“This way,” he said, leading off.
I stumbled after him, more from habit of obedience than anything. What had I done? My faux master, who I had been ordered to obey, lay dying by my hand. I fled my master. Clearly, I fled his will and gave succor to his enemy. But it was so far and so hard to think about. The flowers were so close and so wonderful, and I drifted back into them.
Argyl stopped suddenly and I tumbled into him. I fell but he managed to lower Jade's body carefully to the ground. There were two saddle bags on the ground, although the goats were nowhere to be seen.
“What's that in your hand?” he asked. I looked down at my hand and realized I held a pouch. I held it up to him. Opening it, he pulled out sticky black tar.
“Huh,” he said, and immediately broke a small piece off, much smaller than I would have eaten, and pushed it into Jades mouth. He was rustling through the bags and pulled out some blankets, some rope, and some pouches. Jade's moaning had grown more shallow. She was shivering badly now, her broken and twisted limbs flopping horribly.
“Kara,” Argyl said, “I need wood. Sticks. Sturdy, as long as her limbs. No, half as long. Four, half as long. Sturdy enough that they won't snap, but just so. Four of them”
“Yes master,” I heard myself say and looked about my feet. There were not as much wood as there had been the last time I looked, but there was still enough. I managed to gather four and stumbled back to him. I was dizzy and couldn't quite focus. Orders were good. No need to think with orders.
Jade was screaming as he pulled her limbs straight.
“I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, I was too late,” he kept saying. He took the wood from me without saying much and I sank down to my knees. It all seemed distant still, I hoped I was keeping up, desperation chasing through my mind, but so so far away. Like I was distant from myself, her screams filtering through a thick dark space, their faintest echos only penetrating to my nerves. Like my self was some other thing there, in a world with pain and consequence, where terrible suffering was the price of healing, separated from the peace and warmth I floated in.
He had tied the sticks tightly to her limbs and was fumbling with the blankets. He rolled them out and lifted Jade and put her in them. Her lips had turned blue and somewhere I thought that wasn't good.
“Kara,” he said,” I'm sorry, but please take off your dress.”
“Yes master,” I said, struggling out of it. I got caught in it and felt dizzy. The wind was very cold against my exposed thighs and buttocks. Then the dress lifted over me and Argyl was holding it. He was very careful to look only into my eyes, and never let his gaze fall down against my chilled body.
“Quick,” he said, “in the blankets with her. She'll die of cold.”
I was down and pressing my body against her almost at once. He pulled the blanket tight around me and wedged it underneath me.
“Hold her very tight,” he said, “Your body must warm her or she will die. I need to build a shelter and a fire, then I will join and help you.” The explanation was not necessary. I wasn't present enough to disobey. Had I disobeyed my master? I pulled my body close to Jade, intertwining my limbs with hers, feeling her chill flesh against mine and willing my warmth into her. The sticks tied to her legs reminded me to be gentle there. Why did I care? Did I care? Argyl carried the pouch of tar now. To please him would mean more tar. Was that why I did it? Surely I could kill Argyl and take it. But I did not. I held Jade to me and rubbed myself against her. There was nothing sexual about it, although it might seem so to read it. Our bodies were not mechanisms of sex then though. They were broken fragile things that needed each others warm to live, and so I rubbed and clung to her.
After a time it grew dark. Had I dozed? I did not know but it had grown dark and I could not account for the time. Then another body had crawled into the blankets and was holding Jade's body opposite of me. It was as if time was stuttering forwards, little snapshots with the intervening time hewn away. Arygl I knew. I felt his limbs snake between Jade's and press against mine. His arms wrapped around Jade. One grazed my breast but he quickly lowered it, so that it pressed against my lower ribs. That seemed funny to me. All three of us naked, pressed together to save a life, and he still scrupled to get no pleasure from my body. I would tell him I did not mind, but that didn't seem the point to him.
Had my opinion of him changed? He had seemed a helpless intellectual, reasoning his way though circumstances that required action more than words. But then, when it mattered, he had charged men outnumbering him, desperate and against all odds, to save his wife. To save me, I realized slowly, dumbly in my drugged mind. He had come to save us both. We were kin of some kind. As clumsy and useless as his attack had been, he had acted when it mattered.
I pulled myself into Jade, shifted myself down so that my breast pressed, just slightly, against his hand. He did not pull away. Was it a stupid thing to do? Would he think me a slut, beneath his contempt? Would he think me a fool for thinking such things when his wife lay nearly dead between us? Yet was I not giving my warmth to save her too? I was drifting, it was so hard to stay aware of the world. It was stupid. The worst possible time and place for it. Yet, he did not pull his hand away. It pressed, ever so slightly, against my breast.
Jade had stopped shivering. Her breathing came more regularly then and she seemed to be sleeping, healing. Our warmth had saved her from freezing, the tar had let her sleep. So odd that I felt it poisoning me as it saved her.
“Master, I think she will live now.”
There was a long silence. Then, “Yes, Kara, I think you are right.”
“Master,”
“Don't call me that.”
That sank through me. A command? I ought to obey. He had always asked before, but now he said.
“Argyl, I am glad that she will live.”
“Me too Kara.”
“Argyl?”
“Yes Kara?”
“Do you love her as I love my lover?”
There was a long silence. Jade breathed slowly but firmly.
“I don't know Kara. It's complicated. But I am very glad she is alive.”
I didn't respond. The flowers now were more distant. How long had it been? I felt myself drifting still, but the world was closer. Jade's body was warm now and it felt good to hold it against me. It must be very cold for her to have almost died of it so quickly. We were all three keeping each other alive then. I realized there was no wind on me. Argyl must have built the tent around us to block it out. I closed my eyes and drifted there, three naked bodies holding to life as if it were a thin golden string that might slip away.
It was so dark in my dream that I could not see, though I could feel cold wind cutting through my back. I walked forwards but had no sense of movement. Then there was a light far in front of me. Crumbled walls of white stone, bloody flesh and bones, and among it stood the bull headed man, streaked with gore, the great bull mouth drooling obscenely. In the logic of dreams I stood before him. There were two blades protruding from the stump of his right arm, where there had been one before. The white rubble seemed familiar, as if I had wandered through it in a dream before, but I could not place it.
I must have drifted out of sleep then, as I felt cold ebbing into my back and the warmth of Jade's body before me. I pulled myself closer to her. My legs bumped against one of the sticks that had been used to splint her leg. Jade moaned a little and I pulled my leg back.
The bull man was flanked now by two creatures. One seemed sometimes a great cat and other times a woman, yet I could not tell when her form changed, it was simply different from moment to moment. The other was a bear with three heads, one of a serpent, one of a vulture, and one of a man. All three were filthy with matted blood.
“You are to be broken, little slut.”
I stood before him shivering. He stepped towards me and there were two cock blades now, and his left foot was three blades. I did not resist him. My rebellion was overt now. I had acted on my own to murder myself. I had attacked a servant of my master. No mere hesitation now, I had acted. I fell to my needs. Was that terror inside me? Or fear? Both, I thought, but distant somehow, as though I were above myself and watching. And then I was shaking with it, paralyzed as that great obscene man stood before me, erect blades bobbing inches from my chest. He loomed huge above me, twice my height or more, and I shrunk down before him. I fell to my knees and supplicated myself before him.
“I have wronged,” I whimpered. “I accept my punishment. I accept I accept I have wronged.”
The cat took me then, gripping me with harsh clawed hands that bled my flesh. She bore me down, and the bear stood over me, the human face protruding on a long scaled neck, filthy, bits of dirt and shit caked on a ragged beard, its breath rancid with vomit and rot. I gagged then screamed as pain shot through my hand. My head twisted to look but could not, the serpent's head hissed and flicked its tongue on me. Pain then in my other arm, then feet. I screamed and tried to pull away and gagged and that awful mouth was in front of me. I could not get away, I screamed and whimpered and whimpered but I could not get away.
Then I was outside myself again, looking from far away, through colored glass. They hung me, through holes the bull man had cut through my hands and feet. They hung me and I was suspended in a pit, darkness all around except a small glint of light far above me. It was very cold, and my hands and feet burned with pain.
Then above came a procession of figures. Were it not a dream I would not have been able to see them, for distance and for pain. First came the bull man. He spit down at me and a wad of cud landed on my stomach. Then a three headed dog came and pissed down on me, the stream soaking my legs and pubic hair. The cat woman came then and looked. She was a woman then, but when I blinked a great lion. She did nothing, simply walked away.
Then came a man with the legs of a goat and rounded ram's horns on his head. He spit on me. Then three grimy children came and threw bunches of filthy wet rags onto me. One landed on my hand and the terrible pain grew worse. I screamed up at them and tried to jerk, to fall and die in shame and cowardice. But each twitch rocked my body with fresh agony and my protests ended in whimpers. Still somehow I was distant, only half feeling, half watching. Creatures who looked like men but had no color threw rocks, bruising my flesh.
“Master, forgive me, master, forgive me,” I heard myself whimpering, hardly knowing what I was saying. A stone struck my head and I could no longer focus my eyes. Far above black shapes threw stone and pissed and spit on me, and I whimpered and wished to die, for my hands and feet to tear open that I would plummet to the great black below me.
My hands wrenched in pain and flesh split as my master impacted into me. He now was a great beast, all dog, bear and lion, roaring hideous shrieks through a vulture's beak. His eyes were little black beads that sucked the color and the life from me.
“Master, master,” I whimpered. “Punish me, punish me.” I wished only for that great beak to close over my head and snap my neck. But it did not. He pissed his hate on me, hot acid that burned and peeled my skin.
“Kill me kill me kill me” I mumbled in pathetic little gasps. Pain and panic mixed in me and I was only the awareness and suffering of the pain.
“STUPID LITTLE PANSY STUPID LITTLE MUM, STUPID LITTLE HUMAN FUCK.”
“I will obey” I whimpered, anything for that pain to end. I heard my words echo back to me. “I will obey, I will obey.”
He took my head in his beak and I screamed, starting myself awake.
Jade and Argyl were still sleeping. My head ached badly and I felt dizzy and nauseous. It was very cold. The side of me that pressed against Jade was only slightly chill, but my back and legs ached and cramped with cold.
Argyl had built the tent around us, fitting into its corners what supplies we still had left. I lay next to Jade and realized she was still breathing. A little bit of relief made it through the pain and horror that I felt. It was hard to shake the dream. My head pounded and I knew a terror for my master that I had not before. I had disobeyed. Not just a hesitation, not a toddler's first tentative step. I had plunged a knife into his servant, a man he had ordered me to follow. From disobedience to open rebellion. My head hurt and I didn't want to think about it.
I reached over my head and into one of the saddle bags Argyl had saved somehow. There was another story there. How had he escaped when the brutes captured us? Where did he find the sword? How odd that events beyond our knowledge affect us so much. How many lives ended through some other narrative they had no part in? A man living his life, suddenly trampled to death by a run away carriage he had no knowledge or understanding of. My head hurt. My thoughts could not distract me from the horror of my dream. It lingered in my muscles and in my blood. A deep and terrible horror.
My hands were still above my head. I had lost track of them. I shivered with cold and longed to pull my arms back into the relative warmth of the blankets and Jade's feeble heat. But I needed something first. It was not in the first bag. I reached for the second, barely reached it, and pulled it closer. Argyl stirred and I froze, but he only pulled himself closer to Jade. It was in the second bag. I pulled the pouch to me, opened it and had the tar in my mouth. The bitter taste of flowers filled my mouth and nose, and I felt muscles relax that I had not known were tense. The horror of my dream, the cold, all questions of self washed away under the fragrant taste. I closed my eyes and savored it. Then, quickly, I closed the pouch and shoved it back in the bag.
Jade seemed warm and I wrapped myself around her. Argyl's hand still wrapped around her, and I shifted to press my chest against it. It fell just below my breast. I felt warmth blossom inside me and spill it's life out into Jade and warm our little cocoon. I did not wish to sleep again, did not dare to sleep, even with the drug. But I floated there. Horror was all around me, but I was warm, or felt warm at least, and that was all that mattered then.
“I wish we still had her firs,” Argyl said. He had pulled on his robe and I was struggling into my dress and boots. My whole body was very stiff, and though I felt little pain through the drug, I had trouble getting my limbs to bend, especially as I had to crouch within the small tent. He was outside before I was. Jade still slept. I tucked the blankets around her carefully, making sure the cold air would not get at her body. Her face looked strangely peaceful for the agony her body must be feeling. I kissed her forehead and crawled out of the tent.
Argyl was blowing on the coals from a fire I did not remember from the night before. Several fresh bits of wood were on it and starting to smoke. I approached him.
“How may I help, Argyl?” He had managed a small flame and was positioning wood to keep the wind from blowing it out.
“We need long pieces of wood,” he said between huffs on the fire. “Longer than Jade's body but only by a foot or two. They should be the same length.”
“Yes, Argyl.”
He didn't turn to look at me. It was very cold and the wind was very harsh. I climbed back inside the tent and found my gloves and mask. The gloves I put on, the mask I tucked into the bosom of my dress.
The woods were sparse here, and provided very little shelter from the wind. It seemed strange that it would be so cold without any snow or ice, but I did not know what I compared it to. Fairy tales perhaps. There were very little wood of any kind on the ground. The trees were smaller here, though I could not tell if they were younger or just stunted by the rocky earth. I stumbled about the trees searching for wood until my hands and feet were numb with cold and the shivers impeded my ability to walk. But I found nothing.
Argyl watched me return empty handed and scowled. The fire was burning well now, but he was constantly throwing more sticks on it, as thicker wood seemed unavailable.
“I'd almost break my promise to your lover and cut some wood, but the hatchet was with the goat that got away.”
“Yes, Argyl.”
He looked at me a moment. He looked very tired and weak in the bleak sunlight. I looked at him and wavered a little, shivers rocking through my body.
“Come,” he said, stepping to me and leading me to the fire. It stood before it and let the warmth filter through me.
“We need a way to move Jade. Her leg, she can't walk on her leg like it is. I thought we would make a stretcher, but.” He trailed off.
“I care for her, Argyl,” I said.
He looked at me for a moment. I couldn't read his expression.
“Yes, I do too Kara.”
We sat in silence for a while. He had some jerked meat that we shared. Then he went inside the tent. I stared into the wood for a time, feeling the warm darkness of the tar inside me, feeling coming back into my limbs as I held them to the fire. I thought about the touch of Argyl's hand against my chest and breast, the soft curve of Jade's body against mine.
A bit of movement caught my attention. I looked and in the distance, it was a naked man, looking at me from across the woods. I went to him immediately. He watched me approach with his head slightly cocked. I felt myself float a bit above the earth. I knew my feet plodded clumsily beneath me, but it seemed unnecessary, as though lifting them would not send me tumbling to the earth.
The man was not a man. That is, he had the general form alone, the details were vague. His eyes were only sunken impressions on his face, his hands separated into fingers, but only slightly, giving them an odd webbed appearance. His mouth was more square than oval, he had no nose, and his skin was a dark speckled brown. He had no genitalia, only a smooth stretch of skin where it should be. As I came up his head turned to stay faced to me. I cannot say he looked at me for his eye sockets were empty.
“Sir, my mistress is badly wounded, we require aid.”
He didn't say anything for a long time. I wondered if he could speak. The cold was sinking back into my bones, and I thought it would cause injury to my flesh soon. Still, the pain was distant, and seemed less important than I knew it probably was.
“You you you you you you.” he stammered, his voice sharp and harsh as wood striking wood.
“I am,” I considered what to call myself. I am my master's slave? I am, I am? What am I? “I am Kara,” I said.
He looked at me, said nothing.
“Please, sir, I, my mistress is injured, I fear for her life. A tree spirit, my lover, she healed me once. I was, I had slain myself and she, she rebuilt myself, I mean me, I mean Kara. Can you, can you save her, my mistress?”
“You you you,” he paused, seeming to consider, “are were was will would not of the forest?”
“I, I am blood and bones and flesh.”
“And and and?”
I had no response. I stared at him stupidly.
“You you have bloomed?”
“I, my lover is of the forest. We, we mated.”
He came forwards. He seemed very powerful, tall and strongly muscled. He reached out and touched my dress.
“You, this is the forest.” he said. “You you you are water not sun?”
Again, I had no response.
“You will, you will have? You have? You would will have frozened with the ice?”
“Yes, but my mistress.”
“Yes yes yes yes.” He stepped forwards suddenly past me and was marching towards the tent.
He had left his tree.
My love had never left her tree. She had sent me away. She had sent me away and she had not left her tree. But he had left his tree. I spun to look at him. Argyl had stepped out of the tent and was watching the brown man approach. He was holding the sword, but did not hold it up.
Then I was running. Is it my curse to never feel myself? I ought, in the height of passion, to have felt all myself, to be so firmly embedded in that weak and lustful flesh that carried this consciousness through those circumstances. Yet I felt more like a spectator, watching my hate and love roil within me, watching myself run, stumble, fall, run and stumble, run and run until I collided with the strange brown apparition of a man.
Apparition of man. A strange, laden branch, strength bending, bending, bending under the weight. Snow was falling, when had it started? It was up to my ankles, when had it started? I would murder him. I would murder him and all of them and then myself. A great gorey slaughter, all broken chips and angles, my master's broken tool, jagged, cracked, broken broken broken I would cut myself and bleed and die.