Bright Rain

It stopped raining. Slowly. So slowly that it was hard to say at what point the last drop fell. It was hours. It was until nearly dawn. And all that while Kinsom held her, kneeling in the mud, pressing her cheek against his chest.  “Ssh.  Ssh.”  He kept telling her. “You’ll be all right.”

When he could say anything else, he drew back from her a little, taking her cheeks in his hands, looking into her eyes. “How bad is it hurting?”

She could feel the pain of what must be deep burns around her wrists. They felt like shackles of lava – if she could know how that felt. She could still feel the pain on her face. It went deep, and offered little mercy. Perhaps that was best – being burnt beyond pain was an invitation to the grave, that much she knew. But she could think, she could function – the rain had soothed some of the worst of the fire’s damage. She remembered she should speak. “It’s not that bad.”

“You should be in agony,” he whispered.

“I’m all right.”  It was a lie that made her almost laugh.

“I don’t think that’s true.”

“I don’t think it’s terrible,” she said, by which she meant she didn’t think she was dying.

Kinsom held her tighter. “I don’t think you know how close that was.”

I think I do. But she leaned into him. “What if it’d escaped? Burned through the forest.”

“That would probably have been catastrophic.”

“I don’t think we should light another fire.”

“No.” He moved so that he was cross-legged in front of her, examining the burns on her face. “I think that’ll heal,” but he flinched as he took a close look at her wrists. His voice was soft and ragged: “These are worse.”

She could see for herself the charred bracelets that surrounded her wrists. Burns that bad would cause real damage, but she seemed to be able to still use her hands.  That was probably a good sign. “We should keep going,” she said.

“Can you?”

“I think so.”

He helped her to her feet. “I’ve got you. I can carry you.”

She shook her head, “I can walk.”

“Are you sure?”

“It’s not as bad as it looks.” Though she didn’t know how bad some of it looked.

“I think it is,” he sounded almost sulky, angry – maybe with himself. He looked very troubled.

She remembered. “Last night. Did you see…?”

“Something,” he agreed. “Like the rain shaped itself into something.”

“Figures. Women.”

“Yes.”

“Glowing. Sort of. Like… they… they… I don’t know. Old Fey. Agliashi. Like something out of legend.”

“Yes. Like that. I think they saved our lives.”

Mine, for sure. And would Kinsom have left her? “Maybe they just wanted to put out the fire. Before it became unstoppable.”

“I hope they don’t go too far away.”

The ground was all mulch and mud as they walked away from the charred campsite.

#

Walking was no easy task. It took a lot out of her. Kinsom remained at her side, helping her when she needed, but still, she was slowing them down. Her head had started hurting crazily, her vision was saturated with all the wrong colours, she was tired too easily.

“You’re hurt worse than I thought.”

But what were they to do about it out here? Jadda didn’t even know anymore if they were walking in a broadly uphill slope, she didn’t know if south was still south, and she doubted Kinsom did either.

He tried to be positive at first, tried talking. But eventually the weight of it all began dragging on him too. His hands and shoulder were burnt, though less badly than hers. They descended into trudging silence and the air around them into leaden grey.

Then, maybe midafternoon, they came across the village.

They came across it over a low hill, where the forest trailed into thorny scrub. Jadda imagined that those low shrubs would be like traps, just waiting to close around their ankles. It was exhausting having be constantly wary, always waiting for the simplest things to suddenly turn sharp and deadly. But beyond the scrub there were trees that grew in nearly orderly lines – orchard-like – and beyond that, the unmistakable, man-made straight lines of a settlement.

People?

But what kind of people? They could be walking into worse than they were walking out of, but they were tired, discouraged. Kinsom murmured, “Let’s see what’s there.”

Between the hill and the village was the grove. Its trees were set out in an orderly manner. Planted by human hand. But their shape was wild, ragged, they seemed to bend once they reached a certain height, caving in all directions as if they shied away from the sky. There was a feeling as they walked amongst them, a kind of tension that Jadda didn’t think was her imagination. The air felt tight. And there was something about the trees, about the bark, and the shadows that fell over it.

She stopped in front of one of them when she realized: this was a face. Etched there in the bark, perfectly woven into it, but the detailed image of a human face, wide-eyed, mouth set in an ugly grimace. “Look,” she whispered.

Kinsom said quietly, “It’s not the only one.”

How much sooner had he noticed? “All of them?” She asked.

“I think so.”

“He looks so real.”

“We shouldn’t linger here.”

He was real. Or had been. Jadda’s imagination conjured an explosion of roots, wrapping themselves around human interlopers, swallowing them and weaving their faces into the trunk of a new strong tree.  She kept glancing back over her shoulder as they hurried through the grove. Did they move? Were they following them?

The village, when they reached it, was a strange sight too. At first it seemed almost normal. Houses built in the ordinary way, mud and branches woven into panels, sunk into the earth around a skeleton of strong beams, low to the ground, topped with dull thatch. Houses that could have existed all over the kingdom. There were wells, fences, the shapes sunk into the ground that suggests former gardens. No sign of life – no smoke, no movement. Deserted but ordinary?

Except that there were patterns in the mud, carried on by grass and wildflowers, patterns that suggested the shapes of strange beasts. And on the walls of some of the houses there were images of people, but they were far less ordinary that the houses, with their foreheads bulging above their eyes, their chins puckered and broken, shoulders that weighed them down, bent backs, splayed legs. Some stranger yet: eyes where their ears should be; some with four or six legs. A two-headed figure half man, half woman; the two heads turned to face each other as if in challenge.

“I don’t see anybody,” Kinsom declared at last. Not even animals. Or birds. It wasn’t clear if he thought that good or bad.

“There’s at least shelter,” Jadda ventured, more tired and sore than she wanted to let on.

“But why did they run?”

“Did they run?”

“Well, they’ve gone. But it’s better than out in the woods, and the shelter’s good since we daren’t light a fire.”

“Do you think there’s food?”

“Would you eat it?”

She bit her lip, considering. “Not yet. But we’ll run out of what we have.”

“And then we’ll have to eat something.”

But that was a thought for later. Right now, they found themselves a sturdy looking house and slowly opened the door. It led into a dark, empty main room, where a cold firepit suggested there had been no occupants for a while. There was no furniture, but there were shelves on the far wall, and poles that ran from one end of the room to the other, though nothing still hung on them.

There were images here too, on all the walls. Too rich and detailed to be painted. They seemed to tell the story of a journey, of a group of fair-skinned people beaten and whipped against rocks, wandering, crawling, until a dark, veiny hand reached to take one of theirs, to lift them into a rosy light. But if the story ended happily there were no images to tell them so. Just the depiction of a light that obscured some roofs behind it – no more than dark triangles against the light – no clue what must have happened next.

“Do you know anybody who could do this kind of magic?” Jadda asked.

“I don’t know many sorcerers. And I don’t think so.” No artist could have. Surely.

“We should try to sleep.”

“I know.”

Better than to talk about how they had next to no plan, and no real hope of success.

#

When she slept, she dreamed. First of the fire elemental that’d attacked her the previous night. In her dream it was bigger, more bestial, it came charging at her at speed, knocking her down, and the flames flared golden in a full circle around her. Somehow her wrists and ankles were anchored to the ground with steel. She was a sacrifice. But then the rain came, laced with rainbows, quenching the flames, while a green forest grew in their place. It was beautiful but clawed, and the rain just got stronger, until it hurt her raw skin, until it was like being pelted with stones.

She was a sacrifice after all.

A figure moved from the shadows into the light. It wore Dreok’s face – as best she remembered it – but its eyes were blank, it’s face was stiff and still. Its skin cracked when it finally opened its mouth and roared…

… the roar was rain. She was awake. She was sitting, staring around, trying to tease reality out of dreamscape. Here, in this strange cottage, surrounded by darkness, but aware that the walls were full of such real, lifelike images.

It was raining so hard.

Kinsom’s voice was near her. “Jadda. You all right?”

She nodded. Then remembered the dark. “Yes. I… dreamed something.”

“Something’s outside.”

She listened. It was hard to hear it through the rain, but yes, there was something out there, soft sounds that were more than just the earth settling and shifting. There were footsteps, and a soft gurgle of almost-voices. Despite the rain there was a dim glow of what would have to be moonlight.

Kinsom said, “Stay here.”

“Now, wait…”

“Stay back. Please. I’ll see.”

Jadda almost argued. But then she couldn’t see the point. Whatever was out there was either coming in or not. She whispered, “Don’t go out.”

He felt his way to the door. Jadda could see his silhouette against the blue-black light of a moon diluted by clouds. He crouched in the scarce light, then beckoned her forwards.

Jadda crouched at his shoulder. Out in the rain there were figures. They wore the shape of women, but they were constructed out of rainwater, shimmering through a downpour so thick there was almost more water than air. The same women. She was sure of it. But they looked strange, as if the forest had taken hold of them, sinking its substance into their flesh so that their skin was barklike, or dotted with the shapes of flowers, their hair was more like a profusion of antlers.

“Dryads,” Kinsom said softly.

“How do you know?”

“I’ve heard stories. You can never see them. You can only see reflections of them.”

“Like in rain.”

“In rain. Or a brook in thick forest. They’re tied to the trees. They’re tied to the forest.”

“But they saved us.”

“Or they saved the trees.”

Jadda crawled a little bit forward. She leaned her head just a little bit out there, wincing at the shock of hard rain against her burnt skin. She looked back towards Kinsom. “What else do you know about dryads?”

“Not much.”

“Are they good or evil?”

“Sly. Mischievous. Mostly playful… but these ones…”

These ones had helped her. Jadda edged out into the rain. “Can you hear me out there?”

The rain shimmered. All of it.

In front of her a shape emerged. A muscled, watery woman, bright and beautiful, her body smooth but boldly wooden, a living tree as much as a woman, her body thick with moss, sweepingly sculpted.

“Can you hear me.”

The answer seemed to come from everywhere at once. “We can hear you. See you. We watch you. We follow.”

“Why?”

“You’re clumsy. You break things.”

“I’m sorry about the fire.”

“You stumble like babies.”

“Help us.”

The figure tilted its head. All the figures behind it did the same in beautiful unison.

“We’re trying to find my brother.”

“We might know.”

“Please.” Hadn’t they saved her?

“You have his eyes.”

“Yes. Yes. You know him? You know where he went?”

“We know all. We always know all. We know where he went.”

“Please.” One word said it all. And all she could offer was her desperation.

“There’s a stone on a hill. In the morning you’ll see it, haloed by sunrise. If you have questions, there you will find answers there.”

“A stone on a hill.”

“You will see it.”

The rain doubled, it dissolved the woman-forms, it blurred everything. It was too strong to stand up in. Jadda collapsed to her knees and needed Kinsom to help her beneath the roof. The thatch shuddered, threatening to cave in beneath the onslaught.

“They trick people. They play games.”

“But they don’t hurt people.”

“They seduce men sometimes, and steal their fertility.”

She looked him in the eyes. “Perhaps you’re not their preference.”

He snorted a half-laugh. “I could have resisted. But listen: I don’t know if we can trust them. I’m almost sure we can’t.”

But they’d saved her. She couldn’t put that truth down. For whatever reason, they’d still saved her.

“Why should they care about us?”

“I’m not saying they do.”

“We have to be careful.”

“I know. But tomorrow… the morning will tell us. What else do we have?”

#

The morning came as promised. Golden with sunrise, the wet earth and dripping trees turning the world into a golden lake while the leaves dripped tiny grounded stars. It was like stepping into yet another world.

The forest had shifted. The village had reordered itself, so that the buildings were all in different spots, the wells all clustered in one spot. The ground under them had buckled and risen, lifted as if by an unfelt earthquake, so that they could see a little way out towards the horizon. Far enough to see the low hill, long and lazy, where a great, asymmetrical rock stood dark against the sky, while the rising sun made a haze of light behind it.

Haloed by sunrise.

“It could still be a trap,” Kinsom warned.

“Of course it could. But what else should we do?”

“She only said answers, not that he’d still be there.”

“I hope he’s not. I hope he got out of here.” But then, why hadn’t he come back for her? “I hope he’s alive and well in a little village with a wife and babies. We have to know though, don’t we?”

“We wouldn’t be standing here otherwise.”

You wish you’d never come. Never come looking for me. Never tried to go back for him.

A part of her wished she’d sent Kinsom on his way back on Firenight, gone back to the clear, cool emptiness and self-reliance she’d become used to. But since that choice was long gone, she linked her arm into Kinsom’s and summoned up a grin. “Well, then, I suppose we’d better get going.”

 

Picture credit/discredit: author's own work