Words Leave Traces

He finds her in the forest. She bends and cuts sprigs from a plant, having no idea he is there. He watches her silently, sun striking painfully across her fiery hair, her skin lit like a wish. He would have to be a different kind of man not to be stirring. It doesn’t matter; he’s not that kind of man.

It isn’t the first time he has watched her, he’s invisible in the forest, soundless, even the birds are fooled into song. He imagines her being sharply aware of such things. He sees what she cuts and when, he is pleased to note that she has missed nothing.

From the first crocus right through to the heavy heads of autumn stalks, he has observed her. He knows how early she starts, how late she stops, if there is a husband, he doesn’t deserve the name. She has three different dresses to collect plants in, this tells him she is a person of wealth, her father perhaps a thane.

He knows that her face will freckle with sunlight, but the rest of her is goddess white. Her legs are strong, she runs like an animal. Her hair, past her hips and taunting him, spine straight and supple. He’s a patient man, a cautious hunter. He knows where to find her, so he doesn’t mind leaving her when the first frost appears.

Work calls him, lords are eager to hunt, the woods echo with silent fear. He is the master of the forest, so they come to him. There is nothing he can’t call, find, or hide. He will lead the hunts, he has chosen the sacrifices ahead of time, the strong always survive. The weak are called and culled, knowing what they come to, and they come anyway. It’s the worst fate to be weak in the woods. Eaten by something before you’re dead, or chased to death with arrows in your breast, these are terrifying, he will save them.

They run, with their blood flooding, pounding in their ears so they can’t hear what follows them, flying on instinct. He stands silently, somewhere, feeling the sting of adrenaline not his own, as different kinds of lust chase themselves through his forest. A deer dancing with death, what music should he provide for such a thing?

When they have brought it to bay, he will appear and do what must be done the way he wants to do it. He will take what must be given back to the forest and leave them with the rest, they will fall on it like starving wolves. Over-fed in every possible way, there is only one way to satisfy them, it is always death.

Where he reigns, long miles of dense forest and hills, he makes the rules. Others might own the land, but he is the master of it. Self-appointed caretaker to everything that men like to destroy when they are bored. That’s how he likes to think of himself. Born that way, with shoulders strong enough to carry such a burden. He really can find or hide anything, has he? Is he that kind of man?

The truth about him is that he simply does not care for people the way he cares for the woods and all that lives in them. A definite handicap, in any world. Something to be hidden, thought about carefully and then put to use. If it doesn’t kill you, it will make you stronger.

He is a forester of a different kind, long before such a thing exists. A mistake of sorts, as bad as a limp in his century. The deathly pallor of ‘different,’ it can’t be hidden. Different and ruthless? Thrive in any century. Everything else will give you trouble. What if you’re not a monster? Pretend.

It’s easy for him, an outsider, dark hair and eyes, not quite perfect English. Tall, well made, and invisible at will. Fear confers as much power as money or divine right. How to cage something like that? Never try, you will find him your chamber at night with your insides in his hands. Names they give him, to his face and behind it, countless. In the wider winds he’s known as the Forester, and that is enough.

A lone man. Silent. How is a man to know what he is thinking?

He drinks enough to sink most, never getting any louder, or more reckless, nothing like a normal man. Hat on or off, it makes no difference, eyes of still brown, with nothing in them to be read. When he smiles it throws them off, always a real smile. Those who can be are charmed by it, immediately disarmed.

He is a man who everyone knows, but no one knows anything about. That’s how he wants it. What is there to know after all? He isn’t worried as he leaves with the end of the season. Who will dare hunt in his forest without him? None.

He walks through the snow, without a sound, using shadows, using winds. Surrounded by friends, healing himself as he walks. Nothing cleaner than the forest, nothing simpler. No hidden motives or machinations, the rules are known, the game eternal. He walks, wishing he could walk forever, always moving through something alive, something understood.

He walks to where he knows he will find her, collecting rose hips at dawn, a glow in the morning mist, her own kind of light. He knows what cloak she will be wearing, what small basket she will use. He knows what the sun will do to her as it winds itself around her in wonder. He knows all of this, but he did not know, could not know, that there are two of her.

He freezes. Does what every man would do, closes his eyes, and opens them again. Despite himself his breathing grows rapid, his heart thumps painfully against his ribs, surely every creature in the forest can hear it? He is not a man to appreciate surprise, in any form. He isn’t used to it.

What to do with it when it, well, takes you by surprise. Be silent. Think. Crouched in the shadows, growing numb, soon they will be finished. A foot, a skirt, the end of a cloak, all of this suddenly appears before him, without sound or warning. He will not look up. A second set of feet, a different skirt. Still he will not look up. He closes his eyes and speaks to himself, sternly. When he is ready, he rises to his feet, they are there before him, exactly alike but beautifully different.

He bows to one and turns to the other, looking at her without a word. Her eyes are darker than he thought, patience a part of her face. Pure and perfect lines, everything he knows her to be. He is hungry for all that he doesn’t know. How much can he say without using words?

 Her sister takes the baskets and moves away into the woods. Snapping twigs, crisp snow underfoot, she lets herself be heard leaving, soon it is silent again. He has not taken his eyes off of her. She looks fully into his face, hers a living artwork of questions.

 “Why have you watched me? Why have you hidden yourself through the season to follow me, what am I to make of such behaviour? If you wanted to remain unknown, you should have done better. I don’t appreciate being spied upon, already you have lost my respect. What will you do to recover it?

 “I know who you are, tell me your name. Tell me why I shouldn’t bring you to my father and have you thrashed.” She trembles with carefully controlled fury, “I don’t know what could possibly bring you here, to play the knave. I could scream now, and they would come running and you would be- something that I don’t want.

 “Are you a madman? The gods know you act like one.”

 “Yes,” he says. “Does that matter?”

“Tell me your name, your real one.”

His voice is quiet, low and sure. “Fulk. Will you say it for me Gytha? Will you mean it? Do you understand what I’m here for?”

She shakes her head, she looks away, she looks at him closely, she breathes quickly. A heartful, a mindful, how to understand it in an instant. “Fulk, what kind of name is that? I am the one who is mad.”

Dusk sinks down and changes their world. He takes her hand, and they walk silently into the woods.