Music from the Woods

"Well done!" said the woodsman to Rudsis as they entered the small campsite where they'd been sleeping for a month now. "You brought us back without getting lost, and even got us our food for tonight."

Rudsis sat on the stone that had come to be his seat by the fire. "How much longer will this take?" he asked irritably. "We need to find this witch now."

"I take it you know where she lives, then?" the woodsman sat contentedly on his own stone to strike two flints together on wood that had already been laid before they'd gone off to explore another part of the woods.

"How could I?" replied Rudsis.

"Then how do you expect to find her now?"

Once the fire took, the woodsman extracted some nuts and berries from a bag that hung from his belt to divide them up equally in two. "No meat today, but that's fine. We're sure to run into something tomorrow."

"How much longer will this take?" Rudsis insisted.

"Hard to say, lord." The woodsman sniffed and passed the back of his hand under his nose. "You know this forest might be endless, and without a single thing to tell us where she could be, we're gonna have to set up camp, search the surrounding area, and then move on. She might be close to the river, or she could have struck lucky with a well and live well away from the river."

"We can't waste away the time like this," Rudsis said sternly.

"What are we going to do, then?" the woodsman asked lightheartedly. "If you know better, lord, I'm ready to follow your orders."

"You care nothing for the people being enslaved, then? Or for those whose lives are to be offered to Treni?"

"I ask you again, lord," the woodsman's tone was less friendly now, "If you know better, order and I will obey."

Rudsis had to force air out of his nostrils to alleviate some of the frustration. "Is there no faster way?"

"Not unless you know how to smell like animals do and track down this witch."

Rudsis moved his head in a circle, stretching the muscles of his neck. He didn't know how to respond.

"Do you really worry about the folk?" asked the woodsman.

"They're my charges. It's my duty to protect them, their well-being, their lives."

"Have you ever lived among the folk, lord?"

"My whole life has been dedicated to them as a guard."

"Heh. That's it, then."

"What is?"

"Nothing." The woodsman cleared his throat and waved his hand in the air to drive away the subject. "Are we really looking for a witch? I would have sworn they weren't real."

"Why did you say that's it, then?" Rudsis hadn't liked the mocking tone of the man.

"You won't like the answer, lord."

"I'd still have it."

"Just keep in mind I can run away and leave you to fend for yourself in the forest."

"At most I'd fix your nose for you," Rudsis said with a sly smile. "I figure you can take a deserved punch like a decent person, can't you?"

The woodsman chuckled. "I should keep my mouth shut like a prudent person, more like. But fine. What I meant was that if you'd lived some time among the folks, you might not be so quick to want to help them. That's all."

Normally, Rudsis would have replied reflexively. But he'd only found out about people living in the streets of Crown a month ago. What the woodsman said was true. Rudsis had never lived among the folk. He'd come from a family where all the men, and even some women, were guards. This elevated their status. He'd never had to interact with the children of folk that worked a trade to make their living, much less with the children of people that begged or stole. And most of his youth he'd spent with others that were being molded and disciplined as guards.

"Are we really looking for a witch, then?" asked the woodsman.

"Yes." Rudsis realized he must have been quiet for a while. "We are."

"Guess they must be real, if gods are as well. Damn. Who would have said those old tales are likely true? This reminds of what my grandfather used to tell me as a kid."

"Is it something that will help us find that witch?"

"Hah." The man slapped his thigh. "If only. But do you know what? Maybe it will, if I can remember everything he told me. It all had to do with legends of the forest. Warnings and such."

"Get it out then. We might find something useful."

"Oh, I don't know. Most of it might be senseless. He was always going on about how you want to get yourself in a cave during a full moon, and block the entrance with a rock."

"Why?"

"Monsters." The woodsman threw a log to the fire. Sparks cascaded up into the air and faded. "Things that looked liked the breed of a wolf and a bear. Then, he said that if you ever heard a hissing whisper in the air, you better get yourself up a tree and be as quiet as a mouse hiding from a snake. There was also that thing about sitting by a fire at night. Something will come close, but stay in the shadows so you can't see it. It'll speak to you in different tongues and if you can't talk back to it, it will kill you and eat your tongue."

"My friends used to tell those kinds of stories when we were young," said Rudsis dully.

"Yeah, that's what I meant. I doubt any of this will help us. But my favorite was the bit about music in the woods."

"Music? What does that sound like?"

The woodsman shrugged.

"And what do you have to do when you hear it?"

"If you can barely hear it, as in you're not sure whether you're hearing music or not, you run away from it. But if you're sure you're hearing music, you might as well cross your fingers and hope it's--"

A grave, chirping sound drowned out whatever the woodsman was saying. It was a prolonged sound that hung in the silence of the woods for so long that it made both men feel uneasy. It finally died down slowly, and the two of them looked at each other over the flames of the fire.

It had gotten dark during the course of their conversation, Rudsis noticed. "I wouldn't call that music," he said.

First, the woodsman smiled. Then, he let out a single chuckle. Then another one. Finally, he laughed.

When it was silent again, grave chirping notes came out of the darkness of the woods, arranged in a melody.

Neither man dared make a noise. They only had a second to recognize the fear in the eyes of the other, and to see how their faces paled to a deadly white, when an enormous mass tackled the woodsman.

Rudsis jumped back on reflex, fell on his backside, and dragged himself away for a second before springing to his feet and running away. His panic pushed everything out of his conscience, and the only thing he was aware of were the screams of the woodsman that faded in the distance as he fled.

The sun had already come out by the time fear left him. With a bit of awareness finally stirring in his mind, Rudsis climbed out of the hollow of the tree in which he'd hidden.