The Dark Wood
The warrior fled toward the haunted wood that held a hundred tales of mischief. Sprites and fairies were said to roam the dark places, but there is no going back. He does not believe old-wives’ tales or the warnings of seers, the warrior was a man of sword and strife who once lived by a code now abandoned. In the dust lay pieces of his history: his ancestor’s shield, a medal of valor, a lover’s letter, and a broken shackle chain; all leading to where he is fleeing. The haunted woods lay still and unencumbered by the king’s claims on the land, it owns itself and is of itself and everything which enters belongs to it and it alone; the creatures born of its leaf have no other master, the creatures who enter must surrender the claim on oneself. It is filled with spirits and things unseen, so filled it is bursting at the seams; but the forest is infinite, it is whole, and always has room for one more. The warrior plunges forward, ignoring the warnings, for he has no other way. Shouts and cries cannot stop him, nor can the hustle of hoofs and steel boots; he runs from his past to protect his future, he runs through uncertainty to gain certainty, and in the wood he will trade sanity for wisdom.
The trees curve like an arch, a welcoming doorway into a place feared by the men seeking his head. From the suffocating well-lit paths to the liberating darkness of the wood he stumbles, arrows and spears falling short of wounding. He is alone in the dark in a world inhabited by the other-worldly, but he is free. His throat draws dry air into his lungs causing his chest to seize and a cough to erupt. He spits the sickness out and trudges straight and forward. It is dark, and fear tickles the back of his neck like the long, spindly legs of an insect. It is nothing. His false bravery tricks him, but it does not trick the forest. The forest accepts and beholds its new arrival with the anguished love of a tortured mother. The leaves twist to see him, every twig, every branch, every vine, every root, every sprout examines and measures the warrior. He is quick, but there is no hiding from one which possesses all within itself. He is not a virus to be destroyed but a nutrient to be assimilated.
The stump he tripped over, hidden well in the dark, showed no remorse in the damage done to the warrior’s bare foot. He caught himself on the moss-covered ground with a cry and favored the injury, rubbing and tensing and trying to remain calm. He is a man of sword and strife, but this wood has reduced him to a child. He tried to get up and fell, and again, and again. He then used a stick as a crutch, but tired far too easily. This forest, these woods, were closing in on him. He rested on a stump to catch his breath and try to get a glimpse of the sun through the thick canopy, but it was as if he walked into the night. He cried in anguish and slid to the ground. When he opened his eyes he saw a light, it grew closer, a soft light as if from a candle. The flame grew and shot away with the finesse of a bird. Another light floated through the wood lighting things in its path he wished he did not see: insects with many legs squirmed making the ground appear alive and moving like a rippling puddle until it passed, and stillness became it again. With rapid breaths he brought his whole body on top of the rock and waited, fear now gripping his heart like a fist. The floating lights spun around him, he swatted and missed, and then yellow eyes peered from afar and grew until an ugly hominid creature with a rat-like face sneered from the shadows. The old-wives’ tales and seers words floated and called out to him from the dark until it all ceased.
“What do you want from me?” the warrior cried in anguish.
From the dark, a series of roots and trees and branches blossomed flowers around the figure of a woman. A light surrounded the figure and all the hateful creatures retreated from her. She stepped within arm’s length and stroked the man's face with a wooden, yet soft, finger. He opened his eyes to a nymph or a goddess or some celestial angel sent to rescue him, yet the fear did not leave his heart.
“Why do you fear the dark wood?” The angelic being asked with tenderness and love.
“It is not the wood I fear. When I was a boy, I heard stories of soldiers risking their lives for honor's sake to go into the dark wood who would never return, and I was not afraid. When I was a youth, a young man from my village entered for the sake of love, to win the heart of a maiden, and was never seen again, but I did not believe. When I was a young man, the king declared the dark wood as his own and bad fortune befell him, and yet I still did not quake in terror as the people did. Now, as a warrior, a man of sword and strife, faced with the question of my mortality, it is still not the dark wood I fear.”
“What is it you fear?”
He felt so compelled to tell her, to whisper all his secrets and follies, but resisted. The woman floated around him, her flower blossoms brushed his beard and ear as she passed, her fragrance was like jasmine and lavender.
“Are you a nymph,” he whispered.
“Am I a nymph? Am I a tree, or the river, a stream, a lake, a rock, a pebble, a leaf, a blade of grass, the decaying logs, the old roots, the lily pad, the fruit, the seed, the sprout? Am I the soil of a mighty oak or the sand on the riverbank?”
“I do not understand.”
“I am none of these things, yet without them I am not. They are me and I am them, they are mine to own, yet they are not my subjects. I am not a queen nor am I a peasant, yet I am the highest and the lowest. I am all; I am none.”
“It cannot be.”
“I am the ambassador of the forest, the mouth of the vegetation, yet it is not I who the
vegetation speaks for, but the vegetation that I speak for.”
She spoke all this as she surrounded and studied the warrior's handsome jawline, his thick hair, and his hard muscles. She mounted his lap and drew her lips near, then away. Her smell nearly drove him into a frenzy. His foot ceased to throb.
“What, then, do you fear?”
“I do not fear a leaf on the wind, nor a blade of grass; not a rock or the riverbank; not the insects or the creatures cursed in these parts. If I do not fear them, I cannot fear you.”
“Then why come to the dark forest? It gives you no fear and offers you no gain. You are not a woodsman with an axe, what can the dark forest provide that the city lacks?”
“Safety.”
Branches shook, leaves rustled, animals howled, and it all seemed to sound as if She were laughing.
“Safety? Why would a man of sword and strife need to seek safety if he has no fear?”
“I never said I have no fear, only no fear of the dark wood and whatever inhabits it. You have pushed me into a corner, and I feel I have no reason to be dishonest with you any longer. By all logic and reason, I have lost my mind for good, and this is all a hallucination. The fear that trickles from heart is not of the dark wood, nor any god or demon, no beast or man, there is nothing in this world that I fear; it is leaving this world that shakes my bones and pushes me to madness and despair, enough so that I would enter the dark forest.” The man laughed victoriously, “I have grown mad, haven’t I? In fear of the executioner's blade, I have conjured this mystery around me so that I might escape my doom with no sanity left. Now I am wise, truly, for I have spoken truth to nobody for nobody is here. Who am I but a man of sword and strife who fears death? I cannot greet death with a gentle hand, I will meet it with my fists if possible. But truly, that is not everything, for it is not death I so much fear, but life that I love so much! The woman I love is the most beautiful in the land, my ancestry dates to kings and legends, I once led the greatest knights into battle against a terrible evil! Oh, the love I have for life and what life can be outweighs all my senses. But now it is a new regime. The king is dead, long live the king! And his snotty son lives on the throne and tackles those his father favored with vigorous assault. We are in the way! Lies have been spread; falsehoods have been created, all to discredit our name and our work. And what can we do about it now, you dark, bloody wood? The history books will slander us; all we worked for is naught. So yes, I fear death because I love life, but what kind of life is it now? My lover has abandoned me, my ancestry is dishonored, my court post is someone else’s, what life is left for me?” The man snickered and laughed and fell into hysterical crying and fell off the rock.
She withdrew and let him fall. She let him cry and she let him shiver until he was done. When he was done, she gave him water from herself and he drank, then she gave him fruit from herself, and he ate. He regained his bearing and sat up, no longer in despair, but in calm appreciation for the blood pumping through his veins. She lifted him with strong roots and vines back onto the rock. Her form mounted him once again and she spread her fragrance and caressed his jaw and felt his lips and smoothed his sweat glistened hair. The makings of her body were soft and sensual and aroused him and made him want this part of her. She spoke so softly yet he heard so clearly.
“My warrior, your time of despair is over now, isn’t it? I offer you now a gift, a gift I can give to all who enter here. You are now mine and mine alone, but you retain the essence of you still.”
He moved his hands to the small of her back and slid gently across the slopes of her physical form, it felt to him like expensive silk. “What gift can a fantasy offer a man of sword and strife?”
She left his body and floated as a fairy does in a dance, the surrounding glow followed her and transfixed his gaze upon a form so lovely the pain of his own lost lover receded to nothing. She danced and moved as the river; as a leaf in the wind; as a dew drops; as a bird sings. She rested and her smile was like jewels and her hair like feathered onyx. “I offer you eternal life, my warrior. Become a part of me and the essence that is yours will live forever. Become a part of me and you will know and remember the first day of creation and you will see the last day of extinction. Your consciousness will expand to every part of me: you will see the edge of the world by the rivers flow and the deepest parts of the earth below, you will see the highest treetops and the bright moons glow; you will see the birth of the sun and the death of the universe, you will return to dust and become numerous.”
Her words dripped like honey and soothed like milk. The warrior was overwhelmed by her vast, endless beauty and her promises of eternity.
“Return to dust?”
“Oh, my sweet warrior, don’t you see? No man survives the forest long enough to find the other side. You will die in the dark wood without me, and you will die by the executioner's blade in your own kingdom. Become dust with me and feel the extent of creation.” She pressed her warm forehead to his and nuzzled his nose with her own. The power of her aroma and stench of her words echoed like an explosion in the warrior’s head. He deeply wanted to kiss her and give himself to her and to have her as she let him.
“No!” the warrior cried.
“You are not thinking clearly,” she expressed sorrowfully.
“No. Your promises are great, but the sacrifice is greater. I was a man of sword and strife, it was fear of death that plunged my sword into other men, it was fear of death that told me to move faster, think smarter, to fight harder; and it was love that kept me alive in the trenches and on the hills of battle, it was returning to love that kept my feet swift and my legs strong. It was my ancestry that honor-bound me to lead and lead well and to win the wars my king needed to win, and it was the shackles that brought me here to the dark wood, shackles binding me to a cage to await death itself. I cannot become a part of you, even for everything you have to offer!”
“You are confused,” She said and kissed his neck, her soft lips moving from the base of his collar to his cheek.
“No, I said!” The warrior cried angrily as he felt his resistance slipping away, his desire and passion taking over and making him wish for nothing in the world but to become one with this infinite being. “If I give in to you now, I will be happy and blissful until the end of time, but I know I will not be myself, I will never again be the culmination of a life well lived, I will be sustenance for you, no matter what pleasures come it will be pleasures with a price I can only pay once.”
“You can only die once,” She said with the fury of the dark wood. Her beauty, terrible as it was, enthralled him still, but to remain a man he resisted once more against his base impulses. She flowed like the rapids and shrieked like an eagle, the trees shook, the creatures screamed high-pitched screams, and still it was beauty redefined. “You want me, and I will offer myself to you once more: infinite bliss, infinite pleasure, make your decision my warrior of sword and strife!”
The warrior fell to his knees as the dark wood collapsed and rebuilt itself around him and he felt as if he were shifted in and out of time; his life rolled in and out of view and consciousness: birth, life, his impending doom; it surrounded and enclosed upon him like a leaf filled canopy. She gave him visions of a life he could create for himself even in the darkest pits of the earth; he would always have her, always be with her, she would be his and he would be hers; it was love, it was panic, it was an unbreakable bond. His life outside this dark wood will be short; short, and his alone. The warrior, agony incarnate, screamed, and chose his fate between death and eternal bliss. And then all was still. She was gone. The wind ceased, and the trees remained silent and unmoving. No yellow eyed creatures, no insects, no roots in his path as he exited the dark wood.
He stretched his neck on the sticky pedestal, sticky from blood, toward the vast dark wood. The executioner begged his forgiveness for what he was going to do. The warrior, unflinching, forgave the executioner, for this was now his choice. The order sang and ravens cawed and the last vision for the warrior was of the dark wood, a sanctuary of life whose cost was merely one’s soul.
The End
Stephen Arnold is an emerging writer of fiction. He enjoys reading books from all genre's and considers himself a life-long student.
