Akilina: Out of the Woods

by Patricia A Bowmer

  Halley felt she was hearing him from some great distance. The baby was gone. It had had nothing to do with her. She would not be the one to save it. She looked across at the man before her. He could lead her out of the woods, back to her real life. It had not been a new place to begin after all. “Oh God,” she whispered aloud.

  Immediately she regretted it. The man shifted the torch, and she could almost see his face. In the half-light, his eyes had narrowed. Her despair over the baby was quickly replaced by a renewal of her fear of this stranger. Trance Darkling? The air left her lungs. What kind of name is that?

  She shook her head again, harder this time; his sing-song voice and his words had dulled her senses. She tried to calm herself. Spots of light swam in front of her eyes. The words this stranger had spoken swirled around her. He said he won’t hurt you, Halley. He saved the baby. He knows the way out. You need his help. You’re imagining things – it’s only the darkness that’s making him so scary.

  Letting go of the tree root, she held one of her hands in the other and felt how cold and small her hands were, felt her pulse thudding fast in her veins. Oh stop it Halley – just let him help you! You don’t know what you’re doing and you need help!

  She watched as the stranger leaned forward, as if easing himself. The movement narrowed the distance between them. He smiled, and the familiarity of the smile was disconcerting.

  Tentatively, she asked, “Can you really show me the way out?”

  All her instincts said to run, but she didn’t. If he could help her, she could get out of the woods and never come back. To be free of the darkness, to be in the light again, the thought was lovely. Enticing.

  The steel in her voice had melted away. She sounded small and weak, as he had described her. Halley shifted uncomfortably on her thin buttocks. The air in the shelter was heavy and close. She stared hard at the man before her, felt the familiarity in his mannerisms with simultaneous attraction and aversion.

  As the torch burned lower, Trance stared back. “Of course I can show you the way out,” he repeated smoothly. “Please, have some of my water – you must be desperately thirsty.”

  Invitingly, he held out an old canvas canteen, but though her eyes watched it thirstily she didn’t move to take it.

  I am so thirsty. Her very cells were crying out for water.

  She leaned forward and took hold of the canteen, took his offering. Drinking in long, hungry gulps, some of the water spilled out, dripping down her chin and along her neck and even intrusively down, down below her queen t-shirt and onto her breasts. It reminded her of the rain during her long unsheltered night, of her longing for death. She shivered anew.

  Even with her vast thirst, the water was not refreshing. It tasted metallic and foul. Hurriedly, she passed the canteen back.

  “Look – you’re shaking,” he said. “Please, let me help.” His voice was gentle, his eyes soft. “At least tell me your name.”

  “Halley. My name is Halley.” Drawing on some strength deep inside her, she spoke with sudden certainly. “I won’t decide anything until morning. Not until I can see your face more clearly.” In the dark, he was all shadow, only vague hollows where his eyes should have been.

  “All right.”

  She sat still, watching him closely, speaking no more. But inside her head, she belittled herself. Get a grip Halley – he’s just trying to help. The hairs stood out on her forearms though, and she could not “get a grip” at all.

  When the torch burned out, the voice in her head spoke more urgently. Who are you Trance? Why have you come here? Something about you is deadly to me. I can feel that deep in my bones. She shifted her seat uncomfortably. But I don’t know where to go, and I’ve been lost since I fell down the hill into these woods. I’m not strong enough to get back alone. The blisters on her feet burned and her head throbbed where she’d bashed into the tree roots. She was afraid to put her hand to it, afraid she’d feel the wetness of blood. Her hunger was deepening – she needed food and water, and she didn’t know what she was going to do – she couldn’t last much longer. She longed to silence her voice, but it hummed on. Sparrow. I wish I knew what it meant to be a sparrow. I want it to mean free and able, quick to maneuver. If only Fernando had been calling me those things when he called me Sparrow…if only this man was…

  On a sudden impulse, she felt in the inner pocket of her jacket. She had an irrational urge to touch the crow’s feather, the totem she had carried to remind her of its message at the start of her journey: “You will be all right”.

  It wasn’t there.

  Swallowing hard, she began to check the rest of her pockets, already knowing she wouldn’t find it.

  In time, her exhaustion pulled at her with long boney fingers, dragging her back to sleep. It was the deep sleep of the lost, who dread awakening because they know when they do, they will find they are still powerless.

  She slept. He did not. He watched and waited, knowing that when she woke, she would already be tamed. Indeed, she had been tamed the instant she’d allowed him to stay.

  Always so easy with you, he thought. Your weakness is my strength. So many times I have nearly finished you. This, this is my time.

  In the early morning light, he stepped outside. She followed.

  Walking several steps behind him, she noted the broadness of his shoulders. Her eyes worked their way down the back of his body, searching for clues. His jacket hugged the muscles of his upper back tightly, the fabric straining. Where his waist narrowed, it went suddenly limp. His lower body, encased in tight jeans, reminded Halley of a quarter-horse, thickly muscled, designed for short bursts of power and speed. She couldn’t see the lines of his arms or shoulders, but the way his body moved suggested strength there as well.

  There was more to his walking movement than just strength. He moved with assurance, with power. The canteen slung over his shoulder swung with each stride, back and forth, its movement mesmerizing. His stride was long, as if he were in the habit of moving quickly, perhaps impatiently. She had to half-jog every now and then just to keep up. Taking her eyes back upwards, she noticed his whitish-blond hair. It was cropped close all over, except for a small thin braid that snaked from the base of his skull. She could just see the root of the braid – the rest of it was tucked inside the collar of his shirt.

  Her leg stalled halfway down to the ground, and she had to consciously place her foot down to continue walking. The white snake braid didn’t fit. As if hearing her thought, he stopped walking and turned to her.

  His expression was hard to read, but the make-up of his face was spell-binding. The cleft in his chin cut deep, the square jaw with its promise of strength. She saw with surprise that his face was absolutely and strangely symmetrical. His eyes were a light ice-blue. The white color of his hair contrasted sharply with the deep tan of his skin. The darkness she’d sensed during the night was not there. At least not in his face.

  He didn’t speak, only nodded slightly as if to acknowledge that she was following him, before turning again to lead the way.

  Later, when she had settled into the pattern of his footsteps and was stepping carefully over tree roots, when she was feeling more at ease with him, she happened to look up again at the back of his head. Just at that moment, he’d turned to look to the left. She felt a deep unsettling in her stomach. His ears. They were oddly out of proportion, too small for his head. The ears of a predator, she thought.

  She tried to ignore how she felt. She didn’t want to distrust him, didn’t want to face the action such distrust would require. It would mean she’d have to leave him. Then she’d be alone again, lost. She just couldn’t face it. They were only ears. And yet they make me feel frightened again…like that white snake braid.

  Trance stopped and turned around again. For the first time, he smiled at her. It was a broad smile, open and warm. But his even, perfectly white teeth made a caricature of his faultless smile, made it seem unreal. His thick lips moved slowly and un-hurried as he s
poke for the first time that morning.

  “We’re nearly there,” he said. “Soon, we’ll be at the river. We can take my boat and we’ll be out of the woods in no time.”

  Was he watching her for a reaction? He seemed to be.

  “Don’t worry,” he added. “I know the way.”

  She smiled back, but the smile was false, as if she were willing the muscles around her jaw to lift, but not quite succeeding. He didn’t seem to notice, and to her, it felt the same as all her smiles; forced from a deep place inside that was not smiling at all.

  He turned to lead again, and she followed, carefully avoiding looking at him. It struck her that she had been watching him as she used to watch Fernando – from behind. Following. A surge of anger flowed through her.

  “These woods can be dangerous you know,” he said ominously, without looking around. “I’ve heard of people who came here for day hikes, and were never seen again. No one finds their bodies or their bones. It’s as if they just disintegrate, out here alone.”

  She was silent, and he stopped to look back at her.

  “Oh – I’ve frightened you. I’m so sorry,” he said gently. “And you’re cold too – look, you’re shivering. Here, take my jacket.”

  He slipped the canteen from his shoulder, and placed it carefully on the ground. With the movement, the long white braid slipped free from his collar, and hung loose down his back. It was at least six inches long, braided tightly and with precision. She couldn’t take her eyes off it. Removing his jacket, he stepped close to her.

  She hadn’t noticed before, but the color of the jacket was ambiguous; it might have been green or grey or even black. For some reason, this ambiguity, this un-graspable-ness alarmed her. Cape-like, he swung it over her. She watched it settle down over her body, as if in slow motion. The jacket was on her, over her shoulders, hiding her orange windbreaker completely. Her nostrils filled with a dank, stagnant smell – the smell of him. It was a smell remarkably out of place in someone with such clean, fresh looks, with his blond hair and blue eyes and small white teeth. It was like the jacket had been put away wet, left to grow moldy in a wardrobe without enough airflow.

  He rested his hands on her shoulders a moment too long, as if to comfort her, but the weight of him, the weight of his jacket, was oppressive. The pressure of his hands was so great that she imagined herself moving into the earth, towards dampness and darkness.

  Instinctively, she took a step backwards, slipping his hands quickly from her shoulders. Her mind worked fast – she still needed his help – she must not offend him. “Thank you,” she said. “That’s very kind of you. I’ll be much warmer now.” She shuddered and fought to control it so he wouldn’t guess at her revulsion.

  Trance slid his canteen back over his shoulder. He did not tuck the braid away again, and it hung whitely down his back against his grey shirt. She thought to question him about it, but instead kept carefully quiet. He led the way again through the woods, she heavy in his jacket, he utterly silent.

  As they walked on, she found her eyes fixed on the white braid. It blinded her to everything else around her. She pondered why it was important, what it said of his character. She was frightened of him, but couldn’t decide why. Is it me? He seems so kind, so concerned. So familiar. I really do need his help. He hasn’t done anything wrong. And yet…

  She couldn’t place her finger on what was wrong, couldn’t explain her intuition. The small hairs on the back of her neck stood out alertly; they had done so since she had heard him following her the day before. The wild-flowers on the forest floor were suddenly too bright. They were glaringly bright, their colors jarring. They looked illusory, as if they had been colored unnaturally to add a false brightness to her world. To seduce her into following.

  She tried again to discern the source of her unease. The word came suddenly, causing her stomach to lurch: Evil. There was nothing to pin the word to, no reason for it to occur to her just then. He was handsome and smiled so well and yet there was a sense of evil about him. As if his ears and the braid he had hidden down his shirt collar were marks of his nature. Even more than anything physical, it had much to do with the way he had entered her life, in the dead of night. His feet crushed the leaves as he led the way. Even that was awful. And he was only walking, tramping along in his heavy black boots. The evil she sensed walked there with her, chilling her. She tried to shade her eyes from the brilliance of the wildflowers. Her heart beat like a wild animal, newly captured. It’s like waking at three-thirty in the morning all alone in the dark, and noticing a light has been left on and thinking, but I remember turning that light off… that’s how he makes me feel. She shuddered.

  “Ah, here it is. The river.” His words broke the long silence. He turned to face her with his perfect smile. “There’s my boat…”

  She wasn’t listening; she was down on her hands and knees, scooping water into her cupped palms, gulping it down fast, letting its fresh taste wash away the lingering flavor of his water from the night before. Splashing her face, she rubbed her cheeks with the palms of both hands, as if to remove the past two days. She longed to keep her hands over her face and not have to see Trance again. His voice interrupted her thoughts.

  “First, we’ll eat,” he said. “We won’t be able to once we’re on the river – the current is far too strong.”

  “I don’t have anything left,” she admitted quietly.

  He lifted his eyebrows in what might have been a mocking expression. With a fast and unexpected movement, he spun towards the river. A knife flashed in the sunlight, and he thrust deep into the water, spearing a large, big-bellied fish. He heaved it out onto the riverbank. It thrashed on his knife, desperately sucking at the unfamiliar air. He smiled as he pulled it off the jagged knife. Holding the fish tightly in both hands, he smashed it on the rocks, smashed the life out of it, slamming it again and again. All the while his lips were raised in that terrible smile.

  “What’s wrong, Sparrow?” he said sharply, looking up at her only when the fish was finally still. “It’s only a common carp, not some fish on the endangered list.”

  She stared at the blood on the rocks.

  He contained himself. “Please, don’t look so upset,” he said, his voice softer this time. “We have to eat. Out here, we have to hunt to survive.”

  Halley didn’t answer.

  He gutted the fish with what seemed unnecessary cruelty, roughly jerking its insides out onto the ground with his bare hands. She wanted to run away, but she was so hungry her mouth was watering. And anyway, she didn’t trust what her intuition was saying about him. What was “evil” anyway? Was hunting evil?

  Building a searing fire from loose twigs and dry leaves, he roasted the flesh of the carp. It was a freshwater fish and it should have tasted sweet and of the wilderness; she gagged as she ate.

  Trance reached across and rested his hand on the sleeve of his jacket that she wore. His movement had an air of ownership.

  “There, that’s better,” he said. “You were weak with hunger.”

  His inflection disturbed her. He had put special emphasis on the word “weak”.

  Trance stood up.

  “We must hurry.”

  Trance held her wrist firmly as he shepherded her towards his boat. He knew the urge to run was growing in her – it was visible in a captured animal tightness about her eyes. He shoved her roughly into the rear seat of the boat, and, leaning his heavy boots hard into the gravel riverbed, he pushed off from shore. Quickly, he hauled himself aboard. The boat shook precariously. Trance seated himself on the middle seat, facing the shore. With three pulls on the oars, they were away and moving fast down the steely river.

  Halley’s heart beat a staccato pulse. There was a metallic taste in her mouth. The river was swift but the water’s surface strangely smooth. Trees flashed by on the edges of her vision. The piercing shrieks of birds split the air. It was all too fast and too loud. Too out of control.

  Soon, they enter
ed a gorge with high overhanging walls, and Trance looked directly at Halley for the first time since they’d boarded the boat. She was sitting as far as possible from him, shrunken inside his jacket. He rowed from the middle of the boat, facing Halley, guiding the boat without looking behind him to see the course they should follow.

  How can he row without looking? The question became trivial when she saw the coldness of his eyes.

  “Beautiful, isn’t it?” he began, his tone unexpectedly soft, belying his face. He gazed up at the rock walls, worn perfectly smooth by the passage of water. “Have you traveled this river before?”

  “No,” she said, in a small voice. Could I make it to the cliffs if I swam? Even if I could, there’d be no way to climb out. The walls are too smooth. She moved uneasily on her seat.

  “Are you sure?”

  She wouldn’t meet his eye. Her travels by boat had been curtailed a year ago. The memory of that last trip she knew intuitively not to share with Trance. Still, the memory flooded her, and she turned her eyes to the grey wooden planking of the boat’s floor:

  She and Fernando were using single-man kayaks to avoid traversing some difficult terrain. By foot, it would have taken hours to reach their campsite. In the approaching darkness, she had decided it was far safer to take the water route across a small bay.

  Halfway out the wind rose unexpectedly, blowing them off course, out beyond their planned depth. He waved to her from his kayak, gesturing that she should move closer towards shore. His gesture made her notice the shark net – their kayaks were well outside it. The space inside the net loomed empty. Suddenly she felt disoriented – what were they doing outside the shark net? Wasn’t it dangerous to be in the open water? A second later, she laughed aloud – of course they couldn’t kayak inside the shark net – it only ran across a small section of the bay beach! She shook her head, glancing across to Fernando’s kayak to see if he’d heard her laugh. She’d like to tell him her silly thought.