Aid

OF GODS AND MEN

Chapter 18: Desire

             The forest was dank on the inside.  Humidity hung heavy in the air; grains of pollen languishing in vaporous clouds that floated lazily.  The airborne moisture weaved in and out of the thick rows of trees that bordered the path on which Tarsus stood.  Broken rays of sunlight shone through; fractured by dense brambles of shrubs that grew overhead, wreathed together like a fisherman’s net.

            Tarsus wondered how shrubbery could grow so high up.  He had seen such choking vines before, littering the floors of the Wandering Wood outside Brierden.  The village had been named for those thorny bushes, and shepherds avoided taking their flocks through that forest at all costs to spare their sheep. 

Like those briers, these brambles were laden with beautiful roses.  Normally, Tarsus would welcome the sight of flowers, but these overlarge blooms only added to the densely woven briers.  They only helped in choking out more of the sunlight that fought to break through.

Tarsus’s eyes fell back to the path.  It was straight enough; extending into a wood that grew darker with every step.  Only a few feet on, the road disappeared entirely from Tarsus’s eyes. 

The sunsword walked on, hoping the shadowed path would reveal itself as he got closer to the darkness.  He was not sure how.  Perhaps his eyes would adjust to the low light.  Perhaps he was at the top of a hill, and the path descended sharply down from its vanishing point. 

No such luck.  The path simply vanished, leading into a void of utter black.  It was as though the forest suddenly ended, and only nothingness lay beyond.

Tarsus halted on the threshold of the void.  One more step, and the darkness would take him.

He contemplated what to do next, grateful for the relative quiet of the wood.  There were no birds chirping or squirrels running, not even the sound of trees rustling.

Tarsus wiped his brow as he stood staring at the black before him.  Stopped in his pursuit, his mind was able to wander to other things: like how hot he was.  So hot.  The humidity felt suffocating now.  He bent over, putting his hands to his knees to ease the strain on his breathing.  Quick and shallow, those were the only breaths he could take in now.  The air was too thick with moisture for anything else.  Moisture…

A flash of his body, drowning in the Crystal Sea, assaulted Tarsus’s mind. 

Tarsus closed his eyes tight and tried to banish the image.  He focused on his breathing. 

“So hot…”

He ignored the sensation.  In and out; that was all he had to do.  In and out.

He felt dizzy, and began swaying where he stood. 

In and out.  He focused on the sounds of his breathing, and those short, sharp breaths echoed in his ears.

He realized then how odd it was that he could only hear his own belabored breaths.  Why was no wind blowing, at least?  He needed air.  Was any getting through?

Then he realized, he could hear something else: the sounds of low groaning.  It was faint, and so natural to the wood that it must have been there since he entered. 

Tarsus shot upright and looked around.  There were trees and thick bushes crowding him on either side. 

“Were they that close to the path before?” he wondered.

He turned around, intending to go out the way he had come.  He needed fresh air, and time to better assess how to get through this wood.

More thick-bowled trees and lush flower bushes stood right behind him, blocking the path back to the forest entrance.

“They were not here before,” Tarsus asserted, coming to understand the truth of this place.  “It is growing all around me.”

He was stuck on the last stretch of visible path.  Behind him was the encroaching forest, and before him was an impenetrable blackness.

“Enemy of the forest, beware,” a lilting, feminine voice reverberated from everywhere at once.

Tarsus searched for the speaker through the trees and brambles, but he saw nothing. 

His breathing quickened, and his face was covered in such thick sweat that he found himself wiping it from his brow every few moments just to keep his sight. 

From out of the blackness that was Tarsus’s only way forward, stepped a knight clad in silver armor; face covered underneath a full helm.  Whoever the warrior was, Tarsus was certain that she was female.  Her form, mostly obscured by her armor, could not be entirely hid beneath metal and silver. 

Taking in her shape: the gaps in the plate and the curves of her shape underneath: he was momentarily distracted by a sudden sense of longing for this woman he did not know.  Images flooded his mind: the two of them embracing one another, allowing the forest to grow all around them and cover them from the view of the world.

He shook his head, though his thoughts were no so easily dismissed. Like a lioness circling a wounded gazelle, they lingered. 

She drew a sword and held it up in a readied battle stance.  The implication was clear.

“A fight?” Tarsus thought; panic rising inside of him.  “I can barely breathe.”

“Why have you come here?” the knight asked.  “What do you want?”

“I’ve come…” Tarsus wheezed.  He took several breaths in rapid succession.  “…for Malthir.”

“Ye who seeketh the sword, beware,” she said in that lilting voice that echoed from everywhere all at once.  “Devices of gods are not meant for the hands of men.  It could destroy you.”

“Have to…” Tarsus managed.

“Why?” the knight prodded.

“My friend,” Tarsus pushed the words out.  “Cecily.”

“Ah,” the woman exhaled with the intimation of intimate understanding.  “Love.”

Tarsus did not respond, he only breathed as quickly as he could.  He told himself he did not care what this woman thought about his reasons; about what conclusions she jumped to. 

“But I do,” he thought to himself.  He did not know why, but those lingering thoughts from before: those desires: fell into his mind again like overripe fruit falling from brittle branches.

The knight lifted her free hand to her helm, removing it and dropping it onto the newly moss-covered path. 

Cecily’s eyes bore into Tarsus’s own, past the sword she still held up.

“How…” Tarsus began.  He was forced to take in a few more breaths.  “…are you here?”

“You tell me Tarsus Cole,” Cecily replied with grim satisfaction.  “You were the path.  This UnderIsle is yours.  How am I here?”

Tarsus did not answer.  He could not.  He searched his mind, but he had no knowledge of the lore surrounding the UnderIsle.  Before Cassius told him otherwise, he believed the UnderIsle to be a myth.

“The only way through the black,” Cecily teased, “the only way on, is with a clear purpose.  Honest…focused…brutal.  The path to purpose is through desire.  So tell me, Tarsus Cole, what do you desire?”

“The sword,” Tarsus answered quickly.

“Lies,” she hissed gently. 

Suddenly, she materialized before him; her face so close to his that the tips of their noses nearly touched.  She exhaled slowly, putting a hand to his chest.

“The sword is a sigil…an emblem; etched onto the coffin of the desire you bury inside.”

Tarsus did not look down.  He tried to keep his eyes locked on hers; tried to lend his demeanor and air of calm and confidence.  But the beat of his heart sped up to match the rhythm of his breathing.

“Your heart knows the truth,” Cecily whispered.  “It shouts it even now.  Do you hear it?”

She looked up at him, and he down at her.  Neither one of them moved; they only stood staring at each other as the forest grew around them, faster and faster.  Very soon, it would close in on them fully: binding the two in twined branches and wreathed vines.

“I…” Tarsus froze.  He was almost entirely focused on her.  Her presence had nearly drowned out everything around him.  But a crescendo of wood groans reached his ears, and he remembered the ever-growing forest.  He spared two quick glances, left and right.  The leaves had covered their feet and legs.  He could feel the light squeeze of vines wrapped around his thighs.  The forest was swallowing them whole.

“Tell me,” Cecily comforted, inching her face closer to his.  Their lips were so close now.  All Tarsus had to do was lean in, only a little, and…

“I have to go on,” he finally said.

Cecily backed her head away from his.  “You are free to.”

She stepped aside then, breaking the vines that anchored her to the earth.  The way into the black was clear, though the forest was closing in on it quickly.

“I’ll see you back on the ship,” Tarsus betrayed.  He did not mean to say that.  He wanted to say something else, but he did not know exactly what he wanted to say.  “I’ll have the sword,” was the best he could think of.

But Cecily did not respond.  She gave herself to the wood; rooted to her spot as vines and branches wrapped around her, covering her legs, torso and chest in green.

Tarsus stepped forward, freeing himself of his leafy shackles.  He stepped onto the threshold of the black: onto the last bit of visible path.  He turned back to take one final look.

Cecily was entirely gone now; consumed by the forest that was quickly filling the little remaining open space with itself.

          Tarsus turned back to the black.  His choice was made.