To thou whom I spear, know that within thy vessel thou harbors a great purpose; thou wills unto life the prosperity I will unto thou. It is through I whom thou are directed, and through I thou are given purpose. Know that thou, without purpose through which I have given, thy vessel shall be naught but a tool for the gods. Stay in grace, for I have delivered thine purpose; and offer up to me thy soul, as it was a mere blessing from I.
***
Drawing short breath, an arrow was knocked and bowstring drew taught. Through silent release, too came the arrow’s silent whisper. It flew, making strands of the wind through which it soared; through the breadth of spoken landscape, it fell just short of its stalk.
Naught a moment from the first’s departure, another arrow was knocked, drawing back to the shoulder. The stalk reared its gangly head in suspect of a whisper. It was to run, but with exhalation, the bowstring snapped, and the arrow flew through the dull silence of the pass. The missile whistled gleefully as it soared, starlight illuminating its metallic point. The stalk knew of the incoming arrow, but it naught had time to flee. It watched as death charged headlong toward it, coming in the form of a singing bird. In naught a mere moment, the bird descended upon its stalk, talons outstretched, beak agape. It killed the beast with equal vigor as it carried through flight, piercing through the beast’s bulbous eye and embedding itself deep into the skull.
The drawer of bowstring climbed down from their perch atop a high tree. They walked across the soundless pasture between their perch and the fallen arrows. On their way, the chilled night blades crunched underfoot, and a cold wind brought a biting freeze to the stranger’s lungs. The eerie darkness seemed to sway around the weight of the stranger. Eyes watched out from the murky waters, their forms obstructed by the pine and willow which guarded them. The stranger paid them no heed, instead effortlessly seeking the arrow that fell short of its mark. Grasping its shaft with one hand, the stranger continued towards the resting-place of the beast. They sunk into the high grass, and they parted the reef of blades with their free arm. The beast laid there quiet and motionless, no sense of agony or any pain thereof. Deeply embedded into its skull was the messenger, cutting near short of the fletching.
The widower brushed their hand upon the beast’s snout, still warm, yet lacking the breath of life. Folding their fingers under the beast’s lips, they examined its teeth; pristine as the buck was young. Grasping its horns, they rolled its head to examine the other eye; intact and glossed by death. Lifting its leg, they examined its tread; large as the stalk was tall.
The deliverer brought their hands together for a silent prayer. They offered up the beast’s soul to its kindred spirits. They offered to take upon all its pain, and they offered to expend all its hatred. With sincerity, they thanked the beast for its kindness and offered gratitude by laying none of it to waste. With this gesture of parting, tranquility came to the watchers in the wood. Everything came still once again, and the stranger was free of their burden. Another cold wind came ravaging through the pass, chilling the stranger deeper than the earlier gusts.
Upon lowering their hands, the exile drew a knife and made to expertly remove the beast’s coat from its body. They sliced up along the inside of its legs, meeting at a prior slice through its underbelly. The stranger then began separating the skin by the rear straight of the beast, pressing the bladed edge against the muscle, easily disconnecting it from the pelt. Without excessive force, they tore the remaining coat up to the buck’s nape, there making to remove its head from the pinkish trunk.
Through the thickened muscle and fat, the listener intricately cut, seeking the cavity of the heart. When they uncovered it, the reddened mass was still beating. It throbbed slowly, attempting the vain effort of keeping its body alive. The stranger stabbed at the valves of the heart with their knife, removing it from the body as it stopped pulsing. They held the heart in their palm, then raised it to a position above their head. As was tradition with any kill, to fully embrace the wills of their stalk, the stranger let the fresh blood of the beast drip into their open mouth. The stinging taste of iron overwhelmed their senses, and the impervious stranger winced slightly at the discomfort.
As the moon shone above them, the butcher continued their work. Slicing the prime meats and separating the excessive fats, removing the viscera and entrails, wrapping everything in fashioned slices of pelt. They extracted the eyes and brain from the skull, setting it with the other bones they wished to bring. Even the bones that would be seen as worthless, the stranger packed and brought. After they had finished, there was not the slightest sign of a killing. With this, the stranger departed. And as they walked, the sun came to greet them and warmed their back on the journey home.
The travel was nothing irregular. The speaker crossed peaceful, uncontested ground. The world through which they walked was silent. Aside from the churning of dirt and leaves under their foot, there wasn’t so much as a whisper from any tree, as the wind did not provide them voice. Birds flew overhead, but they did not sing or call. Treads were left in the dirt, but they seemed to follow only each other. An occasional stream was the only proof that the forest breathed while in the presence of the stranger.
They walked for hours. Dawn passed as the sun rose into the sky, turning to midday. And as it rose, it so too fell; its cascade of light to be replaced by the incandescent shimmering of the stars. But before the cycle could come to pass, when the sky came to resemble a roaming desert overhead, the traveler reached their destination. A small village in the forest offset by the natural curve of the land, overlooking a grand lake as dark as the sky was red. The houses were awkwardly arranged, some keeping to tight clumps while others strayed further from the rest. They were very poor, being structured from wood which made to hold the mud and manure used to keep the spaces closed.
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It was a young village, seeing as trees were still being cleared to make the land for tilling. The people were very busy, even into the coming of night. The men worked to carry the fallen trees to be made into timber. If not this, they were sure to be tilling the land or ensuring the oxen were safe in preparation for nighttime. The women and children too had their own work to be done. Whether it be preparing the nightly meal or tending to the remaining animals of the household, entire families went without an early rest. In some vestige of the village, due to the shortage of hands, the women occasionally worked the field for their family as well. Although mostly grueling, the people didn’t dislike the conditions of the village, seeing as the young lord wasn’t of the normal imperious nature.
However generous the lord was told to be, the stranger didn’t trust his words. Thus, they remained away from the village. They walked along its outskirts, catching some attention of the people as they passed. After their recognition of the stranger, the people returned to their duties, offering nothing of greeting upon their return. The stranger returned as much care as the villagers had done to them, and continued on their way down the slope away from the village. The lower the stranger descended toward the glassy lake, the more gripping it seemed to be. Previously a simple recognition that it was there, eventually becoming a spectacle the eyes would stray to behold.
The stranger’s cottage sank into soft earth on the easterly side of the lake, its rear wall sharing the stone face of the looming mountain edge behind it. The building was simple at best—many octaves grander than those of the village people—but still paling in comparison to a cheap city home. Its walls were made of small logs piled atop each other, leaving no openings aside from the door-frame, in which hung a pelt of some sort. To provide better safety, there was a meager perimeter made of stray sticks, all arranged erratically and unevenly. Effigies comprised of bones and other animal parts hung around the fence and lined the house, providing solace from unbeknownst spirits or people. Its top was awkwardly slanted, with one side being shorter and flatter than the other. Vines, herbs, and flowers all crawled up the sidewalls of the cabin, equally spreading about the ground—some wild, some not.
Atop the straightest edge of the roof sat a black mass of sorts, its surface rising and falling in a calm rhythm. As the stranger approached, it stirred, first sprawling out along the planks of the roof, then lifting its head to lay sight on the stranger. Its feline face had no complexion, as the coming of night masked the bristles of its blackened fur. However, its silvered eyes shone in the darkness like that of a stray coin gleaming under a moonlit sky. Its saucers fixed on the stranger, monitoring their movement towards the cabin. It watched, staying absolutely still, as if the stranger hadn’t already noticed is presence. When the stranger finally met its gaze, the cat took its time to stand, then silently jumped down to the earth.
The stranger entered their home, taking time to discard the heavy sack they had been carrying on them. Within the cottage were more plants and effigies hanging from the ceiling, along with a large variety of animal skulls—each painted with different markings in unique colors. Woven barrels and boxes lined the walls of the building and stray books and wooden carvings laid on the floor. As little that went by furniture, there was still a bed in the furthest-back corner with a blanket made from woven animal pelts atop a mattress seemingly stuffed with straw. Following the length of the bed there was also a wooden table, atop which sat more stacks of books, an oil lamp, and the cat with silvered eyes.
There was no way the cat could have entered from the side of the house, but the stranger paid the thought no heed. Instead, they walked towards the lamp, beside which was a pair of flint and steel filing that they struck together to light the wick. A soft, flickering light illuminated the interior of the cabin, revealing the intricate notches and irregularities in all the wooden surfaces. As well, the detail of the cat’s fur could be seen more prominently. Its hair was not long and looked as if it wrapped its entire figure tightly. The warm glow of the fire reflected off its beautifully clean fur and in its coin-like eyes. These eyes were the ones that continued to follow the stranger as they retreated back to their bag, beginning to unpack its contents.
The cat became curious as the stranger laid the pelt bundles on the floor, and lunged off its perch beside the fire-light. It walked, trustfully approaching the stranger and leaning its head down to smell the rich stench of meat from the bundles. The silver-eyed cat sat down, its tail methodically swaying along the wooden floorboards, the deep rumble of a purr coming from its throat. The stranger acknowledged the cat’s purring and unwrapped a large slab of venison, swiftly cutting an enjoyable piece from the whole and setting it before the cat.
Suddenly, the stranger heard the intricate noise of muffled grass outside. Assuming from the weight, the step came from a person. The movement was slow at an uneven pace, indicating the person was impaired, therefore not a large enough threat for the stranger to struggle against. They waited for the noise to stop, eventually at their perimeter of fence. When the stranger emerged from their dimly-lit cabin, they could immediately recognize the hopeless, worried face of a frail old woman. An old woman who stood lopsided and whose face was as leathery as tree bark and whose hair was as colorless as the turning leaves. An old woman wrapped in drab cloth, stained from soot and dirt, holding a bundle of wool tightly against her chest.
She had stopped at the fence hung with bones, unease filling her soul. However, as soon as she saw the image of the stranger, it evaporated from within her. She spoke hurriedly, in a pleading manner. She spoke earnestly and filled with emotion. Please doctor. Please, my boy does not breathe. He does not breathe but he does not pale. Please doctor, my boy isn’t dead. Please help him.