The Burning Eye

By nightfall, Lee thought that he had made good ground, and estimated that he had travelled at least several tens of li. He was sure now that he was out of the range of the search parties that would be sent to try and find him, unless there had been individual runners sent after him.

He had kept a steady pace, timing himself as he crossed the distance between two specifically chosen trees to calculate his speed, before using said speed to calculate his distance, multiplying it with the time he had to walk to estimate the distance he had travelled.

Lee knew that was firmly in unknown territory, following the river down stream and through the forest. There were no more familiar trees with their comforting gnarls and well trodden climbing footholds. There were no familiar paths, made from decades of running children who had made their way weaving through the trees playing pretend at wars and farm animals.

The sun was beginning to dip below the horizon, burning a bright orange through the haze of the grey clouds, looking like the giant fireball that it was. The thick, grey cloud cover was fading closer and closer to the ground, thinning out into long, horizontal strings, stretching across the sky and the horizon.

Lee watched the sun fall, gradually transforming to a painful red, dyeing the sky pink as it did so, looking as if it were a painful, festering, infected wound. It looked as if it was bleeding colour, leaking power and might, leaving raised pink scars in all the places where the sun had been before, forming the clouds.

Lee teared his eyes away from the pain mosaic that was ahead of him, forcing himself to turn his head to look down at the ground, closing his eyes to reduce the pain of his seared retinas, watching the black spots persist as his eyelids sealed shut and stubbornly not removing themselves and healing. He rubbed his eyes harshly, his vision blurring, eyes tearing, when he opened them slightly, quickly shutting them once more, unable to keep them open through the pain.

The sound of the river rushing past him, was a welcome distraction as Lee sought to do literally anything else than other than this. He knew, standing there, that he wouldn't be able to sleep here, exactly where he stood, tonight. The rapids were too loud, the waves slapping against each other, and the water slamming against the river banks, frothing up, and leaping over the edge, onto dry land.

He wouldn't be able to sleep listening to this loudness.

He was also too exposed here. If any large animals took this path, and he was sleeping here, he would be easily trampled. He wasn't going to risk discovering if any tigers or wolves lived in these woods by finding himself within their murderous jaws, being eaten alive, in his sleep.

That would be too painful, and a ridiculously stupid way to die. It was practically choosing the most violent and painful way to die. It wouldn't be nearly as bad as drowning in the river though, lungs burning and filling up with water, the skin of it being shredded, in the slightest presence of salt, and then choking and drowning in your own blood.

The pain in his eyes, in the face of drowning and being torn to pieces, dissipated slightly, relieving him.

Lee wondered if he would able to sleep in a tree for the night. He didn't move much in his sleep, and it wasn't likely that he would fall down and break his neck or any other bones that would guarantee his death.

On the other hand, the stories of bats eating his ears, in his sleep, may actually be true. The old ladies who had liked to gather in the village centre on festival nights to tell their stories were only right about half the time. Lee had later discovered that their stories of magical plants that could be used to heal ailments were true, and was a legitimate practice used in the next village with one doctor carrying around a book full of all the different plants and animals he could use to cure people. Then again, Lee wasn't quite sure that there really were giant cats who walked through the forest as its guardian.

Lee liked his ears where they were, and didn't want to lose them.

He decided to himself that it was probably better if he did sleep in a tree. If anyone from the village did arrive in this place, if he stayed in a tree, Lee would probably be able to spot them easier from a distance, and his hiding place would probably afford him a few valuable, extra minutes, in case he needed to escape.

He may not be as quick and as nimble as little Mei, but he could still jump from tree to tree extremely well.

He would just have to keep his sleeping rug pulled over his head to keep his ears safe.

Lee opened his eyes, blinking several times to recalibrate his sight, gradually being able to see more through the blur which fogged his eyes.

He looked over to the treeline, and decided that his next task would be to pick a suitable tree. He needed a wide enough, sturdy branch, somewhat hidden from the river, but still close enough for its sound to still carry over to be heard at the bottom of the trunk at the ground.

He needed to count the money that he carried in total, and ration his food out, to last him as long as possible.

Lee had found himself without an appetite, since he had left the village, and he still wasn't hungry now.

He froze when he suddenly realised that he had forgotten to pack himself a pot to cook his rice in, immediately making all his rice inedible, and unable to be eaten until he was either able to make one from clay, or he managed to buy himself one.

A traiterous, painful part of him, whispered that it was better that he had done so. There was only one pot in the entire household that he had run away from. If he had taken it, he would have further damned his mother. He had run from his marriage, thoroughly damning his mother into a life where she would be looked down upon even more.

She was already a widow, and would now be branded as the mother of a cowardly and weak, runaway son, with no notion of filial piety or sense of common duty to his ancestors. If he stole her cooking pot, he would only be giving her more trouble, forcing her to interact more with a town that would force her to listen to rumours and speculations about her parenting, and her personality.

Lee forced down the pain at the realisation that he had left his mother to piranhas that were his relatives, already quashing his mother's prospects of a careers, and a life where she would be left alone without a source of income.

She still had all the rice from the previous year, produced from Lee's lone hard work, and she would probably receive a share of the rice from this year, as part of a share, representing Lee's toil in the rice fields.

Lee slapped himself, viciously, before wincing at the pain, and rubbing his rapidly heating skin.

There was no point dwelling on the repercussions of his actions now.

He had run away, and there was nothing left in the village for him now.

He might as well declare himself evil and wash his hands clean of the affair.

Lee kept moving away from the river, turning around now and again, to ensure that it was still in view, as he heard more and more, louder and louder rustling bushes and leaves, as the nocturnal creatures began waking.

Just as Lee thought that he would have to change direction to keep moving downstream to find his tree, he came across something he wasn't expecting, this far into the woods.

It was a small, innocuous hut, with rushes making up the roof, and walls made of planks of wood, matching the same colour as the trees around him. It had only one door, and no windows.

Lee approached it and knocked once on the door, stepping back as it creaked open.

"Hello," he cautiously called in, shuffling back a little further in case danger awaited him inside. There was no reply, only the slight whistle of the wind as it blew through the cracks and slits in the wood, where there was rot and loose splinters.

Lee looked from side to side to find a long stick he could use to poke the door open from an even safer distance.

Lee looked back up to the shack, to check once more on the door before he left, and froze.

There was a single, glowing eye peering out of the darkness from inside the shack, slit pupils and burning red.