An avalanche of dirt, gravel and roots collapsed down on top of me. I gasped, sucking in one final breath seconds before I was crushed underneath the solid wall of sediment. I felt my body compress, flattening down into a satyr pancake. Seconds passed, and I sensed my lungs beginning to give out under the weight. What could I do? In a trap like this I couldn’t say anything, and nothing I could do would allow me to escape!
You can’t do anything. You’re going to die. It won’t allow that. I won’t allow that.
Sonphez’s voice cut through the fog of my air-deprived brain like a hot knife through butter. I couldn’t respond but I could struggle. I tried to move my limbs, vainly pushing them through the dirt. But the more I moved, the more my earthen prison packed itself around me. My chest was already burning from lack of air. If I didn’t find a way out…
You can’t. Give up, and let me do the rest. The voice was curt, but not unkind. Similar to a mother trying to calm down her child while under enemy attack.
What do you mean… let you do the rest?
You learned something interesting during that fight. I can use that to save you. The spark in my chest lit up, and my internal heat began to grow. As it did so, I felt myself begin to lose consciousness. Whatever Sonphez was doing… I wasn’t going to be awake to see it. As my sight began to fade, the last thing I saw was the sparks in the earth beginning to move towards me. At last, I was lost to the dark.
“Hey. Hey, wake up.” A cool hand patted me on the chin. I groggily opened my eyes and was blinded by the sudden influx of light. A gap-toothed grin greeted me, followed by the stench of sweat and booze. “Ya alive? Weren’t sure ya were for a bit,” he said, pointing to my chest. I looked down, following his fingers. The flesh on my chest had been scraped away, and chunks were missing from my arms. Bones showed through, but no blood. It looked like I’d been decaying for months. The man let out a guffaw, then snapped his grubby fingers. Instantly, my flesh began to mend. Muscles filled out and skin flowed over them, growing healthier. I looked at the man in amazement.
He wasn’t much to look at. He was plump, had on an old fire-fighter’s jacket and a scraggly brown beard. His hair looked like it hadn’t been washed in days, and he was missing more than a few teeth in that smile. His lips were cracked and dried out, as if he’d spent too much time in the sun. He pulled out a flask, took a swig, then offered it to me. “Thirsty? Betchya are. Plenty o’ folks need a little bit of alcohol to take their mind off my dashin’ looks.” He belched, then let out another raucous laugh. I looked at the hand holding the shiny canteen. As I looked, I began to notice the hand’s digits were subtly changing at all times. I couldn’t tell how, but there was a certain… unspecificity to the man’s hand that made me shudder internally. The flask shook as he laughed again. “Yerp! Didn’t take ya long to notice. I’m just like you. Not human, just look like one,” he said, pushing the shiny thing towards me. “Don’t worry. I’m just here because you don’t ever sleep, so it’s not like we can talk much.”
I decided to venture a question. “Who are you?” I asked, taking the flask from him. I simply held it, not sure if I wanted to drink yet.
“Wrong question, youngster. Try again. Be quick though, we ain’t got much time.” He looked off into the distance, squinting. “In fact, I think yer ride’s already on its way.”
I tried to follow the stranger’s gaze, but only saw a blank whiteness all around us. “What do you mean, my ride?”
He looked back at me, startled. “Ya don’t know? Blorbus, but I figured you’da guessed by now. That thing in yer head. The one ya call Sonphez. It’s comin’ to getchya out.” He spits off to the side. “Real piece o’ work that one. Splintered. Confused. Can’t even ‘member old Matt.” He glanced back at me. “Yah gonna take a swig before ya go? One fer the road.” He nods towards the flask.
I looked back at it. “I… guess I might.”
“Matt” grunts. “Damn straight. For what’s comin’ ta ya, you’re gonna need it.”
“What do you mean, ‘what’s coming to me’?”
The man shakes his head again, his oily hair shaking off his shoulders. “Sorry young ‘un. Spoilers. And yer still askin’ the wrong questions.”
I stared at the flask. Then, without another moment’s hesitation, downed it in one. Immediately pain seared through me and the spark in my chest suddenly reignited. “What… what was that?!” I coughed.
“Reality. Yer dyin’, Zephnos. It’s the only reason I can talk ta yah.” The man’s voice had lost its joviality. He looked me straight in the eyes. “Yah wanna try that question one more time?”
This time, my paradoxical knowledge kicked in, providing me with the answer. “What are you?”
The man clapped lightly, never taking his eyes off mine. “I’m whatchya might become. Whatchya have become, once. Whatcha can’t become now. I’m yer story, Zephnos.” He holds out his hand, and I see the subtle shifting beneath his skin. When I look back up at him, he’s not a “he” anymore. She stares at me with moonlight eyes, strands of seaweed hair trailing down her neck. “And I am also your story.” The dragon’s eyes drilled into mine. “And I am your story.”
I stared at the reptilian beast sitting on the moon in front of me. I hadn’t ever taken my eyes off it, but even so I’d missed the moment when it had changed. The monster returned my gaze calmly. It was a mirror image of Stentor, though it seemed smaller with green scales instead of Stentor’s white. “You’re her. You’re the reason he hunted me. ‘I know your story.’ That’s what Stentor said.”
“Matt” held out a hand, helping me to my feet. “Funny thing about stories. They change based on who’s tellin’ ‘em. But yer’s ain’t allowed to be told anymore. It’s not allowed to change. I don’t much like that, no siree.”
“What do you mean? You’re speaking like it’s all predetermined.”
Matt looked at me, frowning. “Aintchya been listenin’ kid? Yer no more predetermined than I am. Something’s wrong with these here woods. More than ya might think.”
I laughed suddenly.
“Oh? Didn’t figure myself the comedian type.”
“It’s just that you’re telling me that there’s something wrong with the evil dark woods filled with monsters that are constantly moving when you take your eyes off them.” I kept laughing, and after a few seconds Matt joined in.
“Yah got a point there! I never even thought about it!” We were both laughing for several minutes, then Matt grabbed the flask from me and took another swig. Handing it back to me he said, “Take it. Yer gonna want the clarity.”
“But this is a dream isn’t it?”
He grins back at me, responding, “Prolly. Guess you won’t know till yah wake up right?” He turned back towards the void, squinting. “Almost time now. Take care o’ yerself kid. Don’t go almost dying again. And try yer best to find out why that lizard ain’t tellin’ yer story.” The strange vision turned to me, saluted, and then everything went black.
When I opened my eyes, I was greeted by both unimaginable pain and the stale air of the Rootways. Matt’s parting words sat in my brain, sloshing back and forth. Then I realized that something WAS sloshing back and forth in my brain, and it was a wholly unpleasant feeling. My body was burning, literally blazing with heat, which accounted for at least some of the pain. The rest…
I tried to overcome the blinding pain and focus my eyes. I was still trapped underground, but from the fires licking at my skin I could see I had a small space hollowed out all around me. A familiar voice trickled through my concussed mind.
Zephnos? Are you alive?
“What… did you do?” Even my tongue hurt as I spoke, scorched by the intense heat that exuded from me. Gouts of fire escaped my throat. Where was all this heat coming from?
I pushed more of the essence of the Dark Forest into you. You must live, and it has so much to give.
As I watched, the fires leaped out and swallowed up more of the dirt around me. My small cavern was rapidly expanding, even as the heat intensified.
“You’re burning me alive!” I gasped as I noticed chunks of myself begin to drift away inside the small space.
I’m doing what I can to keep you alive. There was a hint of reproach in the voice. You NEED to live. As long as your connection to the fire lives, you will recover.
“How do you know that!”
Sonphez didn’t reply. All of a sudden, the raging inferno that was my connection to the Salamander diminished drastically. For a moment I thought Sonphez had gone too far, that this time I really was dying. The conflagration shed more and more of itself into the surroundings until at last my skin stopped glowing and emitting tongues of flame. My ashsight, which had been completely overpowered by whatever Sonphez had done to my body, finally began to recover. And that’s when I noticed the near complete absence of the Forest’s sparks in the ground around me. It likely couldn’t see me. And THAT was good news for me.
I raised my arm to touch the dirt and realized with horror that my bones were protruding through the skin. I cried out and tried to grab my mangled limb with my other arm when the bone began to submerge into my epidermis. The wound then sealed itself and the pain began to ebb away. I pulled the healed appendage to my face, inspecting it with my ashsight. It was incredibly dense, packed with so many sparks of power that it was dizzying to look at for too long. “Is this where the rest of the dirt and stone went?” I asked Sonphez. He didn’t reply. I guessed that I’d somehow annoyed him and he was sulking now. Flexing the hand, I placed it on the wall of my new prison. It began to fall away as the now ashen barriers lost integrity under my touch. As I’d suspected, no sparks meant they were just normal ash once more.
I thought back to what Matt had said. At this point there was no doubt about it. Sonphez wasn’t just a voice in my head. What was he? Why did he keep insisting I had to live? And another question came to me. The Dark Forest itself needs me to live. Why? It even intervened in the fight with Stentor. If not for it I’d be dead. Who would know the answers?
It all keeps coming back to the Salamander. Matt said that it wasn’t telling my story anymore, whatever that means. If I was going to get more answers, the Salamander was going to have them.
Purpose set in mind, I tried to get up and let out a cry of pain. I looked down at my leg with my ashsight and saw the matrix of sparks that now composed them solidify into a complex mosaic of power. Pain left it shortly after, and I experimentally tried it out. Confident that I could once again stand, I began to notice the sloshing in my head fade. Whatever my ride-along had done, I was now healing remarkably fast. The pain in my head disappeared, which just left one more area.
Deep inside me, something new was there. There was a deep emptiness, close to my heart. It felt like something had been sucked away, leaving a cavity where it had once been. I felt around my chest. Everything appeared to be in working order. No more pain met my touch, which meant it was something else. I didn’t have a word for the emptiness. Without a way to deal with it, I decided I’d try to move on.
I began to dig my way through the ash, angling upwards. It was hard to keep it from smothering me. It stuck to everything, and I could feel it accumulating in my fur. Every now and then I stopped to let it settle, filling in the hole I’d come from.
It was as I was digging that I came across something I hadn’t expected: when my hands pulled away from the ash, they brushed cool scales instead of dirt. In the near total darkness I almost missed it. There were no corresponding sparks to indicate a dead guardian, which meant… oh.
“I just found Stentor.” My throat ran dry and I stumbled away from the unconscious dragon, causing a small avalanche of ash on my head. Nothing happened, but I also couldn’t see Stentor’s body. It was simply too dark to see anything without ashsight.
“Is he… dead?” I poked at the scaly hide with my hoof. Then I kicked harder. No reaction. Stentor was either a very deep sleeper, or completely dead. Thoughts began to invade my head. If he was dead, then I had no more threats in the Dark Forest. Everything else completely ignored me. But… I had to make sure. I began to excavate around the uncovered section, digging up and around the creature. Eventually I broke through into fresh air and sucked in a massive breath. It was so good to be outside again. Looking back down into the hole I had emerged from, I considered just leaving Stentor’s body alone. Cursed as he was, he wasn’t a threat to me even if he did still live.
I began to slide down, but hesitated. I wasn’t in any hurry to get crushed again. To be honest, I was scared. I’d nearly died, and going back down there would be putting me back into the same situation that had nearly gotten me killed: underground with an angry dragon. Looking around, I checked for the Dark Forest’s attention. It was there, but its eyes weren’t on me anymore. Whatever my underground journey had led to, at least some good had come of it. I began to compose a verse, climbing out as I did so.
“Once you you were my enemy,
And now I sing your elegy.
Trapped beneath the ashen ground,
By curse you once were bound.
I raise you above the dirt,
To reveal how much you hurt.
My bones, my flesh, my soul anew,
All because of wounds caused by you.”
I paused, and as I did the ground beneath my hooves trembled. The tunnel I’d just vacated collapsed, the ash sinking into it like water. A ghastly scream echoed from beneath the earth and for a second I thought I’d caught the Forest’s attention once more. However, no entity rammed into my skull, and I jumped towards one of the giant pines around me, grabbing onto a branch and pulling myself up. Looking down, I saw an ocean of earth churning where I had stood moments before. The few sparks that still resided in the substrate were now gleaming bright as stars as they attempted to follow my command. The wail from below grew louder, and then the dark absence of Stentor’s bulk surfaced, ripped from his prison. And he was still alive.
He roared, unleashing a massive gout of flame that illuminated his pale scales. It was then that I saw the blood streaming from beneath them. Even as I watched, the flames were cut off, replaced by a torrent of viscera as he coughed up more of his insides. “ZEPHNOS! WHAT DID YOU DO!” It was a demand, not a question, and the actions that followed made it painfully clear why.
All around me, the trees awoke. One by one they wrenched up their roots and began to shuffle towards the wounded dragon. Unbidden, they began to cover him in their gnarled feet, yanking on the convulsing beast. And then, to my horror, they began to pull. Alarmed, I quickly belted out another rhyme.
“My intent was unclear,
My foe I hold dear,
Harm was not my wish,
From the dirt I did fish,
Keep him from moving,
While I do the proving,
Stentor must endure,
Of this I am sure.”
The words left me, and this time met a solid wall. The Dark Forest’s attention was back in force, and my spell was no longer under my control. A flash of memory hit me like a frying pan: wide, leaving a lasting impression, and impossible to forget. This was the SECOND time I’d felt this. The Dark Forest had hijacked my spell once before! It was where Stentor’s curse had come from!
Stentor screamed, streaming fire and blood all over the trees. But despite his best efforts, his wounds had taken their toll. It was clear that he was near death, and I began to hear pops as bones dislocated and flesh tore. I averted my eyes as the tree I was standing on joined the fray. Against my wishes, the Forest had decided to end my enemy’s life once and for all. All I could do was cover my eyes and ears, but even then I heard the calls of agony as my old foe’s body was ripped to pieces.
I held on to the tree, my face buried in the bark, hands over my ears. Every now and then the tree would jerk and I would hear the muted torture once more. It felt like hours, but I knew I had to be sure that Stentor would never come after me again. I had to stay until the end. If I left now, I might never be able to find his body, and he might slink off into the Rootways once more.
Eventually, the screaming stopped. The sick sound of cracking bones continued for a while after that, but then even that stopped. I opened my eyes, hoping that meant that the remains were still there. That Stentor’s own abilities to forestwalk had prevented him from escaping. A sob I didn’t know I’d been holding escaped my lips. Nothing deserved what the Forest had done… no, what I had inflicted on him. Now that I knew that I’d wronged him, that I was the cause of his mate’s death, I felt responsible twice over. Why had my rhyme woken the Forest? What had happened? I needed to see the body. I needed to know that at least it was worth it.
I wiped my eyes. It didn’t help. Deep in my being I felt a new emotion, which I guessed was guilt. I didn’t know what Stentor wanted, or what he meant to do after he killed me, but I had ended his life in possibly the most painful way possible. I needed to make it mean something. I needed to know it was worth the cost. I needed to make sure that his death meant I found the Salamander. Now I had free reign of the Rootways, I could avoid the Dark Forest entity’s gaze. It couldn’t trap me, and I could use the Rootways to find the Salamander.
You can finally find me.
I paused, struck dumb. “What did you say? Sonphez, what did you say?”
But no response came.
Slowly, I climbed down from the tree. It had rerooted itself in the gore that was left behind. I touched the ground, forcing myself to feel what I had caused, to feel the blood that my action had spilled. The seed of guilt spread. “You didn’t deserve this. Even if you did try to kill me, you didn’t deserve to be tortured.” Bones and bits of skin had been flung all around, and smoking craters were left behind where Stentor had made his last stand, illuminating the battleground. A burned out tree spoke of his final moments. Even as they pulled him apart he’d fought back, burning their bark and reducing them back to their base components. But even he wasn’t able to escape when the forest itself was against him.
It got what it deserved. The malice in Sonphez’s voice shocked me.
“What is wrong with you! I would never do this to a living being! Nothing deserves this!”
You would, and you have. Now, come and find me.
A cold shiver ran through me, making my hair stand on end. Up until now I’d considered Sonphez to be a companion, even if he was an unusual one. Now, I looked at it with disgust. If it was capable of that, then this thing wasn’t born from my mind. Matt was right. It was a real piece of work, and one I no longer wanted living rent free in my head.
“What do I do now?”
I just said. Come and find me. Find the Salamander. Answer your questions. Sonphez worded it like it should be obvious.
I ignored it, looking at the corpse that lay on the ground before me. An idea came to mind. I didn’t need to eat… but Stentor probably did. Maybe during his time here he’d eaten some of the guardians of the Forest. If that was true, then I might be able to absorb something from him… like memories. If that was the case, then maybe I could learn something from him. He’d been an incredibly powerful enemy, capable of doing things I couldn’t explain. That knowledge might help.
I bent down, trying not to think of who the blood and flesh used to be. I tugged away a chunk of flesh, flinching as the meat stretched and snapped. I tried to ignore the blood that dripped from it as I put it into my mouth and began to chew.
What are you doing? Sonphez sounded annoyed, impatient. I didn’t answer him and tried to swallow. I gagged once, then repressed the reflex and tried again. This time it went down.
I stood there dumbly for a second. No new knowledge came into my head. I sighed, turned, and walked off into the distance. Once more, I’d have to find a human. But this time, nothing would be able to stop me. The Dark Forest couldn’t lock me with its gaze, and Stentor was no longer preventing my use of the Rootways. It was time to finally find some answers.
As Zephnos disappeared into the Dark Forest’s mist, a light flared in the darkness around the deceased legend. Chains clattered as the light’s owner stepped forward, knife in hand. “Another dead one. One of the last. Dragons are hard to come by these days. Last of the forest walkers. Last one to escape from Earth.” The figure, covered in a swirling mask, begins his work breaking apart what’s left of the body. He knows he won’t have long before the Dark Forest begins to claim its most recent victim. Already, he can hear the skittering of millions upon millions of Ants in the distance. He looks up from the body, after Zephnos. “Will this be the time? Will this time be different? For her sake. All for her sake.”
