Into the Deep Wood

The mess hall was empty except for the two men sitting at a long table. Only one of them had food in front of him; the other only twirled a drink in his hand.

“All day?” The larger, rounder man asked. The other nodded, his eyes on the ridges of the mug.

“Last night. All day. All night.” He drawled out.

“With a fa-ce like hi-s?” The bearded man looked suspiciously at Iros.

“He did not always.” Iros smiled. “I’ll try to get them to come out again when noon hits.”

Yaro stuffed another spoonful of honey buckwheat into his mouth.

“Can’t wait to s-ee who he tricked into hi-s bed.” He lisped, his eyes squinting as he both tried to grin and chew with only his back teeth. “I bet s-he ha-s a cleft lip. And a tail.”

Iros was too much of a gentleman to laugh, but the smile of holding it back crossed his face. He let go of the mug, allowing the water to stop swirling.

“Can’t just throw her in front of a whole King’s counsel.” Iros sighed.

“I bet s-he only ha-s one leg.”

“The southerners are too traditional. She’ll say two words and they will hang her for being a witch.”

At this, Yaro looked up at him.

“Came acro-ss a witch in the North.” He said. “Didn’t think her a witch at fir-st. But there wa-s s-ome funny bu-siness.”

“I better go try again.” Iros stood. He looked at the large man and the buckwheat that was spilled all around the table and in his beard. “Hm.”

“You have to tell me if s-he ha-s a tail.”

They had been locked in his room for so long. Most of their time was spent with each other, unable and unwilling to say no.

A glance, an accidental brush of fingers against skin - and it had all begun again. When night fell, they snuck out and to her room. There, they too barricaded the door. Like kids, they sat atop the bed and ate cabbage cakes and pudding. They bathed and spoke and told each other many things - small things, big things, all things.

“You are almost out of pages…” Marat flipped slowly through the journal and its entries.

His eyes scanned what she’d written, his eyebrows betraying his thoughts as he did.

She noted that he had been impressed far more than he had been concerned.

And then, she saw him staring at her.

“What is ‘the Tethers of the Nothing-Touched’?” He asked with interest, but his words came carefully spoken.

“When she’d…” Val began, but thought that certain things perhaps should not be said. The very first time she truly felt the thread - when it had ripped out of her the child she would have had. “When she reached out in my dreams, and at the River Cities. There, at the Wound, it had grown stronger. I could feel her.”

He looked down at the entry again.

“And, you found that it goes two ways.” He deducted. “Have you tried? Since?”

Gods, but she felt the answers in her chest. She wanted to lie, to keep the happiness they felt to themselves, at least for now. But this was Marat.

“I have.”

“And?”

She sighed uncomfortably, but he ran his fingers through hers, her hand in his.

“There is nothing you can say that would make me think differently of you.” He said.

“I tried, and at first it had worked. I gave my name to them, and I could touch it - as if it were their very being.” She took in a deep, nervous breath.

“You gave them your name?” His voice had betrayed his astonishment.

She did not like how it had made her feel.

“You listen or you don’t.” She said definitively. “This is how it was - how it is.”

“I’m sorry.”

“These chorts, in the Deep Wood, they called to me one night. It was them that I felt. I felt their pain, their fear. They did not fear me - they feared the light, starvation, open fields. They asked for me to unwind the threads that bound them. And, I did.” She said, holding up the palms of her hands. His own dropped, and with new eyes he looked over their scars.

“And they let you?”

“They begged. They were suffering.”

“What did you mean by ‘at first’?”

She swallowed, knowing how the old Marat would react.

“There was a beast. In a snow storm. It was my third. I tried to draw a thread, but it had seen me - it had ripped it from my hands. I could not get a hold.”

“A Vindigo…” He said, a strange look on his face, his eyebrows deepening the wrinkle between them.

“It almost killed us. It had deeply injured one.”

“By chance, did he lose his teeth?” The words came out slowly and suspiciously.

It made Val questioningly look at him. Was this a norm for this type of beast?

“You’ve gotta be kidding me!” He laughed so hard it made her flinch back. It was so uncontrolled, so genuine and loud. When he caught a breath, she could only laugh at the expression on his face.

“Is that funny??” She asked, giggling. “A man had lost his teeth!”

“My gods, but this life is a strange place.” He smiled. That smile. It had been so rare even before, but gods she loved that smile. “The man you speak of, I met him on the road.”

He gestured below his chin, and then did a very rounded sweep of the hand over his stomach.

“Yaro??” Val gasped, feeling another wave of overwhelming emotion. “Is he here?”

“Give me another day of you to myself, and we can go to him.” He promised. “But, please, Val, the beast.”

“Right,” she tried to recall how much she had already disclosed, “It was the last I tried on purpose…”

“On purpose?”

“Sometimes, I will only feel for it. I know it to be there but I do not touch it.” She suddenly remembered the spider in the binding of the book. “Oh gods! Marat, you have to promise me, please do not hurt her.”

“What?” He stared as she ran her fingers across the journal’s spine, her fingers tapping lightly, a very rhythmic sound.

A moment, and Arachne’s fuzzy front legs poked out.

At this, Marat threw himself to the side, although no sound came from him. He looked at Val with wild eyes.

Perhaps she had become entirely someone else.

She picked up the spider in her hand, pulling her legs underneath herself to kneel on the bed. She leaned forward to let it onto the pages.

“Valeria. What is that?” Nervous words. She smiled at how boyish he looked right then.

The face on the spider’s back twisted in a laugh - or scream?

“I do not know. I named her Arachne. She is fragile, so you must be careful.”

“I am fragile.” He kept his distance, creating ever so slightly more with every step Arachne took. But, when he saw the face he squinted to get a better look. “What did you say you named it?”

“Arachne.” The spider tapped its front legs again and went about its business across the page.

“Val,” He now watched it in fascination. “How did you think of that?”

“I’m not sure.” She shrugged.

“I think it told you its name.” The discomfort seemingly dissipated, he got a bit closer. “That is what that is. It’s an Arachne.”

Val looked at the spider with new interest. It told her it’s name… but, even having felt the thread - she’d felt nothing on the other side at all.

“How does it feed?” She asked him.

“It doesn’t, truly. No one knows what they are, only that they are. It’s harmless, as far as Nothing-touched go.” He, again, looked at it with suspicion.

“There is something else.” She said, catching his eye - she wanted to be sure he understood the importance. “She weaves these webs. I did not notice before, but the way she weaves them - they are like maps to the threads of the creatures. I recognized it, the thread I unbound for the chorts - she’d woven it between my fingers.”

“Val,” He looked thoughtful. “I do not think anyone had ever known that before. I do not think anyone else ever will…”

There was such pride in his words. She felt the warmth spread in her chest. She wanted to show him more, but, a hard insistent knock came at the door.

“I know you are both there.” Iros’ voice was stern, fatherly.

“Batyr ordered to see you, now.”