A Walk In The Woods Chapter 14

Archibald and company find their way back to the village

Archibald stopped, his elderly hands landing on his knees as he wheezed air. They had been running for fifteen minutes and the black fog ominously ebbed and flowed through the trees. He glanced into the distance, the faint light of the sun illuminated the dusky village his group departed from a day before.

“Just… A bit more…” Archibald called as he coughed. He had not run that hard since his journey to the golden sea of the east.

Olgash and Analise reached his location as hooper trailed behind. The mighty carapetyr was fast when he needed to. He crouched down, allowing Analise to climb off. She unslung her pack and assembled her cross-staff.

“As long as the sun continues to rise, I could chart our way back to the fields and out of this wretched place.” Analise stated. Her voice became shredded and sown with uncertainty and fear, but her optimistic resolve stood firm.”

“Good. I… Ah… I wish to leave… We know what happened to the wood elves.” Hooper said as he jogged, bringing up the rear of the group. He breathed through his mouth like a fish gasping for water. “These trees killed them!” He announced.

Archibald gazed upon the surviving rangers. Analise was beaten and visibly tired, Hooper looked disheveled and hopeless. Olgash looked concerned and on edge as the beast stared back at the ominous fog. The old man sighed. “Steel yourselves rangers. The village is close and we may rest there.” He remarked as Archibald felt a sense of dread overtaking him. Deep down, he feared there was no way out. Perhaps the forest had consumed and digested them, the branches and roots around them swallowed them. Visions of the Daeva Majora cut through his mind. The twisted crown, the morose horns… The pale blue eyes glared into his mind. He held his head, took off his hat, and wiped the sweat from his brow. “We… Must hurry.” Archibald uttered out as he stepped forward.

Hooper looked at Archibald. “Captain, you must rest. We could stop here or Olgash could carry you.” Hooper fiddled with the crossbow string as he clutched it.

“No. You two need strength. We lost enough people here. I won’t lose you all to this forest.” He said as he squeezed his waterskin into his mouth, rationing the clear liquid. Archibald picked himself up and marched on. He endured all things nature could muster. The older man hobbled onward through the thick fiber like trees.

The rangers moved through the forest with a renewed sense of hesitation and fear. Analise felt branches rub the sides of her shoulders, Hooper ducked as he felt branches reach down towards him. As they dodged branches and walked the underbrush, the village slowly arrived to greet them. Its moss ridden stone streets offered a strange comfort to the group. It was enough to make Archibald stop and take a deep breath, hobbling over to a set of human sized rocks. Hooper scanned the area surrounding them and noticed figures shifting in the gloom.

“Sir… Something is out there…” He remarked with specks of fear in his voice. “Maybe survivors? Could it be the witch hunter and the other rangers?” He asked as the man slowly unfolded the bipod stand for his large crossbow.

“I see them… yes…” Archibald glared into the shapes writhing in the distance. He watched cautiously as they sauntered. Archibald noticed they moved erratically. “They wander like mindless beasts searching for a morsel. Perhaps we can wade our way through them and sneak past…” He observed as his bones ached, the man gently sat down on a moss covered rock that stood defiantly against the roots.

“Could they be beasts of this forest or perhaps other red cape soldiers? Perhaps the Duke has sent another party into this Daeva ridden forest.” Olgash wondered out loud as he softly stepped through the underbrush, resting with the rest of the group.

“Don’t say such things, Olgash. The Duke chose us. I do not believe he’d continue to feed such a place like this. I pray to Arkeval that no more people were sent, nor that any of this plague of roots spread beyond the treeline.

“Look, someone is coming.” Analise said cautiously as she raised her weapon tentatively. Her head tilted toward the village. A figure emerged from the gloom and slowly approached the party.

“Be you friend or foe,” Archibald called out in a cold professional tone. He looked at Hooper and nodded, signaling the man to load his heavy crossbow.

Hooper’s hands twitched as he aimed the heavy weapon at the silhouette meandering toward Archibald. Its movements looked erratic and strained. Soon the being came into view. Hooper and company gazed upon a rotting corpse draped with roots. A mass of branches, woven into a crude imitation of a limb, had long ago overtaken the elf's arm. Thin branches had engulfed his right eye hooked into his pallid skin. The wood elf had a gaping hole dripping yellow ichor in the center of his chest, a heart laid suspended and chained by roots as it struggled to continue beating. His one pale eye strained itself, looking at the survivors as his weakened regular hand reached out.

Archibald stood stunned, Hooper felt his stomach flip, Analise looked away, searching for some kind of weapon. Olgash looked stern and cautious. “Elf! Are.. you….” Archibald’s words trailed off as he realized a dark truth. This plague of roots had overtaken this elf and possibly the entire village, just as it had Gregor and Whittaker.

Instinctively, Hooper fired a heavy bolt, skewering the elf to the ground. Olgash rushed forward and stomped the elf’s head in. “The forest has taken them! It’s going to take us too…” Hooper cried out as fear gripped his vocals.

Archibald took off his right glove and smacked him across the face. The snap of the leather ushered in silence by the portly man. “We are rangers. Nothing we do is easy, that is why they send us. Gather yourself, Hooper, and we will survive this place. “ Archibald reassured the group.

Olgash scowled as he scraped his foot against the underbrush, rubbing the brain matter and tree bark onto the underbrush.

Analise watched the ground gently pull the corpse of the elf below the earth and disappear. “I think I’m going to be sick…” She quietly remarked. Gone were the thoughts of excitement and charting. Survival instincts and adrenaline took their place.

A bloodied, emaciated arm grabbed Archibald’s lower leg. The remnants of the elf clung to life as thin branches sprouted from the head wound. Standing up, the corpse trudged forward somberly. The exposed cavity in its chest pulsated with sickening yellow ichor and thrashing roots.

Olgash roared forward, his heavy claws plunged into the cavity as he ripped the dying elf in two. “The foul stench of Daeva is all over this place. It smells of the same sickly sweet scent of the ashen grey tree that slayed Whittaker and Dima.” Olgash said as he stepped before the rest of the party, his hulking body standing before the mindless horde and the unfortunate adventurers.

“Set up your cartography and charting tools Analise. We’ll ensure none of these abominations come to harm us while you chart a way out.” Archibald explained as he crouched down to assess what supplies were left. He had his flint and striker, twelve small bolts, his survival knife, hatchet, and his great bow were all the tools he had left. He had three thin crisps of bread and half of his waterskin left. Though it did not look like much, Archibald breathed a sigh of relief. He had accomplished more with less.

The sound of Hooper’s heavy crossbow interrupted Archibald’s thoughts, slinging a bolt into the fog. The sound of high pitched squealing shattered the air as another wood elf hit the overgrown underbrush. Slowly, the mindless horde lurched toward the party. Picking up his great bow, Archibald joined the slaying as he stood next to Olgash, his hatchet and knife in each hand. “Stand with me, friends. Stand before the precipice of darkness and the unknown.” Archibald said in a slightly pious tone.

The horde descended upon the group as Analise screwed together her cross-staff. Olgash was a flurry of attacks and primal roars as his heavy claws carved and smashed into various rib cages and organs of the infected wood elves. With each swipe and snap, roots and branches jutted out, hoping to pierce Olgash’s skin. Only to deflect off his impenetrable scales. The turtle-kin was truly in his element. His cheerful optimism from the forest edge had eroded away into a zealot like madness.

Hooper was closest to Analise as he cast his heavy bolts into the gibbering horde of branches and flesh. Each arrow skewering a wood elf to the underbrush, each reload costing him precious time. He continued to fire, his hands reaching into the side quiver, only to come up empty. The hand slapped and scooped around the quiver, desperately looking for some kind of arrow he forgot he had, yet to no avail.

“I…I’m out of bolts!” Hooper cried in a nervous tone, slowly unhooking his hatchet. He scanned the forest and corpses for any bolts he could harvest from their bodies. He spotted a mere three in the distance, beyond the tainted wood elves. “There! In the distance! Could you reach them?” Hooper called as he pointed in a single general direction.

“Get them yourself!” Archibald called out as his hand wielding his knife dove into the eye socket of a wood elf, spilling yellow ichor onto the forest floor.

“I will help you, small one!” Olgash called out as he charged forward, raising his left arm to impale the wood elves on his claws,he reached the three bolts.

Hooper ran through the melee as Archibald held back the last remaining few of the wood elves. Olgash stood defensively before the corpses ridden with bolts.

“Southwest! That was the way we entered from.” Analise called out as she squinted one eye. The cross staff sat over her right shoulder. Her hands shook as she glimpsed into the branch ridden sky, measuring the distance between the sun and the faint southern stars faintly shimmering in the daylight sky. Glancing at her compass, the orientation arrow spun in circles. The cross staff was all she had. “I am… not sure if this is perfect. But my star finding remains true. We must head southwest.” She said as the girl lowered her cross staff, pointing down the central road of the village, now clear of elves.

Archibald pulled his hatchet out from the shoulder of a decaying wood elf. “Good. Once Hooper and Olgash finish scavenging bolts, we should continue venturing onward.” The elder responded to Analise as he wiped away the yellow ichor from his hatchet head.

Moments passed as Hooper loaded the heavy bolts into his side quiver and folded his heavy crossbow up. “Are we leaving, hunter captain?” Hooper asked as he looked at Archibald.

The captain shook his head. “Not yet. We should search for some supplies in this village, and perhaps Otto and company… If they are alive.” He said as the man stood up, his hand gestured into a sign signifying the party to follow him.

The brisk early morning air chilled the bones of Archibald as he wandered through the village. Truthfully, he wasn’t sure what he was looking for.His work usually provided easy access to supplies; however, this village had been completely stripped, resembling a corpse left to decay in the desert sun. To Archibald it was almost as if the village was never lived in at all.

“Companions, I have found footprints,” Olgash decreed, crouching down to examine them. “Boots… They look fresh.” He exclaimed.

Analise joined the Carapatyr and looked at the print. “Similar footprint to our boots, sir.” She said in a soft, optimistic tone.

Hooper glanced at the tracks and followed them with his eyes. “They go into that small cottage there. Could be supplies… Or the rest.” Hooper said with faint inflections of hope in his voice.

“Or a trap, one to lure us in.” Archibald said. He contemplated his words after the statement and shook his head. “No, you’re right… Perhaps this forest is getting to us. Let us investigate.” He said to his party.

Slowly, the group approached the cottage, weapons in hand. Archibald nodded to Olgash. The Turtle-kin has seen that nod many times before. It meant he needed to open the door, or to lead the group as their vanguard. The hulking carapatyr lumbered forward as his long clawed hands curled around the doorknob. Creaking open the door, Olgash’s neck slithered through the door frame, greeted by the smell of rotting wood and moss. His eyes scanned the room, spotting a faint torchlight from a small kitchen-like chamber. Inside, he heard voices. Carefully, he entered the room, ducking below the doorframe. The living wood woven floor effortlessly resisted Olgash’s immense bulk. The three survivors followed.

Archibald glanced around the room, black leather gloves had been thrown to the floor, a strange brown sludge oozed from the inside. He felt watched.

“My rings corroded away.” A voice called from the dimly lit kitchen chambers.

The party turned around and were greeted by the black overcoat of Otto and the others: Fraeleth, Priscilla, and Garrius.

“Did you encounter it too? Did it come through this village?” Archibald said, his eyes scanned the four as Hooper and Analise looked relieved to see their fellow rangers alive.

“Did what? The Daeva Majora? No, I have yet to find the beast, but it must be powerful to erode dawnbringer rings. We found the villagers.” Otto exclaimed as he folded his arms.

Archibald nodded along. “As did we, they are nothing more than shambling abominations now. Ravenous yet a mindless rabble.” He proclaimed.

Otto nodded, examining the party. “You left with five. One of you is missing.” He stated to the four. His words chilled Priscilla and Fraeleth. The rest of the group glanced at the other survivors.

“Whittaker, yes…” Archibald said as his tone trailed off. “He is… no longer with us. Taken by the forest.” Archibald admitted with a sigh. “We found the Brothers. Gregor was alive, but Dima was… He looked similar to the wood elves. His corpse was impaled by a small tree… It had taken him over. His backside opened like a gnashing maw and stabbed Whittaker.” Archibald said as his voice grew infected with more pain.

Priscilla looked away, she felt her stomach tumbling at the thought of Whittaker turning out like Effidora. “Was it… Quick?” She asked Archibald as she rubbed her wounded hand. Strange bumps perforated her skin as the blood drained from the appendage.

“I don’t remember. It was all so fast…” He admitted as his gaze fixated on her hand. “What… happened to you.” The captain approached the girl, gripping her hand as he examined the bumps. They looked like small tree buds growing from her palm and knuckles. His hand reached out to grab one. Quickly, the others retracted inside her skin, creating several bumps as Archibald pulled the bud. It screeched as he pulled hard. The group watched in horror as the buds retracted below Priscilla’s skin. By Arkeval…” He murmured.