Chapter Text
Part One: Sorrow
Consciousness returned abruptly, several sensations registering at once: the cold, hard ground; the rocks and twigs digging into my back; leaves rustling overhead as the wind blew through the trees; and the feeling of insects crawling through my hair .
I shrieked, eyes flying open as I rolled over onto my knees and clawed my hands through my short hair, trying to shake out the insects that I could feel crawling . Panicking, I stood and clawed at my scalp, flinging my hands away when I touched one of the insects. Long, agonizing minutes passed as I sobbed, ferreting out every last insect I could still feel crawling on my head.
After reassuring myself that my hair was free of the nasty bugs, I took big, gulping breaths as I tried to calm my racing heart.
With my heart still pounding in my chest, I looked around, brow furrowing as I tried to figure out why I was lying on the dirt. I was almost phobic about insects crawling on me in my sleep, there’s no way in hell that I would have willingly laid down on the bare dirt.
Yet there was nothing in my immediate surroundings, no tent, sleeping bag, not even a blanket.
Grabbing the front of my shirt, I slowly turned around, taking in my surroundings. I stood in the middle of a dirt path with trees and brush lining the path as far as I could see. The path was wider than the hiking paths I’d walked with friends, more of a path for a forest ranger to drive down, maybe?
The trees themselves were taller than I’d ever seen in my life, easily well over two hundred years old. How much older must they be, I wondered distantly, the thought oddly separate from my panicky consciousness.
Swallowing past the lump in my throat, I closed my eyes a moment to steel my nerves. I’d always had issues with anxiety; I had lived with it so long that I had made my peace going through life with it haunting my every action. But right now, it had to take a back seat. Running around like a chicken with its head cut off was not good.
Taking another deep breath and slowly releasing it, I opened my eyes and took stock of my surroundings with clearer eyes.
The fact that I was on a pathway was good. That meant that I wasn’t lost someplace that would make finding my way back to civilization impossible.
Looking down at my clothes, I figured that they were also a good indication that I couldn’t be far from civilization. I was wearing my normal summer clothes: jeans, boots, and a short sleeved shirt. If I had been planning on going camping, I’d be wearing a different set of clothes more suited to long hours without air conditioning. Even if I couldn’t remember how I got here, I remembered that much about myself.
“Alright,” I told myself. “Alright, alright, alright. I can do this. Let’s get going.”
Looking down either direction of the path I was on, I debated which way would be the best to start heading down. If it was a path for forest rangers to drive down, then it was possible it could go on for miles before anything was in sight. But that would also mean there could be a ranger station at the end, one of those forest watch towers in case of fires, or maybe a cabin they would use to sleep in when it got dark.
Taking another deep breath, I turned to my left and began walking with determination. My legs were aching within minutes, but the ever present anxiety urged me on in the hopes that something, someone, was around just around the corner.
Unfortunately, the longer I walked, the more the anxiety was taking over again, turning into panic. I saw no trail signs, no outhouses, no short wooden fences. Hell, I didn’t even see any furrows from tires going over the soft earth.
I tried to reassure myself that it wouldn’t be long now, that I would see something. The dirt path was obviously traveled, pitted with tracks from animals and people. Just because that was all I saw didn’t mean I had picked the wrong direction.
But with the thought suddenly in my head, panic set in.
I took off at a slow jog, increasing my pace until I was flat out running. Just around the next corner! There had to be something, someone! Tears began to streak down my cheeks and my vision became blurry, but onwards I ran until I stepped on a rock jutting out from the ground, my ankle turning and making me fly forward, catching myself on my elbows before my face could slam into the dirt. The shock from my arms ramming into my breasts stole my breath and I lay there, quietly sobbing and gasping, for several long minutes.
Once the tears had slowed to a trickle and I regained my breath, I slowly rose to my knees and picked up the neck of my shirt to wipe the tears and snot from my face.
“Fuck,” I muttered angrily. “FUCK.” I scrubbed harder at my face, anger now replacing the panic and filling me with resolute determination. No one was going to come for me and I wasn’t going to find anyone anytime soon. The only one I could rely on at this point was myself, and damned if I wasn’t going to let myself down.
Gritting my teeth and refusing to start crying again as the pain in my arms began registering, I stood and began walking again. This time, the pace I set was reasonable and wouldn’t tire me out within minutes.
It wasn’t long until I heard the distant sounds of...something. Chills went down my back as I drew closer to them but hope began to rise in my chest.
Battle.
They were the sounds of battle.
The sounds of steel clashing against steel, people shouting as they fought against one another, and people dying.
I must be close to an SCA event! That meant people who could help me!
I sped up, jogging down the path. The sounds of battle grew louder with every step and my relief with it. I could now see a bright light at the end of the path, the trees suddenly falling away and letting the sunlight shine full down on the earth.
Coming to the edge of the treeline, I came to a stop and beheld the battle waging in front of me. It was a small battle, maybe about fifty participants, but already a fourth of those participants lay on the ground, defeated and playing dead while their comrades continued the fight.
I looked around, trying to see past the clusters of fighters. There had to be an encampment close by, or even a place for spectators to watch the battle. In the distance, I saw what looked like a medieval fort. That must be where the non-combatants were staying while the fight waged on.
Circling the treeline, I looked for a ‘corpse’ that was far enough from the fighting that I wouldn’t risk interrupting them and getting myself injured. There were bodies heaped upon each other closer to the fighting, fake blood splattering the trampled grass beneath. I was looking for the ‘corpses’ further away, the ones who had 'died' first when the battle began.
Halfway to the other side of the battle, I finally found a ‘corpse’ close enough to not interrupt the fighters. I kept myself low to the ground, to make myself as unobtrusive as possible, and edged closer to the person laying on the grass in a pool of fake blood.
Once I was kneeling beside them, the knees of my jeans soaking in the fake blood, I reached down to nudge their shoulder, hoping I wouldn’t startle them too badly.
As I reached down, I noticed that their ears were curiously pointed, quite long in fact. A very well done prosthesis--but I suddenly couldn’t remember if the SCA allowed fantasy elements in their events.
I reached out, hand on the person’s shoulder, and stopped cold.
The wind had shifted and I could finally smell the blood.
The very real blood.
SWISH!
I fell back just in time to narrowly avoid the blade that cut into the body in front of me. I looked up, eyes wide, and saw Death.
This was not an SCA battle.
“Well, well, well, what do we have here,” Death spoke, lifting his blade from the corpse, the indescribable sound impossibly loud in my ears. “A carrion bird looking to feast upon the dead before the battle’s even done?”
I swallowed, mouth suddenly dry. Trembling from head to toe, I scrambled backwards, eyes flicking between Death and the bloody sword he wielded.
“Come now,” Death said, watching me as he stepped closer menacingly. “Did you honestly think we wouldn’t notice a stranger skulking about the field?”
“Please,” I said, voice high. “Please don’t hurt me.”
Death laughed. “Begging for mercy already? My, you’re a cowardly thing, aren’t you!” He stepped closer as I scrambled back further, hands digging into trampled grass for purchase as my boots slipped uselessly on the blood soaking the earth.
“Please, I just got lost, please, I just wanted to find a way to get home!”
Death stopped laughing and snarled down at me. “We all want to go home, knife-ears, yet here we are!” He lifted his blade high and swung down.
I rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding the blade as it sunk into the earth. On hands and knees, I scrambled around Death, back toward the body. I don’t know why, but instinct had me moving toward it.
“Come back, come back, little carrion bird,” Death crooned at me, jerking his blade free of the ground.
Back at the body, I ignored the revulsion at touching dead flesh as I searched for, I don’t know, something that I could use to defend myself.
Hearing Death come up behind me and laughing again, knowing he had me caught, my hand closed around what I had been instinctively searching for and I swung around just in time to catch the downward swing with the flat of the blade I now held.
Death’s eyes narrowed. “You best put that down, knife-ears, lest you stick yourself with the wrong end.”
I grinned then, viciously, fear and panic filling me with adrenaline. “Bite me,” I said, using my legs as leverage to help me push his blade up and away.
Death watched me stand and take a stance, holding the blade in front of me with one hand, body angled. His eyes were narrowed suspiciously, now seeing me as a credible threat.
“So the pig of an elf thinks she can wield a blade,” he taunted, holding his own blade steady. “I could never have guessed with how much your gut protrudes.”
The sounds of the battle behind me faded away, my concentration now focused on the opponent in front of me. He was taller than me, which meant a longer reach. He was also more physically fit, which meant he would be faster than me as well. With his height and strength, he could easily overwhelm me. That is what he would be thinking, even with my little show of leveraging away his blade with ease.
It was something I had often used in my fencing bouts, the assumption. Short and fat, I couldn’t possibly outmaneuver a taller, more athletic opponent.
Death lunged forward, sword raised in both hands for an overhead slash. A foolish move.
I leapt back, sword arm swinging the blade up, catching the downward slash, and deftly knocked it to the side and away from me.
Death’s momentum kept him moving and our shoulders collided as his body moved in the path of his sword.
The blow spun me around and I cried out in pain, reflexively bringing a hand up to clutch at my shoulder.
“Bitch!” Death snarled, already recovering.
Gritting my teeth, I brought my blade up in time to parry another slash from his blade.
Clang, clang, clang .
With every parry, he forced me to give up ground. The blow to my shoulder earlier hampered my movements, just barely keeping me from being sliced to bits. The pain and lost ground was starting to boil in my veins, my competitiveness rearing its head.
“Enough!” I screamed, forcing his blade away with more strength than I’d been using. The scream distracted him as his blade slid past me once again.
I went on the offensive.
I ducked low and thrust the sword forward, my back leg kicking off my lunge with all the strength I could muster.
Death’s eyes went wide and he dodged to the side, the sharp tip of my blade sliding past him. The blue surcoat gaped open at the side, neatly sliced where my blade had passed.
“Shit,” I heard him say just before I pressed him with another attack, coming in close with a slice instead of a thrust.
He went on the defensive, startled by the gap between my appearance and my aggression. However, it wasn’t long before he recovered from the shock and began meeting my blade with his, the force of his blows resonating down my arm.
Panting, I knew I wouldn’t last long at the level we were fighting. I had to do something to gain the advantage, anything.
I tripped over the corpse’s outstretched arm, the limb rolling under my foot and sending me crashing to the ground, winded as I landed on my back.
Death stood over me, panting as well. “About. Fucking. Time,” he wheezed. “For such a fat elf, you know your way around a sword.” He collapsed to his knees over me, throwing his sword away and pushing mine away as well.
Shit.
Was he…?
“I’m going to enjoy this,” he said, leaning down.
I balled my hands at my sides, tensed my muscles, and threw a punch to the bottom of his ribcage.
Death winced and curled around where I’d punched him, giving me time to get my legs under him and thrust him away, sending him flying off of me.
Wasting no time, I scrambled over and grabbed the nearest sword, turning and bringing the edge of the blade slicing with all my strength where a gorget should have been protecting his neck.
Death gurgled, eyes wide as blood spurted around the blade buried in his unprotected neck.
Horror dawned on me as I let go of the blade still lodged in Death’s neck.
The man tried to say something but all that came out was gurgling and more blood.
He fell forward and I hurriedly backed away on my hands, body trembling and boots sliding in the slick combination of dirt and blood.
I rolled over onto my hands and knees and acid ripped it’s way out of my throat, burning the roof of my mouth as I threw up anything and everything that had been in my stomach.
Crying from the pain and horror, I looked up as sound burst into life. I was still on the edge of the battlefield and all around me were people fighting and dying.
And I had just contributed to the body count.
I got to my feet and looked around, sniffling and hugging myself. The people closest to me were concentrating on the fight, and presumably not dying, a very good distance away.
Taking a deep breath and trying not to choke on the remaining taste of bile, I squatted down and looked around at the bodies at my feet. As much as the flat, lifeless bodies chilled me to the core, I wasn’t going to survive long if the rest of the fighters came at me. Which meant I’d have to get some type of gear.
Just being practical, I told myself over and over, a mantra, as I blinked away the horrified tears and tried not to cringe at the touch of cooling flesh.
The first corpse had a leather backpack. I couldn’t tell what was in it, but I took it anyway. Looking at the two swords that lay nearby, I couldn’t tell which one I could least stand touching. One was covered in the man’s blood, the other in the blood of who knows who else.
Squeezing my eyes shut for a moment and clenching my fists, I steeled my nerves. Looking back at the swords, I grabbed the smallest one, the one I had used already.
Glancing back over my shoulder toward the fighting, I edged back towards the edge of the forest, clutching the hilt of the sword and holding it warily between me and a bunch of people who would kill me if they noticed me.
“Thank fuck,” I breathed as I made it to the dirt pathway I had left. I looked over my shoulder again, checking to see if anybody had noticed me. There were a lot less people and by the looks of it, the ones left over were all from the same group, wearing blue surcoats half stained with blood.
“Fuck fuck fuck,” I panicked, turning around and high tailing it the fuck out of there, running as fast as I could with a bare sword and leather backpack weighing me down.
I got to the bend of the road and instead of turning, ran straight through the brush along the side and leapt over fallen branches, trying not to fall as I ran headlong through unfamiliar territory.
“FUCK!”
I tripped over an outstretched root, falling headfirst on the other side of it, my chest and stomach hitting other roots haphazardly sticking out of the ground. The sword fell from my limp hand.
I wheezed, whimpering with pain. Fuck, that hurt.
My breath catching, I hefted myself up slowly and looked up at the large tree whose roots I had tripped on. It was easily the largest tree I had ever seen, even larger than the three-hundred year old oak I had once seen in a park.
The roots of the tree were pulled half out of the ground, leaving a large enough hole beneath them that any opportunistic animal could create a den.
Or a human could hide.
Groaning, I struggled to my feet, reaching down to grab the sword once more. I tossed it and the backpack into the hole before looking for some fallen branches, dragging them over and hiding half the entrance as best I could.
I slipped down through the other half, rolling onto my stomach before I started clawing up dirt and pushing it toward the other half of the opening, making it smaller and less noticeable.
I slowed to a stop, fresh tears spilling down my cheeks as I sat back in the hollow, the backpack lumpy against my back.
“Fuck this shit,” I sobbed, lifting the neck of my shirt to hide my face. “What the fuck is even going on .”
Overwhelmed, I started crying in earnest, sobbing quietly.