Lone Wendy: The Girl and the Forest of the Gods (9 page)

Overtime though, these things became unavoidable. No
place to be, I fled into the holes in the ground, the tunnels of a
mountain.

The tunnels, an expansive maze of ice and stone.
Warmer than the open land, but still cold. Chortling wind roaring
through caves. Steep drops form without warning, and slick ice
sends you skating. I know the entrances from the rumbles, the
howling gusts of wind, the searing cold, and the sound of snow
being blown ferociously into everything. I've become accustomed to
feeling changes in the air, sensing if something is around. My
sense of smell is heightened. My hearing too good, picking up every
stray sound, instilling terror in me constantly. Nowhere is safe.
The smaller beasts hiding like me in here, and much more ready to
kill. They can see, I cannot. I can rarely use fire, and not for
long, it attracts the demons.

These things, drawn to fire, can't be animals.
They're semi sentient, almost alien, and hungry for blood. Eating
the animals as well. Occasional screams as the things rip each
other apart. Sometimes I stumble through what's left, end trails. A
sickening smell of fresh insides and blood.

Lost alone in a sea of satin darkness. Wandering
aimlessly in frozen torment. In avoiding a quick death in the
outside, I fear I am guaranteed a slow and painful one in here.

***

Still dark and in the tunnels, I reach out with the
tip of my foot, slowly extending it forward until I feel the floor.
Carefully adding weight to it as I cringe, waiting for it to break
and drop me. Again and again, the same thing. My new way of
walking. Foot, fingers, and spear sensing like an insect through
vast spacial nothingness. Tapping for danger and salvation. So
slow. I feel a jealousy underlying the fear as I hear things scurry
past at normal speed.

As I plod along, I hear a rustling, like sand falling
along rock. Tip tap, tip tip tap. Footsteps. I close my eyes and
inhale a deep breath, the cold helping to slow my heartbeat. When
you can't run, calm is all you have. When you can't see, certainty
is something you need. Moving low I bring myself into a relatively
tight corner of the cave wall, my spear rising and falling as I
guess the height of my attacker by ear.

A snorting breaks the relative silence. A hurried
claw scratches the ice, a stone flicked across the floor. Then
quiet. A sudden push against my spear, a splat as the sharp tip
breaks skin and plunges into flesh. Shrieking and squealing of the
wounded thing follow as I turn my blade, rise, and thrust. I feel a
sense of accomplishment as its warm blood runs over my frozen
hands. 'Kill me' I think to myself, anger directed at the fresh
corpse as it slides along the shaft. Its limp body drops to the
floor with a satisfying thud. Yet another day in the dark.

***

The food ran out. I haven’t eaten in days, though
honestly with what's on the menu, lapping up the left over guts of
dead things, I don't think I really even want to. The slow twisting
and churning pain has given way to a feeling like I swallowed a
handful of knife blades. I'm light headed and dizzy, my fingers are
too cold to shake, but I feel a tingling as they try. I've given up
caution as I shuffle bent over in pain, my mind unsettled from
reality. So tired I wander like a zombie, empty and hurting.

As I shuffle along in the dark, I sense a steep drop.
The black no different from that of the wall, but I know it's
there. A deep pit. As I feel the vortex rush against my face, I
feel as though I could fall into it, and never return. Such a
calming thought to fall, and rest. I would throw myself into it, if
I could be sure that I would die....

"No!" I release in a low breath, as if a quiet
scream. I have to throw myself back, landing hard against a wall.
These thoughts can't take me. I tremble as I quietly and moistly
sob. My tears freeze in my eyes. It's been like this. Every now and
then I just have this urge to end myself. I hate it. Why won't the
pain go away. Why can't I sleep! Sleep, I just want to sleep...

Life is not the blazing path, but the small, dull,
beacons of light that dot our path. Our lives not so simple as we
are told, or how they may seam.

Our continuance relies on our ability to see the
faint light in the dark distance, and to act on the hunch that the
light isn't some trap. As those who know our methods, replicate our
goals, in the hope of making us believe them to be our
salvation.

This is were the darkness is our aid.

The darkest times ignite the embers of our brightest
passions. Our whimsies flame out, and only those things that are
truly important to us remain.

Though the darkest night may drown out the many
lights that we are used to, the lights remaining guide us on our
truest path....

-Wendy

Alone still in the immortal mountain's cold heart.
Thoughtless and freezing. Moments of terror and blind carnage
breaking eternities of nothingness in the black. My mind fights for
awareness, though most of time is lost to me in memory, and
conscious. The world is not a real thing to me anymore, reality is
no more, and the ice tunnels leave nothing to fill it. If it
weren't for the pain, I would question if I existed at all. If I
simply remained in this world, a remnant memory, who had long been
dead.

As I wander, slow and mindless, the silence is broken
again by screams. Another gruesome battle for life and substance.
But there is a strange pitch to the shrill noise, a sound I have
not heard before. My mind comes back to me as I wonder. I lower my
head to the floor listening for vibrations, as the scream suddenly
stops. My ears focus intently. A piercing howl echoes through the
corridors, so loud it shakes the walls. THE HOUNDS!

Leaping to my feet, more aware now than ever, I have
to hold myself back. I know I can't run, though that's all I want
to do. If I did, I might get lucky and slam into a wall. Or I could
run straight into a pit. A massive fall that cripples my whole
body, left helpless to lay there as the hounds devour me alive.
Standing knock kneed, heart pounding from my chest, I calm myself
from my terror and contemplate my options. I could never fight
them, not normally, much less starving and blind. My only option is
to move as fast as I can while maintaining care. I move low, a
quick crawl. The baying of the hounds overshadowing the blood
curdling screams of animal and demon alike, when silence
returns.

I wonder for a moment if the silence is a good thing
when a faint light sparkles, splashing across my eyes as they
constrict. Painfully they focus, as the first light in ages
overwhelms them. A white hot light rounds the corner, held by a
shadow. The roar of machine parts as they spasm. I leap back,
landing hard against the icy wall as a blur flashes in front of my
face. As my eyes focus I see the Kennel Master, massive sword in
hand before me. A pillar of ice obliterates beside me. His huge
form next to me, shards of ice flying in all directions. I dodge,
rolling across the floor.

He steps forward for another blow, I raise my spear
at him and he stops in place, as if shocked to be challenged. He
pulls his sword back and extends his bright torch forward in front
of him. The intense flame concealing him behind it. I get a glimpse
of my surroundings, and know I can't fight him here. The area is
too closed, and he's to fast.

His sword suddenly bursts forth from behind the
blinding fire, half of my strength goes into dodging his swing.
There's no way I can fight him head on.

But his torch! His torch is useful. If I stay within
its light and lead him, while staving off his attacks, I can see
enough to find a favorable place to engage him.

I run, turning on occasion to clash with him, but in
my weakened state, he's much faster than me. Nearly ending me with
every exchange. His sword tears through my cloak nearly taking my
leg. I know quickly, staying within the torches range is within his
range. My heart drops as I realize, I have no choice but to run. It
takes everything I have to flee into the dark. I run as fast as I
can, keeping my left hand outstretched as it crumples against wall
after wall. Swallowing the pain, I can't afford to injure my right
arm, I need it to fight.

As I run I begin to feel a trembling behind me. Soon
panting, a hound in full pursuit. I push myself to run faster,
slamming harder against the walls of ice, until I fall pinned
against three walls. A dead end.

I brace myself as the earth shakes, but I feel a
draft from below me. Through the dark I investigate with my hands,
a hole in the ice! I quickly shove myself into the tiny gap as a
tremendous force crashes behind me. I can hear clawing, panting,
and hungry growls as it tries to dig its way in. I push myself
through the claustrophobic passage until I squeeze out into what I
can only guess is another ice tunnel.

Not knowing where I am, I wander slow and aimless. My
mind a blur for awhile. Suddenly from around a corner, a torch
rises. A sword slashing behind it as I throw myself clear once
more. I square off, me and the Kennel Master. I slowly back up when
I feel a rushing force behind me, a drop. I smile inside, taking a
rigid stance. He leaps for me, I dodge out of the way. He stops at
the edge, but I swirl around and rush him, pushing my spear against
his chest. A horrible moaning from him as his foot breaks the edge
of the ice, and he falls.

I watch him disappear into shadow, and rejoice for a
minute when a great force strikes me, taking me off of the ledge as
well. I fall with the thing tumbling down the edge with it. We hit
the floor hard, the thing rolls over and off of me. As I rise to my
feet I see a hound, growling, its teeth gnashing at me. We exchange
slashes, its claws and teeth appearing towards me through the dim
light of the Kennel Masters fallen torch in the distance. I bat it
back, only just with my spear.

I stare into its eyes, haunting and devoid of
knowing, as it fixes its gaze into my very being. It leaps at me,
fear quickly taking hold, but soon vanquished as I see my
opportunity. Its neck exposed as it stretches outward. My whole
body tenses as I begin my leap, the spear a part of me as it draws
back, and surges forward. I ready myself for impact with the hound
as a shrill scream erupts from the darkness. My attention diverting
to the Kennel Master as he runs at me. He sloppily heaves his sword
to block me, but my spear glances off of it, penetrating his chest
with a horrible sound of twisting metal and bursting fluids. I land
upon the mess, spear driven through the master, and into the
whelping hound.

I pause in shock for a moment before a steel hand
strikes me, sending me flying. He rises and pulls the spear from
his chest, sending it hurtling towards me, narrowly missing my head
as it flies off. His legs crumbling, he turns back towards the
hound, stumbling. Falling to his knees with a horrible wailing, his
massive steel hand outstretched toward the great dead beast. He
falls atop it, his unnerving scream crackling and fading, until
silent. Dead as well.

The Kennel Master, a mighty monster, laying as
unmoving as the landscape, a weeping from behind his steel face. If
I didn't know better, I would almost say that he were crying.

I don't know what to do with myself for a time,
shocked in the still and silence. Soon I hear more howling from the
distance. I quickly recover my spear, take his torch, and retreat
into the tunnels.

From the depths of death and darkness where I
languished, I saw a light. Crawling forth from the bowels of the
earth, I fell to my knees under the blinding sun. Bathed my lungs
in the cool fresh air. Felt the morning dew melt against my skin.
Ate fresh berries until the pain went away. And then I looked upon
the endless land, and despaired....

-Wendy

Vast landscape mingling on crystal waters beneath an
ember sky. My first sight as I arose from the dark mountain. A land
both beautiful and bountiful. But not without its quiet horrors.
For within this pristine vastness, hope fades, and your fears fill
you.

Madness, when dark things roam freely in your mind.
When the things before your eyes defy imagination and reality slips
away. When the world becomes so inconceivable, that facts and fairy
tales melt together into an indistinguishable mess.

I stared into the eye of a giant, and felt a fear so
fierce, my legs could not hold me. No thoughts would come, only
tears. I whimpered powerless and paralyzed. But what was it that so
much I feared? The monster so large? Or myself... so small.

***

Sitting on a hill, under a tree at sunrise, big sky
dwarfed only by endless land. Staring, so still, into the distance,
I never slept. My eyes are cold and glaring, hiding my thoughts
behind them. My fears, hate, and despair.

I could have kicked the shard. Laid beside it.
Stepped over it, walked away, and never known. I should have known,
I'll never find it.