Chapter Text
These woods are a terrible place to be wandering at night-time. She knows that, because it is a matter of common sense. That dark magic and nightmarish creatures emerge from the humid earth when the moon is up in the sky. And, even if that part were not to be true, there are always dangers lurking under the thick cover of the trees, ones more prosaic in nature, hidden away in the dark.
She knows that, she knows that well. Many have been lost to the forest before. Some of them were stronger and braver than her. And yet, she finds herself trekking through the underbush, clad in light clothing as if she didn’t even possess one ounce of sensibility in her body.
The truth is that she had not planned on staying away from home this long. She had intended to return before sunset, before the sun even grazed the horizon in the far west. But day had turned into night faster than she had predicted, as it usually happened this close to the winter solstice. And now, here she is.
Her mind does not want to admit that she is lost. There is too much pride at stake, because she is supposed to know the area surrounding the village like the back of her hand. No one dares enter the woods as frequently as her. That is the reason why she always has the finest herbs, the freshest fruits and berries, the rarest roots. That is why the village people tolerate her and fear her in equal measures ‒because she has come back alive more times than any other person there.
Well, that can be about to change.
The thick, humid air makes moving almost as hard as if she were wadding through a lake, calm and refreshing but heavy with lime at her feet. Roots and low branches tug at her skirt and make her shoes get stuck. She can feel a few shallow cuts on her skin, not bothersome except for the stinging, and the heavy weight of the wicker basket on her back. Clearly, she has been too ambitious today, too greedy, and that has caused her not only to be late, but also to carry too much weight for her own good. Her movements are slow, and the muscles in her legs ache dully.
Oh, what she wouldn’t give for a gulp of water.
But that’s a worry for later, if she makes it to her hut without getting into more trouble. For she knows there are eyes watching her every move from the shadows, eyes that could belong to the animals of the night or to something else entirely.
She pretends she doesn’t feel their stare. She pretends the cold sheen of sweat that lines her spine is completely natural in this kind of weather, just like the trembling in her limbs is only due to physical exhaustion. She refuses to acknowledge that presence, that unnamed thing that keeps following her through the woods.
When she sees a flickering flame in the distance, her rattling breath halts all of a sudden. There is only one thing that she knows can produce fire such as that. It is so far away that it looks like a dying light in the middle of a tempest, but she knows better ‒recognises that deep, warm colour and knows too well that there should not be any fires like that one alight in the open.
So she walks faster, moves with the last remnants of her strength towards the light. It takes some effort, because her body is the most tired she ever remembers it being, and expectation rolls funnily in her stomach, but finally ‒finally!‒ the woods seem to thin until they don’t block the moonlight from above. Just a little longer, and the trees turn into bushes, and the bushes open to let her see a path in the dirt, and the path then leads her to a meadow. It is tiny and secluded and barely fitting of the name, but it is home.
“Thank the goddesses, you’re back.”
There is no time for her to get her breathing even before a pair of sturdy arms are encasing her in a hug, constricting and too warm, but void of all ill intention.
“Yeah”, she rasps out, “somehow I wasn’t expecting that, either.”
The man hugging her lets go suddenly and fixes her with a hard stare.
“You know it’s dangerous out there. You should be more careful.”
There is heat coming off in waves from where he touches her, big hands clamped down on her shoulders. It is too hot, even when it comes to him and his unnaturally high body temperature, and she can’t help but wonder.
“Wait. Ace, what in tarnation is that?”
Only then she seems to notice the giant bonfire, preoccupied as she was in the brunet’s embrace. It has been lit in the middle of the clearing; it burns and roars like a fiery pillar towards the night sky. The flames are a deep orange colour, different from any other fire she has ever seen. It also smells distantly of cedarwood, although there is nothing like that feeding the flames. It is not a normal fire, and so it does not behave like one. Because, despite being unrestricted and surrounded by grass, it holds itself as well as if it were tamed.
“That’s your beacon for coming back home, of course!” The cheeky smile he is directing towards her is only made warmer by the shining of the flames.
She supresses a sigh of relief. It is true. If not for Ace’s fiery signal, she might have not found the way back. “Let’s go, then. And don’t misunderstand my gratitude, but you shouldn’t be out of bed.”
Ace rolls his eyes playfully. “I just saved your life and you chide me like some kid-”
She laughs it off and pushes him towards the humble cabin she calls home. At their backs, the burning fire column extinguishes as if it had never been there in the first place. Only a faint burn mark is left on the ground.
Ace keeps going on about something she only partially hears. When he crosses the threshold, bowing his head a little as to not hit it, she stays outside just for a little bit longer. The night is clear and calm. The moon shines over the clearing, bathing it in silver light and soft shadows. But beyond the meadow, not so far away, all light dies at the treeline, casting the world under total darkness.
And, despite not being capable of seeing a single thing, she feels in her bones a presence lurking there, by the forest’s limits. Something sets in the pit of her stomach like a rock, but she does not want to give it a name.
With one final glance back, she enters the hut and closes the door behind her with intention.
.
∞
.
The next day, she wakes up early to make sure all the sigils are in place around the threshold and the windowpanes. The presence can be no longer felt, so she sets up to check on the markings she left long ago on the trees that surround the meadow. They are old, deep scratches in the bark that look like scars covered with dried sap and moss. But they are in place, intact and fully functional. They hum with a faint rumbling at contact with her fingertips, the energy flowing from her to the trees, and back. It is a pleasant feeling.
Satisfied, she goes back to the cabin, much more relaxed than before.
“You know”, starts Ace, already making breakfast, “things like those are why they call you a witch.” He signals to the sigils engraved on the wooden door with an obvious look, but does not comment on his distaste for them. After all, they are designed to keep at bay all magic creatures that harbour contempt. And, even though he has never meant any harm to her, his magical blood still tingles uncomfortably every time he crosses the front door.
That is why he sticks to the inside of the cabin most of the time. That, and the fact that the villagers are scared shitless of him. No matter how many times she tells them that the young man is not dangerous, they just do not listen. They do not seem to care that he has been injured either. They just want him gone.
“I don’t care what they think”, she frowns.
The bacon in the iron pan frizzles, oozing grease and a mouth-watering scent.
“Maybe you should.” Ace does not look at her while talking, a sign that he is, for once, being serious. “They come less and less these days. If you’re not careful, soon they won’t come at all.”
That is, indeed, true. The villagers used to come to her for herbal remedies of all kinds ‒from wart cream to supposedly aphrodisiac perfumes. They also visited when someone was in dire need of a healing hand, for she knows how to set bones back into their sockets and mend broken limbs. Other simply wanted commodities, like the special mix she crafts for an excellent infusion from wild roses and peaches.
She exchanges her services for coin or other things with value as a fair price for her art. And, even if there is no magic in the things she does for the village people, they have always called her a witch. They are too scared to say that to her face, but she knows better.
All in all, things were good enough.
Until Ace came, at least. She had found him in the woods one day, terribly wounded an unconscious. Sha had taken the young man to her cabin, helped him heal. Soon enough she had learnt that he was no ordinary man at all. In fact, he was not even human.
The villagers had taken note of him whenever they came to ask a favour, of his fiery eyes and the bite in his words, as well as his wild temper. Rumours had begun to spread, about the mysterious stranger that lived with the witch near the woods. It had not been until the day he almost set the son of the butcher on fire that they had started to call him a demon. From that point onwards, the visits had started to diminish in number.
She knows better than to blame Ace, though. Being a fire creature is not easy, especially one that has been fatally wounded. Sometimes during the recovery process he had had serious trouble controlling his flames. He had recurrent nightmares, called names in his sleep. Also, he had been very hostile towards her at first. Only when he had started to make progress in healing from the nasty wound in his chest ‒which had almost pierced all the way through him‒ she understood that the lad had gone through some awful things in his life. So, with patience and care, she had managed to trade the scoff in his features for a smile, the hurt for a happy-go-lucky attitude.
It is not his fault that the trade is at a low, no. He is a fine person, actually. It is the villagers, with their superstitions and presumptuous assumptions, that should bear the blame.
The both of them eat their breakfast in quiet companionship. It is unusual that the brunet is this silent, but not unpleasant. Maybe, she thinks, he is still a little thrown off by the villagers issue, or maybe something else completely. For a brief moment, she wonders if he has felt that quiet sentience in the woods the night prior, too, but dismisses it quickly. For the very virtues she is sure he has, Ace is not the subtle type.
It is, indeed, difficult to take him seriously when there is so much grease dripping down his chin and when he downs the fresh milk in giant, noisy gulps. She cannot help but chuckle, and the worries she had at the start of the day vanish immediately.
.
∞
.
It is just like Ace had said. The villagers’ visits grow sparse, and when they do come, it is always with fear and distrust clear in their eyes.
They are wary of the lad, they both know. That is why Ace hides away whenever there is someone calling at her cabin’s door. He hasn’t burnt anyone since that one time, but she doubts that matters much now that the harm is done.
However, they are still uneasy. It does not take very long for her to understand that they are starting to become hostile, too ‒and it is directed to her. Not Ace, not the magic symbols. Her.
It is an inconspicuous thing, at first. It starts with heated glances when they think she is none the wiser. Next time, some old lady comes for a fertility remedy, and the apple basket she gives her as a reward has one rotten fruit at the bottom, smartly hidden from view, and it soon spoils all the others, making them go to waste. Then, a man whose finger she had to amputate spits on her doorstep on his way out, calling her nasty names she tries very hard to forget, but cannot. Later, Ace offers himself to teach the bastard a lesson in chivalry, the freckles on his cheeks burning like embers. She declines, politely but firmly. It is better not to walk straight into their game.
The worst comes when a couple of villagers come to her cabin wailing and pointing fingers, accusing her of killing their only daughter. They manage to explain among screams of rage and curses that the lass died bleeding from the inside, crying for mercy while her vowels pierced through her in never-ending agony. It had been that moon tea she had given her, made to make her monthly blood appear. She knows both facts are unrelated, that even if that kind of herbs can actually be deadly, she did not give the villagers’ daughter enough to cause a poisoning. The most reasonable explanation is that the lass was struck by the piercing abdomen, an uncurable illness that kills as fast as lightning, and messily. But the villagers do not want to hear reason ‒they are consumed by loss, devastating and unadulterated loss, and they turn to anger so they can pull through the void.
There is no comfort that night, only silence. Ace tries, but she prefers it like that, quiet and numb. She is used to being alone, to mourn with the stars as her only witnesses.
.
∞
.
As time passes, her fiery companion’s condition improves greatly. It should not come as a surprise, since he is a preternatural being, but it is still striking. The deep, gruesome carving in his chest has regenerated with unconceivable velocity. Now, it is only scarring tissue, darker than the rest of his skin ‒a permanent reminder of whatever traumatic event that has happened to him. She has asked, of course, but he has never cared to tell her. She figures it is still too fresh of a memory. Too raw.
He insists that she accompanies him the first part of the journey, as a way to say their farewells. She acquiesces, albeit a bit reluctantly. It is the middle of winter, after all, and although it does not usually snow around these parts, the path gets tricky and the cold is dangerous.
“Don’t worry 'bout the cold, lass!” Ace laughs unabashedly. “I am a human bonfire, after all.”
She tries not to let his smile get to her and grumbles about how it is the return journey what troubles her, since she has to go back on her own.
Alone. She does not want to think about it that much. She was supposed to be a lone wolf, always isolated, only reaching to others for undeniable necessities, and nothing else. But, somehow, now the prospect of returning to an empty, cold cabin makes her a tad melancholic. She blames the lad and his shining grin for that, absolutely.
They trek through the silent woods like they were the only living creatures moving under the dark canopy. The air is damp with the perspiration of plants and fungi, the thick tapestry above preventing the humidity to escape towards the sky. It smells like decay, which is, ironically enough, the scent of life.
Fortunately, Ace fills the eerie silence with a constant flow of words in rapid succession. He teases her relentlessly, saying that for a witch, she is too wary of the woods. She defends herself, saying that she is no witch, and then retaliates in kind. The playful banter goes on and on, making her forget about the quietness that is unnatural even for the cold season.
When the sun reaches its peak in the sky ‒or so they presume, for there is no way to know for sure‒ they arrive to the place of their parting.
There is an old shrine erected in the middle of a wild-looking clearing among the fir trees. It is too large for an ancient shrine dedicated to the goddesses of the forest. It takes almost all the space in the clearing. The signs of abandonment, however, are painfully present. Otherwise, it would have been an outstanding temple.
“This is where we go our separate ways.” Ace tends his open hand in the space between them, happy grin a tad duller than usual. “I know I have nothing to repay your kindness-“
She interrupts him with a shake of her head. “It is not necessary. Friends need not pay.”
There is a spark in in his eyes when he hears the term ‘friend’ leave her mouth, and his demeanour lightens again.
“Even so”, he argues, “the custom provides I give you something in return.” He turns towards the looming entrance of the shrine. “This used to be a sacred place for my people, back when… When our father was alive.”
That right there has been the most personal piece of himself he has ever revealed in her presence. Not only that he had a father, but that he has siblings, too, somewhere. Is that where he is going now, back to them? She hopes so, wishes that wherever he is going, he is able to find the inner peace he seems to lack.
“If you ever find yourself in need, don’t hesitate to come here, and you shall find a helping hand.”
He kisses her cheek, warm and honest like a brother would, and the next moment he is gone. Vanished in the moist air as if he had never been there, right next to her.
She remains rooted to the spot, almost frozen now that his warming presence has been replaced by the chilly winter air. The shrine attracts her eyes like a black hole does light, an unnatural pull that twists gravity and compels her to come forth, to get closer, to cross the vacant threshold that hides even gloomier secrets than the forest that surrounds it.
She turns and begins to walk the path that leads back to her cabin, afraid of the invisible power the place holds over her. Why would Ace tell her to come here if she is ever in danger? She feels anything but safe next to the ancient construction.
With a sigh, she shakes her head. It does not matter anymore. She has to focus on the road ahead, least she gets lost again. This time there will be no welcoming fire guiding her safely home.
.
∞
.
One week. One week is all it takes for things to turn awry.
It is difficult to pin down the exact reason. Maybe there are so many that it simply is not possible to single them down to only one. Is it because the villagers have ‒somehow‒ found out that Ace no longer lives with her? Is it because they think she is defenceless? Is it because their patience has finally run empty? She honestly has no idea. All that she knows for sure is that one day the grain supply that feeds the little village goes rotten, and the next a mob o furious people come to her cabin with torches and forks and knives, seeking bloody revenge for an imaginary affront.
They lock her in her own cabin. The sigils she has carefully craved all around the tiny meadow do not prevent their unsolicited entry, for that magic does not work against the evil of human beings.
She is scared. Now, she wishes she had listened to Ace and made some effort to make these people understand that she is not a witch, not a threat. However, deep down, she fears that no pleading could have changed their minds.
They set the cabin on fire with her trapped inside. She knows these flames are not like those of her friend ‒these are vexing and hungry, they lap at the wooden structure and consume everything that had once been hers.
Escape, she needs to escape, or she will be a part of the ashen pile in the middle of the meadow come morning. Just ash and charred bones.
She refuses. Oh, she refuses with an intensity such that it boils in her veins and sets her jaw in a firm line. She squares her shoulders and gathers her resolve, quickly, ignoring the shouts and hollers that come from the outside. They are cheering for her death.
Sooner than expected, the smoke clouds her senses and burns in her lungs. A deep itch scratches at her throat from the inside. Sweat dampens her clothes as she looks for an exit, but everything is dark. A cough hacks her chest. And then another, and another, and then she is not able to stop them.
She does what she can to gather a few things ‒not the ones she would need on her escape, but rather, whatever she can grab on her way to the small window in the storage room at the back of the cabin.
She knows she is not coming back for the rest.