This is a story I've been publishing elsewhere for a while, and now adding here too.
Tha Woods Boy
It was a misty fall afternoon, somewhere in late October I guess. I'd been out in Knock Woods with Bess, my old wolfhound, hoping to add another doe to my larder before the winter really bit. It had been fruitless so far, but then my hopes hadn't been high to begin with. Fact is game of any kind had been scarce all over of late, and while I had provisioned myself well enough so far, I always liked to have a little to spare for those few neighbors I had that were going without, but each trip this season had been bringing poorer and poorer returns. It was almost uncanny, how still the wood was that day, the tall straight pines disappearing into the shrouds of mist and not a breeze or a bird to animate them. It was, then, a blow to my ears when all of a sudden Bess erupted into barrage of deep, angry barks. Evidently she smelt something ahead, hidden in the white.
"What is it, girl?" I said, before crouching beside her and following her gaze, but I couldn't make anything out. The chill in the air seemed to deepen, whatever had spooked her couldn't be good. She was a wise old thing, not quick to temper or easily provoked. My presence next to her calmed her some, and the barking had subsided to a deep, guttural growl. Mind racing like my heart now was, I tried to assess the possibilities, and the dangers. There were bears further north that sometimes ventured here, and a few cats not much smaller than bears, but they had all seemed to disappear when the game had. Could be one, maybe sick or old, got stranded here, in which case the beast would be hungry, and desperate. Bess's front paws danced in place on the forest floor, and while she would never go ahead without my say so I knew she was itching to get at whatever she had smelt or heard. Deciding to trust her instincts, as I had so many times before, I got back to my feet.
"Go on, girl. Go find it." It was all she needed, and she leapt into a sprint, charging in the direction she'd been pointing at. Quickly unsheathing my hunting knife I ran after her.
Bess led me over a ridge and down into the shallow valley of one of the brooks that lace the woods. She was making fast towards the bank and I as I followed I began to make out her goal. There on the bank, just a few feet from the water, crouched a large, dark shape, like some kind of great beast, but no bear or cat or anything else I'd seen before. Beneath it lay another, smaller figure, pale and unmoving. At mine and Bess' approach the creature looked up, two red, shining eyes seeming to glow from within like flames. I swear the heart almost jumped right out of me as that thing set me in its sights, and a thousand little prayers flew through my mind. It was the look of death, and as the beast began moving towards me I thought it was my end for certain. It stopped and regarded me with such intensity it felt like a furnace, like a terrible force of will made manifest, seeming to strip me to the bone. All I could do was stand there, and that was hard enough, as every fibre of me wanted to fall to the ground, to curl up and die rather than continue under that stare. Don't ask me what happened next though, because the next thing I knew the scrutiny had gone and the creature had backed off and was making its way back towards the stream, almost effortlessly crossing it in one bound before disappearing into the woods beyond. Bess was going crazy again, but I barely heard her over my thumping heart. Slowly I came back to myself, though, and I remembered the second figure. With a last scan of where the creature had vanished I cautiously approached the pale body.
It was human, that much I think I had already known. I stepped up, expecting to see a mess of blood there on the rocky bank, but there was none. Whoever it is would be dead, I thought, as I crouched down to it. I slowly placed my shaking hand on the shoulder. If was cold, but not the cold of death, that much I could feel. It was like a gentle tug on some sense I have no name for, a plaintive plea. Don't leave me. Don't leave me.
I pulled them onto their back and saw it was a boy, naked and wet, his dark hair matted about his face. No, not a boy. There on his pale chest he wore the mark of Becoming that signaled he had been welcomed by the men of his tribe into their fraternity, but the deep, sharp blue of the swirling lines of his tribe's design, along with a lingering pinkness to the skin around it showed that it was new, just a week or two worn I'd guess. I didn't recognise it, so he was not local to these parts. I leant over him and placed my ear to his cold lips, straining for a sound of breath. It was lucky the day was so still or I wouldn't have heard it, faint as it was, but I had been right. He lived. Bess, too, had come to investigate, her previous aggressive demeanour now replaced with the fussing maternal instinct that was much more her nature.
"I guess we found a wounded stray, Bessy. What do you think we should do with it?" She barked once, and it was the playful bark she made when when I teased her with a bone. "I guess you're right. Not that I expect you'll help much."
The day was still light above the mist. I put it at maybe a few hours before it would be dark. Examining him more closely I saw some faint color had come back into his cheeks already, and looking close I saw his narrow chest was rising and falling steadily. Sighing, I carefully lifted him from from the rocks, holding him in front of me and, trying not to jolt or disturb him, got to my feet. I was surprised at how light he was, no more than a bundle of firewood he felt as I carried him away.
I had taken him home, back to my cabin, arriving as the last of the day's meagre sun had given up. I had wrapped him in my coat and that seemed to help some, because by the time I had lit a fire and lay him on a fur in front of it he seemed to simply be asleep, and no longer in that deathliness that had held him at first. I'd wet a rag and put it to his lips, wringing water into his mouth, and saw that he swallowed. That relieved me some, so I left him be and set to making some food, for I for one was famished. I took two of the rabbits I'd manage to catch the day before and, with some roots and herbs, put together a stew. It simmered above the fire and I sat down at last, the weariness of the day now hitting me.
The cabin window was dark by then. I looked down at the shape now lying at my hearth and began going over in my head just how he had come to be there. I shuddered at the memory of the beast that had so unmanned me. Despite the mist I knew that thing was not of those woods. No damn bear can jump like that, and no cat I ever saw was that big, or that black. And those eyes, those firey eyes that had pierced me like nothing ever, those weren't the eyes of any normal animal. Just recalling them I felt the dread that had filled me then, and I knew it would be a good while before I returned to Knock Wood. The creature was likely the reason every other animal with sense had left the place alone, and I was not about to contradict that wisdom.
My thoughts turned again to the boy as he lay there in the soft, orange glow, a look of quiet contentment on his face, his brow relaxed and his lips barely parted, and I found myself gazing at him and wondering why I hadn't just left him there on the bank. I know, I sound like a monster myself, but life can make monsters of us. Truth was I had supplies for myself, and little chance of getting more, and when I lifted him from the ground I had made a commitment to keeping him as long as was needed, be it one night or the whole winter.
Don't leave me.
That voice came back to me then. I looked to see he hadn't woken, but he lay there still asleep. That was why, I thought. When I had touched him and had felt that pull and heard that voice, so faint and yet so clear, I had known then what my duty was. There were still questions to have answers to, and perhaps the boy can provide some, but on that at least I was settled.
The smell of hot rabbit stew was now filling the cabin, and my belly began growling like Bess. She, by the way, had been happily gnawing on a bone, seemingly content to have had her usual spot usurped. She, too, was keeping one watchful eye on the stranger as she worked away. I stood and stepped to the hearth, lifting a ladle to the stew, then to my lips. It would do, more than do after the day. Maybe the smell of the stew had roused him too because, as I turned to grab a bowl and some bread I saw the boy stir. He looked like a little babe waking from a nap as he slowly and lazily stretched his arms, rolling and groaning a little like it was his own bed he was waking in and it was a Sunday morning. The sight held my attention as I stood half turned, and I admit the sight warmed me in more than one way. It had been a while since I had seen a naked human form move so, too long, and damn if he didn't look beautiful to my eyes right then.
I told myself I was just happy to see the kid alive, but my growing want made a liar of me as the blanket slipped, showing his taught, lightly muscled chest, the tattoo black now in the firelight, his pits brushed with hair as dark as that on his head, standing out against skin that was now no longer white, but still pale, like fresh cream. By the time my eyes had returned to his face his were half open and squinting up at me. No doubt I looked like some huge, dark shape looming above him, so I stepped back and squatted down to his level, and his head and eyes followed me, wary, and no doubt still half full of sleep.
"You're awake." I said. He looked at me for a moment, then peered around the small room, though he didn't look like he was taking it in. I pushed on.
"I found you by a brook in the Knock Wood. You were..." I didn't want to mention all that had happened just yet. There will be time for that. "You were hurt, so I brought you back here."
