Private Tales a Forest's Cover

[Oliver]

A pair of siblings, ten and thirteen of age, had gone missing. This had been in the midst of a busy yesterday, wherein the actual time of their disappearance eluded everyone. The lone father had come back to an empty home from a day’s work, it already late in the afternoon and with the dark fast approaching.

In way of both blessing and curse, the night hadn’t been clear. It wasn’t terribly frigid, but snow had fallen and would yet, if the persisting overcast above was anything to go by.

Stare bouncing betwixt the ground and the surrounding endless evergreen, Oliver tried to keep his mind from the fact they might well not find the wayward sisters. Himself and one of his kin had happened upon the predicament on their way through, purely by chance. Before he’d had the time to properly even consider the practical futility of it all, he’d already offered to join the effort.

That had been earlier this morning, from whence they’d raked the woods amongst a number of others who’d come forth as able and willing in the village. Their shapes weaved in and out of the gloom ever so often, voices calling for Anja and the younger Silja fading to a distance, without an echo.

Exhaling a cloud of steam, he swept some of the powdery snow off his shoulders and glanced at his company, Syr Isander’s steady presence some paces to his left. He couldn’t but feel a little guilty then, watching him trudge through a layer of snow that even for him reached halfway up the shin. This had been largely at his urging after all, had it not? A whim on which he’d failed to consult his fellow beforehand, like any which inconsiderate bastard.

“ Suppose we get lost ourselves— “ He started in jest, regarding the man with an easy smile. “ Think you can forgive me for having wrought it? One should hate to freeze to death ardently despised. “

Isander

 

[Isander]

In layered cloths and furs with wool lining his cuffs and collar, Isander picked his way through the hooded woods. The snow was soft about them, leaving pillowed tufts on the skeletal fingers of surrounding trees and gentle whorls in the barren grass. Each trundling pace came in step with a heavy breath, haloing the knight in an effervescent gray.

His gaze lingered on the trees. Desiccated, dying branches. Limbs stripped bare of life in winter's ingress, sat in rows upon the open Wyld. A graveyard.

The chill air lent itself to solemnity. As part of the search for the missing siblings, he had prepared himself at the onset for all possibilities. It was a struggle to keep his teeth from gritting. He promised to find children, not corpses. No matter the turn of the macabre, no matter the odds set against the growing fang of time.

He closed his eyes to avert himself from such introspections and returned Oliver's smile beat for beat. Let a laugh roll out from the chest. Hearty, full, and cut with a shake of the head.

"Aye," he said, "I'll forgive you that much. But perhaps not for polishing off the last of those peppered spuds..."

The levity helped. It kept him grounded. All too easy to get swept up in darker fantasies, assumptions of failure. No good came of such thoughts; the longer they dwelled, the deeper their claws sunk into the heart and occluded the vision of hope. Too common a tale, this far into the Wylds, but one that served no aid in the current search.

He cocked an ear.

"I don't hear the others. Have we wandered off that far?"


Oliver

 

[Oliver]

The man responded and it was his time to laugh in turn, a stifled version of it escaping betwixt the teeth in a hiss.

“ All too reasonable, though I cannot truly bring myself to feel sorry for that. “ Those were some mighty fine potatoes, after all. A couple more steps later, the briefest silence be broken again as Isander remarked on the atmosphere, pulling him to a stop so that footfalls not distract his hearing. A low hum resonated in the chamber of his mouth, thoughtful. The old forest said nothing, standing tall and still.

“ We only just heard and even saw them not long ago. “ He muttered, glancing past his shoulder at their tracks that meandered betwixt the trunks, stumps, rocks and mounds of snow covered moss. To the distance they went, wherein all faded to grey.

“ I’m not saying we haven’t strayed overmuch of course. I don’t know this forest. “ He tossed a hand, glancing up at the sky for direction that wasn’t there, the bright disk of the sun completely blotted out. Still, he figured the dark would be at least two hours away yet and even then greatly alleviated by the snow.

Not that any of that helped, should they completely lose track of themselves. Keeping his unbothered expression, he tried the ground with the staff he’d been using to keep balance and check the dirt ahead for pits and sinks on their way. Stepping into one was bound to twist an ankle or an entire leg, depending.

“ We could go on a time yet, if you’ve naught against it. Can always pick our way back along the trail. “

Isander

 

[Isander]

Concern flickered across Isander's brow, made furrows above his eyes. He suppressed it, hid behind a shrug that teased nonchalance at the cusp of a smile. Affected airs unconcerned a while longer.

"I've barely worked up a sweat," he said, rolling the tension from his shoulders, and brushed the snow from his face. The gentle, stilted breaths of the forest murmured in response. A while longer. Reasonable enough that the snow muffled noise. They were bound to cross paths with the others, eventually. Evening had yet to kiss the horizon in full, the sun peeking gray from behind those chiaroscuro skies.

He prodded ahead with the butt of his spear, taking careful steps to maintain pace with his companion. Winter, despite its pale and effervescent beauty, set brambles in his path.

"I must admit, I cannot profess myself much of a woodsman. This place looks much the same as any other forest to me," he said.

"One of us, I hope, can play shepherd to the other's lamb."


Oliver

 

[Oliver]

His halt was short-lived, done away by denial of weariness and implied approval therein. Pleased and shamelessly wearing the fact on his face, he nodded and begun forth anew.

“ Perhaps your hopes be answered and I’ll play the half. How competently is a matter to itself, but — “ He shrugged, more in mischief than cluelessness, careful not to look at the man lest he break into a grin.

“ Nothing like limited experience to make a man overconfident. “ The hardest part wasn’t to tell direction. It was to keep to one, to avoid meandering in a circle. Hopefully the snow and visible tracks would prevent that to a point.

“ Best case scenario — we haven’t lost ourselves at all, but the search itself has concluded as successful and they should’ve just forgotten about us being here yet. “ Wishful thinking, but not uncommon. He couldn't remember if he’d even given his name to most whom strayed here tonight. Introductions hadn’t been of the most pressing essence.

" It has been a time since we begun, after all. "

Isander

 

[Isander]

"Has it?" Isander asked, that easy smile spilling off his lips. The tooth of day had grown long, bared beneath the glistening snow, but he felt little of exhaustion against the roll of his shoulders. His spear made for ample staff, poking at the ground before each step, and their breakfast (small as his portion was) filled him yet.

The gnaw of hunger was a well-acquainted lover, one stayed by the hand of company kept. His eyes found a wistful cast.

"I'd like to think the children were found, that we are here on a merry, pointless lark. But," he said, worry about his chin, "I fear that is far from the truth. Pray that I'm wrong. There is a strange taste upon the air."


Oliver

 

[Oliver]

“ Is there? “ He inquired, searching the man’s face for implied detail. Had it been anyone else he might’ve taken it for a joke or some clever crypticism, but as far as he knew his present company partook in no such sport. Of this nature, anyway.

Visibly perplexed by the remark, he slowed his pace to listen what lay beneath their footfalls, just to come up with ‘not much, to be honest’. Somewhere in the volumetric haze was an echo, but what it spoke was indiscernible.

Far from the truth, hmh?

“ Anja! Silja!? “

He snapped to attention at the call, a little startled by how loud the voices rung of a sudden. In flummoxed silence, he watched a pair of shapes cross the trail himself and Isander had left, neither acknowledging the two of them.

“ It’ll be dark soon, Hannes. We’ll have to go. “
“ Not before we find them, I swore to— “
“ You know that’s stupid, right? You’ll never make it out of here in the dark if you stay by yourself. “
“ How great then that you’re here, hmh? “

“ As are we. “ Oliver elevated his voice at them in a smile, waving. The most bewildered expression and a halt came upon one of them, but it was not half as strange as the fact that they appeared to be looking through him.

“ The fuck was that? “
“ What was what? “ The companion asked, continuing on their way.
“ I don’t know, like— ” A shrug, wariness about the figure.

“ Somebody talked. “
“ Well, I heard nothing. You seeing ghosts again? “
“ Look, that shit is real — “

The unseeing gaze averted as one made to hurry after the other, defensive to the boot. Himself hadn’t but to stare after them as they faded out into the thick fabric of the woodland. Much too soon too, felt like. Having ground to a full on standstill, he glanced at Syr Isander sidelong.

“ How bizarre, no? “

Isander

 

[Isander]

"Bizarre," Isander said, the word chirping out in an echoed croon. It seeped into the snow through the confluence of voices that waned dull in the flux, faded slow. Evaporated into silence, the sanctity of which was pierced but by the soft crunch beneath his boot.

He reeled, felt himself rock back on a heel. Blinked. His eyes were lidded thick, the draw of weariness settling about him; it teased the knots from his shoulders, the tight kink from neck and jaw. His bones were light, fluid. His muscles lax.

The wind no longer stirred against his flesh. And yet, he could not conjure alarm within himself. The song of it trilled on deafened notes.

"Perhaps we should rest."

He had to pull himself together.

"Is it... warm?"

The pieces of him crumbled, left him oddly whole. Only the grip of his hand on the haft of a spear kept him upright.

Someone's lips pursed into an off-color frown.

"Do you believe in ghosts, Oliver?"


Oliver

 

[Oliver]

There was a strange air about the man, he realized, watching him remain on his spot and speak. The sequence of words, a series of inquiries more or less, was disjointed at best and concerning at worst. As the latter was also the weight that appeared to have perched itself on Syr Isander’s shoulders, adding to his general weariness. Ghosts, perchance?

“ Yes, I do. Very little reason not to, what with all I’ve seen over the years. “ Or should one say — what we’ve seen, collectively? Closing the distance betwixt them to a mere arm’s length, he hovered with some indecision, a long exhale billowing into the air.

It was, indeed, not warm at all. The further into the distance the unknown forest faded, the more it appeared to sway and shift. Like an image painted on canvas, observed through a waterfall. He hadn’t noticed it before, but every direction appeared awfully similar of a sudden, save for the habitual larger stone undersnow.

Remaining unfazed, he slung the pack off his shoulder and into the ground at his feet.

“ I don’t assume you meant to ask whether we’ve turned into ghosts, unwittingly? “

Isander

 

[Isander]

"Perhaps," he said, laying a hand over his brow to wipe at unfelt sweat. He was faint about the physick, the world a haze seen through kaleidoscopic eyes; the waning edges converged beneath a cover of snow, and for a time he could make out the individual crystals of it, the airy pockets of space between each flake as they piled on the forest's floor.

The slurry of seconds passed him with a stark fluidity, left him a passenger in his own mind, and he could but blink to regain a semblance of control. He sought for grounding. The cold haft of his spear. The crunch of leather about gauntleted hand. The keen of shifting maille beneath the layered cloth and wool that hung limp from shoulders slumped to apprise his boots.

He doffed that easy grin and a shrug slipped from him.

"Just a spell, Oliver. Perhaps if I'd been spared a few more of those taters I'd be haler of health, no?"


Oliver