CHAPTER TWO

The blending cacophony of cicadas and crickets in the early morning hours eased me back into the waking realm, and I took a deep breath of the misty air before opening my eyes. For a fleeting moment, I forgot the horror of yesterday. Realization struck me as I wiped the morning dew from my forehead, and recoiled upon feeling the raised symbol and gasped while it settled itself in my memory. As the streaks of red-tinged dew on my palm glistened in the low sun, I traced over my skin, hoping my Marks had somehow vanished. I was gravely disappointed but not surprised when the first crevice circled my fingertip, then another, much like the shifting refraction of light through water. With a defeated sigh, I brushed the dirt from my shoulder and listened through the insect chorus for the telltale bubbling of a stream for water. In the back of my mind, I wondered if my Marks could cause a fever with all this dirt rubbed in. I chose a direction and started walking.

The sun had not yet gotten to the top of the sky when I noticed a rumbling in my stomach. I was so focused on other things that I had not eaten in a day. The village would be easy enough to find if I followed the smoldery scent of a woodfire and burnt hair. I would not be able to see smoke through the thick cover of leaves.

The hill the village was built on generations ago rose higher than the surrounding forest, except the fields for seasonal crop, which laid upon the natural decline northward, the side that captured all the sun for the better part of every day, with the exception of yesterday and probably onward. As I approached, the giant shadow of the living wooden monument covered the land, reaching opposite it did last night from the sinking sun. The being still covered the eastern sky and blocked the setting sun. I wondered exactly how far it rose from the village- or what remained of it. The sky was still unnaturally cloudy with dust stirred from its eruption, and thick dirt coated every surface, even upon the plants, undoing the season’s growth. I chose each step carefully as I got closer. When the new layer of dirt was and rotated to the topmost layer, it brought with it small roots, rocks, threshed plants, and even small animals caught in the movement.

I suppose I wouldn’t have died alone, in a way.

The fresh soil was soft and uncompressed, and the dark clay mingled with lighter sandier dirt, black and mudlike deeper soil, having gently tumbled upon itself. Small piles crested with fertile soil lined my path as I climbed the very ravine I had escaped through last night.

The village lie smoldering, whimpering its last words through the occasional shift and collapse of buildings with burned-through supports. The unmistakable scent of charcoal overpowered the musty dirt that layered everything else. No dwelling was completely untouched. Each building invited sun between the walls of dried clay: the thatch roofs were gone, as were the doors and any wood furnishings inside. I stepped over black powdery soil surrounding what was my home. My roof was only half-burned at the doorway where my fire had spawned, my things miraculously untouched.

How did I control this? Did I even control it?

I made my way to my bedding and grabbed a wool blanket to cover myself with, and tore some linen for a bandage. I tested the strip with a stretch and found it usable. Careful not to brush against the symbol on my forehead, I draped it across and tied it under my filthy tangled hair. This ought to keep it safe from view, I thought. I knotted the front of the blanket to keep it from slipping from my aching shoulders as I walked out, stepping over blackened bones. I did not give a backwards glance.

The storehouse had lost its cover and black tendrils of smoke inlaid the exterior but the inside seemed relatively intact. I snatched a vase of yeast and some flour, but I stopped. I had never made bread before. Helini was our baker, and a good one as well. Every loaf beside the brick oven was soft with a thin rind and tore easily into chunks. The memory of consuming the sweet fluffy bread made my mouth water and the need to eat soon overpowered any other thought. I set down the vase and flour and rummaged among tweed sacks. Then I remembered seeing some meat roasting over the main bonfire yesterday, before all of this happened, and if I was lucky, it may still be there.

I glanced at the sky while making my way to the central firepit. The morning clouds dissipated and soft light shone through, showing that most of the dust had settled with the morning’s dew. There were many footprints on the paths through the village, scattering in every direction, ending where blackened bones laid. Did anyone survive? I didn’t want to take the time to count the bodies as my mind was set on food.

It was a short walk from the remnants of my cottage to the central firepit. I was lucky. Skewered on the multi-layered grates above the snuffed fire was a charred lamb leg, which I immediately stuffed into my mouth. With each bite, the leathery skin broke and spilled the sweet juices underneath. I felt life return to my body with each chunk, and any untouched part was gone as soon as I saw it. It was over as soon as it began.

As I licked my fingers, the wind slowed and I heard something that reminded me of the labored breath of a felled but not finished animal. Curiosity once again overtook logic, and I stopped to listen. I stepped out gently onto the well-worn path and turned the corner of the cottage next to mine, stopping every few steps to reorient my senses. Sticking out from behind the blackened structure I saw a crisped and smoking piece of leather. It was the mostly burned form of a shoe. I approached cautiously, using the wall for support. As I crept closer the clay returned to the color it was before the smoke stains sank in. This shack must have not been damaged. I noticed dusty footprints which looked as though something was dragged around the corner. I poked my head halfway and froze from shock.

Two corpses leaned against the clay wall: one only scorched bone and the other with still-smoking skin, bright red and blistered, embraced as though accepting their death by some unseen monster. The shorter of the two had its stiffened back flat to the wall, and the other leaned up on the breast of the first, dried bones and ligaments held close by the loose stripped flesh in what might have once been a death grip. I couldn’t peel my eyes away.

This was my doing.

The wind had stilled and a rasping presented itself, like the crunch of autumn leaves tumbling over themselves and again the overwhelming scent of burning flesh filled the air around me. I felt stones in my gut, or maybe sick, or maybe I didn’t feel anything at all. The edges of my vision pulsed and my knees sunk into the earlier-disturbed dirt before the upright corpse. What I heard next had no qualities of a sound and seemed to embody the startling sensation of when walking alone and hearing footsteps behind you.

“K…”

I felt through my heart a stony knife when I heard the corpse utter a defeated plea: “K- kill… me.”

My blood ran cold and all I could do was stare with widened eyes. I recognized her now much more fragile voice. It used to be what I believed to be beautiful and confident, but now only a whisper like torn parchment, seemed at risk of being lifted by the wind and whisked away. Any memory of my own language had been purged from my being, and I was lost somewhere between her diminishing hints of life. After far too long, I somehow gathered the strength to summon my own voice. Wavering, and with tremendous effort, I squeaked, “Anna? Anna is that you?” although I already knew the answer. “Oh no, oh please no…”

Her face, or what remained, was held together by smooth ridges of cooked muscle, and the skin was all but gone save for what looked like a dried riverbed baking in the hot sun. Her mouth housed fewer teeth, only visible because her lips were gone, and pieces of her skull caught sunlight for the first and last time. One mostly intact eyelid tore itself free from melded flesh and loosed flakes of ash which floated down, landing softly on the skull resting on her bosom. In several extraordinarily labored motions, her dry, auburn eye met mine.

“...lease. It h-”

I ran and did not look back.

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I saw above me my own twisted hands clawing at the air, and I was falling through a musty nothingness. Below me, churning earth opened to a maw of bloodied stone teeth, the crushed and shattered bodies of the villagers wedged between them, being gnashed apart for eternity. Drowning within the muddy throat was the form of my father, terrified, pointing his flayed hand wildly upward. As I descended, I held out my own shaking hand, hoping to pull him from the muck. He screamed, recoiling, and I realized he had been pointing at me.

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The bush’s whiplike branch sprung back when I plucked the fat, dark-hued berry from its socket, popping and shaking off an afterimage of the resting dew, which sprinkled onto the lumpy handful I’d collected so far. Their skin grew thick to protect the juice trapped inside, but wasn’t too tough to break, especially as I was starving and desperate. I walked south of the village the next morning further than I ever dared, and was surprised that the forest declined even lower than I had thought. I never once thought to venture beyond the wood-fenced boundary of the fields, and though it wasn’t explicitly prohibited, was spoken about in hushed tones and any mention of travel was shut down quickly.

Going downhill was easier than the alternative, and the cliffs to the west were unpassable, and I refused to go east, fearing what would happen if I closed any distance between myself and the massive tower of branches. It remained there still; a giant, looming menacingly over the land, and shortened every evening with its bulk, like a living shadow breaching the gap between earth and sky in some umbral bridge.

My leather shoes weren’t quite in need of repair but they did seem looser. It had only been days before that I fled from the smoking remains of my village, and though I had left, it never left me, and cornered me nightly with horrible scenes of blood and fire that disrupted my sleep and woke me drenched in sweat. On the third day my makeshift wool shawl began to emit the odors of exhaustion, made into a gathering-place for flying insects and though it stunk, what I feared more than smell was exposing the curling Marks across my body to the damp forest air. Caked with a dark crust of blood and no longer absorbent, I deemed the bandages underneath no longer safe to wear.

Removing them despite their dryness was incredibly painful and took what felt like hours. The thin cloth had adhered to my skin despite the constant movement, a cocoon of scabs, and as each strip was torn from my wounds in repeated crunching tugs, I felt sickly and weak. It stung how I imagined it would, but for far longer than felt possible. I guess I have to get used to this, I thought. How long can I live with such injuries? How have I not collapsed from blood loss? The drone of pain pushed my mind away from reality and I recalled a scene from my previous life.

The hunting men returned with an injured but still breathing treecat bound with the sinew taken its equals from previous hunts to a thin but sturdy wood pole hoisted upon their shoulders. In preparation for that day’s roasted meat and the stews to follow, with fresh cloth dipped in boiled water they bathed the bound treecat and laid between its beautiful golden eyes the mark of earth to ensure proper tribute. Just before sundown, they lifted it above the carved stone bowl at the very top of the hill, and with a jagged stone-handled blade, plunged it deep into the creature’s chest to spill its insides. The time-smoothed walls of the basin amplified the wet splattering of entrails. It drew breath as they drew blood and held out before death longer than I thought possible of any earthly beast. When the last trace of life left its eyes, it was after nightfall, and I wondered if I would survive as long as that frightened, captured animal.

A strong tear and subsequent sting ended the memory abruptly. In my mental absence, I had been pulling too hard and loosed a long segment which leaked red blood onto my hand. Losing faith that the bleeding would ever stop, I decided to walk to the south.

Rocks adorned with fuzzy moss and crumbled pieces coated the forest floor, smaller and more frequent, until eventually giving way to a gravel beach beside a slow-moving and wide river. Green fish dashed, kicking up with their lengthy tails fragments of sand which billowed and were carried by the current. This was a sharp bend, but seemed to be the narrowest part of the gravel beach I found myself on. I wasn’t tall by any means, but even so, my head should stay dry above the water. Shallow and clear enough to see the bottom, I knew it was likely safe to cross. I removed my thick leather shoes and was careful to avoid sharper stones. However, when I took a step closer, I froze in place. It felt to me like I was leashed to a tree and had run out of slack. The shining points on the small waves stabbed my eyes with pain through the deepest part of my skull and became unbearable.

The trickling of tiny waterfalls filled me with restlessness and the desire to flee; visions of tumbling over the edge and smashing myself against the rocks overtook me. Threatening waves reached out to nip at my toes, and I let slip a cry of fear, reflexively, falling backward away from them. Legs kicking up the gravel I dragged myself far from the water. I was confused. It’s just water, why do I hesitate? Swimming always came naturally to me, especially as a child. The dancing glow of crested waves repulsed me, and I decided to leave. But where? I couldn’t bear to stay where I could be tormented by the trickle of water, so once again I resumed walking.

With each step the sound of water faded, replaced by the endless hum of tree-clinging cicadas. I was alone in the hot midday, walking in whatever direction would have me. It was long after distancing myself from the river that it hit me: everything I knew was gone. I walked away from the only home I’d known; away from the connections I made, the friends I had and lost, from the graves of my parents, from the fields we prayed to, from…

There was so much I have lost.

My heart was heavy, and each step faded into the next until it felt like I was gliding. I was walking, but I might as well have been sleeping. Wherever my body was, my mind wasn’t.

With no sense of direction despite the giant tree creature and the distant trickle of water, it occurred to me that I was hopelessly lost. No matter how far I walked, nothing seemed to change. Where was I going? It really didn’t matter where I was going. As long as the past was right behind me, whispering in my ear, “You deserve nothing and you are alone.” it seemed I would never know peace or comfort again.

I have always been an insatiably curious person, often to my detriment. Turning over rocks to disturb the insects underneath fascinated me, like revealing a world I wasn’t meant to see. It dawned on me one day that there must exist so many other things we can’t see, or that we don’t know about, like how fire turns wood to coal, or uncooked meat makes us sick. I have always wondered if there was more to life than farming and building. The sacred text told us all we needed to know, but I felt it wasn’t enough. Too often my peers failed to entertain my methods. Anna accused me of being cruel when I spirited away a muckskimmer from its pond, and demanded I put it back. She wouldn’t try to understand me when I told her they didn’t stay as muckskimmers, but became frogs. She told the Elder and I went hungry that night. They buried the creature.

Anna.

The visage of her scalded face appeared before me, superimposed across my waking vision. I fell to my knees, screaming into my hands.

Oh fields above, what have I done…

The weight of the world drew me even closer to the earth. I rolled onto my back, staring into the uncaring sky, which grew darker and gave way to night. With reddened eyes and a broken soul, I slept on the hard earth.

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I was in a tunnel of flame. Behind me, an unyielding wall, and before me, my father and Anna wrapped in fire. The sweltering tunnel closed after me with every step, forcing me further in. They screamed. I shouted at no one to save them. I watched their melting faces, which dripped at my feet and sizzled, yet I stood untouched, trapped between the wall and their smoking corpses. I wished to burn with them, but the flames moved as I moved, and would not touch me.

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