Death of the Body

by Rick Chiantaretto

  “Who’s here?” a booming voice echoed. “I will find you.”

  A cloaked man appeared beneath me. Since I was on a trellis, I was looking down at him. The cloak he was wearing was familiar, but the Elder’s robes were usually crisp, accented with sharp silver stitching. I had never seen an Elder looking so disheveled. The silver stitching along the seams of this robe were darkened with dirt.

  “Elder!” I cried, the panic in my stomach subsiding. The man turned his face upward, and I saw a twinge in a familiar blue eye.

  “Edmund?”

  The sound of my name was recognizable. The man was not just an Elder but also one of my teachers.

  “Joshua!” I exclaimed.

  He was looking at me, a slight smile on his flushed face as understanding settled. He talked to the rose now.

  “Edmund, where are you?”

  “Still a few hours outside of town. We were gathering—”

  “Who is with you?” His face showed concern, but his tone was impatient.

  “Hailey and Ralph. We were talking about home when the wind whispered something terrible.”

  “Edmund, listen to me. You must return as quickly as possible.”

  The smell in the air that I hadn’t been able to place before became evident as an orange glimmer caught the corner of my eye. The trellis to which my vessel plant was clinging was on fire. It wasn’t fog that blurred my vision, it was smoke. It wasn’t dirt on the silver lining of Joshua’s cloak, it was soot.

  “Joshua. What is going on?”

  “The kingdom of men,” was his response. “Quickly. The horse must run. I will take care of you when you arrive but I don’t know how long I can linger. I will meet you at the gates.”

  The fire around me roared. I heard the flames licking at the poor plant. “What happened? Men? My father? Where is my father?”

  Joshua’s face fell. “There is no time. Go, Edmund. Quickly return to me.”

  “But—”

  My vision was consumed in hot flames, my body felt like it was being stretched. The roots of the plant were failing. I felt death creep through its vines as I was ripped from the haunting images of my home by firm hands around my waist. If hitting the ground hard wasn’t enough, I was forced to roll over and over again along the rocky terrain. I was disoriented and sputtering. Being rolled like that made my head swim.

  “Edmund!”

  The rolling stopped, but now I was being violently shaken. I opened my eyes and recognized Ralph’s face, covered in dirt, just inches from my own.

  “Breathe!” He shook me again.

  I gasped, but the air was so thick and smoky that it made me cough.

  Ralph got up quickly, holding out his hand to me. “Get up!” he commanded.

  “Wha—?”

  His red hair had an unnaturally fiery glow to it, and his eyes were wild. “Get up!” he shouted again.

  I reached toward his hand, but balked at the sight of my own. It was black, covered in ash. I looked down at my clothes; patches of cloth were missing, singed away.

  Ralph pulled me to my feet. As he steadied me, my spinning head began making sense of things. I was back at the line of trees where I had spoken to Mother Tree.

  “Let’s go!”

  Hailey was under my arm, helping me walk. “You’ll be okay, Edmund. We need to get you back to the wagon.”

  A loud explosion made me look back, but for the rest of my life I would wish I hadn’t. My eyes grew large in horror as the rest of my body froze. Fear pushed tears to my eyes that I didn’t feel coming, too quickly for me to push the emotion into the planet. I screamed, terrified, as Ralph and Hailey dragged me forward. Mother Tree, the oldest and kindest of the grove, had given her life for me. Large flames leapt from her branches, devouring her. The explosion I heard was a large branch splitting from her body and cracking as it hit the ground. The wind carried her screams, although the roaring of the flames muffled all other sound. Her acorns, her beautiful children, exploded in a sickening symphony of percussion.

  My stomach rolled and I heaved. Every muscle in my body responded by tightening, which caused Ralph and Hailey to drop me. I fell on my hands and knees. I wanted to cry out but I choked on the smoke instead. I crawled toward the tree, but before I could reach out toward her, my friends restrained me again.

  “You can’t save her!” Ralph pleaded. “Only fire cast by magic could have followed you back through the roots.”

  My body convulsed. I couldn’t control the tears or the trembling. I was angry and frightened. Most of all, I was in pain.

  A shower of ash and spark surrounded us. Smoke obscured the sun and coated the grove in a thick canopy of misery.

  I heard Hailey whisper in my ear and I wondered how long she had been at my side. “We need to get out of here so we can find the people who did this and bring them to punishment with the Council of Elders. Please, Edmund!”

  Humans. They must have done this.

  The Elders. Joshua. He had asked me to return. He said he didn’t know how long he could stay and wait for us. Did that mean the mages were gone? Was he our last hope of finding them?

  A new emotion surged through me: hate mixed with panic. I hated the kingdom of men. Somehow, they were involved in this. Somehow, they were to blame.

  I found my balance and stood. Ralph and Hailey were there to help support my weight. I still trembled but I was determined to place one foot in front of the other.

  My head seemed to clear with the cool, fresh air. The farther we walked from the grove, the more stable I became. When we made it back to the wagon, I gave myself a once-over. I was covered in ash and the uncovered parts of my arms and legs didn’t have any hair left. I had several burns and blisters on my legs and hands, but fortunately adrenaline still surged enough to keep the pain at bay. All that was left of my clothes were strips of charred material that clung together in patches. When I realized this, I reached for a blanket in the wagon and wrapped it tightly around me.

  “I was on fire?” I asked.

  Ralph and Hailey exchanged a brief look before Ralph answered with a shrug, the panic draining from his face as he found his dry sense of humor. “Only for a little while.”

  I grinned in spite of myself. “Is the horse rested?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good, because she’ll have to run.”

  Two

  I was lucky. The fact that I was on fire, at least momentarily, seemed to purge my friends’ questions during the walk back to the wagon. The vibration of the cart, mixed with the rhythmic pounding of the horse’s hooves on dry ground, created enough noise that Hailey, Ralph, and I couldn’t talk. Although the quick-paced ride was uncomfortable, it provided an excuse not to answer any of the questions I could see burning behind their eyes. They stared at me with an expression that seemed accusatory. I knew they both realized I was purposely avoiding telling them what I saw.

  I sensed their questions at the surface. I could see Ralph fighting back fear with a patience I admired. I assumed he was able to give his emotions to spirit, as I could with the planet. I knew him well enough to know when he was afraid: his eyes were growing large and the left corner of his mouth had started to turn upward in a hard line, not a smile.

  Hailey looked calmer and sat taller than the rest of us. Her logic never failed her as her ebony hair tossed wildly in the high wind and her crystal blue eyes studied my face. She didn’t require patience. She was piecing together meaning from my unconscious expressions.

  I considered throwing the bag of mushrooms in Ralph’s direction, hoping that getting something in his stomach would distract him from the thoughts he was having. Then I decided that it wasn’t a smart idea. I didn’t want him to think that the mushrooms wouldn’t be needed for later.

  As that unintentional thought crossed my mind, I felt a stab of fear. On the trellis I hadn’t seen anyone except Joshua. The town square was usually bustling. Was it possible that our town was deserted?

  Hailey
must’ve seen my eyes flicker to the burlap sack. When I looked at her, her gaze drifted up to my face again. I tried to control my expression, hoping she would conclude I was merely hungry again.

  The evening sun bathed the sky in crimson as the road curved to meet the base of the rolling eastern hills and the town slowly became visible in the distance. The town was nestled between the eastern hills and a large expanse of grassy plains to the west. Beyond the hills, farther east, was a forest that separated our civilization from the kingdom of men. I was always told that the forest was impenetrable and had never known someone—whether mage or human—to cross through the forest. Until now.

  At first, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Small stretches of smoke reached toward the sky from the houses just as they would if cozy fires had been started in their fireplaces.

  My face slipped as I studied the town’s growing silhouette against the darkening sky. When I looked back at Haley and Ralph they were studying my face seriously, their expressions dropping to an ominous blankness I hoped didn’t echo my own.

  I reached out and softly touched the horse’s hind end. During our brief connection, I asked her to slow. She was hot and sweaty under my touch after having run for so long, but was anxious for the stables she knew were only a few minutes away. She fought her desire to ignore my request, but it became much easier when she saw my thoughts. I felt her flinch in fear as I pulled my hand away from her, unwilling to show her the complete visions I had seen earlier.

  As the horse pulled our cart closer to town, the damage became more evident. It began with the faint smell of charred wood that mixed sickeningly with the scent of roses. The smoke that resembled comforting wisps from far away now turned to menacing billows. They weren’t coming from the houses, but from somewhere near the center of town: the schoolyard, the town square, meeting places, and the parliament towers, perhaps.

  Hailey looked at me incredulously. I knew the time for protecting them from what I had seen had passed. Her eyes flickered briefly to the smoke-darkened sky, then back to mine.

  “Show us what you saw,” she commanded.

  The muscles along my jawline tightened. I drew in a deep breath in protest but held out a hand to each of them. I closed my eyes and took my memory back to what I had seen through the eyes of the rose. The warm energy from my friends’ palms resting on my own began to crawl slowly up my arms. The sensation continued past my shoulders and up my neck until the warmth penetrated my head.

  The vision pushed its way to the front of my mind as Hailey and Ralph pulled out the conversation with Joshua the Elder, the smoke-filled town square, the flames devouring the bush I had used for communication, and even the feeling of what it was like for that poor plant in the final moments before it couldn’t support my presence.

  At first they felt my fear, but then I felt theirs. Seeing into each other’s minds was a two-way road. I could hear Ralph’s breath quicken as if I had breathed it myself, and Hailey’s logic started to fail her.

  “We have to find Joshua,” she said. “We need to find out what happened to our family.”

  By family, she meant everyone.

  The horse stopped abruptly. We were at the city gates but an odd silence blanketed the town. A solid brick wall surrounded our town, the only entrance through an iron barred gate.

  The entrance had never been closed to us before. Watchmen on the walls would have signaled our presence and the gates would have swung open. The town should have been alive with commotion and celebration as the dining hall was prepared.

  Memories of smiles from the women and looks of pride from the men were replaced by empty silence. I realized I had no idea how we were going to get into the town.

  I threw Hailey and Ralph a frustrated glance, thinking it must have startled them because they were inching toward the far side of the wagon and wore fearful expressions. It took me a few moments to realize they weren’t looking at me, but behind me, toward a hill that was outside of the city wall. I had the strange sensation of someone watching me. I bolted over the side of the cart in terror. My quick movement was enough to justify Hailey and Ralph’s fear. In an instant they were at my side on the ground, huddled behind the wagon.

  “What is it?” I asked nervously.

  “Someone is coming towards us,” Ralph replied in a whisper.

  I stole a peek over the wagon and saw a slouched, hooded figure slithering along the edge of the city wall, down the hill toward us. With its quick movements and the dim light of the setting sun, it looked like a shadow.

  “Edmund,” Hailey pleaded. “Edmund, what do we do?”

  The figure was close enough now that we could hear the thudding of footsteps, accented occasionally by the crunching sound of a dry leaf or twig.

  “Edmund, don’t let it see you,” Ralph said, tugging on the blanket I still held around me to hide my nakedness.

  I was frozen. I had no idea what to do, but there was something about the way the figure moved that looked familiar. As the shadow got closer I could make out the shape of a man in a hooded cloak; he was almost close enough to make out his features.

  The figure stopped suddenly. He stared in our direction, as though he had just noticed the wagon. His weight shifted nervously from one leg to the other before he slowly inched his way towards us.

  The figure called out, but it was a cautious cry, “Ed? Edmund?”

  My eyes grew wide. The next words fell out of my mouth. “It’s Joshua!”

  The three of us leapt from behind the cart and ran toward him. His gasp of relief was carried on the wind. When we got close enough, the same relief was obvious on his face.

  “Mother Earth!” Joshua exclaimed as we drew ourselves to him. “What happened to you?”

  The concern on Joshua’s face immediately broke through the wall of protection that fear and tension had created for me. I looked down at my hands and saw the ash; the vision of the tree being consumed in brilliant orange flames caused my eyes to flood. “The fire followed me back,” I managed to choke out between sobs. It felt good to finally let the terror I had experienced shake my body as tears rolled out of me.

  Joshua pulled me into his cloak and embraced me. “That is terrible, just terrible.” He got down on his knees so he could look into my eyes. “Listen to me,” he said, pulling Ralph and Hailey into the folds of his cloak as well, “we don’t have time for tears. I need you to be strong for a little while longer. I had hoped that you would get back faster.”

  He turned to all three of us and spoke louder so Hailey and Ralph could hear. “The kingdom of men has taken the town. Those who attacked us intend on inhabiting our village. They consider it secure and believe they hold the only key to the gates.” He didn’t need to tell us that not even magic could get us through the walls. The city was protected so a person could enter only through the gate. “These men are returning to inhabit the city with their first round of villagers.”

  Joshua’s expression was full of sorrow. He glanced behind himself nervously. “They are just over the hill now; we don’t have time to escape.”

  I heard Hailey let out a breath she had been holding. “What do we do? Why did we come back? You should have run and met us on the road.”

  Joshua reached into his robes and produced a large golden key.

  “I’m searching for anyone that is left. I have a key to the city. Right now, we have to hide. Edmund, take Hailey and Ralph. Run home as quickly as you can. Clean up; get on a change of clothes. I suggest you not look around your house too carefully—these men have left their possessions everywhere. Find your clothes, get changed, and hide down in the cellar.”

  “Why would they do this?” I asked. “They’ve always stayed to themselves.”

  Joshua didn’t answer the question. “Go. Hide down in the cellar.”

  It dawned on me that he wouldn’t be coming with us. “Clothes? Why? Where is everyone else?”

  The look on my face must have given me away, because Joshua added,
“Just trust me, Edmund. Someone has to slow them down to give you time to hide. I’ll come for you and we’ll all leave together, but we’ll need to blend in. Looking like this will give you away.” He tousled my hair and smirked.

  “If they find us, are they going to kill us?” I asked slowly.

  Joshua ignored my question again. “Stay in the cellar until sunset. I will find you after dark when it’s easier for me to move around undetected. Now, Hailey, Ralph, go.” He handed me the key and patted me lightly on the shoulder before turning back up the hill.

  On the other side, our enemies were advancing.

  I stood for a moment, frozen in fear and confusion. I watched Joshua’s black cloak dance with the movement of his steady feet. Somehow focusing on something that simple and insignificant was all that my mind wanted to do. But I knew I couldn’t give into the terror I felt rising from the darkness inside me. Instead, I forced myself to turn toward the city, clutching the key to the gate.

  Hailey and Ralph were on each other’s heels. The moment I started picking up my feet, adrenaline shot through me like a bolt of lightning. I ran fast and hard, making it to the gate a few lengths behind Ralph. The sun touched the horizon as the heavy iron bars swung open.

  We were met by familiar cobblestone streets and intricate brick buildings that made up the frame of our town. There were still roses blooming along trellises and ivy clinging to the buildings. I couldn’t help but feel a twinge of pain as I saw the beauty of what my people had built here.

  The town was quiet and empty now. There were no people to greet us, no mothers and fathers bustling about, and no entertainers or music. The town was never quiet, but now the only sound was the slight gurgle of water that bubbled in a nearby fountain. The dark streets were covered in long shadows cast by the quickly fading sun. I felt isolated. The cobblestone looked cold. My imagination turned the shadows into nightmares.

  Strong, I reminded myself. Joshua told me to be strong. Just a little longer.

  I swallowed and pushed the fear down into my feet, allowing the warmth of the planet to ground me again.