by Peter Plasse
“My father once said to me when I was little, ‘The only thing you have to be in this life is safe.’ I suppose that is not entirely true, but it is a start. Anyway, we need to be getting some more food laid in for the winter. Let’s get going. We need to check our snares down on the Slovan flats. You are going with me, right?”
“No, I’m going to stay here and worry myself sick about you all day. Of course I’m going with you. Give me a few minutes to get ready.”
Jared walked out into the early morning. It was definitely chilly as the weather began its annual, inexorable march towards winter. Despite the fact that he didn’t like the cold any more than the next guy, he took it as a good sign in that the Gnomes, at least, would soon all leave Ravenwild for the much warmer climate of Vultura, meaning that the Humans, Elves, and Dwarves might now have a chance to plot some sort of strategy to survive.
He went back into the cave that he and Diana were using as their temporary home and made a quick survey of their setup. There were several pelts stretching on wooden frames. They would need more in order to fashion the garments that would protect them from the cold, but he felt confident that they would be able to acquire enough. He reminded himself to scout for more salt that they would need to cure the hides.
His eyes drifted to his experiment in the far corner where the rock wall sloped gently downward to meet the floor. Along the way he had been gathering materials from which he thought he might be able to make an explosive powder. Up until now, he had had no luck. But then again there had been very little time to work on it, their lives now being one hard exercise in survival, and you had to eat before you could mess around trying to make bombs. Finally, he looked at their crude bed; nothing more than a large collection of pine bough tops with several Broadwood branches for their covers. The beauty of the Broadwood branch was that the leaves, each over two feet long and a foot wide, clung tenaciously to the mother branch, meaning they were not only warm, they tended to hold up over time.
“Are you ready?” he called to Diana, who had disappeared deep into the cave for reasons of privacy. “You already look beautiful to me, and with any luck, I’ll be the only one judging you today.”
She emerged with her hair neatly brushed out and her clothes, although tattered, slightly cleaner than the day before.
“What’s the plan?” she asked.
“First we check our trotlines and hopefully hang a dozen fish to dry. Next we check our snares and gather the rabbits that the Old One has provided us. Meanwhile, it would be nice to drop a plains buck, or an antelope at least. It would be good to have some extra meat drying, and we need the pelts. I would like to be back before the sun gets too low. I don’t want to have to work on my firestick project by the light of the moons; too dangerous. And that, my wonderful friend, is about it. Pretty simple, huh?”
“Simple is good,” she said. “Truth be told, I could live the rest of my life this way with you and be happy. Too bad we have a country to save.”
They embraced warmly and set out for the day. Staying off the main trail, they checked the trotlines and, in the end, had 14 fat fall trout hanging high to keep them away from the bears. Next, it being a lucky day, they dropped an enormous plains deer with an excellent shot by Diana, who was proving to be the far superior marksman. This too they suspended high in a tree using ropes they had painstakingly crafted from the Barnagad Poplar.
“Keep your eye out for Burnfast,” he said. “You remember what it looks like, right?”
“I do,” she said. “I’ve been looking, and I haven’t seen any.”
“Me too,” he said. “It is kind of rare.” He wiped his hands on some large ferns that were starting to wither with the arrival of the colder weather.
“Well then,” he said. “First of all, that was an amazing shot. I am impressed. You can handle all of the bow-and-arrow duties from now on.”
She smiled at him, blushing a little, and said, “Thank you, Jared. That is kind of you to say.”
You’re welcome,” he said. “Let’s keep moving. We want to get those snares checked. Don’t forget about the Burnfast. Now we really need it, unless you want to eat raw venison.”
He glanced up at the large deer hanging above them. “One more of those and one of us gets a warm cloak for the winter.”
“Me first.”
They smiled.
He checked the suspension ropes one last time to be sure they were secure, and they started out again.
In about an hour they had checked most of the snares. They were not as productive as either of them would have liked, but three rabbits were surely better than none. Together, they offered thanks to the Old One for His gifts.
Jared said, “Three left. Wait right here. I’m going to check right over there. See that patch of sand? Burnfast, you recall, loves sand. Stay in sight, now. Remember, just over that rise in front of us is the start of the Slovan Plains and you can be seen for miles. Make sure that you keep behind that rise.”
“Good point,” she said. “I’m going to get a quick drink from the stream.” She motioned at the stream right in front of them.
Jared made his way into the brush. He noticed something peculiar right away. Something, or someone, had recently crawled this way. He noticed a scant amount of blood. As the hairs on his neck all stood at attention he drew his knife and continued in.
The first thing he saw sticking up from the grass was a Human foot, grotesquely swollen and bloody. It was that of a girl, passed out, lying face down. He noticed that both of her feet were badly torn up. He checked her quickly for other wounds, or injuries, and found the large bloodstain on her flank. He tried to awaken her, but she remained unresponsive.
He quickly returned to tell Diana of his astonishing discovery, and together they rushed to her side. Gently, they rolled her over. Diana returned to the stream, where she hastily tore off a piece of her shirt and soaked it in water. Back she went, where she cleaned her face. They cleaned and checked her flank wound and found it was only a skin injury. However, from her color, it looked like she had lost a lot of blood.
“At least she’s still breathing,” said Diana. Her face too was white, from worry.
“What could possibly have happened to her?” asked Jared. “And what is she doing here?”
“We need to carry her to the stream,” said Diana. “Here, help me.”
They hoisted her up. Jared cradled her in his arms, and they returned to the stream’s edge.
“How much rope do we have left?” asked Diana. “Enough to make a litter?”
“If I go back and skin out that deer, we’ll have enough pelt to fasten to the two poles.”
“Do it then,” she said. “We’ll be right here. I need to get her undressed and cleaned up so I can check to see if there are any injuries we’ve missed.”
Jared gnawed at his lower lip but didn’t move.
Diana raised her eyebrows and asked, “What?”
“I don’t feel good about leaving you here. What if someone was chasing her, and they end up coming this way?”
“I’ll be fine,” she said. “This is not the time to think of what is best for us, but what is best for this poor thing. Go on now.”
He moved off, and Diana stripped her out of her filthy clothes, washing them in the stream and hanging them to dry. Fortunately, the day had warmed up nicely so she wasn’t worried that she would be cold. On the contrary, it was quite warm on the rocks upon which she lay. Next, she washed her feet hard. In a way, she was glad that the girl remained in a coma because the scrubbing she gave her feet would have been agony. By the time Jared returned, she had her redressed. Her clothes, while still damp, would dry out nicely the rest of the way in the afternoon sun. They fashioned a crude litter and took turns dragging it back to the cave, one dragging and one sweeping the trail behind them, arriving as the sun was setting in the western sky. It was troubling that the girl had not moved.
They eased her into the bed, and Diana covered her as b
est she could.
“What do you think?” asked Diana.
“Hard to say,” said Jared. “Hard to say. I’m going to get the fish. The deer will be gone by morning. Try and get some water into her, maybe?”
Diana nodded. “Be careful,” she said.
When Jared returned, he was carrying the hindquarters of their buck in addition to the fish. “We need this,” he said, “especially now that we seem to have a small family to feed. Any progress?”
“Some,” said Diana. “She has moaned a few times, but has never really come to. She has taken some water.
“Oh,” she said, “I forgot to tell you. She was wearing this around her neck. I found it on her back at the stream when I was cleaning her up.”
She held up Doreen’s necklace with the eye-catching, red stone. Jared was astonished and fell backwards, tripping over the hindquarters of the deer that he had brought in. He put his hand over his mouth.
“What is it?” asked Diana. “Jared, you look a fright.”
He didn’t answer her right away, prompting her to repeat the question.
“Well… it’s... you see… ” he stammered.
“Come now,” she said, “out with it. In the name of the Old One, you look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“Let me hang these,” he said, picking up the hindquarters of the deer. “I’ll be right back.”
He left the cave like he had been shot from a bow.
In a few minutes he returned. Diana sat at Doreen’s bedside, idly fingering the stone.
“You should put that back on her,” he said. His voice sounded odd.
“Jared,” she said, “Whatever has come over you? Come here. Sit by me. Tell me what’s wrong. I’ve not seen you like this. Tell me, please.”
He took the necklace from her and tenderly placed it around Doreen’s neck, carefully fastening the clasp and rotating it back around until it was positioned just so.
“Why are you so afraid of that little thing?” she asked.
He took a deep breath and said, “All right. Here goes. You remember I had in my possession, back at the cabin, my father’s collection of books?”
“Of course,” she said.
He held up his hand as if to tell her to let him finish, to let him get this whole thing out without being interrupted. “Sorry,” she said.
He nodded.
“I think I might have already told you that among the many volumes I had were some dedicated to prophecy. Most of the writings dealt with prophecy of history that has already taken place, which frankly always led me to suspect that perhaps the writer, or writers, had written them after the fact. You know, like they knew what had already taken place historically, so now they could spin yarns about how prophets of old had predicted these things. I always wondered if these things had been written not out of a sense of duty to the races, but in order to sell the concept of religion to the masses, not to mention selling the books themselves. Anyway,” he ran his hands through his hair, “There was this one book. It was completely different than all of the others. First of all, it was tiny. Most of the books, like those of the Sciences and History and the like, were large, large enough to require two hands to hold them. But this one would easily fit in the palm of your hand. I always liked that because I would oftentimes carry it with me when I was fishing, say, from shore, or sitting and waiting for a deer to come by, and read it while I waited for the Old One to reward me for my efforts. In fact, I read it more than I read any of the others for this very reason, because it was small. Secondly, it was written in ink, penned by a Human hand. The others were all, now please don’t think me strange, obviously written by some sort of machine. I know this, because all of the letters, you know the symbols that make up the words, were the same, whereas these were made by a quill dipped in ink and drawn across the page. And the pages,” his face was now full of wonder as he thought back to this small volume that had obviously meant so much to him, “were not like the others. They seemed to be made of some sort of super-hard membrane. And, oh yes, contained in the binder were small, colored ribbons used for marking your place. It was an incredible little book.” He paused. “Lastly, the cover, the binder, fit together so perfectly that it was actually watertight. Imagine that. I know this to be true because I accidentally dropped it in a puddle once, but fortunately had sealed it up before it slipped from my hand, and to my amazement when I retrieved it, the pages had not suffered the insult of one drop of water.”
He finished.
“I’m confused,” she said, “What does this have anything to do with this young girl?”
“Yes,” he said, “of course.”
He closed his eyes and went back in time. He spoke as if in a trance.
“There will come a dark time when the Trolls will be led by one with a heart as black as the darkest night. Under his command they will subjugate the Gnomes. The Gnomes will then fight with them as the only means to their survival. Together, then, they will try to eliminate every remaining Human, Elf, and Dwarf from our world, and they will never stop until this they have done. Nothing done by those that survive the first assault will matter, except to forestall the inevitable, for the force that hunts them will be too great. The final attack will come in the spring after the fall of the Great Wall. Left to themselves, all will perish.
“But from beyond the stars there will arrive a lost girl, on the verge of womanhood, in the great reaches of the Ravenwild forests, who can be their savior if she is herself first saved. She will travel to the Enchanted Northland, spelled since the time of the Great War by twelve great wizards, whose bones will have long since turned to dust, but whose sorcery will never weaken nor fail. There she will match wits with the Dukkar, a creature given life from lifelessness by the power of those same twelve wizards, and if successful, she will come to possess a talisman that will give her more power than has ever been seen on this world, since even before the Great War.
“If she fails, all is lost.
“She will be recognized by those who save her by the blood-red gemstone that she wears on her neck, on the finest of golden chain. It will be in the shape of a heart, and two serpents will wrestle at its center. Take great care with this precious stone, for it will be how she finds her way home.”
He finished, opening his eyes. Now it was Diana’s turn to cover her mouth in wonder.
He noticed that she had moved backwards away from the bed.
“Could it be?” she asked.
“Not only could it be,” he answered, “it looks like it is.”
“May the Old One show us mercy,” she said softly, “and guide us now in what we must do.”
Jared whispered, “Amen.”
Chapter 16
She couldn’t get the butterfly to talk to her, no matter how hard she tried. It truly seemed like it was trying to, and she honestly thought she could hear something when she leaned in real close, but she knew she was probably imagining things.
Until now, she had spoken briefly with a furry little chipmunk-like creature, and a beautiful blue bird with a bright red beak, but that was it.
So, after she had finished eating as many berries as she could, as well as some odd fruit that looked somewhat like an apple, but tasted more like a sweetened pine cone, and drank her fill of water from a spring that Cinnamon had found while out exploring the day before, she had spied this awesome insect and was giving it her best shot.
It was almost a fatal mistake to lose herself so in her attempt to communicate with it, because by concentrating on it as hard as she was, she failed to hear Cinnamon’s cry to climb back up to safety until it was almost too late. In fact, Cinnamon had to use an old-fashioned cat scream to get her to jerk her head up, and she spied the problem as soon as she did: A pack of Wolves, not a hundred yards away from her, over on the far side of the same clearing where she now lay on her belly. She sprang for the vine at the same time as the Wolves sprang for her and was shocked to see how fast they made it over to her.
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br /> As the jaws of the closest one snapped within inches of her ankle, she shrieked, and was all at once glad she had not shied away from the exercises on the ropes in gym class. Down to the ground it flopped, rolling once and springing back upright.
“Nice try, Brutus,” one called out.
“Yeah, nice try,” called out some of the others.
Jacqueline continued her climb until she was way back up in the treetops and had rejoined Cinnamon, who admonished her by saying, “Well now. That can never happen again, can it? Never. This is not your backyard in Salem, Connecticut! These are the wilds on a strange planet, and there are lots of animals here to whom we are lunch. What were you doing, anyway? Didn’t you hear me calling you?”
She saw her young friend was trembling mightily, so she stopped herself and hopped into her lap, rubbing as close to her as she could.
“Oh my dear girl, I’m sorry for having lambasted you like that, but you gave me such a fright. That was a close one, but we won’t let it happen again, will we. It’s my fault, really. I should have been closer to you; it’s just that I can hardly see anything, what with all these leaves … There, there, now. It’s all right. It’s all right. Take a deep breath. That’s it. Good.”
It was several minutes before she had calmed down enough to be able to speak.
“Oh, Cinnamon,” she said. “That was the scariest thing that has ever happened to me.” As she said it, she unconsciously fiddled with the ruby on her necklace, which sparkled brightly in the morning sun.
“Of course it was. Never before have you had to think of yourself as somebody else’s idea of a snack. Now you know, and we won’t take any more chances.”
“Can they get at us up here?”
“Of course not, dear. Come now. You know better than that. Wolves can’t climb trees, now can they?”
“No, I suppose they can’t. Of course they can’t. I know that. Oh my, Cinnamon. That was so terrible. Holy S-word.”
