by Mark Baggett
humanlike in sound, but more bizarrely, Dmitri felt it suited the animal. It also left him gasping. Was he going mad?
The heavily antlered beast shook the snow fall from its thick pelt and lumbered directly over to him again. Why was it following him? He watched in a daze as a large drop of blood fell, splattering soundlessly upon the white covering at their feet.
“A boy I see,” the stag again spoke to him. “But a king I do not.”
At that very moment his brother Grigory, all but forgotten in the excitement and terror, let out a scalding cry of rage from atop the slope Dmitri had so enjoyed not minutes ago. An instant later he was bounding wildly down the hillside, changing into his wolfen guise midstride, to defend his charge.
Suddenly full of boisterous pride Dmitri flashed his bloodied teeth at the stag.
“Now you will see,” he taunted the animal, knowing full well that his brother would slay the beast.
The mystical stag swiveled away from the onrushing wolf. Was that fear in its eyes? Dmitri certainly felt it was and was filled with pride, and of the glee of the approaching hunt.
Quivering with rage the Golden Stag, a mountain of muscle and sinew, stamped the frozen ground as if indecisive. Despite himself Dmitri trembled from fear of the powerful forest denizen. His brother would teach this creature that the wolfen were not to be trifled with.
“Hah! Run, run and hide!” he gloated in a heady mix of power and fright as he scurried away from the stamping hooves lest he be caught underneath them.
The beast snorted, raised its snout into the frost laced air and bellowed its own trumpet of aggression. Digging in with hind legs the thickness of logs the stag shot forward onto the slope aggressively.
Swallowing hard Dmitri stared in disbelief. Why was it not fleeing? The stag should be running for fear of its life, not attacking! Surely it was intelligent enough to fear the wolfen clans. Everyone feared the wolfen.
But the stag did not flee. Indeed it pressed forward, fighting both gravity and slippery ice as it rushed the hillside. His brother was also dealing with these same issues as he barreled headlong down the hill.
“Oh, no,” Dmitri muttered, his voice as meek as a field mouse. What had he done? Taunting such a beast as this… What had he been thinking?
But then he had not truly been thinking clearly. Rather he had been glorifying his brother, his pride and joy. Knowing that, like Grigory, he too was wolfen, that their kind ruled these woodlands. That they were the dominant predators of all nature here.
The next instant happened so fast that it seemed completely surreal to the youngster. The two combatants closed range with an ungodly speed. Entire drifts of snow were kicked skyward and blood sang through the brilliant sky with its delicately sad song.
A wail of pain braced Dmitri’s spine and had his bladder had not already spilt then he would have wet himself a second time.
And then it was done, the moment was gone, irreplaceable, written on the glassy face of time.
Only one warrior remained standing. It was not Grigory.
Dmitri was devastated. Sobbing he fell face first into the snow. Grigory was dead? Unbelievable, but true. The boy’s final sight had been of the stag standing nonchalantly over the sprawled body of the wolfen. Blood dripped from those awful antlers; tiny stars and pale lightning alight above its head.
Head in hands he cried for what seemed hours but was very likely minutes and only paused when he heard the crunching of snow and ice. The sound of a killer approaching.
With sullen eyes Dmitri lifted his head and glared at the Golden Stag, daring it to take his life as it had Grigory’s. But the creature refused. Instead it swung its huge head sadly, the dark eyes drilling into Dmitri’s.
“Never tempt Fate, young pup.”
With the solemn warning still ringing in his ears the boy watched as the stag turned and sauntered away.
The death of Dmitri’s brother had unexpected and far reaching effects. None of which was good for any member of the family.
Found huddled beside the frozen corpse hours later Dmitri had been in shock and very nearly frost bitten. While these injuries resulted in short-term hardship for the boy the same could not be said for his parents’ trauma.
Daniil, his father, had begun to drink heavily that very same eve. Locked within an unseen but clearly felt bubble of rage and pity the man became bitter and sullen. His heir, his pride and joy, was lost to him. Snatched away in his youth.
The man would never recover.
The loss of her eldest boy would have been heartbreak enough for Ulyana Kovtun or any mother. But to add insult to injury by having her dear husband chose the comfort of the bottle over her was doubly shameful. It was more than she could ever bear and she withdrew from all. Especially from Dmitri.
The wrong child had survived. Or so he came to believe. And without anyone to say otherwise…
Having become unwelcome - an outcast at seven years of age - in his home the boy had taken to the wood alone to find solace. The forest was an unforgiving place, more so for the young. But what was there for him to lose? His life? He was unwanted, shunned even. What could be worse to a child?
If something bad did happen he reckoned, and correctly at that, he would hardly be missed.
And so the deep wood became his hideaway, his playground, his only haunt. Where typical children would run and play in the streets and fields Dmitri would hunt small game and devise traps to snare them. His imagination was his only playmate.
Thus it was until two years to the day that Grigory had been murdered when Dmitri again glimpsed the Golden Stag. It was spying upon him from the brush. A silent monster. A killer!
Blood rushed to his face, his temples began to pound horrendously, as a wild rage over took the boy. He longed to chase after the animal, to kill it with his bare hands. To rip it to shreds for what it had done to his brother, and thus to him.
Yet Dmitri was not yet a wolfen. It would be many years before the change would take him. This wait might as well be a lifetime.
Fuming in silence Dmitri glared at the stag as if he could kill it with nothing more than the wrath of his gaze. He wished it to fall, break a leg and wither. To die! But such dreams were for the childish and he had been forced to long ago forfeit being a simple child.
The stag, in turn, watched him passively. He was a small boy after all. Feeble in comparison to the huge, muscular beast whose mighty hooves could pummel him into a bloody mess in short order.
With a grunt of indifference - or had he just been dismissed? - the stag began to eat noisily. Was it toying with him again? Laughing at him?
“Go away, stupid animal!” he yelled into the silent gulf between them.
The big head bobbed up suddenly as if only realizing Dmitri’s presence. This greatly intensified the boy’s anger. He refused to be belittled by a dumb plant eater.
Getting to his feet Dmitri bounded through the deep fresh snow. It then struck him how similar the conditions were to two years ago when Grigory was killed. It was eerily similar.
But this was of little concern to the enraged boy of nine. His blood was racing and he felt the animal within him eager to escape.
Smiling a toothy scowl Dmitri pushed forward. He grimaced, pain ripping his insides which burned and twisted with perverse glee. Then he faltered.
Falling to his knees in agony he clutched his stomach as if to prevent his guts from exploding into the pristine snow.
With a terrified look on his face he sought out the only creature within sight, the Golden Stag. Was the monster doing this to him? How?
Groaning loudly as the knots twisted ever tighter in his guts Dmitri nearly swooned outright. The pain, the agony, was so very intense. So merciless. Just before he cried out Dmitri saw the look of startled bewilderment flash in the stag’s eyes. It bounded effortlessly over the brush and fallen trees as it approached quickly.
“Why?” he gasped frantically as he spilled out onto his side and shrieked in agony.
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br /> The massive shadow fell over him as he thrashed about wildly, completely at the mercy of an unseen enemy. He felt shamed by his weakness. At the moment he could not even defend himself from the cursed beast.
But as with their prior meeting the stag did not attack him. Instead it merely nudged the boy, forcing him onto his back. Then the voice, a deep rumbling of thunder in the distance that echoed within his skull.
“Breathe, child of the wolf. Breathe.”
As if to demand he obey, the stag used its rack to force the curling boy to open up, to lie flat, and to unfurl his twisted frame.
“Breathe deep. Breathe slowly. Take in the breath of the forest for she will protect you.”
“Wha…” he cried out as the cramps attacked from within, almost breaking him as easily as if he were merely a twig. The pain was unbearable and yet the stupid stag wanted him to take a slow breath?
His lungs were on fire and he wanted to scream, to rail at the beast. But he couldn’t. There was not a shred of air in his lungs with which to fight. So violent had this invisible attack been that it had indeed caused him to stop breathing. And it was killing him.
“Breathe, boy,” the stag commanded. “Breathe! The King of the wolves cannot allow the beast in his heart to smite him so easily. Can he?”
Ignoring the condescending tone of the gargantuan creature towering over him Dmitri began to concentrate on opening his lungs instead of the continuing pain. What should have been second nature was anything but. Still he did manage to gasp