The Beast Inside

by M E Wolf

  “Obviously you are better at the cross then I ever was, a fact that my jaw knows all too well. You will do well as a hunter and your size is sure to give many a false sense of confidence. The uppercut is more devastating than even the cross, but harder to execute and that is why I have saved it for the last in these basic punches.

  “For an uppercut the elbow is bent at a ninety-degree angle. The fist is shot up towards the sky to hit your opponent below the chin or into their solar plexus. It is a very devastating punch if thrown properly. Now, let’s see you try it. Remember to block, use the straight punch or cross once in a while.”

  Alexandra found that she got hit more often than when she had tried to execute the cross. The uppercut was giving her trouble, so she focused more on the straight punch, blocked and kept waiting for openings in Jentus’ defense. He made it a point to block all of her crosses. They were indeed blocked, but Alexandra could see the tension in his arms that he was having a hard time blocking her crosses. Many punches were exchanged from both Alexandra and Jentus, many were blocked and some got through.

  She found that an uppercut well placed in timing and positioning was very hard to block. One such punch managed to get below her guard and plunged itself into her solar plexus leaving her almost breathless as it lifted her, momentarily, into the air. This was followed by another uppercut into her face while she was still bent over and recovering.

  It too, lifted her from the ground. Dazed and in some pain, Jentus followed up with a right cross then a left cross sending her spinning to the left. Putting her back leg back to slow her descent to the ground and attempting to block as Jentus kept sending wave after wave of punches. He varied each punch so that she could not figure out a pattern, but she did. Hours went by and Alexandra knew that they would only have the sun for a few more hours.

  CHAPTER FORTY NINE

  Alexandra was glad for a break from the usual intense workout that Jentus was putting her through. Doing that much work made her stomach empty and she knew that her body was complaining to her about the lack of nutrients in her system. After many helpings of rabbit stew, wild potatoes, leeks and some herbal drink that tasted terrible her body and stomach stopped complaining.

  She was tired, but when Jentus brought out two wooden practice swords about the size of her short sword she knew that her rest would have to wait. Jentus handed her the practice sword hilt first and then began to speak,

  “Alexandra I am going to train you a bit in the short sword. There will not be much to learn later when you move to a normal sword. For now you will learn how to use the short sword.

  “You will be taught the slash, overhand swing, thrust and the parry. There are sword forms, but I will not be teaching you those in these next six months. Now, hold the sword loose in your right hand. Try to hit me.”

  Alexandra held the wooden short sword in her right hand. It felt awkward as she clumsily swung the thing at Jentus with no specific target in mind. He put up the twin of her sword and blocked and parried her chaotic swing. The force of the impact sent her practice sword twirling into the air. Her right hand pained her. Holding her right hand protectively in her left, she turned to look at Jentus,

  “Jentus I am not cut out for this. The sword just flew out of my hand.” She threw up her hands, and glanced over at where her sword went.

  “That will be corrected in time. Everyone get's better with experience. So, you dropped the wooden sword, most do that when they first use it. Let’s continue your sword training.” Jentus picked up Alexandra’s sword, and tossed it to her.

  Alexandra dropped the wooden sword over a dozen times, but kept picking it up and continuing her sword training out of Jentus’s urging her on. Her slashes and thrusts were crude, but at least she began to be able to hold onto the sword without dropping it. Every once in a while she would strike her own foot, knee or left hand. The pain that was caused by her mistakes helped her to correct them.

  After a couple of hours of both Jentus and Alexandra exchanging thrusts, parries and slashes, Alexandra was better for it. She at least knew the basics of wielding a sword and had many bruises to remind her of how not to use a sword. Handing the wooden sword to Jentus, she fastened her sword belt on and placed her short sword, the real one, into its sheath.

  The night sky was grey. Void of any clouds the stars sparkled like giant fireflies that danced on the earth and flew up and into the sky in many different formations. Alexandra enjoyed looking at the stars in the sky because it reminded her of a book she read. In that book, the author had said that not long ago a star fell to the ground. That star contained a great metal that if made into a sword, that sword would not grow dull and always would be sharp.

  It was said that someone had made the sword, but that sword was stolen from the forge before it could be tested fully. The man at the forge told the author that it was made of a special metal that was a legend. Heroes of the past once used weapons fashioned of this metal and it was used in armour as well even though this was less often than a weapon of this metal.

  The armour was said to fit whomever had the desire to wear it. But there was one problem with the armour, if you died in it you became a part of it. Thus, the armour had a skill of its own and was hard to control, especially if you obtained a suit of armour that someone had died in. After changing her training outfit to her regular leather armour, fastening her sword, her dagger and her traveling gear Jentus began his instructional talk,

  “Be careful in the enchanted forest because the time you spend will be real, and is a must for your training. You will spend three months real time in the forest facing many perils. All hunters must do this after their basic training. I will come back in three months to give you more training. Remember to practice everyday while you remain in the Enchanted Forest. Now, go.” Jentus smacked her on the round part of her left butt cheek to urge her into the forest.

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  It was dark in the forest. Alexandra set up camp a couple of hours after she had entered the forest. The trees stretched into the sky, ancient pines and oaks that were probably planted at the beginning of time. Their ever-moving silhouette draped Alexandra in dancing shadows. The only light that she had to comfort her in the darkness was her simple fire. Fire is always the key to survival as for those that are not able to make it do not survive long enough to have their genes enter the gene pool. It was known that fire was both good for cooking food and for morale.

  Most people felt better about their surroundings with a fire of some sort that gave them comfort, warmth and light in the darkness. A silver reflection of the tops of the trees was the only light that the moon provided and a cold breeze passed through her camp that made her shiver and pull her wool cloak tight around her small wiry frame. Outside of the forest she had never experienced cold. She had only known the warmth of the sun on her exposed skin.

  Shivering just made her feel colder and stomping her feet did not help. Putting her hand under her armpits helped a little, but it was not much of a help because she had to use her hand to hold her cloak around her. Her fire helped a little bit, but it was too far from her terribly made shelter. Alexandra’s teeth chattered, but it was from more than the cold as she was frightened of being alone in the forest.

  Included with this chill was the unnerving sense and prickle of hairs on the back of her neck that someone or some thing was watching her. No matter how much she looked around in no matter what direction she could not see what was watching her, but she knew that something was watching her. Too afraid to go to sleep, she stayed awake the entire night. One day of training to her was not enough to prepare her for three months in the field, let alone the enchanted forest.

  Remembering what Jentus had said about some hunters in training not coming out of the forest alive made her even more frightened than what she already was. Cold, and afraid for her life she stayed awake. She jumped at every twig snap, every leaf shuffle and even the scurry of a field mouse across her foot almost made her lose t
he control of her bowls. If it was not so cold she would have cried all night, but part of it told her that tears hurt your face by freezing and making your face colder than cold could or should be.

  Jentus said that she would be in the forest for three real months. The first time she had entered the forest it felt like a few days when it was only an hour. She wondered what it would be like this time. At least it would only be three months real time, but it would probably feel more like thirty years and that was the bad part. How could she cope with something like that?

  How would she handle the time that would pass, especially when everything would change once she left the forest? A few hours of these thoughts and she drifted off to sleep while in a sitting position. At first she fought off sleep by shaking her head or straightening up when nodding off, but in the end she was just way too tired to stay awake regardless of the reason for it.

  CHAPTER FIFTY ONE

  Days, weeks, months, and even years seemed to pass away before anything of any import actually happened to Alexandra. In fact, time seemed to be the only thing that she was not lacking. She had long since run out of the supply of food that Jentus had given her and she was left to hunting and foraging. Even though she was being put through training as a hunter, she was not very good at it.

  Eventually she had given up eating meat or even acquiring the smallest of game. There were plenty of animals for her to hunt, she just did not have much if any skill whatsoever. When she had tried to hunt she tended to hit trees with her arrows or make way too much noise and the animals would be very scarce. A moving target these animals were and she could not hit any of them even if her life depended on it and it did depend on it.

  Foraging seemed to come easy to her. At least she would not starve. She came close to starving many times, but managed to find enough food to barely keep alive. Keeping up to her training was hard on so little food. Alexandra managed to be able to train moderately while she ate very little, which happened to reduce her womanly figure to that of a wiry frame with a slight feminine twist to it.

  She lost a lot of weight and could not maintain any level of fat on her body, bony she was not. Alexandra still seemed to have enough meat on her bones to adequately cover them. It took a while for her to figure out what plants were poisonous and which ones were edible. Her taste experiments had her puking her guts out for days and the diarrhea did not help her much, if at all. Grubs seemed to give her the most pleasure in eating. They just made her throat tickle as the slimy things slipped down her throat towards her stomach.

  Grubs could be eaten in many different ways and berries, nuts and seeds mixed in made chewing on them a bit more tasty than one might think. All in all she decided that grubs were an acquired taste and they were just not for anyone. Kind of like dark chocolate not being for everyone. The first few nights of eating them she was constantly throwing up, but now she was ever so fond of them. Her life was spared because of these little creatures and it made her feel good.

  She remembered when the L’art’o made her eat all that garbage, and excrement. Anything was better than what they made her eat. In a way she was thankful for them giving her this humility. False humility was not real to her because she knew what real humility was. To be humble was not to fall under her attitude of pride, and succumb to starvation. It was better for her to stay alive and swallow her pride than to die for no real reason at all. There really was no reason to die at all.

  CHAPTER FIFTY TWO

  Alexandra wondered what she was to learn by being in this forest so long. She had not met anyone or anything, but the feeling that someone or some thing was watching her kept getting stronger. Time passed quickly here in the forest and by now she was getting sick of eating only grubs and herbs, she needed something more. Years and years had passed already and she had only improved her physical prowess, her fighting ability and her knowledge of the forest.

  Most of her day now consisted of foraging, setting up camp, traveling to an unknown destination, nourishment, training and meditation. In fact she spent roughly fifteen hours a day in meditation. She excelled in meditation and could achieve ecstasy in a matter of minutes. Alexandra figured that the actual time spent in the forest was about one month, but her body experiences, mental and spiritual knowledge were reacting as though she had spent ten years here in the forest.

  She now had the maturity of a three hundred plus year-old and the body of a seventeen year-old, no longer did she have enough meat on her bones for those feminine curves of a twenty something year old woman. Alexandra wondered if that would change once she was out of the forest. Her clothes had to be altered so many times that she was afraid that they would fall apart if she even attempted to alter them one more time.

  The only piece of clothing that looked half decent was the once oversized wool cloak that just fit. All of her clothing long since lost their colour and was nearly worn out. Most of the leather material that made up her clothing now had the consistency of cloth. Ten years of being outside and camping on the earth had made her skin tough and strong. She had not seen any buildings in the forest until this very moment.

  Further up on the trail that she had traveled over through most of the time that she was in this forest was a small log cabin, which had smoke billowing out of the stone chimney. An old man could be seen sitting on the porch smoking a pipe. He looked in her direction and smiled,

  “It has been a long time since anyone has traveled this far into the Enchanted Forest. Come have a seat on my porch and we can talk for a while. You look tired and worn out, come sit and we can talk for a while.”

  The old man said with a comforting grandfatherly smile as Alexandra was a few yards from his cabin. The cabin was made out of whole logs that whoever made it did not remove the bark from them. Them logs fit together like a nice glove would fit a hand made for it, but it was not like it was a box of chocolates. Let us just say that it fit amongst the other trees and it felt good to look at it.

  Alexandra approached the old man with caution. She was not sure what he was up to, but she just could not understand why someone would be living in the Enchanted Forest. Jentus had never told her that it was possible. Maybe this was the guy who disappeared and now lives in the forest. Not used to being in the presence of someone that looked so old, she was nervous. He was so old looking that he might have had more hair in his ears and nose than on the top of his head.

  Not that he was bald, just that his hair was short for the most part, and what most call blue hair or arctic blonde. Personally Alexandra did not know why people called old people that it just happened that they did and who was she to change that. Slowly Alexandra approached the old man and sat at a distance from him on the porch step. In her opinion he just smiled too much.

  Why was he so happy to see her? She did not know the answer and figured that she probably never would. He looked into her eyes and she felt strange so turned her head, but the feeling did not go away. It was like he was probing inside her head. After a while he spoke,

  “You are not living your potential my child. Life could end any minute, yet you continue to live a lie. Why is this so? What purpose do you have for living a lie? There is no purpose to live a lie. Or is it that you do not really know what the truth is? Even so, it is still living a lie.

  “I have lived many eons, my child, and in that time I have never come across someone who would accept a lie for the truth, until now. Face the truth, Alexandra, and start living a true life.”

  No one had ever talked to her like this. At this point she was a three hundred and seventy two year old or so Dochani woman that had been living in this forest for about ten years. She knew that those years were probably false, but that is what it was at this point. Never before had anyone ever considered that she was living a lie and now it had been said. How would she be able to reply to that? How would she be able to discuss something with someone that she did not know?

  Sure he seemed like a nice and sweet old man to her, but was he? For him to
make a statement like, ‘Face the truth Alexandra and start living a true life’, he had to know something about her. Did he not? Or could she be read like an open book? She had to speak these concerns and speak she did,

  “What do you mean I am living a false life? How do you know that my name is Alexandra? Why do you always smile at me? What are you doing here? Who are you?”

  The old man paused for a moment and then spoke, “I have lived here for some time. To the L’art’o, this is the Enchanted Forest. My dear this is really a gateway and you are really no longer in the Enchanted Forest. The Enchanted Forest is not that large.

  “Depending on what day you enter it, it could take you anywhere from one year to thirty years to reach the edge and pass through the gateway. You passed through the gateway about three years after you entered the enchanted forest.

  “Unfortunately, the gateway is very fickle and not likely to take you to the same place that you have entered it from. Personally, I do not know why you would want to go back. Anyway time passes here normally, which means you are now three hundred and seventy nine.

  “If you were to go back to the planet Sevle, everything, and everyone would be seven years older. Right now you are on the planet, Dochani Zeta. This is the place of your mother’s birth. It is unfortunate that she had died giving birth to you. After she had died, your egg was placed in the earth to be later dug up.

  “A lot of documents were lost that would have given proper instructions for raising you. This included your proper name, and training that you were to go through. I am Genshen, your father, and I am very happy that you are alive.