Barrier Woods

Flakes of decrepit leaves compacted beneath Balek's fingertips as she scrounged for sustenance.

The starched light of the forest didn't give her much to see by, but she felt for the tell-tale thorns of the sychen plant that would lead her to its bulbous roots, and when she felt the pain of discovery she traced the plant's thorned stem back into the soil. There she dug, latching onto her prize with her knife to bring forth its nourishing blood.

The sychen blood-milk barely showed against Balek's dark skin, but she felt it trickle down the underside of her arm as it spilled free of the root's phloem. Despite the copper tang and grainy texture she latched on with her teeth and bled it dry, frustrated by the amount that had already gone to waste.

"Balek! Balek come quick! I've found something!"

At the sound of Iah's voice, Balek felt guilt and sorrow creep into the back of her throat. Because it wasn't Iah, it was an imitation from the demon that stalked her.

Voice-stealer, mimic, Atemdieb. Different names for the same innate fear of one's voice being lost to the forest.

The demon skulked its way into view, coiling itself around a tree trunk and staring at Balek eye-to-eye. It displayed no emotion that she could read, but its voice was as real as the person it had taken it from.

Hating how dry and raw her own voice sounded, Balek spoke, "Why don't you crawl back into the hole you came from."

"Balek, darling, you already left me once, must you send me away also?"

Balek ignored the demon while she sated herself on the sychen plant. Residue layered itself against her teeth, making them feel unclean, but it was nourishment and nourishment was good.

They sat in silence for a while, and as Balek's clawing hunger lost its edge so to did her contempt.

"Demon. What happens to the voices you steal?" asked Balek.

The demon twisted its head so it hung upside-down and began to laugh heartily - far too sizeable a noise to truly come from its slender form. It seemed to possess an endless repertoire of imitations. Borrowed voices, borrowed emotion, perhaps borrowed thoughts. Balek wondered if the demon had a nature of its own at all.

"I don't steal their voice," it said in the manner of a wizened scholar, "I steal their last breath, so that they can never die, not as long as I exist."

It was a story of the demon Balek had heard once before, told by the wise Geralt who tended to the graveyard. Geralt loved to twist the traditional tales handed down from parents to their children. Nothing is truly lost, he used to say, it merely becomes part of something else.

Could that be a comfort? That within this creature there was something of Iah. That the blooded and twisted body Balek had left behind might not have been the end.

"Why don't you find out?" the demon continued, now mocking Balek with Iah's voice, "Go home, and see if you can learn to sleep at night."

No. Without Iah there could be no turning back.

Balek crumpled fistfuls of decomposing leaves into her hands, feeling the putrid warmth contained within. She crooned and whispered just like her mother had taught her, feeding the warmth and kindling its appetite, until sparks began to flicker from within the rotting cocoon.

She didn't need the light or warmth - though both were welcome - but the smoke was a necessity. It billowed above her, and she began to see vortexes form as transparent sprites circled above her. There were at least two dozen now, waiting for her to give up.

Back in the village, the elders had taken the discarded teeth of children and placed them in small bowls at the edge of the forest. They were a tribute, so that the villagers could sleep in peace.

Balek had no such tribute. She scattered her smouldering pile of leaves, treading the crisp orange edges into the dirt.

It was getting late and she needed to rest, despite the taunts of the demon.

She took a strip of silk (Iah's scarf, taken when she had been at her coldest) and gagged herself, tight enough to be sure that a swarm of sprites couldn't remove it.

*

Balek woke coughing and choking on her gag. She felt the sprites scatter as she rose in a panic and tore the silk from her face. She clawed at lungfuls of air until satisfied that she wasn't yet dead.

It was still dark but Balek was awake now. No sense in wasting the adrenaline while she had it. The heart of the forest was close, she could feel it in the soil. A subtle but rhythmic pulsing, that crept into her subconscious and dictated the cadence of her walk. It wanted her to find it.

The sprites hadn't given up. There were enough of them now that she could feel a haze over her face, like a spider's web that refused to be brushed away.

The demon hadn't left her either, not that she had expected it to. It tussled among the undergrowth, making her flinch whenever it pounced across her peripheral vision. When it spoke it assumed the voice of an old man, using the hollows of dead trunks to enhance its timbre.

"Does it hurt? Knowing that you lead her to her death?"

Cold heat rose in Balek's throat, but there had already been too much of that.

"I didn't lead her; she lead me."

She waited for a retort but the demon held its tongue, prowling in silence as if it had never engaged in conversation in the first place. Balek refused to give it the satisfaction.

"She spoke of this forest with such conviction. It was enchanting. Alone, I hated her for it, for wanting to leave the life we had. But when I was with her I saw it like she did - the necessity, the obligation - and that's how she convinced me to let her go.

"On the day that she left I realised I had blinded myself to another possibility: I could go with her. I ran through the fields, heart crushed, sure that I was too late and that I had already lost her.

"She was waiting for me at the forest's edge, relaxing in the last glimpse of sunlight she would ever enjoy. She didn't say anything, but she wiped away my tears then took my hand and lead me inside."

Balek looked at her hand now. She could see the stains of the forest, feel the tightness of leathered skin as she stretched her fingers.

The demon fell from a branch above and landed in front of her. Balek shied backwards. Until now it had toyed with her emotions, but never obstructed her path. Its shadowy form blended into the surroundings, leaving two dull, glassy eyes to stare through her.

"Then what hope do you have?" an accusation, not a question, it seemed to be asked by the forest itself, "You're a cast off, an afterthought, just waiting to shrivel and die without your shepherd."

Balek knew this already. Nothing the demon said could change the situation.

"That was always the difference between me and Iah," she said, "Iah thrived on challenge. She wanted to be a hero and was prepared to stand up to anything this forest threw at her. But I was always terrified, and now I'm too scared to turn around without her."

The demon exhaled a soft blue light, enough to give it an outline, then motes of flame caught the air in front of Balek's face. She was entranced as lights ebbed in front of her. It was a rare moment of beauty in a forest that had been filled with the dark and decaying.

Then she realised that each flame was a sprite combusting.

"The forest thrives on confrontation," said the demon, stepping out her way, "It preys on the brace, and destroys the courageous."

*

As Balek fought through a day unworthy of the name her muscles grew weary. A minute's rest brought more pain than relief, so to keep walking became a kindness when the alternative was to suffer without progress.

The forest had become thick and knotted, forcing Balek to hack and wade through tangled webs of gorse until she reached a wall of interlacing branches.

She was exhausted. Her strength was draining away from the cuts that covered her arms and legs, but she could feel the heart of the forest pulsing just beyond the natural barrier.

The demon felt it too. It still displayed no visible emotion, but when it spoke it took on the wavering voice of a child.

"Do you really intend to go through with this?" it said.

"Someone has to."

"But it doesn't have to be you. Many others have turned back. I've watched them all turn back."

And that was true. Many had struck out into the forest, determined to be its healer, but none had succeeded. They either returned to the village, ashamed of the promise they had broken, or they never returned at all, and the demon taunted the villagers by singing gaily at the moon using the venturer's voice.

Balek had broken a promise too, but if she could fulfil someone else's, maybe that would make up for it.

Her knife was too small to make any reasonable mark on the barrier. Instead she used it to lever a rock out of the soil, relying on gravity to turn it into a sledgehammer.

"Won't you turn back?" said the demon.

Balek stopped and stared down at the demon. This didn't sound like the agent of deceit she had been warned of. She was being pleaded to.

"What are you?" she asked.

It didn't speak, but its attempt to hide itself among a nest of roots was answer enough. It was ashamed.

Balek wondered what it was ashamed of. Surely not its sins, for its existence was a function of those sins, but perhaps it had grown to understand what that really meant. Not the evil it was, then, but the evil it represented.

Balek summoned the last of her strength to hack at the branches. As they splintered they gave up slivers of light, then slivers became trenches and the wall weakened. When the damage sufficient, she tore through and stepped into the heart of the forest.

It was like waking from nightmare. Suddenly everything foul and dark had inverted and become gentle and familiar.

The glade contained a pool of silver water, over which faeries etched mathematical patterns into the air. Balek could feel the scent of peppermint on her skin and in her breath.

Iah had been right, just keep going, never give up, and let the forest do the rest.

The demon hung back; it didn't dare enter this place. For a moment Balek considered stopping. She could be safe here, surrounded by evil but divided from it.

But she knew it wouldn't last. Eventually the rest of the forest would overwhelm its heart, and then nowhere would be safe. Not here, not the village. Even the distant towns would eventually become overwhelmed.

She stepped forward into the water. It was warm, uncomfortably so, and the warmth spread through her body, drawn up into her chest and then out again towards the tips of her fingers.

Her muscles relaxed, every ache and strain from her journey falling apart. A numbness spread throughout her then deepened.

Balek saw a fine dust rise on the wind, mingling with the faeries' equations. She knew that she was its source, and that she was drifting away, being disassembled particle by particle and sown into the forest.

It didn't hurt. In fact, she felt nothing of her body. Instead she felt the forest. Green shoots pierced the soil and became part of something new, something regrown.

She felt evil recede. It would sow seeds of its own in its death throes, but for a while they would be powerless.

The demon was beside her now, its skin turning grey as its own particular mockery of life drained away.

"Thank-you, Balek," said Iah, "I knew you would do it."

She was glad to share this with Iah, who had already given everything. Too many promises had already broken to let this one lie shattered as well.

Balek's consciousness spread out like water over a mirror. Her thoughts lost consistency, but left one last impression before she faded away entirely.

"I love you."