THE TALE OF BARLEY BALE
AND THE BEAST OF THE FOREST
The world was white.
It was a peculiar sight, to be sure. The snow covered everything. A thought ran through his head;
It must be warmer in the land of the dead.
His inner monologue was cold and mocking, an outburst of cynicism, deriding himself, deriding the senseless mass of white around him. He glanced up at the distant patches of black that towered over him. A treeline, capped with the ubiquitous white powder. The moon lay suspended at the heart of it, low, pale, and fat.
The moon’s pale shape worried him. He dared not think of what he would do if his beacon vanished into the snow; as it was, he already often failed to spot the treacherously regular-looking pits. It was becoming harder and harder to pull himself out of them.
He dragged himself upwards again, desperately attempting to escape his icy foxhole, but his legs buckled under him before the motion was complete and he slid backwards as awkwardly as a newborn foal. He got up, legs wobbling, snow crunching under his feet, flattened under the pounding of previous endeavours, and tried again,-
A long, low honk pierced the air. He tugged himself away from the edge with the quickness of a spring knife, his eyes scanning as much around him as he could see. Snow and bark.
He wondered, idly, if the thing had actually been thrown off his scent, perhaps by a lucky shift of the wind. Much more probably, it was merely biding it’s time, keeping it’s due to it’s unfamiliarity with his form. He remembered how he got here; how he had been walking at a pace that was not quite easygoing, at first because he was convinced that what he was now hearing had been the first few nervous flutterings of paranoia in a place that was truly part of Outside. Outside, where he had been alone but for the snow and the trees.
He hadn’t started running. It hadn’t started running, either, perhaps because of some misplaced belief in him having retracting claws, or sharp teeth, or that whatever part of him it gobbled up would be vomited out along with the remains of a lingering poison.
If only he could get further into the forest- here, near the edge, the pit afforded him scant protection from the icy daggers of wind that occasionally seemed to blow straight down. It’d be easier to have it lose his scent, too, and then he could wait until it got warmer.
Warmer.
The absurdity of his train of thought struck him all at once. What kind of protection could the forest offer him from a predator that lived here? Not to mention the absurdity of his second thought.
How long did ice ages usually last, after all?
A stand, then. A cave, a rocky outcrop, a warren; somewhere where he could face it with his back to the wall and with his hooves towards it’s teeth.
He dragged himself upwards. It was a depleting motion, nearly draining him of what was left of his energy and willpower, but he carried through with it anyway, force-marching himself deeper into the forest. Only twice did he surrender to his own grim curiosity and look back;
Only once he convinced himself that it was the shadows of the trees, and not of something else that was moving.
He stumbled through the forest as it grew thicker, pushing past conifer branches with a grim resolution. His legs felt shaky and full of hot needles, time moving like drip-fed mercury.
He battered through an evergreen bush, snow falling to the floor almost silently, and looked up to a sight that almost made him say ten Hail Marys.
A gargantuan hollow tree stump. Big enough for five, with ample room for one, nestled closely between two of it’s healthier peers which seem to have grown so quickly and eagerly as to uproot their mutual neighbour, almost exposing it’s roots to the sky; but the broken tree clung to the ground like a scrabbling insect. He hurried into the stump; fortunately, the floor was strewn with dead conifer leaves which, while uncomfortable, would keep his heat from draining into the earth.
--
He awakens from a thin and uneasy sleep and the first conscious thought he has is that large and undefined shapes chasing him through snowy fields and it’s all he can do not to moan out loud because this horrible nightmare has become his reality but, at the last moment, sanity reasserts itself.
He ears perk up from his scalp, swivelling, straining to pick up any stray noise. His eyes are wide and inquisitive and scan the gloom as best they can but the stars are shining like distant linx eyes and every new shape of bunt and borrow seems to jump out at him and there just so many things to hide behind so his mind suddenly blares up with the thought
(too many too many too many trees to see the forest)
There was one moment of absolute and utter terror when he actually sees movement from the corner of his eye, not quite a twitch at the edge of his peripheral but a sudden darting shape flickering in to the center of his vision and it feels like his guts turn to ice and that his breath is lodged behind an oversized pinball that only lets through a strangled clueless sound that peels his throat as it comes out, and then--
The movement spreads it’s wings to the size of a napkin and lets out a hoot.
His relieved sigh escapes him in a long hitching breath.
He shuffles forward but his legs are tingly and half asleep and his movements through the leaf debris and rotten wood pulp only manage make a sickening wet squelch. A second later he feels a small and multi-legged creature on his arm, which he shakes off. He reaches out to the entrance of his wooden bolt-hole to get a firmer grip on the outside and so try to pull the bulk of himself upward and outward, but when his hoof presses against it and he has but a single moment of resistance, which lasts long enough to feel the first light dusting of white powder melt between his fur, and then the whole length of bark snaps off with a soft apologetic crack that fell limply flat, after which he decides to just swing himself outside, raising his head to give it another good try-
And then the shadow figure turns a corner, huge in the murky gloom, only the reflected yellow-green of its eyes clear.
His skin tightens with the thrill of fear and most of what’s in him shrivels up, becomes a seething mass of jutting ice and sheer black terror, blacker than deepest midnight. He tastes bitter tears.
He feels like dying.
But he doesn’t shout.
Rather, he couldn't. That earlier scare pushed everything out of him, saved him, at that moment, though he would only be able to consider that later. The creature stands with it’s head to the side, hulking through the gloom. One step closer and he would be able to stick out a hoof and touch it, and absolutely insane as that thought was, it had a certain pull to it. A kind of fascination. Here it is, here it is, he kept thinking, just it’s presence wiping out any thought of doubt or denial. He could smell fur, and mud, and less wholesome things-- piss and blood and something faint and sour-- and a reminder that as fascinated as he might be, a mind with the slightest hint of sanity would think only to stay put where he was be be as still as he could; to do otherwise would be just as insane as if his mind would think to eat itself.
He stared in enthralled horror as the thing began to turn. slow, ponderous, but even from his darkened vantage he could see the sheer strong muscles writhing like worms under it’s skin. It was so tall that when it turned to him fully he could see up to around where he imagined it had it’s navel. There was further movement outside and he heard the ponderous creaking of as it grabbed at the side of the tree, heard it’s animal breath as saw little puffs of steam come into his vision like exhaust fumes. He heard sniffing, and the thought that his scent was pointing him out like carnival kink outside it’s tent made blood freeze solid; the things head came into view. A floating rams head. A huge mouth poised below two will-of-the-wisp green glammers. That sour scent came washing over him and he realized what it was in a similar wave of detached horror-- rotting flesh. Dead dog and rotten rat and drowned chickens floating in a sewer with their reptilian legs pointed upward to the sky; all that and a hundred more things like it, a hundred times worse.
There was no sound from either of them. The thing opened it’s mouth, showing long rows of remarkably stained yellow teeth, and came forward. It happened so much more quickly than he had expected that it was just inches away before he could react.
“H-hey! Get back!” He fell backwards as far as he could in his cramped space and kicked out violently at the dark shape, hoping it couldn’t sense the sheer terror in his voice.
Amazingly, the thing lunged back. There was a howl like a broken steam boiler and his bolt hole became free. He didn’t hesitate this time. Pushing off from the back wall he sprung, ducking his head to as small a target as possible and springing out onto the snow. The thing swiped at him and missed, but felt the rush of air as the claw came down right behind him. He darted through the things legs, having hitch-titter thoughts about easily they might be mistaken for tree trunks, or the narrow swipe for a breeze of wind.
Finally, with a feeling that his legs might buckle at any moment and that his head might have the idea to explode, he stumbles into the the next treeline. What follows is a bumbling, ungraceful self-forced run, ducking under grasping branches, zigg-zagging around tree bourns, many so large and closely knit that it’s not possible to take more than a couple of steps in a straight line. This goes on for minutes. Hours. Only once does he pluck up the courage to falter and to-listen.
Far behind him, he heard a thudding crump. There was a pause, then a second one. It was followed by several more, then a perfect fusillade. Coming in his direction like marching feet. His eyes widened.
He runs. Bursting through foliage, unfeeling of rocks or branches that swipe him as he passes them by. The trees thin out, become more stunted. His legs battering the ground kadda-dum kadda-dum, kadda-dum, becoming a mantra. one run, two run, three run, re-run, red rum, red drum.
RUN RUN RUN
And then he bursts through another low leaf bush and realizes that that he’s run out of ground.
He goes flying-- no exaggeration. Just one moment of solid surface beneath him and the next he’s catapulted through the air by his own momentum, flailing wildly against gravity which after a moment finally decides to bring him down. His reunion with terra firma is a harsh landing and a rough slide about five meters away from the point of impact, a ride that the ice, which is slick but hard packed and containing many jutting pebbles, makes hurt like all merry hell.
Wincing, he picks himself up, his belly feels like it’s been scrubbed with a wad of steel wool. The ground beneath him was almost entirely flat now. Even the stunted trees were gone. All he could see was unfigured whiteness-- no stones, no shelter. He glanced back over his shoulder to see if he could hide behind some of the foliage he passed earlier. That idea was killed briskly when he heard that great roar, a sound that washed over and around him like a wave, setting into his bones and turning his legs to jelly.
It was like nothing he had ever heard. There was no intelligence in it. No warning to other creatures, no sympathy to a pack mentality, no trace of pain, malice, even anger.
Only hunger.
The creature itself followed, bursting from the hillside behind and above him in a great explosion of snow dust and shattered wood. It came down like a wrecking ball, touching ground with teeth-shattering impact which, to his terror, barely slowed its charge. It swept forward, claws bent into killing hooks, the great trap of it’s jaw hanging open and it’s teeth seeming to--
Running while looking back over his shoulder proved to be a very bad idea. He skidded, then stumbled. For a horrible moment he thought he would fall to the ground in a complete sprawl, but at the last moment a scrabbling lunge saved him. No wonder, he thought dully, looking at the groove his hoof had dug into the powder-- the snow under it had been packed into blue ice.
It was almost upon him now. Each running step bringing it further than one full leap oh his. Each muscle bound leg hitting the ground like a comet, working like factory piston, but coming for him.
He curled up, heart beating desperately in his chest. Trying not to think about those eyes, and those awful teeth--
Theres a sound like a pistol shot, and for a mad moment he whirls his head, thinking that like in Pepper and the Wolf the hunter has come to kill the beast with a big gun. Then he turns and sees the wounded thing slide into a black hole in the white ground.
All he can do is stare. He’s petrified with unbelieving shock. How he thought, was it over so easily, so... quickly?
Afterwards, four miles west, he feels heady, ravenous, pumped up, still brimming with a mixture pure adrenaline from the heavy exercise, and endorphins, filling up his system like the first puff of a fine cigar, the first sip of a decade old wine, or some kind of excellent drug. He’s starving and needs something to eat, and the flickering torch-lights he sees burning off on the horizon are by now pretty much in walking distance, but when he arrives there it’s just a guard tower at the edge of the village and seems a poor place to have a celebratory drink so he keeps on walking. He decides to go somewhere any kind of visitor would go, the local inn at the village square. Standing in line he orders a broth from one of the steaming pots (extra thick, he warns the server, who just shakes his head and ladles out the stuff) and takes it to one of the depressions in the wall where the leaning shadows can give him some privacy. Despite this a waitress sidles by and sets down a flagon of weak beer which he hadn’t ordered but finds he suddenly parched for. She gives him a smile that might is either obligated or flirtatious and he ignores it completely. An old, crazy mare sits near to him, knitting in her lap, nodding at no-one. A carriage passes by and after two more bowls later his high slowly dissolves, it’s intensity diminishing and now he just feels bored, tired; the evening suddenly seems just terribly anticlimactic and now the waitress, apparently still interested, is hovering near his table and has begun to notice the blood stains on his overcoat in a way that suggests she might be about to say something about them, but a customer comes in, a guard who might have seen him come rolling into town and so she has to take the guards order, so she forgets about him to do her job, and thats what she does. And he is left alone and with a feeling of...
Uncertainty.
Uncertainty, and almost certainly fear. He already has the taste of it in his mouth, a sour, dry kind of flavour that he knows will only grow stronger if he leaves now and so the next thing that springs into his head doesn’t pop up like the random spasm of so much biospiritual circuitry but rather it comes from lower down, his heart of hearts, and so there is no hesitation when it hits him, no momentary stop to mull it over and to breathe in the big picture, but he simply turns with the step with slow, monotonous certainty. It’s simple, as simple as only an absolute could be;
Be all, end all.
--
‘Hello, chumly. Hello you miserable beast of Bethlehem.’ His voice was soft, nearly purring, as he carefully plodded his way through the powder. In contrast; a terrible low moaning sound, the creature was still above ground, barely. It shivered and convulsed and managed to hook its claws to struggle few inches further from the pit, then it stumbled and slipped back until only the broad length of its shoulder reached above the water and those long arms barely mooring it to what remained of the surface crust.
He jolted back one step, then practically hopped two steps forward. The sight of its weakening, futile struggles did little to cool his anger, in fact brought it surging up-- a red pulsing motion dis-sympathy, coiling it’s way into his body like electric steel cable.
“You silly, stupid animal.’ His voice was rising now, his mouth grinning.
The creature might have heard him. There was a hellish grating noise as it dragged it’s one limb in a long arc around itself, the claws scrabbling around for purchase, but only managing to sacrifice yet more inches of precious foothold when it had to awkwardly re-hook the other arm into the snow-cover. The trap of it’s mouth was hanging open and it’s breaths came steaming out in rapid and constant puffs. There was nothing predatory about those yellow-green eyes now, no reason for any fear response at all. They could only be called doughy eyed, both watery and weary.
“Oh yes.” He said. “Chase me around with all that bulk. Hunt me down with those strong, heavy legs. You-” A pause. A giggle came hitching out awkwardly through his snout before his face tightened again.
“You’re in trouble now, aren’t you?”
The creature lunged, it’s whole moisture-slick body giving one great convulsion that sent it’s paw upward and downward in a perfect arc that fell short short- two inches - from his own hoof. This time he only flinched. Again there’s that hellish grating SCREEEEE as it’s claws slice thick grooves into the packed ice, and in a whim he reacts, and now he is the one jumping forward and there is a sudden and satisfying dry crunch as he brings both his hooves down square on the creatures paw, or foot-- hand-- appendage, and there is a satisfying crunch. He sees with no small measure of satisfaction that some of those delicate bones underneath the skin are now arranged at weird and zany angles.
“We’ve got records, you know.” He spoke with quiet sincerity. “Of Mammalia, Marsupials, Reptiles. Very big nasties with very big teeth.”
The clawing was desperate now, the last throes of a losing battle. The paw folded to the side kept hold, but the wounded one kept being thrown out and pulled back, thrown, pulled back, each time with now result and at seemingly great pain to the creature. It’s mouth was working horribly, huffing out short Ursine growls of frustration.
“There aren’t many of you left… Death machines. Stalkers of the ice plains.” The things face slipped lower and he had to take a step to keep level.
“Why do you suppose that is?”
Finally, the folded arm fell back too, and in the next moment the whole creature itself slipped beneath the ice without so much as another whimper.
He counted two bubbles.
One.
A trio floating up, popping one after the other, the last, largest floating out a full second longer.
Silence.
He can’t help but start laughing and he lingers at the scene, amused by the tableau. He starts out slowly, with halting, harrying hiccups. Then he begins braying. Soon he is holding onto his aching sides like a pony struck with a terrible cramp, his shoulders heaving, eyes welling with happy tears, and legs that keep hitting the ground, stomping, stomping...
Another one of those explosive pops, then another. The ground beneath him suddenly shot out crooked black lines, small spiderwebs spreading out from the main fault line. The ice shuddered and settled. He had time to wonder why one leg suddenly seemed shorter than the others, and why it suddenly felt colder as well-- or hotter, it was hard to tell- and then the ice beneath him collapsed and the black, hungry water sucked him down.
Somewhere a clump of snow the size of a tangerine that had clung precariously from a low hanging branch for most of that day (attached by a little more than an icicle and a few drops of good hope), finally loosened and fell to the ground, startling a thrush the next branch over and having it take off with all the frantic speed it’s tiny wings could carry it.
Silence descended again, thin as new frost on an autumn pond, and this time it lasted.
In the distance, a dwindling black speck; the birds silhouette.
And so the pond and the bird
Was the last the world heard
Of Barley Bale
And the Beast of the Forest.
