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Salvation in Demons - Part 1
Althea wasn't allowed to join her father's soldiers. At first, her father was saying she had to stay home and help her mother to attend to those who were wounded in previous attacks. But everyone knew Althea couldn't remember the healing herbs and with lots of effort managed to remember the poisonous ones – not to ever use them. Her best skill, however, she felt she was archery and forest hiding. Her arrows were always reaching the aims the first, and nobody could ever find her if she didn't want to be found, even though she had long ginger hair.
But then father said the girl could join his crew only after she would turn sixteen, not a day before.
"What's the difference, father? I won't wake up with some sacred knowledge on my sixteenth birthday, why can't I join now?"
"Because I don't want you to get hurt, and because this isn't for a woman to fight in such wars. Your mother won't forgive me if something happens to you before you are big enough. You haven't seen what are those monsters and what they do. Your arrows will not harm them, but if you want to see them so much – you'd stay at the back of my crew and return home as soon as I tell you to get back."
And now, just two weeks before her sixteenth birthday, Althea was moving silently, as fast as her father's crew, successfully hiding behind the bushes in her green suit and soft knee-high brown boots. Nobody noticed her up to now, and they have almost reached the village. From here she could already see the villagers who didn't know they might be attacked today, but Althea's father hasn't been mistaken before. He said his wounds spoke to him about the next attack happening. And every time he was coming out of them with success.
But the attacks seemed to be random, so no villager ever believed to Althea's father – or any one of the Forest people – before the shadows would come.
A few years ago these attacks were rare and unpredictable, these days Althea's father has mentioned he figured out a pattern in them and was leading his crew from place to place to protect those who had no idea their days might have been counted.
As they were coming closer to the village, Althea started noticing some dark shades thickening, as if coming from the ground's dust, and the air turning colder, even though the sun was high in the sky and the day felt warm just a moment before. The shades started bubbling and sliding around, growing and separating from one thin cloud into thick black shades. Althea saw one such shade swiftly moving to an old man who was slowly crossing the village's main square. Then some woman screamed, but she moved much slower than the second shade which wrapped her, and the scream was muffled, until the shade moved away, leaving just a few smoking pieces of clothes behind, while the third one was coiling around a leg of a man across the street.
A child let a cry out, and people were trying to hide in the buildings. A mother push her child into the house and run to shut down the windows of her house, when one of the bubbling shades curled around her arm and the woman in tears pulled a pendant off her neck, trying to touch the shade with it before one of the soldiers came to her help and distracted the shade with his swords. Althea noticed the skin on the woman's arm bubbling, and a terrible smell of burnt meat covering the village.
Althea looked at it in terror, trying to understand what was happening – the shades were growing in number as her father's crew stepped into the village, with their silver swords bared and attacking the shades. The man whose leg was wrapped by the shade was screaming in pain when the silver sword touched the shade. The shade coiled around the sword, trying to reach the hand of the warrior who hit it with the second sword before the shade disappeared. Althea didn't realize when and how she managed to get so close to this battle scene – with the corner of her eye she noticed her father trying to protect people from two black bubbling shades at once, and his best officers protecting entrances to the houses where a few villagers took their kids. She heard a man screaming in pain of deep burns the shade left on his leg, and opened her bag, searching for the right ointment, but the most necessary one seemed to have been at the bottom of the bag. Althea felt warmth on her spine when she finally grabbed the needed bottle, pulling the cork out and applying the ointment on mans' leg who was silently pointing behind her back.
"Althea, you silly girl! What did you do?" she heard, turning around and realizing that she was almost embraced by one of the shades. Her father was standing in front of her.
"You don't want to touch her," groaned the man, trying to reach the shade with his silver sword.
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But then father said the girl could join his crew only after she would turn sixteen, not a day before.
"What's the difference, father? I won't wake up with some sacred knowledge on my sixteenth birthday, why can't I join now?"
"Because I don't want you to get hurt, and because this isn't for a woman to fight in such wars. Your mother won't forgive me if something happens to you before you are big enough. You haven't seen what are those monsters and what they do. Your arrows will not harm them, but if you want to see them so much – you'd stay at the back of my crew and return home as soon as I tell you to get back."
And now, just two weeks before her sixteenth birthday, Althea was moving silently, as fast as her father's crew, successfully hiding behind the bushes in her green suit and soft knee-high brown boots. Nobody noticed her up to now, and they have almost reached the village. From here she could already see the villagers who didn't know they might be attacked today, but Althea's father hasn't been mistaken before. He said his wounds spoke to him about the next attack happening. And every time he was coming out of them with success.
But the attacks seemed to be random, so no villager ever believed to Althea's father – or any one of the Forest people – before the shadows would come.
A few years ago these attacks were rare and unpredictable, these days Althea's father has mentioned he figured out a pattern in them and was leading his crew from place to place to protect those who had no idea their days might have been counted.
As they were coming closer to the village, Althea started noticing some dark shades thickening, as if coming from the ground's dust, and the air turning colder, even though the sun was high in the sky and the day felt warm just a moment before. The shades started bubbling and sliding around, growing and separating from one thin cloud into thick black shades. Althea saw one such shade swiftly moving to an old man who was slowly crossing the village's main square. Then some woman screamed, but she moved much slower than the second shade which wrapped her, and the scream was muffled, until the shade moved away, leaving just a few smoking pieces of clothes behind, while the third one was coiling around a leg of a man across the street.
A child let a cry out, and people were trying to hide in the buildings. A mother push her child into the house and run to shut down the windows of her house, when one of the bubbling shades curled around her arm and the woman in tears pulled a pendant off her neck, trying to touch the shade with it before one of the soldiers came to her help and distracted the shade with his swords. Althea noticed the skin on the woman's arm bubbling, and a terrible smell of burnt meat covering the village.
Althea looked at it in terror, trying to understand what was happening – the shades were growing in number as her father's crew stepped into the village, with their silver swords bared and attacking the shades. The man whose leg was wrapped by the shade was screaming in pain when the silver sword touched the shade. The shade coiled around the sword, trying to reach the hand of the warrior who hit it with the second sword before the shade disappeared. Althea didn't realize when and how she managed to get so close to this battle scene – with the corner of her eye she noticed her father trying to protect people from two black bubbling shades at once, and his best officers protecting entrances to the houses where a few villagers took their kids. She heard a man screaming in pain of deep burns the shade left on his leg, and opened her bag, searching for the right ointment, but the most necessary one seemed to have been at the bottom of the bag. Althea felt warmth on her spine when she finally grabbed the needed bottle, pulling the cork out and applying the ointment on mans' leg who was silently pointing behind her back.
"Althea, you silly girl! What did you do?" she heard, turning around and realizing that she was almost embraced by one of the shades. Her father was standing in front of her.
"You don't want to touch her," groaned the man, trying to reach the shade with his silver sword.
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