2. Chapter Two
Ruax holds up the typhon head, and the crowd cheers. In his long purple and ivory robes, the magistrate places the spiky black crown on the thieving man’s head. I slip out of the accumulating crowd before he receives his stolen prize money.
I wait for Ruax to head back into the forest to follow him.
The black horns I need more than breathing stick out of the bag on his back.
If I can get the money too, it’ll be a bonus to help me buy more food and medication.
He opens the black door to his cabin, which has red roof tiles like most of the houses in and around town.
Red protects against the monsters and the madness.
Three large oaks grow around the cabin, and I climb the closest one to wait for night to fall.
When only the stars and a halfmoon give light, I slide to the ground and creep up the creaky steps to the weathered porch.
It takes effort to leap over the holes growing in the rotted wood.
The lights went out a good twenty minutes ago, and I open the door a crack to be sure.
A soft glow from the fireplace casts flickers over a couple of chairs and a wooden bench.
I close the door behind me and cautiously test the floor for squeaky boards before placing my full weight.
An odd painting of a deer with red eyes hangs above the fireplace as the only visible decor, and I study it as I slip into the hall.
The first door is open, and the body under the white fur blanket looks much too bulky to be Ruax’s lanky one.
The next door is shut, and I leave it for last. A third door across the hall is open enough for me to peek in.
Moonlight speckles a pale glow over Ruax’s sleeping face and the bag.
One horn is out on the table while the second is nowhere in sight.
I inch into the room, creeping across the wooden floor until I reach the horn.
When I pick up the bag, something falls out of the bottom and thuds on the ground.
Ruax leaps forward and whips his head around until he spots me and lunges from his bed.
I dodge him and make it out the door with the bag and horn.
He grabs the back of my shirt, but I slip from his grasp as he shouts for the house to wake.
I don't wait for them to reply as I bolt out the front door.
The porch gives, and my foot falls through a crack, causing me to trip.
Ruax grabs my leg, and I kick him in the nose with my free foot.
I roll down the stairs and make it to my feet, running through the narrow trees and trying not to trip again.
The night hides the path home, but a tug on my instincts pulls me to the left as though a mysterious magic guides my steps.
It’s not until I see the house ahead, lit up by torches, that I realize I’ve gotten dangerously close to Albion’s house.
My options are limited, as around the cabin is a raging river on one side and on the other, the trees grow so tightly together that there is no way through.
It’s like Albion built his house as an impenetrable wall to conceal whatever exists beyond it.
Pain strikes my shoulder as Ruax throws a rock at me, and two others join him.
They’ve blocked me in with no choice but to face all of them or head over the forbidden crimson border marking what everyone is warned against. No one steps foot on Albion’s land and walks away.
That is driven into everyone in the village from the moment they are born, but no one ever knows what happens there.
“You’d better turn back before you cross the red line. Better to face me than it.” Ruax throws another rock that rolls close to the covered porch steps.
The cabin's dull green shingles contrast the reddish wood siding that must have been imported from a different forest. The hue makes it stand out from the grey aspens around it.
All the windows are smeared with red paint so badly that they allow no visibility into the small cottage.
An ax leans against a shed, and I bolt for it, ready to defend the hope in the bag on my back.
I get close to the rope as dread strikes my stomach, so I stick my heels in the mossy dirt and wobble over the border.
Ruax cackles. “No one is stupid enough to cross that line. Better to let me have my prize back.”
My lungs burn with each breath, and it seems unlikely I can outrun all of them. I jump over the rope and flinch, bracing for an attack. Nothing happens, and I grab the ax.
Ruax slides to a stop a few feet from the boundary. “You’re a psycho.”
I swing the ax at the men. “You haven’t seen crazy yet.”
The door to the cabin flies open, and an elderly man barrels out. His long white beard whips around, synchronized with his crazy hair. He holds a pot and a cane, slamming them together to create a metallic ruckus. “Get out of here!”
Ruax and the others run back toward their cabin, but I stand firm after noticing Albion’s white eyes staring blankly ahead. He holds his cane out in front of him and turns his head in the direction the men flee.
The old man shakes the pot. “Don’t return!”
I wait until Albion hobbles back inside before retrieving the ax and leaning it against the shed.
I tiptoe toward the rope. Something stops me, like I'm being summoned to the tangled trees.
It punches my gut with the urge to check between the branches.
Fear that it's a trap snaps me from the odd trance, and I continue toward the forest. One foot hovers over the red line.
A hand grabs my wrist and flings me back onto the property.
My eyes widen as Albion lifts his hands while bending his fingers like claws.
He roars, chasing me as I crawl backward.
My back scrapes against the rough wooden steps.
I scramble onto his porch, and having nowhere else to go with him blocking my escape, I bound into his house to find the back door.
From the small amount I see while running, his house looks pretty normal with a kitchen, den, and a hall with several doors.
I fling the back door open and bolt down three small wooden steps, stopping when I’m met with a solid rock wall.
To my left is the chaotic river, and on my right are the twisted trees that almost look like a solid wall.
A strange sensation crawls up my arms and into my gut.
It’s another tug toward the branches. It grows in strength the longer I stand there gawking at it.
“Make a choice.”
I spin around to find the feminine voice that sounds both ancient and young. “Hello?”
“Make a choice,” she repeats. It’s unclear what direction she’s speaking from.
“What do you mean?”
“Would you rather walk through rock, water, or trees?”
“I can’t get through any of them.” I press on the stone in front of me to make sure.
“Choose and then you can.”
After studying all my options and seeing how impossible they all are, I focus and say the one that calls to me the most. “The trees, I guess.”
“What do you see in the branches?”
“Nothing. It’s empty space.”
“Is it?”
Heat wraps around my arms, tugging me toward the branches.
My skin burns, but I can’t pull away from the magnetic force tugging me.
I squint at something in the branches and reach between the gnarled thorns that scratch my arms, some digging deep into my skin.
Even when blood drips from my wrist, I can’t break free from the force.
I pull out a black rose, despite it looking too large to fit.
I bring it to my nose on urgent impulse and can’t place the eerily familiar scent.
It’s woodsy, wild floral, and citrus wrapped in an herby musk.
Not at all like a rose, but my chest aches as though it holds my most beloved aroma, long lost to me.
A twinge pinches my finger, and I jerk it back from the rose to see an elongated thorn shrinking back into the stem.
My blood drips onto the petals and seeps into the rose's veins, creating a ruby spiderweb to break up the solid black.
A burst of gold radiates from the rose until it returns to how it originally looked.
“Finally!” a voice growls, but there’s no source anywhere I can find, like when the woman spoke to me. Only this voice is too masculine to be hers, and too deep to be the old man.
“What have you done?” Albion’s murky blue eyes look to the side rather than meeting mine.
“S-sorry. I was just trying to get home.” I have nowhere to go but into the rushing river.
He clutches a long knife. “Don’t you know red is a warning? A warning!”
“Y-yes, I know that. What are you warning against?”
“The madness! The wicked madness! You shouldn’t have touched anything here!
The energy close to you tells me you have touched the worst thing you could have!
That’s why I built my property here to stop the madness, but you trespassed!
You must pay with your life to stop the end from finding fruition.
” He presses his face inches from my nose.
“I think it’s reached you!”
Albion’s face twists, and he swipes his knife at me. “You must die!”
I fall, landing on my ass. “That's not on my list today.”
“You have cursed us all! And must die for awakening him! Your death will return his sleep.”
He brings the knife down and barely misses me, getting closer each time he strikes.
There’s no way around him, so I can only jump into the river to escape.
The rapids drag me under to choke me with their frantic rushing.
I reach for dangling tree branches and miss.
My ribs are battered on sharp rocks, and I suck in water.
I’m plucked from the rapids and thrown onto the shore.
An enormous hooded figure watches me from the water before it climbs straight up the rock wall like it’s not completely vertical.
I kick several rocks into the river and scream into the sky when I realize my bag is long gone to the river. No matter how far I run with the current, the bag doesn’t appear. My side aches, and I plop onto a rock to catch my breath.
"The horns aren't meant for you. You are meant for another journey," a voice whispers.
I shake my head, but the whispers continue, and it seems the consequences for crossing the red line have found me.
It's doubtful it'll be the only price I pay for the mistake. I again search the river as far as I can with no success. I continue until I find a calm portion to wade over in. Anger boils in my stomach as it plays with the fear of Florian not having his medicine. I’ll have to go to the market and plead for help from the merchants. Maybe in debt myself to the healers.
The rose shimmers next to me, and I wonder how it remains intact when the violent current has enough strength to snatch my bag from me.
As I leave it behind, a powerful pull to return to it crawls over my skin until I have no other choice but to grab it.
I carry it home and stick it in a new bag to take to market.
Maybe someone there will buy it from me.
"You shouldn't have crossed the red line," the tiny voice murmurs.
I spend the morning gathering everything I can possibly sell at the market. At this point, I’ll sell my soul to spare my baby brother.
Yedda brings out a box of her jams and places it in my cart. “Sell those for the medicine.”
I set a box of Agatha’s crafts next to her crate and move a few things around. “Are you sure? Jams in the winter are your favorite.”
“I love Florian more, and it’s the only real thing I have to contribute.”
I hug her. “Thank you.”
She nods and heads back into the house, still wearing the frown she hasn’t changed since Papa’s death.
Elton easily attaches to the wooden cart that I fill with garden produce, quilts, canned goods, and many other things I’ve made with my sisters over the last few months.
Agatha shouts out a song as she skips to me with a basket. “Cornhusk dolls. I’ve worked on them all year.”
They’ll fetch pennies, but I thank her just as enthusiastically as I did Yedda. The whole family is doing all we can for our baby. Mama adds some of her embroidery and items from her garden to the cart.
She squeezes me tight. “You stay safe. Florian’s medicine is a priority. We’ll make do with whatever we have here if need be.”
“Yes, ma’am.” I wait until my family returns inside to grab the baby typhon from the barn and place him in the back with everything else.
Before leaving, I tell the little boy I’m fighting for goodbye, and I hug him longer than the others because I constantly fear for his life each time I leave.
My waking life harbors anxiety like it wishes to collect it as a terrible hoard.
Much of my despair grows in the thought of not getting a goodbye before the angels claim him as their own.
It’s all unfair that they someday will because we need him more than they do.
They have Papa and too many others I miss.
I climb into the seat at the front of the carriage and steer my horse toward the city.
The crisp fall air holds a spring warmth and allows me to remove my shawl by mid-morning.
Birds dip into the trees and back into the air, dancing in a show that seems only for me.
They entertain me for a lengthy part of the trip.
The red and orange leaves speckle the landscape between the greens of sturdier trees.
Stones rattle the carriage, causing my teeth to chatter every so often, and it becomes one of the few sounds disturbing the stillness.
Grey clouds in the west tease of rain as pine, birch, and maple trees narrow the path, spreading shadows over the road.
I pass through two villages, and in each, children stare at my cart with longing.
Stealing can earn death, so none charge me, but it's clear famine plagues them and makes me hate our king more.
He's indolent, not caring for the state of his realm.
I give the lunch Mother gave me to a small boy who reminds me of Florian.
He also reminds me why I can't share everything I'm taking to the market.
The air grows strange, like it does before a winter storm, but it stays too warm. Goosebumps prick my arms, and the same sensation runs down my spine like someone is watching me. The feeling follows me all the way to the city.