Lone Wendy: The Girl and the Forest of the Gods

by D E Dunn

  William Duave, a kind of hero to me. A mentor, and the only friend that I ever truly had. My mother is a beautiful woman, if it weren't for having me outside of marriage, she would have been considered one of the most desirable in the kingdom, but no one saw past my mothers stigma, no one except Wil. She was the love of his life. A love that wouldn't even talk to him when they were alone in a room together. She acted like he didn't exist and wouldn't even respond to him, except to lash out over something that I talked him into. She had to raise me was the excuse. But I think she was afraid. My 'father' betrayed her, and she feared that it might happen again. But Wil never stopped. That's how we became friends, he was always showing up at the lodge.

  I remember, when I first read of the God Slayer, and thought about leaving to find it. Sitting in his sadly empty house, he chuckled at the idea.

  “I'll save you the pain kid.” he said. “I had an idea like yours, go on a big adventure, be a big hero, show them what you're worth. I left home early, and I never made it back. Everyone I loved, dead. Everything I knew, gone. I was lucky to have lived at all.” he paused a moment to stare into his whisky “And well, look at me now”

  I didn't think that I would regret this. I didn't think that I would fail. I blocked out every word of warning, and went headlong into the unknown. Now the ghosts of winter haunt my every step. My frame but a husk, slowly emptying of me. I should have listened.

  ***

  Days have passed, a dream in white. I lay here against the dark sky, too cold to move. The moon bright, as I freeze. The shadow of the forest rising as it always has, majestically toward the sky.

  It's alright, I tell myself. I've lived a full life. If I die ... It's fine. No need to go on, no need to suffer.

  Ice forms around my lips. My eyes, of glass, glaring into the beyond. What a feeling. To live so long. To fight everyday. And to be so fine, in the moment, to slip away. As if you're not even truly there to witness it. Gone already, and left yourself to die.

  I hold myself in pause, bracing for the inevitable, but don't go. A repressed voice echoes in my head, almost screaming to stay, and in my final defense, succeeds. A certain kind of destiny, I suppose. That something doesn't want me to die. Not a choice of my own. I feel a strange mix of gladness and sorrow as I twitch one finger, and slowly pull myself from the freezing earth. It's a feeling I can't describe. I'm alive, a joyous thing, but I hate it. It's as if another decides when I can die. My body, an empty vessel, filling with the will of something else.

  Chapter 7

  Darkness and Demons

  Season – Late Winter

  The days and nights are all dark, freezing,...., fire draws things worse than a demons nightmares--- be quick,...., I’m fading...

  - W

  Part 1

  The Black

  I wandered aimlessly into the mountains, black rises capped in white peaks. The feeling of doom followed behind me. My dreams filled by a dark hand driving evil things. The days shorter, the nightmares long. The end of me becoming evermore real.

  The sun set eons ago, and has never again risen. Either my sense of time is lost, or this night has gone on too long. Something was circling my campsite earlier in the night. Unlike the animals, it wasn't afraid of my fire. Suddenly its shadow appeared. Though I felt out of breath with fear, I slowly slunk my way out, crawling into the darkness. I took my torch, but it has long since burnt out.

  There is no moon, no light, no torch, no fire. In this black, an entire sense is missing. As though the world has vanished. My balance is gone. It's like being an infant learning to walk again. Every sound thunders. Every touch incredible. The sensation of falling takes over every step. I walk slowly, carefully, like I’m on a tightrope. My hands outstretched like feelers searching the air for substance.

  My toes slink along, feet slowly inching forward, until I feel an edge. A slope? A cliff? It's all darkness to me, and I don't feel like chancing it. It just means that I have to move slower, be more careful.

  Descending now, the wind rises over my feet as pebbles crunch below. I think I can hear howling echoing out in the void, or maybe I’m just crazy. I have to fight back the fear, so overwhelming, as I’m blinded. I just want to scream, but I know what will happen. I am in the shadow of a God and its world. A world that is not kind. A thing that is not forgiving. Moving forward at some pace again, I can't help but wonder if I might misstep, and be cascaded to my doom.

  ***

  The sun has never risen. In blackness I stumbled, fire my only sight. But these things, very specific, different from beasts, are drawn to the light. It wasn't long before they came for me from the black. A huge thing from the night, shaking the earth, so large it snapped the trees like twigs. I ran from my camp, the world breaking behind me, until I stumbled. The fall my salvation. Freed from imminent danger, I rejoiced.

  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...

  Journal

  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

  Part 2

  Phantoms

  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.

  Chapter 8

  Madness

  Season – Beginning of Spring

  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 the
n I looked upon the endless land, and despaired....

  -Wendy

  Part 1

  Big Sky

  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.