Luc cleared his throat. “You all go ahead. I’ll take a look around the village first.”
Tasha stared at him as if he was mad. “Alone? In the dead of the night?”
Caiso swiped one of the lanterns from the garden. “I’ll go with him.”
Hana smiled and drew away.
“He didn’t even try to ask for proof that we are who we say we are,” Caiso said as they strolled down the empty streets. “Most men would’ve asked for a seal or something. You’ve got that letter Master Landor gave you.”
Luc patted the pocket where he kept it. “No. I don’t think he cared at all what we had to say. But you know what’s even more suspicious? He looked like he wanted to believe me.”
“Why would you say that?”
“When I said we were here to help. He paused.”
Caiso smirked. “That’s it?”
Luc rubbed the back of his head. “I don’t know how else to explain it. But it’s like he wanted me to help him, but knew there wasn’t much I could do.”
A cold wind blew towards them. Caiso sneezed. “Well,” he murmured, rubbing his nose. “That doesn’t make me feel any better about any of this.”
“Surprising to hear, coming from a mercenary.”
“Believe it or not, I haven’t done anything close to this before,” Caiso said. “There’s been a job or two that’s made me ill, but this is the first one that’s made the hair on my arms stand on end. I shouldn’t have followed Jona when I did.”
“It’s your first time working with him?”
Caiso gave him a thin smile. “I met him at Port Bluetree. Just came off a ship from Baidh myself.”
“But you’re not Baidhan.”
“Oh, I’ve been around.”
“You’re not as…vicious as they are.”
“I’m plenty vicious, boy,” Caiso said with a twinkle in his eye. “I just prefer to choose my battles.” He took a deep breath. “I’m a native Hafed. Unlike those fresh-faced fools from Kago, I know exactly what we’re dealing with here.”
“So why did you come?”
“Probably for the same reasons as you, I wager.”
Luc snorted. “What, the money?”
“Money. Curiosity. Foolhardiness.” He examined his boot against the moonlight before glancing at yet another empty hut beside them. “Maybe just deciding that something like this can’t possibly as horrifying as what waits for you back home.”
“I don’t know what you mean. My father is a good man.”
Caiso smirked. “You don’t say? Well, mine isn’t. My mistake for presuming.”
They reached the end of the village, which was marked by a tall fence made of thatched saplings. The darkness made it hard to see beyond, but Luc could make out the swaying leaves and bowed branches of the forest up ahead. He heard a pig squeal. At the same instance, something moved from behind the fence and a figure slowly ambled out of the shadows. He felt his skin crawl.
But it was only a man, not a monster. One of the villagers, unshaven and dressed in little more than dirty rags pieced together. The frosted snow on the ground didn’t seem to bother him. “Back the way you came from,” he said, brandishing a pitchfork at them. He blocked the fence with his body.
Luc held his hands out. “I don’t know if you’ve heard, but we’re here under Duke Iorwin’s request. We’re not here to cause trouble.”
“You’re causing trouble already. Walk on back to that road and leave us be!”
“Now listen here…” Caiso began, reaching out to push the pitchfork away.
The man lunged at him.
The attack happened so fast that Caiso didn’t even have time to cry out. The pitchfork stabbed him right through the arm, pinning him against the wall of the hut behind him. He managed a low groan just as Luc struck the villager’s hand with the hilt of his sword. The villager dropped the pitchfork and turned to him.
But he didn’t swing back. Even when Luc grabbed him by the collar, he just gazed up at him with a look of terror, his dirty face dripping with sweat. A wave of revulsion rushed into him—not because of the villager, but because he would’ve struck the man again…this quivering, half-sane man who was so thin, Luc could’ve probably lifted him to his feet with one hand. He pushed the man away in distaste.
The villager limped back into the shadows as Luc turned to help Caiso. One of the tines had caught the skin of his elbow, but not much else. Luc tore off the rest of Caiso’s sleeve to wrap around the wound. “That asshole’s lost his mind,” Caiso grumbled. “What the fuck was he doing back there? I wouldn’t be surprised if the entire damn village is unhinged.”
“You should go back to the others,” Luc said.
“You’re not serious,” Caiso breathed.
“If there’s anything out there, it would’ve gotten that villager,” Luc replied. “I think I’ll be all right.”
“Your sense of duty is admirable. Misplaced, but admirable.” Caiso patted him on the shoulder. “Scream if the monsters come.”
Chapter Nine
Grandma never talked about the monsters of the Kag. Luc had asked her once, because she had stories about everything else—about the different deities they worshipped in Jin-Sayeng, like Sakku who put the fisherman Kiba up against the sky as a star to warn others of the perils of crossing a goddess, and of the dragons that used to light up the Jinsein sky. They were strange stories to Luc, and the other children made fun of him and Alun if they ever mentioned them. What about Agartes, Grandma? What about the monsters he cleared from the land, driving them deep into the forest so he could make the Kag safer for all to live in? Tell us about the monsters.
Grandma didn’t know. She wasn’t even sure what an “Agartes” was, at one point—for years she’d assumed it was a Hafed god and not a real person at all. She made odd food and sang them strange songs to sleep, and didn’t seem to understand how this made the other children wonder about them. Father wasn’t much different, reasoning that he, too, preferred the Jinsein stories of his youth. And Kasia? Kasia never spoke much of anything beyond what chores needed to be done and why they weren’t where they were supposed to be.
Perhaps if he had grown up in a different household, he would’ve felt more trepidation over where he was and what he was doing. Standing there at the edge of the forest under a dark grey sky, he was distinctly aware that most locals would take him for a fool. But then again, he already knew he was. To be out here instead of back home was foolishness enough already.
The shadows skipped around the faint light of the lantern he held in one hand. He placed his other hand on his sword. He didn’t know how to use it properly, but the action gave him a measure of comfort.
He found himself walking past the first grove of trees, where the snow ended. Grey mist weaved between the tree trunks, ending in tendrils that seemed to have a life of its own, beckoning to him in a manner that made his stomach turn. The thought of walking through it gave Luc pause. He swallowed and decided to return to the village. Whatever lay waiting for him in the woods could probably wait a little longer.
He returned up the path, stepping over a thick tree root that he hadn’t noticed before. There were, in fact, more roots than he’d realized—gnarled and twisted along the path, some thicker than his own arms. The angle of the moonlight made them a lot easier to see this time around, and he wondered why he hadn’t tripped on the way down.
Luc kept walking.
He kept walking until he became concerned how much longer the trail was than he remembered, but it didn’t really dawn on him that he was lost until he lifted the lantern over his ear and realized that the village was nowhere in sight. There were just trees, everywhere—tall, sombre trees, and then the moonlit, clouded sky above.
A shiver shot straight to his heart. He supressed the urge to run. Where would he go? The last thing he wanted was to step right over a cliff, like what had happened to Flitch’s brother back at the village a few years back. Unlike Flitch’s brother, they�
�d never find him—he highly doubted any of the mercenaries would bother trying to gather bits of his body from the bushes to bring back to his family. He swallowed, urging himself to calm down. Perhaps he had just taken a wrong turn. He tried to look up at the sky to gather his bearings, but he could only see a handful of stars, none of which seemed familiar to him.
Pushing back his fears, he started walking again. He could feel the blood pounding through his ears with every step. Just ten, twenty paces in, and I’ll see the village, he told himself. It kept him busy.
But the forest seemed endless.
After some time, he stopped and placed the lantern by his foot. It was starting to burn dangerously low, and in no time, he was going to be left with nothing but the moon to light his path. And even that didn’t look like it would last very long—enough clouds hovered in the sky to threaten to cover him in darkness.
He wondered if he should take Caiso’s suggestion and scream. The words hovered at the tip of his tongue, but as he gathered a deep breath, he realized that he was as likely to alert every lurking beast and creature in the forest of his location as the mercenaries. He gave a soft exhale instead and pressed his lips together. After a moment’s deliberation, he took his shirt off and turned it inside out before putting it back on again.
It was an old superstition—one his Grandma had carried with her from Jin-Sayeng. Sometimes, she said, spirits played tricks on you, so you turned your shirt inside out to make them leave you alone. He wasn’t sure how it was supposed to work and he didn’t really believe it, but it calmed him down long enough to realize that if the lantern was going to die anyway, he might as well use the time to find a safe spot to spend the night. He could always find his way out in the morning.
He found a spot deep inside the hollow of a fallen tree trunk. Pressed against the branches and leaves in his cloak and with his hands tucked inside his shirt, it was almost warm. He curled as tightly as he could and watched the last of the light die down. There, in the choking blackness, he closed his eyes and tried to sleep without dreaming.
~~~
Rest was surprisingly easier than Luc thought it would be. He woke up to fog and birdsong and just the barest hint of sunlight, seeping through the branches above. He had to stop to remember where he was. He thought he had simply fallen asleep in the pasture back home and that all he had to do was turn around and see the goats bleating as they fed on the soft grass.
The last few days came rolling back at once. He grimaced and pushed himself out of the hollow, cringing as he did so—his legs and arms felt like pins and needles for a moment. His neck felt odd, too. Sleeping with his head in his arms could do that. But then, it was either that or freeze to death, and given the circumstances…
He heard a cough. Startled, he looked up and saw two…women…staring at him.
No, women was the wrong word to use. He realized his mistake all too-quickly. They were distinctly feminine, it was true, with curved waists and small breasts, but their faces were oddly shaped, with pointed chins. Their skin was pale, almost translucent, with a slight bluish tinge that came from the array of veins underneath. Their ears were pointed—nearly dog-like, but long and thin.
“Good morning,” he found himself saying.
They cocked their heads at him before turning to each other with a smile. “Polite, this one,” one said.
“Indeed. I believe I owe you money.” The other one turned back to him, waggling a thin finger at his face. “I was almost sure you’d be rude, you see. People often are.”
“Clearly, this one isn’t.”
“Must you rub it in?”
The first one laughed.
“Since…you’re both being friendly,” Luc ventured. “Could you care to point me back to the village?”
“Village?” they asked, in unison.
“I seem to have lost my way. It’s just at the edge of the forest.”
“You mean you didn’t go all the way out here just to sleep in that log?” the second asked. “How odd.”
“I believe odd describes it the other way around, sister.”
“As if these humans aren’t confusing enough already.”
They stared at him quietly. He felt a touch of unease, though no more than he had already experienced since last night. Eventually, the first sister folded her hands on her lap and got up. “There is a village, come to think of it. But it’s all the way at the end of the lake. It’ll take hours to get there.”
“I don’t think I walked that far,” Luc said. “Couldn’t even have been an hour.”
“You can climb the hill if you don’t believe us,” the second sister offered. “There’s one not too far from here.”
He didn’t want to refuse her and found himself agreeing. Tightening his cloak around his shoulders, he followed them up the path and then across a fallen tree, the trunk of which was as thick as he was tall. The sisters were lithe-footed, gliding over the obstacle with ease. Luc managed to scramble after them without making too much of a fool of himself. They reached the foot of the hill, which had a small path that wound around it like the paint on a toy top. Luc could tell, not even halfway up, that the sisters were telling the truth. He couldn’t see the village anywhere. The only thing he could see were treetops and shadows, and then the mountains beyond.
“And the lake,” one sister said, nudging him with a sharp elbow. “Don’t forget the lake. Such bright, pristine shininess. See how it glimmers like a grey-green mirror from above.”
“Are you reading my mind?” he asked.
She giggled.
“What are you, anyway? If you don’t mind me asking?”
The other sister looked amused. “You mean you don’t know?”
“No.”
“You really don’t know.”
“I…no. What’s so funny?” He frowned.
“Oh, spirits, he’s serious.”
“You really don’t know.”
“Ah, let’s give the man some peace,” the first sister said—he could tell her apart from the other one now because of her slightly more crooked ears. “We’re what you people call the ka-eng. You must’ve heard stories, at least.”
“The ka-eng…” Luc repeated. “Oh.” He remembered the superstitions, usually uttered by children or mothers trying to scare their children, like how you weren’t supposed to walk alone in the woods because these strange, enchanted creatures were liable to take an interest in you and drag you back into their lands…
He must’ve been staring at them a little too hard, because they grinned at him.
“What do you think is going through his mind right now?” one asked.
“Either he’s recalling stories of our people as meat-eaters, with a particular taste for human…”
“Oh, no. He looks too tough and gamey for my delicate teeth.”
“—or he’s remembering the ones where we play the rather willing part of the succubus.”
The first sister scratched her chin. “Well, he doesn’t look too bad for that. You want me to take off his shirt, or do you want to do the honours?”
“Sister! He’s entirely too young! We must have at least a century or two on him.”
“You’re right.” She gave him a look of scrutiny. “Do you even know what to do with it?”
Luc opened his mouth.
“You’ve completely embarrassed him,” the second sister said. “I’m sure he’s at least aware of what goes into what hole.”
“Oh, you’d be surprised. The men I’ve known who couldn’t even claim to such a thing…”
“Anyway,” the second sister said, flicking her ears at him. “You seem to have forgotten how to talk. You were about to react to us saying ka-eng.”
He found his voice. “I didn’t know you were real.”
“Maybe I should take back the polite part,” the first sister said. “We’re real enough. Must be a few of our people living out in Tilarthan.”
“This one’s a provincial lad,” the second
sister sniffed. “I can tell. Look at him. Smell him. He reeks of goat.”
“And I had such high hopes. Still, a lot better than his companions, don’t you think? Spitting on the grass, pissing on the river…”
“Wait,” Luc said. “So you do know where I was.”
The sisters shrugged. “We didn’t say that we didn’t.”
“I think you did.”
They laughed at him. “Come.”
They gestured at him with their delicate fingers, drawing him back down the hill. They took a different path this time, one that was barely perceptible through the thick, dead bush. The ground was soft, too, which told Luc it wasn’t used very often. The trees became sparser, and he spotted the lake in the distance.
“You should visit us during the summer,” the first sister said. “Flowers everywhere, as far as the eyes can see. Purple and white and yellow.”
Luc cleared his throat. “Nobody said anything about flowers in the Kag woods. The way people talked, you’d think it was nothing but shadows and monsters lurking about.”
“Well…” the second said, glancing at her sister.
They reached a small downhill slope, which was strewn with more gnarled bushes, though these ones had small, red berries at the tip of the leafless stems. “Are you hungry?” the first sister asked, noticing his gaze.
“No, thank you,” Luc said.
“Are you sure? They’re delicious. Tart.”
“I think I’ll be all right for a good long while.”
The ka-eng smiled at him. “You don’t trust these woods.”
“I walked a short distance and ended up lost,” Luc said. “You haven’t even explained that part to me yet.”
“As I was saying—” the second sister started.
“And I’m not sure I want you to,” Luc continued. He gave a quick breath. “These woods are magical, they said. Enchanted. That’s good enough for me to know.”
The ka-eng smiled at him. “Then why did you come at all? Surely the idea of magical woods ought to be enough to frighten even the most stalwart of men.”
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