The girl looked lost and alone, wandering in the forest of
trees so tall I almost couldn’t see the tops in the mist of early morning. The
sun shone through the fog and made it near impossible to see anything clearly,
but I could tell she had no idea where she was. She wore her hair in an unkempt
knot. Her face was not clean, her clothes were smudged. The hem of her dress
was shredded, as if she had been running and caught it on thorns more than
once. I knew if I called out to her, she might run again. I could feel her fear
and uncertainty in the air, almost like a smell that no one else could pick up.
I watched her wander, from my hiding place under an old
fallen tree, wondering where she thought she was going. The forest here is old,
old beyond knowing. The trees, both standing and fallen, have circumferences
that 20 men couldn’t circle with linked hands. There is little undergrowth,
since the trees block most of the light. What undergrowth there is consists
mainly of huge ferns, and lots of moss. Even at brightest mid-day, the light is
dim, and the forest feels slow and sleepy. Early morning, with the sunrise, and
late evening, with the sunset, are the only times the sunlight even touches the
inside of this forest.
I nudged my companion. He was still sleeping, since ones
such as he is would sleep their whole lives away if they could. He was hesitant
to wake, as always, rolling his head to the side and snoring, mumbling quietly.
Early mornings were not things he liked to see. I pushed him harder, trying to
make him drag himself to the admittedly dim light of early morning.
“What? What? Why are you waking me,” he asked, fortunately
very quietly, since we both knew quiet might save our lives. We had both been
on the run ourselves, longer almost than we could remember, and silence had
become a way of life.
“There. Look,” I said back, just as quietly. I pointed from
under the tree.
“What could she be doing here,” he breathed next to my ear,
so close I could feel the heat of his breath.
“She looks like she was running scared,” I breathed back.
“Should I try to get her attention, or let her go on her way?”
“She might be bait.”
“True. But if not, she’ll die alone. She has no supplies, in
the middle of this vast trackless woods, she has no warm clothes, just look at
her.”
The girl was climbing over one of the fallen trees, which
lay in her chosen path. Though it was one of the smaller fallen trees, it was
still large enough to pose some difficulty to a girl in a dress. She had hiked
up her skirts, and held them in her clenched fist, which left her only one hand
for holding on to the tree. She looked awkward, like she might just fall down
at any moment. I could still feel her uncertainty, and I knew she was on the
verge of giving up, at least temporarily. Tears could not be far off, as most
anyone could understand.
“So what do we do,” I asked again. “Do we help her, or let her go?”
“Help her, I guess, though it may be our doom.”
So I began to squeeze out from under the tree, silently as
always. Even a broken twig, a scuff of the leaf litter, a hard breath can be
your undoing when you’re on the run. A fall of leaves from the trees, a sneeze,
or a cough… one learns quickly or dies quickly in those situations. As I stood
up, I saw that she really was about to fall, so I let go of the silence and ran
to catch her. The last thing I wanted was to have to heal her or kill her, for
a broken limb could go either way out here.
As she fell, she let out a little cry of surprise and
dismay. I caught her neatly, and she gave a little “Oomph,” then nearly
screamed.
“It’s okay,” I said as I set her down on the leaf duff of
the forest floor, “I’m not here to hurt you. Whoever was chasing you, it wasn’t
me, I promise.”
“But… who… what are you,” she asked, her voice shaking.
“Your ears…,” She trailed off, unable to complete the thought. She backed up
and put the fallen tree as close to her as she could. Granted, my ears are a
little pointy, not that I’m complaining, they’ve always worked just fine.
Better than human, anyway. Up close I could see that she was a little older than
I had thought, maybe twenty years old. On first sight, I had imagined her to be
little more than a child, perhaps twelve, or thirteen. Maybe not so helpless, I
thought to myself while keeping an amiable expression on my face.
She was pretty, in a waifish sort of way, fine boned, thin,
with sculpted cheekbones and a willowy body in her torn and smudged dress. Her
hair was dirty and brown, her eyes a blue that many people would say you could
drown in, I’m sure. I wondered again what she was doing out here, all alone.
“Yes, my ears. Well, they do say that elves have pointy ears
around here, don’t they. Well, I’m half elf and half human, though I can’t say
I remember much about either of my parents. Who are you, and what are you doing
out here in these sleepy woods?”
Her face fell, and again I sensed that tears were a definite
possibility. Whatever had happened to her was obviously not fun, and perhaps
not something she wanted to discuss yet, for all I knew. Or maybe she just
didn’t know how to respond to my half-elven state, who knows?
“My name is Alex,” she said. “I was out for a picnic on the
edge of the forest, and I went for a little walk, by myself. Stupid, I know. My
friends had said something hurtful, something unspeakably rude to me, and I
needed to be alone for a little while. So I was walking, thinking, trying to
figure out if they were really my friends at all, and before I knew it I was so
far into the woods I had no idea which way to go to get back out. Then I
thought I saw something, something following me, and I ran. I ran for most of
the night, tripping and falling, never knowing where I was, trying to keep
ahead of the eyes I saw…,” here she trailed off again, apparently not knowing
how to go on. I could see the after-effects of a night of terror all over her
face, she looked completely exhausted.
“Well then, lucky for you I felt you coming and woke up this
morning, eh? I am Markus. These woods are my home, or as close as I have to a
home. Would you like something to eat? You look famished, and very tired.” At
this, her eyes lit up slightly, as if there was some brightness to her that I
couldn’t see before, and I knew she was going to go with us for a while,
wherever we may go. “Come, on the other side of this fallen log, my friend
ought to be getting some food together,” I said, leading her around the tree I
had so recently crawled from under.
“Quietly now, though, we value quiet around here. Keeps us
safe. Plus, the trees seem to tolerate us much better, the quieter we are.”
“Oh!” She had seen Othello, my companion, he of the
remarkable sleeping ability, and of course he had gone back to sleep. But then,
he IS a giant cat, mostly, and cats do sleep. A lot. I nudged him with my foot,
and again he snored at me.
“Wake up, you oaf!” I pushed him again, and at this he
crawled out from under the log, sat up and stretched. Stretched as only a cat
can, all long body, lean muscles, and kitty whiskers. His black fur rippled,
and he yawned hugely, showing off his teeth. Then he stood up, and stretched again,
and finally the spell was broken for Alex. “What is he, exactly,” she asked.
“Well, mostly leopard. Part human, maybe. Definitely not
entirely cat, see, he does have hands instead of paws. Otherwise it would be a
bit hard for him to help out around here, since all he does most of the time is
sleep! Besides, he can talk, though he frequently chooses not to. We do value
the quiet around here, as I said. His name is Othello.”
While I talked, I was rummaging in my pack, seeking out some
jerky to chew on. I handed her a piece, which she took willingly enough and
started gnawing on it. I kept digging in my sack, trying to see with my hands
what else might be lurking in there that was edible. Not much, but I did find
some dried mushrooms and a little dried fruit, apples and apricots even. These
I shared, as well. I wished I hadn’t finished the raisins off, but that is the
way of things, nothing lasts forever. Except maybe the forest, it has its own
defenses and not much happens here that it is unaware of, or unwilling to
tolerate.
“So Alex, what brought you and your friends to the forest’s
edge for a picnic, anyway? Are there not a million safer places for a picnic? Were
you trying to tempt fate or what?”
Alex shook her head, and some of her hair fell out of the
knot. As she finished chewing the fruit, and made some attempt to fix her
straggling locks, I could hear her thinking what the right answer would be.
Sometimes I can do that, I’m not sure if it’s really that I read minds, or
faces. Some of both, perhaps, along with some nuances of the senses that humans
just don’t have. I know humans don’t really read minds, the best most can do is
simply read faces and body language extremely well. But even the best of the
best of those are no match for me on a good day.
“I’m not entirely
sure,” she said. “My friends Tobin, Sara, and Luke all wanted to escape their
lives for a day, you know… well, maybe you don’t. I didn’t really want to come,
but I figured what harm could there be? It was just near the forest, and there
is a beautiful lake there, we could swim even. What harm, indeed.” She sounded
irritated now, but sad and still tired. “And then, there we were, having a
wonderful time in the afternoon when they all started saying…”
“What? Why would they be rude? That’s what you said before,
right? Unspeakably rude, you said, in fact.”
“I’m not sure I want to tell you,” she said quietly. “I
appreciate the food, you’ve been very generous, but how do I know anything
about you? You’ve not told me much yourself. Besides, this might be something
best kept to myself, at least until I figure it out. I don’t understand why the
people I thought were my best friends would want so badly to hurt me. So,
Markus Half-elven, how came you to be here? Living in the sleepy forest? What
story do you tell?”
“My story may be longer than this day, perhaps longer than
you would want to know, Alex. How do I look to you?”
“You look grubby, and not very old… perhaps twenty-three, or
twenty-four years? Your ears are pointy, we covered that, your hair is dark
brown, possibly black. It’s hard to tell in this light, and your particular
state of, well, dirtiness. Your eyes are green, your fingers are long and
skinny, you look healthy and hale. You said you remember little of your
parents, but I see both human and elf in you.”
“Would it surprise you then if I were to tell you I am not
twenty-three, or even twenty-five or thirty, but fifty-eight years old? And I
might have inherited the long life of the elves, as I must have if to you I
still appear to be so young. I have survived this long by my wits and reflexes,
along with a few good teachers along the way. Dirty I may be for now, but alive
I will be for much longer, if the gods will it. Or the forest does, indeed. My
friend now, Othello here,” I poked the cat-shape, who was again curled up
sleeping next to me. “He is older, and probably wiser, than I. He has been my
companion for many years and we have seen many wondrous sights together. Though
I think he prefers the sleeping part, to be honest. But maybe he’s just trying
to store up the sleep for the times we are running one day ahead of our doom, and
there is not time for sleep.”
Alex looked surprised at the revelation of my true age,
almost disbelieving. She smiled a little at the sleeping Othello, and I could
see that while she might not have been prepared to meet some strange cat-human
hybrid, she was a lover of animals, at least. I made a mental note to remind
her at some later time not to treat him like just an animal, since he is so
much more than just a cat. Odd, yes, but still he is my friend.
“What then is your doom? Why are you running, and what from,”
she asked, with good reason. “Should I be afraid, right this minute, or are we
safe here?”
“Oh, we’re safe enough for the moment. The forest will tell
me if our pursuers are getting close, and it may slow them down itself, for its
own reasons. This forest is more than just a sleepy place, you know.
“As for what we are running from, that is fairly complicated…
suffice it to say that I have made some people phenomenally unhappy with me in
the past. More than a few, even. Perhaps not just people, as well. Creatures,
forces, even some places are not too thrilled with my continued existence, to
be perfectly honest.” I hung my head in mock-shame, trying not to smile. I know
it’s far from normal to be chased all over the true world by more things than
one even knows, but still, a lot of the situations had been pretty funny.
“You don’t look too worried,” she said.
“Always have saved my own skin so far, plus a fair number of
others in my time, so no, I’m not too terribly concerned,” was my reply. “Quiet
is still a good thing, it makes it easier to hear the forest, and it is a good
habit to have. Silence may have saved my life a time or two, but we are not in
grave danger here. This wood is my friend, as much as this sleeping guy here
is.”
“Where exactly are we,” Alex asked. “I’ve no idea how far I
must have run during the night, I just know that something was definitely
following me. All I know is I caught occasional flashes of light off of its
eyes, and it was terrifying to be out here all alone in the dark. So I just
kept going and going, hoping to get away.”
“Well, we are in almost the very middle of the Dim
Forest , surrounded on all sides by
miles and miles of trees and ferns. Hmm. You truly have no idea what could have
been following you? I wonder if whatever it was might have been… not following,
but guiding you? Here, to us. Herding, perhaps?”
Her eyes widened at this thought, and I could feel her
thoughts again as she considered the possibility. I had an idea of what might
have guided her, but I was still unsure. For all I knew, it might have been one
of the supposedly extinct forest wolves without a pack, or a fox, or even a
succession of animals and she had just been so spooked that she didn’t know. If
every time you turned around in the forest you caught a glimpse of some animal’s
eyes, and felt like you were being followed, perhaps you would have run as far
and as fast as she did, I thought to myself. But that thought was a bit silly,
considering how much time I’ve spent in the woods. I am unique though, not
everyone has been where I have been and seen what I have seen.
“Guided me, you think? How incredibly strange. You think I’m
supposed to be here, in the middle of the woods with a half-elf and a… cat?
What should I call him, then?”
At this, Othello finally spoke, though I had thought he was
sound asleep. “You could try my name, it might help. I heard Markus tell you, I
can tell you’re not quite as silly as you sound, so give it a shot.” Alex’s
hands flew up and covered her mouth, as if she was not sure how to react to
this little speech. She was almost afraid again, but her curiosity was getting
the better of her. And I could see she didn’t like being called silly, no
matter how kindly it was said, or how nicely meant.
“All right, Othello then. It’s nice to meet you. Will you
speak more, or was that the entirety of your contribution to our conversation?
Markus did say you generally don’t talk. I remember that just fine.”
Othello made the strange chuckling sound that passed for laughter
in his world. “I’m not sure, I guess it depends on whether or not you two need
any information from me or if you’re just going to keep blathering on,” he
said.
“Blathering?” Alex and I said it in unison, and we all had
to laugh.
“Okay, you win, old friend. What are your thoughts here? Do
you think she was brought to us for some purpose, or is it simply a case of a
lost girl in the woods? Should we try to get her home, or does she need to
travel with us a while and see some more of this wonderful world? Let us not
forget I am wanted in approximately sixty percent of the cities in this world.”
A few regions and a few kingdoms as well, and so are you, I thought to myself.
“Wait, travel with you? I’m not sure that’s part of my
plans,” she said. “What if I really do just want to go home?”
Othello cleared his throat and sat up, yawning again. I
swear he does that sometimes just to show off those teeth. He scooted back, and
leaned on the log. “I think you may have been brought to us for a reason, but I’ve
no idea what that reason is yet. Many times, the future is hard to see, for
there are so many variables, and so many things can go wrong, but yes. I do
feel that you should be staying with us a while yet, Alex.”
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