A single drop of the viscous concoction splattered on the ground. It seeped through it slowly. Onlookers would not notice the difference as it unfolded in front of their eyes, beneath their feet. But for kilometres in every direction, a strange, hyper-charged flow of nutrients was spreading through the soil, like a jolt of electricity revitalizing a dying body.
Marwig and the sisters of moss did not hesitate. They began to cover the conifer seeds, one by one and with great care, hiding them under the renewed dirt. Berna and Grandma stood by Bianka’s side, lending a helping hand. A covenant of ladies of wood could wipe away a deadly plague from a city in a day or raise a forest in a matter of hours. Despite the absence of her sisters, the help she received proved to be just as valuable.
Her hands connected to the enriched soil and the conifer seeds tucked safely underneath. Like the pulse of a healthy beast, it felt warm, reassuring.
A beam of sunlight, a drop of water, a deep breath. A stream of life began flowing through Bianka. From her feet, from her leaf-like hair, from every inch of her bark, it poured into her arms and down to her fingertips.
It was almost instantaneous. For a tree’s standard, that is, specifically for the ones that were now emerging from the ground. They were living through a growth that would’ve taken many seasons but took only a couple of hours. It was quite disorientating. Fortunately, Bianka was there to comfort her patients as soon as their growth was complete. Meanwhile Marwig and the sisters of moss were bathing her in applauses and excited cheering, watching in awe as healthy evergreens were now standing proudly, guarding the edge of the woods.
It had worked!
A surge of hope rose in her chest. It was true, the husks could not be healed. Yet, a forest does not die after a single tree is felled. They truly could give help and they would gather more of it on the way.
15th of January, 1900
On the outskirts of a small town, in a lumberjack shack repurposed into a small house, an old man called Hans looked out of the window. He squinted, as the snow was bright under the full moon, his expression grim as his pupils dragged themselves from the nearby woods to the roofs of the town. The hearth crackled behind him, an empty tin plate on his table. The kind townsfolk had brought him food today as well. They always did, every day.
He hated them and their food just as well.
Hans was not his true name. It was the one he had told the townsfolk, the day he stumbled out of the accursed forest and on their cobblestones, wearing a German uniform, holding a German weapon, spirited and terrified. He didn’t say anything more… but that name seemed to be enough for the townsfolk. They believed him to be a lost hero from the war. A poor soul who had given his body for the German Empire, who had lost his mind to cruel artillery belonging to (some) Napoleon.
And so, they made the old wooden shack into a home for him. A hero did not deserve to be locked away with the sick and the insane, they said, adopting him into their small but loving community.
For many years, he had lived among them.
One day, he would die among them. That thought was nauseating to him. He was about to head to sleep to forget about it for just a few hours.
But something caught his eye. Shadows of various shapes and sizes were emerging from the woods, walking the path that connected it to the town. The moon lit their way as they marched towards it.
He hastily pushed against the glass to get a better look but his breath condensed, making it even more difficult to see. Were they gypsies? Vagrants? Bandits? He didn’t know. He didn’t think clearly. Sadly, he had not thought clearly for years now. Loneliness, old age and the weight of his lie had chipped away at his mind as he held on to the only feelings left: spite and long-nursed hatred.
He geared up to leave the shack immediately and face the nomads head on. He tossed on the old uniform. He grabbed a scarf, kindly knit by a young lady from the village, and threw it around his head and neck. He grabbed the old musket from above the hearth, along with the gunpowder and a bag of mixed projectiles. He sank a hand in the bag, picking the ammunition and loading it.
He flung the door open and left in a hurry. His feet sank into the snow as he dragged himself through the bitter winter night, headed towards the village. His lungs felt like they were going to freeze solid with each breath he took… but he finally reached the lantern-lit streets.
There, he saw them.
Creatures made of wood and moss and rocks. As short as house cats or as tall as his lonely lodge. Eyes shimmering with strange, otherworldly light or lacking eyes completely. Demons, witches and monsters, all of them! They had come out of the forest.
Deep in his mind, memories were stirring of his previous life, the end of which happened in that very forest. That blasted monstrosity had chewed him and spat him out so many years ago, but it had devoured his friends, his life, his identity. He knew that if there was a gate to Hell, it was there, hidden in the dark, waiting in the underbrush.
He hid and skulked through the smaller streets, following them. They were marching through town… unobstructed.
The old man panted, holding his musket in trembling, Parkinson-ridden hands, his back pushed against a wall. The inhabitants were just looking on, some in awe, some with curiosity and some others with fear. Why weren’t they standing in their way? Why weren’t they raising their weapons? Why were their children trying to talk to them? This was insanity!
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Then it struck him.
They spoke the same language. The townsfolk and the forestfolk, they sounded the same. They sounded like harsh, puncturing noise. They sounded like his enemies. He raised his musket in front of him, pointed it towards the hellish parade… and pulled the trigger.
A booming noise echoed throughout the town and a black projectile left the smoking muzzle.
----------------------------------------
The projectile reached one of the feminine creatures, burning through her chest.
Her skin was made of birch.
The Holzfräulein looked down at her breast. A cindered crater was there… and it was growing with each second passing by. Chilling clarity kept her immobile as pain became just another noise in the background. A realization took frontstage: this wound could not be cured. This was death.
She fell to the ground as the Waldleute took a step back in fear. All but Marwig who collapsed by her side, panic controlling his limbs as he spoke to his dying friend.
“No… n-no, Bianka, hold on… please, hold on, we can… we can cure it…!” he grabbed the medicinal herbs within her mantle, tears falling on her wound and evaporating “These… these will- Bianka, please look at me! We can cure it! Everything can be cured, right? Right?! You said that! R-remember?! Bianka!!” his voice reduced to a desperate, sobbing shrill. She raised her hand to his terrified visage… and like a snapped branch, it fell to the floor. The light in her eyes had been snuffed out.
The weapon who took her life was an antique, a relic from an old war, stolen from a very unfortunate German corpse. It was among the least efficient instruments of death even when compared to those that had been in circulation during that war. It required a powder horn and a ramrod to be properly shot. Furthermore, it required time and enough distance from your enemy to grant you that time. By misfortune or fate, it was not a bullet of lead that Hans had pulled from the bag… but a sphere cast in pure iron.
The bane of the people of the forest.
The procession had stopped, looking down on their deceased brethren with grief and horror. They kept immobile and silent, murmuring mostly to themselves. Only Marwig’s sobbing could be heard, muffled as he held tightly against what once was Bianka’s shoulder.
Some certain sounds, however, brought the vigil to a quick end. Grains of black powder were being poured down a metallic tube. The old man was reloading.
The eyes of the procession dragged themselves from their fallen compatriot upon the assassin. They were filled with anger. The trembling, hateful human was preparing himself to take another life… while the townsfolk stared, doing nothing.
Mother Berna made her way through the procession, pushing the people of moss, the elves and the kobolds aside. Inexorable, she walked towards the old man. As she looked down upon him, however, he did not feel just one gaze. It felt like a murder of crows had set its hungry eyes upon him. With each step she took, she looked taller, larger. With each step she took, her long nails looked more akin to claws.
“You… have dared wielding wretched iron against our people” the voice of a kindly old lady devolved into a bone chilling growl with each sound spoken “You must suffer the consequences of your actions.”
The old man could not understand. It was said that his people could not speak the language of the forest. As he had pulled the ramrod from his musket, he dropped it to the floor
“There’s a thousand and one curses I could use… and a thousand more I wouldn’t use on my worst enemy” she parted her mantle, pulling from the darkness within her cauldron of black iron. No one but Hans could see Mother Berna’s terrible visage. No one but him could see that single painful tear rolling down her wrinkled cheek.
He had collapsed on his knees, pawing the floor to retrieve the lost rod as fearful tears welled up in his eyes.
“But by iron you’ve slain” she towered above him, raising her cauldron high above her head “And by iron you’ll be slain.”
“Je t'en supplie! Aies pit-”
The cauldron precipitated on his fragile skull; his long life was finally brought to a conclusion. His last words were cut short by a ghastly gong and a crack. No one heard him and certainly no one would’ve understood him. The dead man fell to the floor, clutching the weapon as a pool of red streamed over the snow.
The people of the village had already hidden inside their houses, frightened beyond belief. From behind their windows, in the safety of their homes, they could see a strange, tenebrous halo coalescing around the murderous witch. Amidst the darkness, thousands of beady eyes lit up. Ominous, deafening cawing could be heard.
Her arms rose towards the sky as she spoke orders in howls and growls. An endless cloud of dark wings emerged from her mantle, a murder of ravens for each black plume she wore. They ascended, then radiated in every direction, carrying a single message.
It was blunt, honest. The forest and its inhabitants were warned of the festering wounds that humanity had inflicted on their beloved land, of the cruelty that was perpetrated on this day, of the terrible fate that would befall those who would not stand up to the injustice.
The people of the forest certainly could be kind, helpful and gentle. Bianka had been. Yet the Black Bear Witch knew their vengeful, unforgiving side. The side she was calling upon.
‘They dared raising arms against us. They dared killing one of the ladies of wood. They surely have forgotten us, why they feared us and respected our home. We will march to where their chief resides and remind him. We will remind them all, with unquestionable clarity, that they still need to fear.’
Another message left the town on that night, once the Waldleute had left. It travelled by telegraph.
The second message did not reach as many people as the first. It took many stops and detours through various checkpoints, being passed around like a hot potato. In the end, it unfortunately landed on the lap of a man who bore the title of Kaiser. An erratic man whose specialties were deteriorating relationships, escalating conflicts and ignoring advice.
He heard of strange demon-people emerging from the forest, controlling the animals and murdering war heroes with their bare hands. During the transmission of the message, the number of slain men had become at least a dozen and the causes of their deaths ranged from strangulation to decapitation to defenestration.
A measured response was in order. Unfortunately, the Kaiser was unable to provide anything close to that. Excessive force and escalation on the other hand, he could supply aplenty.
Led by the Black Bear Witch, the Waldleute left the village in a hurry. They had to bury their lost daughter. They shrouded Bianka in her mossy mantle emanating the scent of camomile and valerian, laying her to rest under the roots of an old birch tree, watered by bitter tears.
They slept by her side one final night, under the full moon.
As soon as night turned to day, however, they were gone.
A march had begun. From every corner of the Reich, the Waldleute were gathering, marching towards the cities. Marching towards Berlin.