Into the Deep Wood

Her steps had been soft, inaudible. The polished tile on the floor was cold on her bare feet.

Lady Katerina had told her the turns, the path to take when the moon rose to midnight. It’d dressed her in a fine nightgown, telling Val that if she were caught - she should not be caught looking like a servant girl.

It took away her shoes, saying she must step lightly - like a sleepwalker in the night, lest she break the spell.

“No one will come out of their rooms, no guard will make their patrol, no servant nor servant girl will cross you in the halls.” It told Val, buttoning the nightgown at the back with her eerie, long fingers. “My promise stands, you will return in an hour’s time. Should you fail to do so, they will come.”

The creature grabbed her by the shoulders, its face close.

“An hour.”

Her shadow followed her, the only movement about the still halls. It had been so cold that the breath of her lungs came out in vapor, dissipating as fast as it had appeared.

In the night, there were no candles. No lamps.

The doors to the great room were heavy, but not even they made a sound as she pulled one. The Skriga kept its promise. Slowly and smoothly, as if gliding, it opened to a vastness of marble, stone, and dark ornamented wood. The ceilings were so high they could not have been there - the darkness above a black night sky.

She recognized this room.

At the very end was an entire wall of stained glass windows. The light from the moon and the reflective snow shone through in many colors - spilling across the floor.

She took a step forward, staying in the shadows behind the white columns.

There had been something behind the throne.

Even her own heartbeat was only a whisper - gone within the Skriga’s incantation. She was afraid to breathe lest it tear through the room as a roar.

Do not break the silence.

Closer still.

Dread crawled through her body as cold would. She was reminiscent of her insides twisting near the Wound for a moment.

She’d stepped into the middle of the room. Val faced the window, and the window shone red, green, and yellow at the back of something twisted and dark. It was suspended above the throne like a ripped tapestry. Its shadow fell just beyond where she stood.

As her eyes focused, something else had begun to appear. It was a spider web, stretching ceiling to floor - pillar to pillar. It had been woven mere feet behind the throne, and the shape had seemed to be caught right in its middle.

Another step, and another, careful and afraid. Walking as if the ground she walked was hallowed.

She could see now - it was not a spider’s web, although it had been woven as one.

Instead of strands of silk, they had been chains. Glistening, gold and silver chains. All ran to the center. All began elsewhere and ended as one at a body hanging limply, caught like a fly.

Val held her breath and took another step. The darkness gave way.

She saw the Hag.

Her arms were chained and stretched out to the sides. Her legs had been similarly bound – no chain had any slack. The collar that Val had seen around her neck was the only thing that had been holding up her head.

The Hag had not moved.

Val approached, fearful that her hour would soon be up. And the closer she got, the more horrifying it became.

The chains had not only met there but they had been entwined with her flesh. She was naked and cut up. A hundred chains had run through and around her muscle and bone, lodged and looped, pulling at tissue and skewing limbs from their natural shape.

Each pulling in a different direction. The blood was wiped away or dry - she’d been this way a while.

Val felt herself choke. This grotesque display was overwhelming, even if it was the Hag.

Had she felt… pity?

She raised her eyes, trying to see the fallen face. There was no life evident there. But… How could this be...?

Carefully, slowly, she closed her eyes and reached out.

Nothing.

Or, almost nothing.

A thin, brittle thread.

Afraid to snap it, she but grazed it with the tips of her fingers. Nothing pulled back. Nothing resisted.

Instead, she felt a presence. Not strong enough to struggle, just barely strong enough to be.

Closer.

It was not even a whisper. It was the sad remains of one.

Val stepped forward still. She was now so close that she could see the texture of the wrinkled, cut-up skin. The frayed edges of the cuts, and the organs that threatened to spill out of open gashes.

See me.

Val’s vision went out of focus. She felt as if she had forgotten which way had been up and which way down. She felt her body fall to her knees on the ground.

Her heart slowed, or was it time that slowed?

It beat once.

She saw a young girl, not even twenty. She knelt right where Val had just a moment ago.

She was dressed in the black of a funeral gown. Her light brown hair was bound back, a thin black veil over her face. It was wet with tears, but she had not sobbed or even trembled.

She was heavy with child.

Val’s eyes moved toward the throne. A thin, cruel man sat on it. She knew the man, but she remembered him not. She had not even remembered her own name.

His face was indifferent, and dead were his pale eyes.

Only two fingers on his right hand moved, and so two shadows separated from the walls. They were unfocused, so Val could not see what they were. They hauled the girl up on her feet, and they forced her back. They dragged her.

Her mouth opened in a scream, but Val heard only silence. The same silence she had already walked in.

She followed the girl. They’d dragged her through the halls. More blurry shadows on every side –some had looked to be in dresses, others only the size of a child. Val squinted, but she could not tell anything beyond the struggling girl.

They took her outside. She’d gone limp, although her painfully green eyes were open.

She stared right at Val.

Beyond stood the Obsidian Tower.

The shadows disappeared as they let go of the girl at its wall. She slowly stood, her hand on her swollen belly. She looked at Val again and then turned - evaporating as she stepped into the black stone. The vision faded, and Val fell back into the darkness.

Her heart beat twice.

It was the girl again. She lay on the floor, her body crumpled in a heap against a glossy black wall. They were in a room, but there were no windows and no doors.

Val stepped closer, trying to recognize the girl. Her eyes were open but empty, their green faded and swallowed by a veil of death. Val stepped on something wet and sticky. She looked down to the floor. The girl’s exposed stomach had been cut open, and the excess of pregnancy spilled all around her, still crawling across the stones.

When she turned around, more bodies were behind her—many, many more.

Her heart beat three times.

There was a dark room with a long wooden table. Only one candle burned at the very end of it. Val walked toward it, hardly seeing anything but the flickering light. And, as she did, a face began to take shape. A hollow face with a crooked nose. The man she knew—the one whose name escaped her—the tall one with the pale eyes.

He was eating. Messily, with both hands, his eyes downcast onto the table. She took another step, and more detail came into focus. There’d been no plate. No wine to go with the meal. Not even a fork or spoon. Only the twisted, shredded, bloody remains of a newborn infant.

Her heart beat four times.

There stood the Hag. Val recognized her.

She stood with only shadows at her back, but she was not alone. In front of her stood a tall, slim man. Who was he? She was sure she knew; why could she not remember?

The Hag reached out her open palm. The man handed her something, and a smile crept across her face. She nodded slowly, saying something to him, but still, Val heard only silence.

She raised her head to the man and then put her other hand on his chest. Out of his chest, she drew something small and thin.

Val approached until she stood next to them. Her eyes focused on the small object in the Hag’s hand. It was only a sewing needle.

He held out his hand, and the Hag gingerly placed the piece of metal in it. He motioned behind him, and a shadow from outside Val’s vision handed him an ornate golden egg adorned with jewels. He snapped it open, and on the velvet bed inside, he placed the needle.

Deathless…

She heard it as if a puff of smoke in a thought.

The second the clasp on the egg shut, three shadows rushed forward and snapped a collar of silver, iron, and gold onto her neck. The Hag screamed, but there was still no sound.

They pulled her down to the ground while the tall man stood above her. The shadows brought out long pieces of steel, they held them to her jaw and hammered until they had gone through bone, then, they twisted the ends shut.

Her heart beat five times.

Gaunt figure on a decorated stallion atop a hill. He wore a pale crown of gold. In front of him was a sea of fire. She had seen him somewhere… if only she knew where. He watched with dead eyes as the fire burned, its light extinguished in them. Blurred shadows rushed about, silent.

Val stepped past him; he did not seem to see her. She walked forward. Under the flames, a city burned.

Never again will there be a god…

Her heart beat six times.

A road. A lone figure on it, far away. There was nothing around, nothing but dark.

The figure walked forward and toward her. Val stood, and she waited. It walked slowly, dragging one leg behind. As it neared Val, it did not look at her but stopped mere feet away.

It did not turn its face but suddenly cried out - although no sound broke the air. It grasped its face in its hands, its mouth twisted in a horrible scream, bits of smoke escaping with its breath.

Shadows came from all directions. They fell, they hit the ground, they stumbled and they disappeared. But still, more came.

None had made it - until three did. They, too, snapped shut a collar on the thin neck before they too flew to the ground, dead.

The collar, chains of gold, silver, and iron.

The creature fell to its knees, still screaming, and began to thrash. Silent. Bound.

Her heart beat seven times.

Val stepped, and her bare foot felt damp earth. She looked up, and in front of her lay a creature. She was so pale and elegant; she looked as if a wisp of seafoam, just a soft sea breeze, would carry her away. Her hair, long, had been clumped together as if wet - but fell across her back and shoulders like a wave. She rested as if suspended on the tension of the water. She arched her back and reached for something in the dark. Down she brought an incomprehensible shadow, wrapped her arms around it, caressed it, loved it. She sank into the water, and she pulled the shadow with it–

–and suddenly, she dropped it. Her mouth opened, and she raised her hands to cover her ears. Another silent scream, as if it came from elsewhere - deafening her.

She writhed, falling deeper into the water. Shadows came forth bearing hooks. They reached and brought the hooks crashing down into her flesh. She struggled, her hands still over her ears. They pulled her from the dark waters like a fish. And, around her neck, they snapped a collar.

Of gold, silver, and iron.

Bound.

Val’s eyes shot open, her heart pounding inside her chest. The Hag still hung atop the chains. Not a single hair on her had moved. Not a rattle of the metal chains sounded.

See me.

Val stood. She walked past the throne as if still in a dream until she stood directly below the body, looking up into its drooping face.

Korschey will eat the world.

And so, you, too, must eat me, stupid girl.

Her hand drifted up, her movements slowed, and she placed it on the Hag’s bony chest as high as she could reach. She felt a single faint beat of a heart, so slight she could have imagined it.

She closed her eyes, and she reached out, but instead of a thread, the heart pulsed slowly in her hand. She brought it toward her.

It did not resist.

She opened her eyes and felt a hot, wet drip roll down her arm. In her hand, she held an ugly, little, black heart.

She brought it to her lips.