a tale of remembering

Who hides in the wood, little children?  Tell me, that I know you know the danger.  He who plots, who spies, and moans.  Oh yes, that he, little children.  He who would steal you from your mothers' hearths and drag you to his own, dark and cold it is.  He seeks to warm himself with you, little children, with the fire of your lives.  Yet he is not warmed by any stolen flame, as nothing stolen can warm anyone's heart.  Learn your lesson from him, children, only what you earn can stoke your soul's fire.  He who earns nothing is forever cold and empty.  He who hides seeks forever to fill himself, and this is why you must be 'ware in the wood.  Long has it been since he had some little one to give to his hunger, long has it been since children of this village went astray.  And so, his hunger must grow.  Take more care than ever.

You there, yes.  In the back.  Near the window.  Do you laugh at my fair warning?  Do you take me for a mere teller of tales?  Do not be so smug, young one, do not think we give warning for fun.  Here, I will tell you a new tale.  I have kept it safe within me for many years.  But I see it needs telling now.

It happened one day when the sun was a bright one and all the leaves were a blessing.  Three children much like you went into the wood seeking relief.  They did not mean to stray far from its borders, but in those days the hunger of he who hides was lesser and the shadows brighter.  The children went deep, deep among the old, old trees before they knew it.  When they saw the trunks were mossy like they'd never seen before, and the leaves were thin and sharp, not like their familiar broad platters, they did not fear.  They were brave children of the village, the last one on the road to the border of the Land of Smoke.  Little in this world can make us tremble.  They did not think the journey back would be hard to make, and if they arrived after nightfall, so much the better.  They had taken shelter in the shade of these trees for the very purpose of escaping the sun.  They listened hard for water and then the tallest said, "I hear a stream, over this way!" and they tramped through the ferns and vines to find the cool water.  It was there, flowing over smooth, blue rocks, looking deeper than it was without the sun to glimmer on its surface.  The children wet their toes and each others' shirts, shouting and laughing as they would on any summer's day in any place.

But soon they were hungry, as children in summer often are.  Their thirst they could slake in the stream in icy mouthfuls, but there were no berry bushes growing nearby.  They did not know the plants around them and were not trusting to taste their leaves or roots.  The first bite of fear came to their throats.  The children tried to walk back the way they had come, but all the trees were the same soft, green trunks, and all the ferns were the same clownish feathers, and all the vines made the same loops like snares on the ground to catch them.

The children wandered, growing frightened, and soon the ruddiest said, "We shouldn't have gone to the stream, we should have gone home right away!  I bet I could have found the way out from where we were."  The tallest child did not care to take the blame.  The fairest child said nothing to or for the other two as they argued.  They kept walking, even as they shouted, but they saw no sign of familiar trees.  The ferns and vines were lush and green and bent under their feet, making no snaps as they did not break.  A sudden snap behind them halted the children in their tracks.

When they turned, a white deer stood before them.  She was a young doe, as they knew from her small, nubby antlers.  She stared and they stared and nobody would move for minutes, but then she stepped to her left, eyes on the children, and she crept passed to go on her way.  The children followed her, still making no noise and neither did the doe.  Except when some dry vine snapped under her tiny hooves.  Then she shook her head in frustration, but kept on, and the children behind her.

Finally, a dark mound appeared amid the trees.  It was like a round hill with no trees growing on it, covered with short grass or thick moss.  The doe trotted right up to it, bounded up the side and over the top, and was gone.  The children stood before the mound awhile, wondering if they should go closer.  Finally the fairest one approached with halting steps, calling back to the others when the distance was closed, "Why, there's a cave in the hill!"  The other two came to the entrance to peer inside.  They saw that under the moss, there was no hill at all, but a pile of stone slabs.  They stood looking and did not go in.  They did not remember the warnings their elders told them at the hearth, but they felt the danger all the same.

"I wouldn't go in if I were you," and the children whirled around as one.  "That place is so old it could fall in any time."  A little old man covered in shaggy dark rags was speaking to them. "We were just looking, Old Uncle," said the ruddiest, "We were not thinking of exploring."  "That's good, eh, that's good," the little man grunted and turned and hobbled off.  After a moment he called over his shoulder, "What are you waiting for?  'Twill soon be dark as a dead deer's bottom out here."  And the children followed him without another thought.

The wood was in fact darkening and the leaves of the ferns stood out like shadowy spears.  The little man lead the children to a small clearing where the earth was bare.  He sat with his back to one great tree and with his hand invited the children to sit before him.  "I am going to tell you a tale," he said, as he pulled a sack of bread heels from amid his rags.  The children were happy for the bread, even if it was dry, and they were prepared to listen.  "I am not the man you see here," his voice rang out clearly, "I have taken this form to escape a terrible fate.  I am a magician, a real one, you can believe it.  But our needs of life come with a price, so too my magic."  He looked at the ground and sighed, "I have been lucky thus far, and my benefactor, or malefactor, has not thought to seek me here."  The ruddier child piped up, "My uncle says the trees are magic too.  Maybe they are protecting you."  The old man looked up at the branches, almost impossible to see in the darkening.  "That may be, child, but if it is so, they may have their own purposes for it."  It was now dark.  The old man pulled a round glass from his rags and laid it carefully in the dirt.  He snapped his fingers on both hands and light fairly exploded from the object, leaving the old man and the children in a little circle like daylight.  The three children clapped and cried, "It is real magic!"  Although bare dirt, the ground was comfortable enough for sitting, and the little group amused each other with jokes and tales and so on into the night.  It was like a friendly game for the children, one they sometimes played at when they stayed out with other friends in more familiar woods, imagining themselves traders or hunters.  They had no fear and they fell asleep.

Until the moment came that they awoke.  At first it seemed that nothing had changed; the wood was dark and the glass was bright and the old man was still sitting in front of the tree, but now his expression was grave and stony.  "How do you manage it, Math?" a voice rolled out from behind them, "Wherever you go, the little ones find you.  This is not a trick I taught you.  The Red One perhaps?  Or cuddly old Drusa?"  The old man sighed with impatience.  "Nothing can be chance with you, can it?"  "Not with me nor with any.  There is always a choice made and a path taken."  The old man looked away with a snort of disgust.  Rustling was heard from the dark and from the left, as the children looked at the man, a bright eye appeared among the trees.  Long teeth glowed faintly underneath it, but reflecting the glass's light while the eye shown of its own power.  "Well, little children.  I am pleased to meet you.  I trust you have heard of me, your dear old Uncle Vulk.  If you have come all this way, you must have a great wish for adventure.  Nobody adventures like I do, the magician will tell you," and the wolf began to step into the circle of light.  As he did, his gray fur rippled and fizzled.  His yellow eyes flamed red and orange as he blinked.  His teeth grew and shrunk and the spittle dripping from his long, red tongue hissed into steam.  "It's a good trick, Math,' he rasped, "but not good enough."  "I know," said the old man quietly.  He stood up and brushed himself off, rags and white hair falling away to show a slender man in old-fashioned but well-kept clothes.  His hair lay neatly on his head like a dark gray rug.  "Run away, children," he said calmly, "Trust in the trees."  The wolf barked with laughter and the children ran into the dark.  Soon each one was alone and racing through ferns grown prickly in the night.

The ruddiest child ran out of the trees and into the familiar lands around the village, and the morning light was relieved.  Three families waited by the main road under the sun.  One left with joy that morning; two left with tears under the moon.

He who hides in the woods may take the tall, the easier for him to jump upon.  He may take the fast, the more fun for his games.  The red-faced may be safe for a time, too untidy for his taste.  But once you have looked into his burning eyes your soul burns too and calls him.  Someday, little children, I may go back to the wood.  I may go to meet Uncle and my old friends, and we will be off all together and always.