Into the Deep Wood

They woke again, after the sun had risen, to rapid hoofbeats approaching. Marat reached for his longbow before his eyes had even opened. The vegetation concealed them, but if the riders came within fifty feet of them, they would surely see their meager camp.

A horse whinnied, stomping to a stop, close enough that they heard the grasses brush against its legs. Marat sprang up, bow drawn and arrow nocked.

And then he lowered it, near dropping it to the ground.

Val scrambled to her feet in time to see the herd of wild horses.

Marat ran forward, affectionately patting one on the neck.

Aditi stood, no reins or saddle, moving foot to foot and snorting - her muzzle in Marat’s hair.

“Stupid horse…” Marat smiled as he brushed the velvet coat with his hand.

“She found us!” Val exclaimed in disbelief, hurrying over. She was sure that the soldiers had seized the mare.

But here she was, sweaty, disheveled, and ever dramatic - blowing spit and sniffing at Marat as if to scold him for their untimely departure.

“How could this have happened?” Val beamed, wrapping her arms around the horse’s neck, but the mare recoiled, nearly stepping on Marat.

“Woah–” he moved out of the way of the animal as its hooves dug into the dirt.

Val stood dumbfounded, her arms still held up.

She lowered them slowly, her fingers trembling. The horse’s ears pricked forward, and she tossed her head back, stepping to the side, but did not run. Marat stepped toward her, holding up his hands to calm her, but she jerked her head away from him, her eyes on Val –the whites of them showing.

“Aditi…” Val called, her voice as unsteady as her hands. “Come, girl…”

She saw Marat’s eyes on her, his expression darkening. The horse neighed and stomped but still did not move.

“Val.” Marat’s hand was on Aditi, which seemed to calm her slightly. “Something scared her. Give her a minute.”

“I think maybe…” Val shook her head, her voice faint as she felt the tightness in her chest build, “it was me.”

She took a slow step forward, hand remaining in the air.

The mare lowered her head, ears still at attention. Marat stepped toward Val, keeping his hand on the horse’s back.

“Come on…” He encouraged her with the gentlest tone he could muster, and she seemed to respond.

Slowly, they came closer until she could put her hand on Aditi’s muzzle, but she held it still, allowing the horse to smell it. Recognition seemed to spark in the animal, but her body remained tense.

“It’s just me…” Val whispered encouragingly. “It’s just me…”

Aditi’s ears twitched, and she raised her head, seemingly done with the interaction, as if she’d known all along that it was Val standing in front of her. She turned, and went to nibble at young blades of grass under her feet.

Val sighed with relief, but Marat’s face remained troubled.

“What does it feel like?” He asked, his hard tone almost unsettling.

She had no doubts about what he was asking.

“I just feel different, that’s all.”

“We cannot know what happened when we went to the Wound.” He said after some time, time that Val spent counting every heartbeat, her nervous hands fidgeting with the bottom of her shirt. “We cannot know what this is.”

“Marat...” She looked him in the eye, and he looked away.

“There was a time when we trusted the All-Mother too.” He said, hesitating momentarily as if picking words that would not be cruel. “I think maybe it’s time not to allow your feelings to guide you, Val.”

“Are you saying that it was my fault?” Her words came out louder, faster than she was prepared for.

“I’m not saying anything other than we should be careful.”

“And what? Keep an eye on this thing inside of me? What is ‘careful’ exactly in this situation, Marat??” She stared him down, but still, he would not look at her.

“You don’t know there is anything inside of you.” He was getting equally irritated now. “We’ve been through All-Father knows what in the past few weeks - days even - is it not possible that perhaps this feeling of yours might just be exhaustion? Stress? It is a pretty far jump from moldy bread and upset stomach to being pregnant with a god.”

“I know what I feel.” She shut him down.

“Well, let me know if you still feel it after you relieve yourself in the field.”

If one’s stare could set someone aflame, Marat would not have survived those words.

She clenched her teeth, her eyes burning into the side of his face. Arguing now would yield nothing, she knew that, but everything in her wanted to…

She saw it in his face, and her own face fell. For all his words, his eyes were downcast. He was scared.

“Alright.” She said although the word was not that of agreement.

They had to ride bareback, something that Val had lived in great fear of ever since first being boosted up onto a horse. Without the stability of a saddle, she felt as if she was getting thrown around, although she clutched hard onto Marat’s back. Although he retained control, after a few hours, his face began to show signs of great discomfort. Their pace had been considerably slower than when they had traveled before.

Val’s sleep was full of restlessness. Each of the prior nights, it felt as if something was waiting beyond her dreams, biding its time until she woke to strike - but come morning, there was nothing. The feeling of being restrained would not leave her, and in her sleep, she tossed and threw her arms about as if trying to get free.

This had especially annoyed Marat as he became the unwilling recipient of several elbowings and kicks in the night.

But there, camped under the trees, the looming feelings had finally formed into dreams.

She was again at the end of a long table. But this time, the room around her was more distinct - with stone walls and high ceilings. Large tapestries depicting heroes and monsters, ladies being served at their whim, and glamorous riders on their white steeds hung around the room.

At the very end of the table sat a man. Even seated, you could see his extraordinary height. He was thin. The hands he laid upon the table were bony and fingers long. His features were very defined, his jaw sharp and nose thin but slightly crooked. The slimness of his face cast shadows across his cheeks.

He sat with impeccable posture, his gray eyes affixed on Val.

Val tried to move but felt cold metal press against her skin. Her arms, legs, and even neck were held tightly, the chains invisible to her without being able to turn her head, but she heard them rattle and clink. She tasted metal in her mouth, and when swallowing, her tongue pressed against something hard protruding from her cheek.

“Witch.” The tall man said. “How many live still in the River Cities?”

Val wanted to open her mouth, but she could not. Instead, another’s voice sounded in her head.

“Four little birds in a big garden hide. We see a man, two women, and two fledglings cower in the shadows of the charred thicket.”

The man nodded.

“What of the King of the White Cities?”

“They scatter, pitter-patter, and they hide from my withered eye.”

The Tall Man’s face remained impassive.

“Feed me.” The voice in Val’s head cried in a thousand voices. They seemed to whine and plead from every side, tangle with each other, and compete with each other to be heard. Val flinched involuntarily, and pain shot through her as the metal screws tore at her flesh.

“A dog that brings me nothing will not get a bone on its plate.” The tall man stood.

“FEED ME!” The voices protested louder, and Val felt the pressure of them rise in her head and threaten to crack her skull. The man turned and walked away. In his stead came robed men, whose hands burned into Val’s skin as they lifted her from the chair.

“FEEEED MEEEE!” The voices cried so loud that Val screamed with them, suddenly sitting awake, Marat holding her shoulders.

“Val!” He shook her slightly but stopped upon seeing her open eyes. She breathed hard, beads of sweat appearing on her brow, the back of her neck feeling damp, hair sticking to it where she lay on the ground. She looked at him with still panicked eyes, and even they took a few seconds to show recognition.

“A nightmare.” She breathed out. “Just a nightmare.”

“Historically speaking, maybe you should tell me about this one,” Marat observed dryly.

She pulled her knees up, hugged them, and pulled her blanket over herself as the chills of the dream remained in the goosebumps on her skin. It was not cold outside, but it was as if she still felt the metal bindings, cold as ice.

“I heard her in my head.” She said slowly, trying her best not to misinterpret the dream. It was the Hag’s voice, but it was more, and it was divided into many pieces. Many voices, all the same, yet fragmented and frail on their own. “But she was not speaking to me. It was like…”

She paused, trying to describe what she felt, but it came to her with difficulty.

“It was as if I was her.”

“Where were you in the dream?” Marat said.

“I was in a big room, and there was a table - a man sitting across from me. Asking questions.” Already her memory of the dream dissolved into only shapes and concepts with slight glimpses of events.

“What questions?” He pressed.

“I don’t know…” She concentrated on his words, his deep voice, but only his sharp features and the aura of danger remained.

“Val, you gotta think.” Marat put his hand on her shoulder. “Anything out of the ordinary can mean something.”

“How quickly your tone changes.” She observed sourly.

He sighed and sat back, propping himself on his arms.

“I’m sorry.” He said after a moment. “I do not mean to be hard on you. I’ve had troubling dreams myself the past few days. I hoped to make sense of them. We are getting further away from the Wound, and its influence has bounds. Be patient.”

When morning came, the sun revealed the valley before them.

What in the darkness seemed like distant low hills with rock formations and boulders nestled between them now showed themselves to be low gray houses. They rode carefully toward them, vigilant and trying to contain their hopes of a hot meal and spending the next night indoors. But, as they neared, these hopes faded.

There was no one outside these poorly kept homes. The wooden fences were in grave disrepair, the gates gone and many posts rotted. As they made their way into the village, it became apparent that no one had been there in some time. Doors hung off their hinges, windows broken and covered in dust. Ruined, caved roofs rested inside the rooms or atop fallen walls. If you looked closely, you could still make out where the windows once had been painted red, but the paint had long chipped away, only leaving streaks wedged into the splintering frames.

“What is this?” Val looked around in horrified wonder. “The war could not have made it this far. Are we not deep into the North?”

“War hasn’t,” Marat replied grimly. “Famine has.”

They stopped outside a house that looked less destroyed than others. Marat held his hand on the knife as he approached the door. He nudged it with his foot, and the hinges creaked as it fell open. Inside were the bare minimums of heavy wooden furniture. A single stool, a bench, and a makeshift bed made of chiseled logs fastened together. The mattress was long gone.

No personal belongings remained in the home.

“They left on their own time.” He said as he came back outside.

Val looked sadly at the rusted wind vane of a rooster atop the roof and worn-off paint. “You said these are scattered about the plains?”

“My knowledge of the area is only that of maps and people’s words,” Marat admitted, looking about again. “I have never been this far North. The village could have been abandoned long before our time.”

In the next few days, they came upon two more desolate villages.

They stopped overnight in these places, bringing Aditi inside the homes.

Marat had thought that in the distance, he heard shouts of soldiers once, but there was no army to be seen.

Another day’s ride, and they came up on a much smaller settlement. Only ten or fifteen houses stood clustered together. Many of the homes’ doors had been nailed shut. This place had been left recently, or recently enough that shiny, unrusted nails still sat lodged in the boards.

Marat peeked into the windows with his hands cupped on the glass to escape the glare.

The largest of the buildings did not have its doors barred, but the shutters on the windows had been nailed shut with crossed planks of wood. Carefully, he leaned on the door, seeing how much give it had. It did not creak or strain against an internal lock so, he opened it and stepped inside.

Only a thin ray of light made its way through the crack in the shutters, the last of the evening sun. Through it danced a lazy current of kicked-up dust. It took Marat's eyes a moment to adjust, but as he did, his muscles tensed, and his hand flew to the hunter’s knife.

Inside the home lay bags upon bags of supplies, equipment, weapons, shields, and broken-down camps. They were the provisions of an outpost.

No dust settled on them, and the floor had been covered in bootprints - pushing the dirt to the very outskirts of the walls.

“Shit.” He whispered and immediately caught the sound of wheezing breath to his right. Without moving too suddenly, he turned to see a sentry asleep against the wall. He was just a boy, his armored plate too large for him and skewed from the way his sleeping form had fallen. His helmet lay on its side on the ground next to him. He did not look a day over fifteen.

A conscript.

Marat took a soft step back toward the door. They had to leave the settlement, and fast. With evening falling on the hills, the troops would return soon from a completely unknown direction.

“Marat?” Val’s voice broke the silence and he swore under his breath. The youth stirred and then jerked forward, his hair disheveled, his face bearing the imprint of the arm he had been resting on.

“Hey!” He yelled, his voice cracking. He grabbed the pike that leaned against the wall, and held it out in front of him, its tip first dragging in a half circle across the floor.

His hands trembled.

Val appeared in the door and swallowed her gasp upon seeing the boy. Her eyes immediately flew to Marat, but a heartbeat too late because he was already knocking the pike out of the boy’s hands, the shortsword to his throat.

“You will not scream or call for help.” He told the boy quietly, his words strained with tension. “When are they to return?”

The boy shook visibly, his eyes wide. He went to shake his head, but the movement nicked his throat on the blade. The sensation startled him and he screamed.

“Shit!”

She was sure that he would kill the boy. But as she watched, Marat pulled his hunter's knife away, dropping the kid, who immediately clutched at his throat where a little blood - barely more than if he were old enough to shave - had dripped between his fingers.

“Go, go!” Marat pushed her out the door, not even giving her a chance to react.

Val twisted back as they rode away to see if the boy would appear in the doorway. They were already fairly far when his head poked out of it - but he had nevertheless seen which way they’d gone.

“You spared him!” She shouted against the wind, whipping their faces from the horse’s gallop. “Why?”

But, even if he heard, Marat had not answered her.