The Redwoods

by Ross Turner

  The mother and father continued their assault upon her, though she could tell they were much weaker than she was, and she sensed the two younger men flanking around to her sides.

  They were trying to surround her. And in fact, they had succeeded. From behind her now Vivian sensed the two sons approaching and readying their own attacks.

  “Red!” She called decidedly, pointing in the direction of the hidden attackers, her hand outstretched and pointed like a knife.

  “They’re mine.” He growled terrifyingly, and he leapt forward with such speed that Vivian had never seen, out of sight between the few still standing buildings within but an instant.

  It was only a second or two longer before the mother and father, still focusing their efforts on young Vivian, realised that their aid would never arrive, and a look of horror crossed their petrified faces.

  A terrible high pitched scream echoed out across the derelict and rubble strewn city then, more frightening than any spell or incantation that could have been concocted, even in a thousand years or more. The hairs on the back of Vivian’s neck stood on end as if they were electrified, and her skin mottled with goose bumps, terror flushing through her veins, for what her Red had done to the first son, she could only imagine. She daren’t look to see.

  The great red bear didn’t stop there however. He couldn’t. The cries had barely echoed their way past Vivian’s ears before a second followed it, this one somehow even more desperate and lost than the first, dripping with the agonised sounds of pain and torture.

  Both the sons were dead.

  Red reappeared then, and though his fur was already crimson coloured, nonetheless, it still shone and glimmered with the stained remains of his most recent prey. He was coated almost completely with their blood. By the sight of him Vivian somewhat doubted that anything remained of the two sons, and she turned to face their parents with a dreadfully resolute look in her levelled eyes.

  They looked back at Vivian and Red with brewing insanity, barely still contained within them.

  “What you have done cannot be excused.” Vivian said calmly, and very clearly. She was no longer speaking for herself, or for her own fragile human emotions, but instead for her entire kin. From the Featherstones to the Greystones, this reign of terror and suffering could not continue.

  It would not continue.

  But of course, as ever, they were blind to the wrongs of their ways, and the two Greystone parents, having just lost both their sons, charged at Vivian wildly. They threw everything they had left at her, uncaring of the cost, blinded by rage.

  Fire and lightning and blades and spears materialised from thin air, hurtling towards the young girl with such fierce velocity that they looked unstoppable. But that, of course, was not the case.

  Vivian halted their charge just as quickly as it had begun, stopping their attacks in mid-air, and dropping them effortlessly to the ground, dissipating their effect instantly.

  They never even stood a chance.

  Blades in hand, legs churning furiously, the two berserk parents knew it was over, but they had nothing else left anyway, so they continued their hopeless charge regardless, now only but a few metres from young Vivian, their weapons raised ready to strike, their hands ready to kill.

  But they didn’t make it that far either. As if they had been struck by great hammers, with a crack like thunder, they were knocked from their path, and sent hurtling head first into one of the few remaining buildings around them. Their skulls split instantly on impact with the cold stone and blood covered them like the great, unstoppable rushing of a flood.

  There was no need to check if they were still breathing.

  Vivian and Red turned their backs to the gruesome spectacle, knowing there would surely be much more to see, and continued into the very heart of the Greystone infected city.

  21

  Trying furiously to force those most recent images of death and suffering from her mind, Vivian pressed on. Now she could sense the true power of the Greystones, and it had most certainly not been in those they had just defeated. They were but mere shadows of her true adversary: undoubtedly the mastermind behind the downfall of her family.

  She sensed quite clearly now the aura of one man, more powerful and vibrant and twisted than all of the others. Somehow innately, Vivian knew he had not only been the mastermind behind the assassination of her family, but the driving force for their countless acts of cruel anguish over the long years of her absence.

  And yet here he was, even still, waiting for her. After all the time she had been gone, lost to the Redwoods, suspected and hoped to be dead, he had always known this day would eventually come. The Featherstones had not earned their legendary reputation by being meek and faint hearted. There were tenacious. They fought not for themselves, but for their people. And their bloodline was that of legend.

  The young woman, Vivian Featherstone, now almost entirely unrecognisable from the frightened little girl who had fled so blindly into the forest, so many years ago, strode boldly and purposefully between the derelict buildings that had once stood as homes. She was no exception from her heritage.

  The long road stretching out almost endlessly before her, leading straight between the ruins built up on either side, seemed somehow symbolic, as Vivian and her dearest friend Red marched onwards. The pressure and imminent threat was all around them as they continued into the heart of their enemy’s stronghold, building constantly.

  They had no idea what they would find, and in fact they both grew quite apprehensive as time ticked by and their adversary did not appear. It wasn’t fear that gripped them, but instead a wariness that was altogether calm and collected, though their hearts raced furiously in their chests, beating heavily and loudly in their ears.

  Occasionally fleeing townspeople ran past them, terror clear in their eyes. But whether they were running from the Greystones or from her, Vivian had no idea. She imagined that after the long years they had suffered here under the awful rule of this forsaken family, the townsfolk would, at least at first, fear sorcery of any kind, even if it was being used to help them.

  The clouds above grew darker and more menacing as the day wore on. They were not weighed down by water, but instead they were heavy with oppression and apprehension, desperate to witness the outcome of this momentous day’s events, and, if necessary, to shroud it in their protective and encasing shadow.

  Another hour passed, and soon the aura of the old man that Vivian had at first only faintly detected, nearly overwhelmed her. It clouded her senses and seemed to come from every direction. It was as if he was all around her, yet equally, at the same time, nowhere to be found.

  She began turning and darting wildly in the street, panic gripping her as her eyes failed to find what she sought: what she could sense so clearly with her mind.

  “Viv…” Red’s voice cut the silence softly, penetrating her panic.

  “I can’t find him Red.” She replied, her dread unfaltering.

  “I feel it too.” He told her then, confusing her. She stopped her frantic searching.

  “You can sense him?” She asked, her eyes narrowing. “How?”

  Red simply shrugged his enormous shoulders indifferently.

  “I’ve dealt with enough Greystone scum in my time to know how they feel.” He replied bluntly. “And how they smell…” He added, his voice deep and rough and threatening, emanating from the very back of his throat.

  A sudden curiosity that she was certainly not unfamiliar with, gripped Vivian then, and Red cocked his head to the side and looked at her peculiarly as a smile touched her lips.

  “What do they smell like?”

  A broad vicious looking grin spread across Red’s furred face then and he chuckled deeply. He had never before been asked to describe a smell in such a way. He had no idea where to start. But then his smile was replaced by a look of grim determination as the words he needed came to him all too clearly, and all too easily.

  “The plague.” He repl
ied sombrely. “They smell like the plague. They smell like death.”

  It was perhaps an hour later again, maybe more, Vivian really had no way of knowing, when the aura that had developed all around her began to slowly fade and focus in at a single point, maybe a few hundred metres or so ahead of them, between the ruined clusters of buildings.

  The day had worn on and was growing long and thin, stretched so exhaustedly out that even the heavy fortifications of cloud above them seemed tired, drifting slowly and laboriously across the stone grey ocean of the sky.

  Still they waited oppressively.

  Looking up, Vivian felt somehow as if things had gone drastically wrong, somewhere along the line, and that if just perhaps one or two things had happened differently, it wouldn’t all be quite so bad now…

  But those are not the types of thoughts one can dwell on for too long, for they will drain your sanity and your happiness all too swiftly.

  “He’s here.” Vivian whispered quietly to Red, though the concentration on his face clearly told her that her words were unnecessary. He nodded gravely and growled a rumbling threat, telling his dear Viv that he was indeed ready for whatever lay ahead. She was too, she thought, she hoped, and they advanced on the final Greystones like vultures.

  Within only moments their enemies made themselves known, charging from buildings all around madly and wildly, with barely any direction or order at all. Screams of rage and anger, misguided and misplaced, accompanied their ragged assault.

  Their armour was spotted and rust stained and ill kept, red and smelly from years of misuse, or perhaps no use at all. They bore swords and axes and shields of varying shapes and sizes, and the whole sight was hauntingly familiar. In many cases they were likely even the same people who had attacked Featherstone Keep and killed Dorian and Miranda Featherstone, all those years ago.

  They were simply finishing the task they had been set that night.

  Or trying to at least.

  Red erupted an ear splitting roar, his bellow nearly deafening them all, and crashed through their ranks devastatingly. He was the most terrifying monster they had ever faced, and he tore through their defences without mercy, ripping limbs and entrails and organs from hot, fresh bodies, casting them off in all directions, hearts and lungs still beating and spewing blood as they spattered down amidst the cold, abandoned rubble.

  When the screaming Greystones reached Vivian however, they realised that their greatest fear indeed shouldn’t have been the great red bear mutilating and demolishing them. But instead, unbelievably, their worst fear should have been the young girl.

  As soon as the first Greystone was within six feet of her, without even batting an eyelid, Vivian cast them back. Clad in their mistreated armour, the invisible blows that struck them rang shrilly through the dreary air, knocking the breath from their lungs and the vigour from their attacks. Some clattered against the few still standing stone walls, while others simply crashed into piles of crushed rock and brick.

  The second wave then tried their luck, faltering only slightly, but the flames that engulfed them were cast on a whim, and within but a moment, Vivian’s fleeting thought became their agonising torture. Eventually the searing flames claimed their lives, though she ensured that they ceased just soon enough to allow them the time to enjoy their suffering, and not to kill them immediately.

  “Use your sorcery you fools!” An ancient and authoritative voice suddenly sounded, booming his instruction across the battlefield. Vivian and Red paused for a second to glance up at the owner of the voice, and sure enough, old and feeble though he may have looked, it was the one they had both sensed.

  Though they were kept very busy, as their attackers now switched to sorcery as well as just brute force, they still cast occasional glimpses at the elder, and could see quite clearly that he himself was advancing in on the battle, preparing to deliver punishment and devastation all of his own.

  Arrays of great bellows of fire, cracking and searing lightning, and tremendous invisible blows struck at Vivian and Red, burning and scalding and battering them. Despite their best efforts to fend off their attackers, they were hopelessly outnumbered. The Greystones had made sure of that fact many years ago, and clearly ever since had spent the time replenishing and swelling their ranks.

  Vivian sorely doubted that many of the men she struck down that day were even of pure bloodline, but in the heat of the battle, and the desperation of the situation, it mattered not.

  “Red!” Vivian called out then, seeing her friend struggling with Greystone figures too innumerable to count. But nonetheless, her momentary lapse in concentration cost her heavily, and a searing ball of flame struck her in the back, scalding her terribly between her shoulder blades, melting her skin, and she let out a piercing shriek, coupling both pain and anger into one, single, petrifying sound.

  Those closest to her drew back, and with good reason, for her next attacks were not searing balls of flame, nor blows of invisible might, but instead, simply, utter devastation.

  Artless Carnage.

  Vivian merely reached out to her enemies and stopped their hearts, ceasing their lives effortlessly.

  She was not a murderer. She had never had a cruel bone in her body. But she had been made that way. She had been twisted and turned and manipulated so many times that eventually, through everything she had ever endured and suffered, this was what she had been led to. And indeed, whether she liked it or not, she had power great enough to wreak havoc and ruin endlessly, if she so wished.

  Red, however, sadly, did not have the same power his dear Viv had, and for all his strength and brute force, he was not such a match for sorcery as his sweet, young Vivian Featherstone.

  And so, as the spear struck the great red bear, embedded with the intense burning flame of sinful sorcery, driving its way with a horrible grinding sound through the monster’s enormous ribcage, he let out a thunderous roar.

  Howling with unimaginable pain, Red toppled heavily to the ground, shaking the battlefield with the immensity of his agony, and the whole of Vivian’s world fell from beneath her feet.

  22

  ‘For together they were stronger than they could ever have imagined…’ Vivian’s own thoughts echoed through the hollow hallways of her mind, reverberating around the empty, abandoned and devastated rooms endlessly.

  At first that thought had referred to herself and Red and Clover, seemingly a very long time ago now. But then, when Clover had died, succumbing to the inevitable pain of the plague, it had left only the two of them. Vivian may have failed to save their mother, something for which she would feel eternally guilty, but at least she and Red had still had each other.

  But now, as she stared hopelessly and helplessly on at her dear friend, his enormous bulk spread out on the cold, stained ground, his red fur thick with blood, her life seemed to drain from her, as she felt his soul slip torturously from her grasp almost immediately, and there was absolutely nothing she could do to stop it.

  And then, as Vivian’s focus slipped from the battle and took in nothing but her dear Red’s death, her body and mind numb with terrible loss, she felt a tingling sensation in her chest. It wasn’t a painful feeling, more so a peculiar one, for her senses were muted.

  She looked down absently, not really caring what she would find, and saw a thick steel blade protruding from between her ribs, stained with blood, her blood, and vibrating slightly as her frantic heartbeat desperately tried to counter the traumatic blood loss her body was suffering. Thick, red, blotchy liquid oozed from her fatal wound eagerly and saturated her front.

  Indifferent, Vivian looked back up at Red’s body, and heavy tears rolled down her cheeks, no longer flushed pink with exertion, but drained ghostly white from lack of blood. Her legs shook violently and she felt them go very weak. They buckled beneath her weight and she fell heavily to her knees, her kneecaps smacking loudly against the hard stone floor.

  The Greystones stood still all around her, admittedly shocked with th
eir apparent success in felling the last of the great Featherstones. Regardless though, they were wary, knowing Vivian was still very much a threat, even while she clung barely to her fading life.

  She ignored them however, and stared on at Red’s now entirely lifeless body. All remnants of life had escaped him, and before long Vivian knew it would be as if he had never lived at all. The only memory of him would reside within her, and soon, it seemed, she too would succumb to death, and her memories and thoughts and feelings would also be lost.

  But then something changed.

  Whatever had been instilled within the blade that struck Red had clearly been nothing but malevolent, and a horrible blackness began to ooze from the gaping wound at his chest, turning his blood stained fur black.

  The plague.

  It spread from the great bear’s wound and engulfed his body, just as it had engulfed his mother’s.

  A terrible anger was then painted across Vivian’s paled face, rising from deep within her. She turned and looked at the elder of the Greystones, her expression both emotionless and furious all at once, resounding and full of pain and of suffering and of death.

  Somehow Vivian managed to rise to her feet, her body still obeying the commands of her mind, regardless of the fact that it was far beyond saving. Cries echoed around her and the elder man’s underlings once again swung their swords and spears for the young girl.

  This time however, their weapons did not pierce her skin, nor break her bones, but instead they shattered into fragments and dust upon impact, falling uselessly to the floor.

  So instead, since their weapons had failed, the Greystones turned once again to their sorcery. But this time, just as their metalwork had done, their spells fell useless against an invisible barrier that seemingly surrounded Vivian. Nothing could touch her, and they had no idea why.

  By now she was facing the old man, the one who she knew was leading the Greystones, and had been even when her parents had been murdered. How she knew that she wasn’t sure, but at that point, once again, it didn’t matter.