Skillful Death

by Ike Hamill

  “Stop complaining, boy,” Sasha’s father called out from the front of the cart.

  Sasha flopped on his back, and Constantine joined him. The two boys looked up at the passing leaves overhead and tried to see the clouds above the canopy.

  Sasha turned his head and whispered to Constantine so he could avoid his father’s scrutiny. “Tonight we’ll be able to see above all the trees. After the sun goes down they let the kids up into the bell tower, and they’ve just rebuilt it to poke above the tops of all the oaks.”

  Constantine smiled. He’d caught glimpses of the horizon when he was smaller and could climb to the very tops of tall trees. He was beginning to understand that most boys had never seen that far, might never see that far, except every ten years when the town added on to the tower, making it high enough to master the tall oaks. Because of Sasha’s description, Constantine looked forward to the sight, but it didn’t captivate him in the same way.

  “I’m going to dance with that girl from the Shylan road. She’s about your age, but I like her,” Sasha said. “My friend, Toli, is going to ask my sister to dance. But he’s not tall, like her.”

  Constantine hated Toli. He was the one whose eye was fresh out of the bandage.

  “She probably won’t get to dance much because nobody sees her around anymore. That’s what Toli says. He says that she’ll be lucky if anyone wants to dance with her because she’ll probably end up like Mom, boarded up in a house somewhere.”

  Constantine felt his blood simmer for this boy, Toli. Sasha’s mother was an amazing woman, and Toli should be overjoyed if he ever had a chance at a woman like that. Constantine decided to avoid that boy tonight so he wouldn’t have a fight at the dance before he got a chance to go up in the tower.

  Baron’s feet settled into a gentle rhythm. Constantine heard when the horse’s prancing subsided and he returned to his normal hoof-strike. The cart wheeled up and down, over the tree-covered hills towards the center of town. Constantine drifted into an easy nap in the embrace of his new suit.

  He felt the eyes of the people on him as they pulled up to the town barn. The other boys wore their wool pants and linen shirts. The only fur their clothes had was around their wrists or on a band around the brim of their hats. Constantine and Sasha wore fur and skin from head to toe, and easily outclassed the other boys. Their new suits, accented with snake, were more formal and yet more practical than the clothes of the regular boys. Sasha’s new suit conjured the image of a bear, and Constantine wore a suit that didn’t look like any predator of their realm. His suit combined deep amber with jagged black stripes and white tufts.

  They stepped down from the cart and flanked Sasha’s father while the sister stood behind. As a group, they walked through the gathering room of the town hall. Constantine’s other snakeskin suits were displayed there. They passed out the back doors to the flower garden. Paper lanterns hanging from poles waited for darkness to fall before they would be lit.

  Sasha’s father paused at the top of the stairs and waited for the attendant to announce them before they bowed.

  “Sir Alexander Skomin. Sasha, Constantine, and presenting Maria,” the attendant said. Constantine bowed with Sasha and his father, as he’d been taught, and the three descended and turned to present Maria to the group. A light applause greeted the young woman and her lavender dress. She blushed and quickly descended to catch her father’s hand.

  Constantine watched Sasha’s sister while Sasha grabbed his hand and dragged him over to the refreshment table. The table sat between two thick oak trees, and Sasha fished an acorn out of the punch bowl before spooning out two cups.

  Speaking into his glass of punch, cupped with both hands, Sasha kept his eyes locked on his prey. “That’s the girl over there. The one from the Shylan road. I’m going to ask her to dance with me when the music starts.”

  Constantine followed his gaze and felt electricity jolt through his body. The girl was lovely, but what he felt for her was more than attraction. He felt a connection with her, like she was something he’d been seeking without even realizing it.

  “I have to go talk to her before anyone else claims the first dance,” Sasha said. He handed his punch glass to Constantine.

  Constantine felt rooted to his spot, or he would have tried to stop Sasha. He didn’t want anything to break the invisible line of force between himself and this girl. Before he could shake his trance, Sasha was already halfway to the girl.

  Sasha was back in an instant. His face had been overtaken by a smile.

  “She said yes!” Sasha was beaming. “She’s here with her neighbor because her mother is taking care of her sick father. She was supposed to dance with young Thomas, but she said she would make an excuse and dance with me. They’re going to start the music after the spring bell rings. I’m so nervous, I could spit.” Sasha reached up and cupped Constantine’s face in his hands, pinching his cheeks. He took back his punch glass and poured the rest down his throat so he could go get a refill.

  Constantine wandered backwards until his feet hit the stairs and he sat down. He stared at the girl from the Shylan road and tried to take a deep breath. His chest felt like it had been packed with a wet cloth.

  “Little Forestling, you’re supposed to offer to get me punch,” Sasha’s sister, Maria, said as she sat down next to him.

  Constantine glanced over at her and saw that the lace hem of her dress was nearly touching the orange fur of his pants. He handed his own punch glass to his left.

  “I don’t want your glass,” she said. “I want my own.”

  Constantine pointed in the direction of the punch table. He didn’t take his eyes off the girl from the Shylan road as she talked to a group of boys who had approached her.

  Toli approached and stood in front of them. Constantine had to lean to his right to keep his eyes on the girl from the Shylan road.

  “I brought you this,” Toli said, holding out two glasses of punch towards Maria.

  “No, thank you,” Maria said.

  Toli stood there, holding out the glasses. His eye had healed, but the skin on top of the mended cheekbone looked wrinkled and thin. Toli kicked at Constantine’s foot before he wandered away with his two glasses of punch.

  “She’s your same year,” Maria said. “And she’s the daughter of the Constable. Your friend Baron will go to her house in a few months and knock up all their horses.”

  Constantine glanced at Maria as she delivered this information. He scanned his mental list of the town’s men and tried to imagine which one was this girl’s father. Had he seen this girl’s father before? A man, about the age of Sasha’s father, took the hand of the girl and led her to the garden’s entrance. They disappeared behind a hedge, leaving Constantine staring at a green wall of leaves.

  “Come on, little Forestling,” Maria said. “The spring bell won’t ring for another hour and I know a way to get up to the tower before dusk. Come with me.” She didn’t grab for his hand, but instead clutched the fur under his armpit and dragged Constantine to his feet. He allowed her to pull him up the stairs and through a narrow door. A hall led to a steep stairway which took a sharp left every fifth stair.

  They passed a window on the way up. It was shaped like a tall rectangle with a rounded top and looked over the gardens. Constantine spotted Sasha easily, standing out in his bear suit. He couldn’t find the girl from the Shylan Road or her older chaperone. The next window they passed showed nothing but oak leaves. At the top of the stairs, a narrow door opened on a spacious landing that had a balcony overlooking the hall.

  Maria spied every direction from the doorway before pulling Constantine in a sprint over to the ladder. They climbed quickly, leaving the landing behind as the ladder led up into a vertical shaft. Hand over hand they climbed, and Constantine couldn’t see past Maria to judge how much farther they must go. Looking down, he felt dizzy at their height. The wood of the ladder had been old and weathered at the bottom, but soon gave way to light, fresh wood that stil
l felt sticky with sap.

  Maria paused and Constantine restrained the urge to look up her skirt as she shoved aside the hatch at the top. Soon she was up and through, pulling Constantine up to the top of the tower. As he gained his feet, he felt the tower slightly swaying under him with the wind. It didn’t feel like the swaying of a tall tree, which was natural and felt like the tree was moving in harmony with the breeze. This swaying felt like the building was resisting the wind and losing. The creaking suggested that the wind might triumph over the tower at any moment.

  “They don’t let kids up here during the day because they said the light is bad for children,” Maria said.

  Constantine turned towards her voice and felt the first blast of unfiltered sunlight. He squinted and smiled as narrow tears squirted from the corners of his eyes.

  “Look! You can see the snow on the mountains,” Maria said.

  Constantine raised a hand to block the sun and looked in the direction she pointed. He didn’t know what the words “snow” or “mountains” meant, but the view was wonderful. Beyond the oaks, he recognized the maple, alder, birch, fir, and bamboo. Beyond that, a glittering river cut its way through big open grassland. Constantine tried to imagine standing out in that big open space and found he couldn’t. Even presented with an unfettered view of clear sky, he still looked up and expected to see the underside of leaves sheltering him from the heavens.

  “By next year’s Moon Dance, the trees will grow up and around this tower. You’ll only be able to see leaves. They say the Providential Boy—my brother, I guess—can follow that river out of the woods. He’ll be the only one of our generation to leave this town alive. I wish I could leave,” Maria said.

  “Why don’t you?” Constantine asked.

  “It’s foolish to try. Nobody makes it out alive. Most come back from the bamboo just clinging to life and they die soon after. Some don’t come back, but their bones do, when the wild dogs drag them around and fight over them.”

  “But others come?” Constantine asked. He’d heard of people who weren’t born in the town and yet they lived there. The mother of the girl from the Shylan road was one.

  “Yes,” Maria said, “sometimes people from the outside come in, but they can never tell us how they got here, and none have ever been able to leave again. It’s not even worth thinking about. We have everything we need here. They say that outside our forest, people don’t have enough to eat and suffer through seasons so cold that people die because of it. They freeze to death.”

  “Freeze?”

  “To death.”

  Constantine’s hands and face felt so hot from the sun that at that moment he couldn’t imagine what it would be like to freeze. In fact, his skin felt tight and seared, like he’d been sitting too close to the fire. Perhaps Maria was feeling the same thing because she tugged him back towards the trapdoor to the ladder.

  “You smell like Baron. Come on, let’s go back down.”

  When the spring bell rang, all the boys and girls paired up and prepared for their first dance. Sasha danced with the girl from the Shylan Road while Thomas glared at them from over near the cherry trees. Maria dragged Constantine out to the center of the clearing and tried to show him how to dance. Meanwhile, Toli danced with a short girl who lived near him. Half of the dancing children looked at their feet and the other half shot looks over their shoulders at the partner they wished they had.

  As soon as the song finished, Constantine extracted himself from Maria’s grip and took a seat over on the stairs. He watched the partnerships dissolving and reforming as the children found equilibrium. He kept a close eye on the girl from the Shylan Road. She mostly danced with Sasha, often taking the fur of his suit between her finger and thumb, but she had plenty of other admirers as well. Meanwhile, the parents stood at the perimeter, drank tea, and talked about life.

  The shadows dissolved as the sun set over the canopy of trees. In the twilight, several men circled the garden, lighting the paper lanterns. Outside the hedges, a group of stray dogs barked and snarled over some treasure until a few of the parents left to chase them away. The children took turns dancing and talking. The younger kids gave up their courting and collapsed into their normal social packs. The band played less up-tempo songs in favor of slower numbers. Some parents moved in to separate children who danced too close for polite company.

  Several children, and even some adults, came by to compliment Constantine on his suit. Most attributed Sasha with the design, but a few said that they’d heard that Constantine helped with the construction. Constantine nodded at the comments.

  The band drew out the last note to a sad, slow song. One of the men in front stood and conducted the band in a loud flourish. The children retreated to the edges of the garden and focused on the center of their circle. Constantine had to rise to his feet and stand on the stairs to see over their heads.

  Skinny men, one from each side, dressed in red and yellow tights, met in the center of the ring. They joined hands and formed a circle of their arms before they spun around. As they twirled, they separated, but their hands were still joined with colorful bands of silk, which described a circle that grew larger and larger. Constantine looked at the rapt faces of the other children and he yawned.

  When their circle was wide enough that a man could have laid down in the center without being stepped on, the two men reversed direction and their silks fluttered to the ground. They raised their arms and the silks flew up overhead, now making a dome in the center of the clapping group of children. The band played a rollicking march, in time with the clapping.

  The silk dome fluttered with the wind and suddenly the two men dressed in red and yellow tights disappeared. Blue flame erupted from the bottom of the silk and the dome disappeared in a flash, revealing a pyramid of nine men, perched with their knees on the lower men’s shoulders. At the top, a woman rose up into a handstand from the heads of the two men below her.

  The crowd exploded with applause.

  A tiny man, dressed all in black and with a black hood, ran up from the side and spread out a black square of cloth on the ground. As the band played to a grand crescendo, the woman at the top of the pyramid launched herself upwards. She flipped in mid-air, and plunged down towards the square of cloth. The crowd gasped. The little man ran off to the side and ducked under a hedge.

  Constantine crossed his arms.

  When the woman hit the cloth, she was upside down with her arms extended. Instead of landing on the ground, she disappeared into the square of cloth, as if she was absorbed by the blackness. Several people in the crowd cried out in shock. One by one, the men of the pyramid jumped after the woman, each vanishing into the cloth until only the two men from the lower corners were left. These two, dressed in red and yellow tights, didn’t jump into the cloth. Instead, they joined hands and formed a circle with their arms. They danced in a circle around the black cloth and it levitated into the air between them. Once it cleared their heads, the cloth caught fire with the same blue flame from earlier. As the spectators watched the cloth rise and erupt into flame, the two men in red and yellow tights ran to the sides of the garden. Constantine watched them duck under hedges and crawl away.

  The performance finished and the children ran for the stairs, queuing up for a chance to climb the tower. Maria approached Constantine as he stood near the back of the line. He was watching the girl from the Shylan Road who stood near the head of the line. She was holding Sasha’s hand.

  “Do you want to go up again?” she asked. “The moon is beautiful from up there, but you don’t get to look at it very long because you have to make way for the next children.”

  “I’ve seen the moon,” Constantine said.

  “My thoughts exactly,” Maria said. She took Constantine’s hand and led him down towards the hedges. He walked alongside Maria, but couldn’t help looking over his shoulder until the girl from the Shylan Road and Sasha found their way inside the town hall.

  “Which one are you looki
ng at?” Maria asked. “My brother, or his girlfriend?”

  “Pardon?” Constantine asked. The word felt strange in his mouth. It was one of the things that Sasha often said when his father barked out an order.

  “Are you in love with my brother, or his girlfriend?” Maria asked. She tugged on his hand as he slowed down to ponder the question.

  “Love?” he asked. He’d heard the word before. Sasha had accused him of being in love with Baron one day, but the meaning of the word used in these two contexts didn’t make sense.

  “I’ve been in love before,” Maria said.

  She stopped and turned to Constantine. He looked up and realized that they were alone, behind the hedges at the edge of the garden. She took his other hand and held both between them. Maria leaned down to kiss Constantine and he ducked out of the way, not understanding her intentions. Maria laughed and dropped his hands so she could wrap hers around his hooded head. She dug her fingers into the fur at his neck and pulled him close until their lips met. Constantine understood and kissed her back, wrapping his furry arms around her torso in a strong embrace.

  After a moment, she pulled back. She stood several inches taller than Constantine, so even on his tiptoes, he couldn’t reach her lips when she pulled away.

  “Little Forestling, you’re too young for such passion,” she said. In the light from the paper lanterns, she gazed at his eyes and breathed shallow flutters of air.

  “Passion,” he said. This word he understood with no context at all.

  From high above the trees, Sasha’s voice rang clear through the dusk. “I see you down there! Don’t go near my sister!”

  Maria pushed Constantine back. For a second, her eyes darted from the Forestling up towards the canopy of trees. Then, they both heard the sound. It sounded like the blast from a dozen tuneless trumpets, and was followed by the crash of a falling tree.

  Maria ran for the town hall and Constantine chased after her.

  Shouts erupted from the crowd and everyone seemed to have differing opinions of the best direction to flee. Constantine followed Maria, who sprinted up the steps to the town hall and turned to look for her father. Screams erupted from the east, followed by the sounds of splintered trees crashing to the ground.