up wooden balconies for the bookshelves to watch from. There were three stories of them all around the space, except from a door on one side and a wooden tunnel on the other, above which was a shield, hung ornately. The emblem was that of Western Kross. This was a good sign. He remembered tales of knights from here, but he assumed they were all gone now.

There was light too – pretty light, which made the fairly regular if not annoying dust look ethereal and free. The spider walked in a large stream of it, and caused a ripple several times his size. This light was getting in through a window, the singular window above the door, lined with green algae and bits of spiderwebs, but clean otherwise. The laying figure tumbled to his side, and found a pile of books at the edge of arm’s reach. He sat up. His head hurt, and every muscle he moved joined in on a small but fairly annoying cacophony of soreness which he did not appreciate. There were talismans and jars of herbs around the library. They took some of his attention off his hands.

Picking up a book from the pile, he noticed that they mostly looked old and unused, apart from this one. Not what he would have expected, given by the fact that there was a pile, suggesting someone expected him to not only be able to read but also enjoy it. Perhaps this was the book people always gave up on, never daring to look at what the pile had in store next. He did, admittedly, enjoy reading; not because he was a bookworm but because it was a rare occasion for him. He adjusted to the font and size as he stumbled through the title.

The Community Guide on the

Workings of the Velvet Plague

as Decreed by

His Majesty King Anugar

‘Huh’ was the only thing he could think of at the time, but it seemed inadequate, so he also added ‘Alright’, this time by voice. The traveller sorted through other books in the pile, finding little connection. He found a book on ballistics and siege weaponry, a book on uses of plants in medicine and warfare, a book about insects and a few other titles which his recovering mind, presenting only the slit of space found in holes used for inserting a DVD, could not easily come to terms with.

He had heard of the velvet plague, of course, but seeing a manual on it was a new experience altogether. He felt as though he knew more about this, but his mind was stuck like a pair of gears with a pebble between them, and refused to bring the knowledge up. The manual looked much more worn than the other books, with bits peeling off and innumerable stains on its elderly pages. In a tribe of tomes, these were the war-scarred veterans of the library wars, dispersing wisdoms passed on from release to release, such as “Pray you don’t get written by a vengeful wizard” or “Never underestimate the power of a child with some pointy coal”. The books always realised too late that to a child, every page was blank.

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There was a faint murmur of wind and a strong smell of dust and wood. There was a dryness in his throat, but he had no water, and wouldn’t dare drink any with the books and wood around. He revered libraries in much the same way that a dog reveres the stick – from a with respect and a sense of promising foreboding. His skin was dry too, a weird combination of dust and scar tissue. His thoughts were a slowly untangling mess, and only now did the mental state of him begin to acknowledge its annoying, physical sibling.

“Good. You’re awake, then?” said a soft female voice, and one with a distinct lack of the expectant tone used by people who expect payment, which he found comforting. He turned and saw a tall woman dressed in a fairly elegant black robe, with her face somewhat resembling that of a cat, in a weird way, and her hair resembling a waterfall, and one with many rocks inside it, with fish trying to swim upstream at various stages of success, and a once-greedy bear waiting upstream who was now falling the other way. The man, whose name was Ronel, tried to summon a clever response, but failed, and simply responded with “Yes. Thank you.”

“Good. Do you need any assistance? We have medicine.” she said, now with a tone of expectancy which seemed to expect something which couldn’t be further apart from what she was actually asking. Ronel noticed that this had a hint of fear to it, and then really saw how still the woman was. She seemed to be barely moving, and the flickers of movement were all trying to go backwards.

He admitted that a painkiller would be much helpful, but only if they could spare it, and she hastily said she’d go and ask. She tripped over herself while racing out, and got her dress caught on the door, but none of these slowed her down. She tried to disguise it of course, but he could tell she wanted to get away. He wasn’t angry or embarrassed, much more was he interested in the cause of it all. Ronel laid back down, because if armed men arrived, he assumed they’d prefer that.

A man soon came in, with a face mask made of animal skins and leaves, and the woman close behind, looking like a mouse might look at its friend who ignored the metal bits and went for the cheese, and was now crushed in such a gruesome way that a mouse wouldn’t be able to really consider just how horrifying it ought to be. She held a hand-woven bag of bottles filled with liquids of every colour of the rainbow and beyond.

“Watch out, this might hurt a bit.” said the man, snatching a bottle and frantically removing the cork, and pouring the orange liquid over Ronel, as if trying to outspeed a defensive reaction. The skin which got hit itched very barely, and the liquid turned weakly darker, but there was no pain, no fizzing, no explosion and no real harm done from the liquid bombard. The bombardier pulled down his mask, revealing his sweaty mouth-area, much more sweaty than the rest of his reddish, thin and balding face which looked like it had been pulled on and held in place with sewing pins. He smiled. “Yes, that’s great. Sorry, I had to be sure.” he said.

“Sure?” asked the man laying down, throwing away some of the liquid onto the hay, where more darkened into a sort of dark blue or purple, but only bits. “Sure of what?” he asked again when the thin man didn’t answer.

“That you weren’t infected, of - oh, yes, you’re not from here, true? I’m Askham, by the by.” said the science man, with the air of one trying to make a good impression despite what had just occurred.

“The Velvet Plague?” asked the traveller, sitting up. “Yes,” Askham said, and looked at the pile of literature beside Ronel, “those books were for my son. We brought you in on short notice, you see, and didn’t dare touch them in case you were puffing spores. Lovely young man, wants to be a man of the cures like his dad.”

“I see. So, the plague is still rampaging? I had heard that it was cured.” said Ronel, realising immediately that he had heard that when leaving town over a year ago, and plagues (from what little he knew about them) had a nature of coming back like this. Askham stood a bit disappointed at the ignorance of his, as of yet, nameless acquaintance. The newcomer also noticed that the woman was gone now, and it made him uneasy how skittish the two were. He had been in a castle under siege once, and this was not a dissimilar attitude to disease as was back then, but he wasn’t used to it. Askham looked like he was waiting for Ronel to say or do something. Ronel wasn’t keen. He had waited a long, long time to reach the country and was surprised at how suddenly success had come.

“Well, Askham, I’d love to stay in the village for a while, if you will take me in amidst the plague.” said Ronel

“We need every hand we can get. If you’re not sick, I’m sure no one will mind” responded Askham

“I’m glad… so, how many people are in the village?”

“Seven. We’ll get acquainted of course, but you see, we sent a plague caravan a while ago. They’ll be returning soon, so that adds a few. Uhm… what is your name, man?”

“Ronel. Originally from Aerodyl.”

“Oh, I see. Say, are you familiar with the kingdom of Kross?”

“Barely, I’m afraid. The plague doesn’t let information out a lot. But I’m here now, and in a library like this, I’ll learn quickly.” said Ronel, looking around with a smile

“We are in the region of Kanno. The village is called Rita. Have you heard of the Lady of the Gardens, by any chance?”

Ronel stopped for a second. He tried to suppress a grin, look unfazed, and reply “No. Care to tell me?” in a normal way. He failed, but Askham was oblivious to many things and luckily for Ronel, this was one of them.

“They say she’s a travelling healer, she uses plants to heal people and, what’s more, she’s not even the region’s designated healer, just a folk hero. She sets up gardens wherever she goes, and the plague doesn’t dare come near. She made travel possible, and some say she did most of the work in making sure the plague doesn’t spread to other places. She’s in the region now, maybe you’ll even get to meet her. I’d love to, personally. Oh, watch me go on, we must get going now! We need to call a meeting, introduce you to the village – come on!” said Askham, in a very animated way, and ran out of the door quickly.

Ronel was wrong about Askham. He wasn’t some dangerous anti-plague zealot-purger. He was a good chap, for lack of a better phrase. Ronel was wrong about the lady at the door, too. She seemed overly scared, but now that he understood the situation more, it seemed fairly reasonable to be. That said, he was right about her. All that travelling was about to pay off, because it was almost certainly her in that story, and he was oh-so-eager to meet her after all these years.

He still had a lot of things to find out about, for the time being. Common sense asked about things like the details of the velvet plague or the work he was to do. It asked about the people here, their approaches to outsiders, their village and, frankly, the life here. His adventuring sense, which he developed in the past year or so, asked more about the folk hero he had just heard about. The topology of the region. The politics with other kingdoms. His conscious mind, though, was still very curious about that light, and how he actually got into the village. He stood up and started towards the door, hoping for some answers.

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