“Well, they have the lace and beautiful cotton fabrics, thank the Mother, but I was hoping to find some sort of jewelry. These merchants go to the Citadels and the villages near the gem mines. You would think that they could bring better.”
Margot stepped back so suddenly in her tirade that Arie stumbled to the side to avoid her, bumping instead into a tall, strong body. Large hands steadied her, and she looked up at an impossibly tall man with a scar running from brow to jaw and a nose that looked like it had been broken in several places at some point. His salt-and-pepper hair was pulled back, and his stubble made him look rough and vaguely threatening.
Arie cleared her throat nervously. “My apologies. Please excuse me, mister… uh—”
“Huntsman Elite Merik,” he rumbled, his icy eyes narrowing as if he were offended at the idea of having to identify himself.
Arie felt her pulse race. A huntsman, here?
Although she’d never met a huntsman, she knew of them by reputation. Savage and merciless, they traveled at times with the merchants, often hired for protection against the beasts of the forests. More often they traveled through the forests looking for signs of the Ragoru. Huntsmen were collectively obsessed with finding and eliminating them. How successful they were was widely speculated on, but never in their presence.
Most villages happily welcomed any huntsman who visited for no other reason, outside their obvious deadly hostility, than to hope the huntsman might dispatch the dangerous wildlife congregating near their own sanctuary walls. She wondered how long it would take for someone to realize he was there.
“My apologies, Huntsman Elite Merik,” Arie mumbled, only to be swept back by a more familiar, but no more welcome, hand.
“Arie, step aside,” Jak rumbled, and then addressed the huntsman. “Welcome to Whispering Way sanctuary, sir. The council extends their kind offer for you to come to the meeting building while the merchants haggle with the womenfolk. There is plenty of food and drink there that you may avail yourself of on our most humble hospitality.”
The huntsman nodded slowly, muttered a few words to a nearby merchant in a dialect Arie didn’t recognize, and followed one of Jak’s companions away from the village center to the meeting building. Arie felt a pinch of hunger as she imagined the sort of generous table that the councilors were enjoying in there for the midday repast. She’d found a bruised apple in the cellar that hadn’t made its way to the coffers of the priest and greedily consumed it with the last few bites of cheese she had left. It did little to sate her hunger, but she couldn’t be ungrateful for what little she managed to find. Their goat Milly had been killed by a neighbor’s dogs, and while she was compensated, she’d not yet been able to find another milking goat, so that was all the cheese Arie was going to enjoy until she could barter for more.
Spying Joshu attending his mother just tables away, Arie smiled and raised her hand in greeting. He opened his mouth as if to speak, but then his eyes flicked over her shoulder and he closed it again. Annoyance stirred in her gut. She wasn’t sure if she was more irritated at Jak hovering or Joshu for lacking any nerve to approach her at all with him there.
She immediately felt guilty for thinking such a thing. It wasn’t his fault that Jak was so intimidating. Few stood a chance against him. Jak always made sure he got whatever he wanted.
Hot breath brushed against her ear. Arie jumped. She hadn’t realized he was suddenly that close.
“Are you that lonely, Arie? I do believe that more than enough time has passed. You owe me an answer.” His tongue snaked out and licked the rim of her ear. She shuddered from both disgust and the taunting words he whispered. “We both know it is inevitable. You will be mine. You don’t have a choice.” He tapped her hood with meaning and raised his voice to be certain that all heard. “Arie Fairwind, I pledge myself. Do you accept the bond?”
Arie cast Joshu a pleading look, begging him to do anything to intervene. He turned away and busied himself talking to a woman beside him. Disappointment was a bitter taste in her mouth. She glanced at the trees looming in the distance and thought again of her grandmother far away in the Citadel, beyond the unending stretch of trees. Jak’s hand tightened.
She knew it was foolish not to accept, but her tongue felt glued to the roof of her mouth. She couldn’t force the words out and give herself over to a man for maybe just a few days, weeks, months or years of safety. She would never know when he would turn her out. Wouldn’t it be better to get it over with? She looked him in the eye and jutted out her jaw in silent answer. He shook her and barked out a laugh.
“I would have protected you. Remember that,” he whispered, and then with a sharp movement of his hand, he ripped back her hood and moved away from her as if in pretense of recoiling with shock. Her hair rippled and fell in cascades of thick crimson curls around her face. A hush fell. For a space of several breaths, it was so quiet that Arie could hear the heavy pulse of her heart. Then a woman shrieked.
“Get her away from us before she gets everyone killed.”
Arie’s eyes jerked over to the speaker, and saw the cruel smile stretched wide on Margot’s face. Her words broke the spell. People immediately began to cry out against Arie, demanding her removal from the sanctuary before ill luck and Ragoru descended upon them. In vain, she searched the crowd and saw not one friendly face among them. The merchants frowned at the disturbance but continued to press their wares. But people she’d known all her life, even those who had been kind to her mother, looked at her with horror and dread, making signs to ward away evil.
“Joshu?” she said quietly, looking over at him. He curled his lip and pulled away from her, making the sign with his fingers. He took his mother’s arm in his and pushed past her, his eyes narrowed in contempt, but his face softened when tears sprung to her eyes.
“You’d best leave, Arie. I say this as one who once called you friend. Leave quickly before the village takes it into their head to forcibly remove you.”
Arie swallowed, staring wide-eyed at him, and nodded her head. She fled back through the village to her sad little cottage. Yanking the door open, she retreated into the cool interior and pulled down a burlap bag. She knew she wouldn’t have much time. Ever since she was old enough to understand, her mother had prepared her for this eventuality. She had to hurry. The village council would not let her take anything they deemed remotely of value.
Now she was almost glad that the dogs ate the old nanny goat. Although the loss of the stubborn old thing had saddened her, she was glad the goat was one thing they couldn’t take away from her.
With great care, she wrapped her mother’s books, one a tome on medicinal herbs and the other a bold pirate romance with faded lettering from frequent touches on its pages. She wrapped both in her extra change of clothing and set them at the bottom of the bag, on top of the thick blanket she put in there. She made her way into the cellar and packed the rest of her dried meat and the loaf of bread she’d made that morning for her supper. Flint and steel joined her supplies, along with an aged bottle for water.
She scoured the cellar for any supplies that had been left down there over the years. She even packed several jars of her homemade salves and ointments to ease different kind of burns, venoms, and toxins. She wasn’t going to go out unprepared. As she put a full pouch of her momma’s herbal blend for cleansing wounds, a gleam of fiery gold caught her eye.
High on a shelf sat the last jar of wild honey. Arie chewed her lip. If she was caught with it, she would be punished. Honey was considered liquid gold. It was an extreme luxury, the only bit of wealth her family ever had. Her father had a way with bees, and he’d taught her mother how to gather it. She picked up the jar and turned it in her hands, and before she allowed herself to think any further on it, she tucked it deep into her bag.
At that moment, a seditious thought began to burn in her mind. She looked around the cellar, noting the bags of potatoes, the stored vegetables, and the bunches of dried herbs. Her entire summer of work
harvested with the arrival of autumn. It was all the wealth she had. She didn’t want to leave them with anything to take from her. Everything there belonged to her family.
She would be damned if she left one thing for the council to fatten themselves upon.
Arie rushed outside and filled her skirt pockets with chips from the woodpile and carried as many logs as she could down into the cellar. She piled the wood at the far end, sending fat-bodied spiders scattering, and stuffed the woodchips between two logs. The cellar ran underneath the house. Any fire started there would spread and consume the cottage.
She pulled out her flint and steel and struck them together until a spark landed on the kindling. The flames caught faster than she’d expected and flared up. Scrambling backward, Arie picked up her sack and smiled.
“Bye, Momma. I am going to carve out a better future for myself, the kind you’d want me to have, instead of withering away here.”
She made her way to the gated entrance of the walls. The sentry there stiffened as she neared, even with her hood on. Word had spread quickly. She touched a finger to her forehead respectfully, and his expression became strained.
Her heart sank. He was going to search her.
An alarm rang out through the village, drawing the sentry up short. His eyes widened, and he rushed forward to help as people scrambled down the path with wet blankets and shirts in a vain attempt to beat out the flames consuming her cottage. Arie watched, her lips twisted in grim amusement. By now, the fire was out of control. They had no hope of stopping it. Then she turned away and passed through the gate. A few steps, and her feet sank into tall grass and wildflowers. Several steps more and she disappeared into the forest.
The trees surrounded her on all sides like a safe haven. Despite the dangers that she knew inhabited the wild places, she felt freer than she ever had in her life. Singing softly to herself, Arie stepped in a lively manner, picking her way through thick bushes and watching for the signs of carnivorous plants and predators. There was no alternate path to stick to for safely arriving at her grandmother’s house, outside of the roughly carved out merchant’s trail, but that wasn’t going to deter her.
As she proceeded down the deeply rutted path, her steps grew quicker as the reality of her situation descended upon her. She’d set her property on fire. The village would have nothing left to claim for their own profit, and the council would be enraged. She wouldn’t be surprised if they sent someone after her—perhaps even that terrible huntsman, who’d take payment for retrieving her for punishment.
Her blood ran cold, and she let her fear give her feet wings.
3
The smoke lingered in the air, gloomy yet purifying. Arie could still detect traces of it around her, carried far into the woods by a light breeze. It seemed to both pursue and expel her, desiring to cling to her but chasing her into the dark grip of the woods like a wolf stalking its prey. Yet unlike the wolf, the illusion of pursuit faded with the smoke the further she went, and the villagers would dare not enter the woods near the settlement.
She had run in a blind panic, darting through brush, her eyes tearing at the sting of bramble and branches. She didn’t really see anything. She was consciously aware of very little except her instinct to listen for pursuit, ready to run like a frightened animal. The realization that no one was giving chase burrowed into her brain through all the panic until her limbs slowed and, panting heavily, she leaned against a tree and looked around.
The first thing she noticed was how ominously dark the forest was. Trees twisted with age leaned heavily and seemed to groan with the weight of their years. The remains of fallen trees rested at odd angles or flat upon the ground, almost disappearing under the cover of lichen and spongy moss. Arie turned and shrieked when she came face to face with a fat spider hanging in a web spun between the two trees nearest her. Stumbling back from it, she tried to rein in her reedy, panicked breath. Adjusting her bag, she made her way deeper into the woods on what appeared to be game trails, or perhaps paths cut by the merchants in their regular passage to and from the village.
Here and there, sunlight pierced through the thick foliage in yellow beams, illuminating the forest floor. It was eerily quiet, all the animals likely frightened by a human crashing through the woods. The only sounds were the sharp creaks and cracks of the trees, as if they were muttering to each other about the intruder. A flock of birds flew off a nearby tree in a thick mass just feet away from her, their wings a cacophony that made her jump back, heart hammering. Ever so slowly, the shrill birdsong gradually began to pick up.
Her eyes on the trail beneath her feet, Arie recalled an old-world tale her mother used to tell her when she was small. A story of a little girl in a big forest, and a fierce wolf. It was a little closer than comfort at that moment, even if she did not possess a red hooded cape. But no one in their right mind would after the Ragoru came to Earth.
Pulling her hood down a little more, Arie paced forward, keeping her feet firmly on route. Logic suggested that it was the safest way through the woods. None of the predatory plants would be permitted to grow along it by the merchants who trekked through the area. She would only have to worry about what ran on two legs or four. Even then, most creatures stayed away out of habit from anything that smelled of humans. She suspected it wasn’t too different for the Ragoru, since no one had seen sighted one in many years. They weren’t likely to come near an established route any more than they would a settlement, especially not with huntsmen about looking to peg a Ragoru pelt on their walls.
“Don’t wander from the path,” she said to herself with a weak smile. “I don’t want to get eaten by a wolf, after all.”
She tried to laugh at her own joke, but it fell flat even to her own ears. Unfortunately, it provided just the right fuel for her vivid imagination to conjure images of a terrible Ragoru tearing at the meat of her body, blood dripping down its muzzle. Arie’s stomach pitched violently and acid surged up her throat.
“That’s just great, Arie,” she muttered, “scare the hell out of yourself. I don’t need a Ragoru to kill me. My imagination will do a fine job scaring me to death.”
On and on she walked, stopping only to drink before pressing on once more. She was too afraid to stay in one spot for more than a few minutes, especially as the shadows grew longer with the late hour. She walked until her feet felt blistered and raw in her boots, her limbs felt heavy with exhaustion, and she could barely summon the energy to set one foot in front of the other.
Everything had long since become hazy as she found it harder to focus on the landscape around her. She was certain that at some point she’d lost the path, for even when she managed to focus on the ground beneath her feet she could no longer see the worn earthen ground. Worse, she was too tired to even be panicked over it. All she could manage were a few feeble whimpers as she stumbled from tree to tree, her fingers scraping the bark in a vain attempt to steady herself as her head spun.
Stumbling over her own swollen feet, Arie finally fell against a mossy log with a hoarse cry. Her throat was parched. It had been some time since she had come across the last stream, and her water skin had emptied hours ago. Hot tears leaked out of her eyes, streaking through the dirt and grime on her face. She was so terribly tired. She lay there looking up at the canopy, quietly crying until her eyes fastened on a gap between the log and the ground. It looked just big enough that, with some effort, a single person might fit inside. Picking up a nearby branch, she shoved it into the opening to see if there were any animals inside.
Nothing.
Tossing aside the branch, Arie scrambled, her fingers digging into the leaves and dirt on the ground as she struggled to turn herself over. Every exhausted muscle in her body screamed in protest, but finally she was on her belly and wiggled herself over to it. Pulling her blanket out of her bag, she shoved the bag in first and then, wrapping the blanket snugly around herself, slid inside. Despite the angry protest of her belly, Arie succumbed quickly to the weight
of slumber.
When she woke, it was in confused disorientation. The world outside her hole was still utterly dark, but there was a terrible snuffling at the perimeter of her hiding place that immediately had her recoiling. Arie pulled her arms and legs tighter against her body as a massive snout prodded as deep as it could into her little impromptu sanctuary. Arie’s eyes widened at the wedge-shaped mass of tissue seeking her out. It was a wild hog.
A problematic nuisance long before the world went to hell, the mutated pigs were even worse than their ancestors. Massive in size and happy to ferret out and eat anything—quite literally. Even the men of the villages who banded together for hunting steered clear of wild hogs and told tales of horrible goring and fetid human remains discovered. Sweat dripped down her brow.
The beast’s sharp feet dug at her burrow and it snorted deeply with excitement. Arie was certain that it smelled her fear and thirsted for a taste of the source. She swallowed her shriek as a wickedly sharp pair of tusks ripped at the bottom of the log. Bark shattered, raining down over her. Arie coughed and covered her eyes to protect them from the falling debris. The nose plunged in closer as it enlarged the hole with its feverish digging. The stench of its hot breath blew over her, and Arie wept as she gagged.
Her blood froze as a loud roar ripped through the air just seconds before something impacted with the hog’s body, ripping it away from the hole. A horrible high-pitched squealing filled the air. Arie slammed both hands over her ears. A body fell against the log, and she heard a second snarl join in. The animal’s squeals elevated to shrieks as the two things out there tore into it. She desperately willed herself to pass out. If she was going to be eaten next, she would rather not be conscious for it. She prayed to the benevolent Mother that the things eating the pig would move on and not notice her.
Red: A Dystopian World Alien Romance Page 2