by Alex Faure
The moon had risen above the trees while they had been scuffling, and as he pulled Fionn forward, its light fell upon them both. It struck Fionn like a spark in dry kindling, illuminating his strange hair and pale skin. Darius froze. He realized, with a dreamlike wonder, that he had never seen Fionn lit by moonlight before—all of their encounters had been in daylight, or when the moon had been shrouded by trees or cloud. Fionn writhed against him like a wildcat, dislodging his hold, and Darius staggered backwards.
Something else had begun happening in the moment the moonlight touched Fionn. Feathers sprouted from his scalp, silver and chestnut and bone-white, curving backwards like a mane of hair. His ears grew sharp and tufted, and his eyes rounded, the silver spilling out into the whites. His body changed, too, his limbs and fingers lengthening, and he grew bone-thin, every inch of skin covered in a strange, pale down. His knees snapped, a sickening sound, and his legs bent backwards. Wings erupted from his back, wings shaped like an owl’s but vast, at least twice as wide as he was tall.
Darius let out a broken gasp. Fionn’s wings, which had the variegated pallor of birch bark, burst open. He arrested his stumble before he plunged into the river, countering the momentum of Darius’s shove. His face was contorted in pain, and then his huge eyes found Darius’s, filling with an emotion he couldn’t interpret. It was something that could have been rage or horror or a combination of the two, mixed with what Darius could only characterize as a wildness, something dark and predatory and entirely inhuman.
In a motion too quick for him to follow, Fionn grabbed Darius by the throat, drawing him forward into the shadow his wings cast by the moonlight. Darius let out an involuntary cry of horror, and Fionn’s lips curled in something that wasn’t a smile.
Fionn twisted his fingers through Darius’s hair as he had before, forcing his head back, then he kissed him hard on the mouth.
Darius struggled out of pure shock. His mouth opened in surprise, and he tasted leaf and moss and shadow, the chill at the heart of every forest midnight and the sticky sweetness of sap. He felt the brush of Fionn’s tongue, soft as a caress, and then a sting of pain. Fionn had bitten his lip. He drew back with Darius’s blood on his teeth, an indefinable expression on his face. Then his wings beat once and he leapt backwards, clear across the river, and disappeared into the forest darkness.
Chapter Nine
Darius had only a jumbled memory of what happened next. He recalled slumping to the ground in shock, then darkness as his weakened body betrayed him. He dimly recalled making his way back to the cave on hands and knees, and he must have made it, for he awoke there the following morning.
It was late, shading into afternoon. Darius felt well-rested, and though his ankle throbbed from the events of the previous day, he was able to put weight on it. Which was good, because he had many miles ahead of him.
He would not remain there another moment.
Clearly, Fionn was some sort of forest demon, perhaps akin to a gorgon or demigod beast, like the minotaur. Either way, Darius had no intention of remaining there when he returned—if he returned.
He wondered if Fionn’s countrymen knew what he was. He recalled how the Robogdi had bowed to him in the forest before Fionn put an arrow in his throat. Clearly he was held in some regard by his people, likely a result of his fighting prowess. But Darius found it hard to believe they knew that he was something inhuman entirely. On the riverbank, Fionn had demonstrated eerie skill at hand-to-hand combat, but Darius now knew, after the hours they had spent together, that he had not revealed all he was capable of.
He’s hiding what he is from them. Darius hadn’t the faintest idea why Fionn had been so careless about hiding what he was from him.
He emptied out the largest satchel in the cave, which held some sort of root vegetable that Fionn had evidently been planning on cooking for them at some point. He felt a tiny shiver of guilt at that, but why should he feel guilty? It was clear that Fionn saw him as little more than his prisoner. Why he had kept Darius alive was a mystery, but Darius told himself that he couldn’t see himself as indebted to Fionn, a man who had threatened him and killed so many of his men.
Not to mention, a man who wasn’t even a man at all. He wouldn’t be beholden to the wayward whims of a monster.
He stuffed the satchel with the supplies Fionn had left him—an extra tunic; a flask that he filled with water; cheese and a small loaf of the hard bread; a blanket; a short knife intended for cutting food. He left everything else.
There was no sign of Fionn when Darius scanned the river, though this brought him little comfort. He had seen how easily Fionn could appear and disappear among the shadowy boughs.
He hobbled downstream, keeping to the riverbank for as long as he could. It formed a natural beach in this part of the forest, and Darius had to clamber over only a few uneven rocks. He wanted to avoid the forest for as long as possible. Though Fionn would surely guess he had left for Attervalis, Darius didn’t want him to know which route he had taken. The river would conceal his footsteps.
Unfortunately, he had only made it a few hundred yards before the beach dissolved, and the river chasm grew steep. Darius had to clamber up the bank, slipping and sliding the whole way, clinging to roots that scratched his hands and rocks that came loose when he put his weight on them. By the time he reached the top, he wished he hadn’t bothered taking the river route.
He ducked into the forest, bracing himself for something—he didn’t know what. But no fell creatures attacked him, nor did Fionn leap down upon him from the treetops, monstrous wings spread wide. Birds twittered their dismay at his presence, and branches rustled in the wind.
It’s only a forest, Darius thought. No different, really, than his beloved olive groves, except perhaps in scale.
He closed his eyes briefly at the memory of the groves, and for a second he could almost taste their dry scent. Then the daydream faded, and he smelled the mud on his clothes, the wet mossiness of that northern forest. He set his jaw and kept going.
He walked steadily, keeping to as northerly a course as he could, judging by the position of the sun. He wasn’t a terribly skilled navigator, but Attervalis was on the coast, not far from where the river emptied into the sea. If he kept within hearing range of the rushing waters, and kept walking downstream, he would reach it, though it would take at least a day.
At least a day for an uninjured man. The longer he walked, the more his ankle throbbed. Though he’d gained back some of the strength the infection had robbed from him, he was far from his old self. He was forced to sit and rest every mile or so.
In the late afternoon, as the sun began its slow descent behind the trees, Darius leaned against a stump and wiped the sweat from his brow. His body trembled lightly from the exercise. He ate some of the bread soaked in water, and felt a little better. Still, though, he was exhausted. He was beginning to wonder just how bad the infection had been—it had never taken him so long to recover from an illness. How close to death had he come? How had Fionn brought him back when he had been so far gone?
The thought of Fionn made his stomach twist. Something rustled behind him, and he started, but it must have been a bird or a small animal, for the sound faded away. Darius allowed himself to rest another moment, and then he forced himself on.
Over the next hour or two, the rustling came again. Always it was behind him, and when he turned his head, whatever it was darted deeper into the brush. And, gradually, another thing happened: the birdsong died away. It was possible that, as night approached, the birds were simply retiring to their nooks and burrows. It was possible that he had merely attracted the interest of a squirrel or forest cat, which was now trailing him in hopes of obtaining whatever scraps he might be carrying.
You have no idea what lurks between here and Attervalis.
Darius heard the words as if Fionn had spoken them in his ear. The rustling came again, but he didn’t bother to look over his shoulder this time. He turned to his right and struck o
ut for the river.
The undergrowth grew denser nearer the water, but after a few minutes of rough going during which he got himself tangled in a thorny bush, Darius emerged onto the riverbank. He was some distance downstream of the cave, and the river was gentler here, and broader. He breathed a sigh of relief at being able to see the sky again. It was evening, but darkness was still a few hours away. The summer days were longer this far north than they were in Rome.
He turned to scan the riverbank, and his gaze alighted on a cabin.
Instinctively, Darius shrank back into the trees. Any structure he might come across in this part of Hibernia would likely belong to the Robogdi. Yet the cabin, which leaned over the flowing water, looked abandoned. The roof was partly caved in, the beaten path to the door overgrown with weeds. Behind it, someone had constructed a dam and a waterwheel, effectively diverting a side channel of the river back to its parent.
When Darius pushed open the door of the cabin, he was pleasantly surprised to find an empty hearth and a low bed with a mattress of straw. There was even a table and chair where he could sit and eat a meal like a civilized person. At the back of the cabin was a flight of stairs leading to a primitive attic with a floor made of thin saplings, also empty. Despite its outward shabbiness, the cabin seemed relatively clean. No animals had found their way inside during its owner’s absence.
Darius eyed the bed longingly—he hadn’t been looking forward to sleeping outdoors tonight, curled up in the forest underbrush. He decided, abruptly, that he would go no farther today. He would rest here, and make for Attervalis in the morning. He was confident he could make it to the fort by the end of the next day, even if he continued at his current pace.
He washed off the sweat of the day’s journey in the river, which had an entirely different sound this far downstream—more of a low susurration than a noisy babble. He spent an hour or so foraging among the trees, and managed to gather a few handfuls of strawberries and another small red berry that Fionn had brought him once. He found a patch of mushrooms, but he wasn’t certain they were edible, and left them where he found them. He longed for meat, but he disliked his odds of catching anything in his tired state, so he didn’t bother trying.
After a cheerless meal consisting of berries and the remainder of his bread and cheese, Darius wrapped himself in his blanket and settled onto the bed, which was musty but surprisingly comfortable. He didn’t dare light a fire, but fortunately, he didn’t need one, for the summer night was mild.
Darius thought of Fionn. He thought of the way he had moved, the warping of his body as the moonlight struck him. As monstrous as he had looked, he hadn’t been ugly. Strange, certainly. Unearthly. But not ugly.
He remembered the sensation of Fionn’s mouth against his. Why had he done that? Why did Fionn do anything?
A shiver like a fingertip traced its way down his spine. He rolled onto his side and ordered himself to sleep.
Chapter Ten
He awoke from a deep, dreamless sleep to the sound of footsteps.
Darius’s hand went instantly to the knife he had placed by the bed. The footsteps were coming from the empty attic above his head. Yet that was impossible—the attic had been empty when he entered the cabin, and surely if someone had come through the door, passed by his bed, and gone upstairs, he would have awoken.
His hand tightened on the knife. A wan grey light leaked through the shutters of the cabin—it was morning, or close to it. The cabin looked different than it had last night—there were two chairs rather than one, and ash in the hearth that before had been clean. Someone must have been there, moving about unnoticed as he slept. But how? He was a light sleeper.
Darius’s throat was dry. The stairs creaked, and a figure made its way down. She—for it was a woman’s voice he heard—was singing softly in a language he now knew. Fionn’s language. The language of the forest.
The woman smiled at Darius and set her lantern down on the table. Her age was impossible to guess, and she was pretty in a well-fed, red-cheeked sort of way. Her hair was a dark cascade down her back, brushing her generous hips.
“Good morning,” she said calmly, and busied herself with several baskets and bowls that also hadn’t been there the previous night. “I’ll make you some breakfast.”
Darius glimpsed a dark loaf of bread, a bowl of goose eggs, and a bundle of apples. The woman arranged some kindling in the fire and set it alight with a single strike of her flint.
“I apologize, my lady,” he said at last, warily. If this woman could speak Fionn’s language, he had to assume she was like him—dangerous. “I didn’t mean to impose myself upon you. I assumed this place was abandoned.”
“But you’re my guest.” She turned to him with a smile on her round face. “How could you impose upon me? Would you care for some tea?” A pot had appeared out of nowhere. She placed it over the fire.
“Thank you,” Darius said, discomfited. “But I must be on my way. Though I offer my thanks for your hospitality.”
He rose, gathering up his blanket. He was unnerved to find that it had been topped with a blanket of the softest fox fur, and that beneath him was another fur blanket, just as soft. How had the woman placed a blanket beneath him while he slept? The woman made no further protest, merely hummed to herself as she cracked eggs in a pan. Darius moved towards the door.
Only to find it gone.
He ran his hands over the place where the door had been, finding only smooth wall. His pulse thrummed. He turned, only to find that the door had appeared in the opposite wall. He dashed towards it, but in the second before his hands touched it, it vanished. He turned again and found it in its original place.
“What do you fear?” the woman said, still in that calm, musical voice. She turned the eggs over the fire.
Darius forced himself to say steadily, “You will release me at once.”
“Well. I’ll find out soon enough.” She pushed a plate towards him, heaped with egg, then sawed at the loaf of bread with an enormous knife. “Dig in. The tea’s almost ready.”
“I will not eat with anyone who holds me captive.” Darius struggled against his rising panic. “Again, my lady, I apologize for trespassing. But you will allow me to leave.”
“Apologies are of no value to me. There is only one currency I accept.”
Darius was beginning to wonder if the woman was mad. “What payment do you require?”
The woman poured tea into a wooden cup elaborately carved with leaves and faces. “You must eat. You will need your strength.”
Darius took a step back, and did not speak until the woman met his gaze. “I will not eat with you.”
“Very well.” She brushed her hands against her apron and came forward. There was a smile on her rosy face, and her black eyes were full of merriment. “If you won’t eat, we may as well begin.”
“Begin what?” If Darius took another step back, he would hit the wall. He scanned the cabin. The windows were tightly shuttered, likely sealed in some way, but could he break through them? He looked back at the woman, who was small for a Celt, more than a head shorter than him, and fine-boned. Yet the idea of attacking a woman was repugnant. Perhaps he could seize her arms, pin them behind her without hurting her—
“Ah, ah.” The woman shook a finger at him. Then she opened her mouth and spat in his face.
Darius staggered back, striking the wall. He wiped the saliva away, but when he did, the room seemed to shudder. He opened his eyes, blinking, and found he was lying on the ground.
The cabin had disappeared. All he saw was a vast darkness, from which came the sound of trees rustling. He felt a sense of weightlessness. Was he dreaming? But hadn’t he already woken up?
The woman, somehow, was on top of him, one leg on either side of his hips. She was naked, her breasts above him like enormous pale fruits. Darius was naked too, he realized. He thought of struggling, but found he couldn’t. It was a horrible feeling, as if he had consumed nightfire again—as if his body
and his mind were no longer in league with each other. He felt a shudder as he remembered his soldiers cut down before him, lost in their own amorousness.
Like lopping the heads off dandelions.
“I see your fear,” the woman murmured. Her eyes were all black, rippled like water. She looked down at Darius, and he felt as if he were sinking into her gaze. “You fear losing yourself. Going so far from who you are that you will never return.”
Her voice took on a singsong quality. “You want me,” she murmured, and Darius found it was true. He tried to quell the lust rising inside him, and managed, just. He removed his hands from her thighs, which they had been caressing.
“Perhaps you have a different preference?” she murmured.
Darius bit back a cry. The witch had changed—her shoulders broadened; her chest flattened.
“Ah,” the witch breathed. She touched Darius’s chest, then bent her head to kiss his neck. Her cheeks were rough with stubble.
Darius tried to push the creature off, but found he could not. The witch’s eyes were large and black as an insect’s. She had turned herself into a large man, larger than Darius, her body heavy and muscular against his.
“There,” the witch murmured. “Now fear me.”
Desire surged inside him. What had the witch done to him? Desperately, he tried to fight against the reactions of his body, but he couldn’t. He was hardening, and his nipples were puckered and sharp. The witch grinned, then slowly rolled him over.
“I am going to enjoy you,” she murmured in Darius’s ear.
Darius tried to shout, but all that came out of his lips was a soft sound closer to a grunt. The witch parted his thighs, and without even an attempt at making him more comfortable, pressed into Darius.
Darius did shout at that. The witch’s cock was simply too large for his body to admit. The witch hissed something under her breath, and Darius felt another surge of desire. His thighs relaxed, and the witch pressed again. This time, Darius’s body opened for her. He moaned deep in his throat.
