A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor

Chapter 20: Blood and Bruises - Part 3

"This sucks," he complained, running a hand through his short hair, getting it out of his eyes. With the cut on his face and the blood on his nose, he had no doubt that he would be getting quite a few funny looks if he went into town. But he shrugged at the thought. 'What do I care?'

He used the sleeve of his dirty oversized shirt to wipe the worst of the filth and blood away from his face – not that it did much good – and he patted his trousers a few times, as though that would do anything to rid them of the filth that covered them.

"Well… That's about the best I can do," he told himself, before kicking his body back into gear with a grunt, taking a few unsteady steps forward as he adjusted to the pain of movement, before his stride normalized and he walked almost as well as he normally might.

The village centre – where most of the stores and stalls and all the important houses lay – was not a great distance away from where Beam's house used to be. A twenty-minute walk at most, though it felt longer for Beam, now that he felt the dread welling up again, knowing that he would no doubt encounter further problems in town.

As he walked on unsteady feet along the well-worn hunting trail, a noise up ahead caught his attention. He twisted his head sharply to look through the trees, unconsciously holding his breath.

It was coming from a short distance off the trail, but he could not yet see what it was, with the thickly leafed bushes blocking his way.

He narrowed his eyes. It would certainly not be strange for someone to be there at this time of day. The families were busy foraging in preparation for winter, after all. The men were desperately trying to get in enough wood to last, whilst the hunters took good advantage of the increased demand, and in turn hunted as much as they were able, knowing that there would always be buyers for their wares.

And yet, despite knowing that it was perfectly normal, Beam still felt the unsatiable urge to check out what it was. He continued down the trail a little further, until he was away from the tallest of the bushes, and then he glanced back over his shoulder.

There, he saw a white rabbit, lying dead on its side, a pained expression frozen on its face. Kneeling beside it was a woman – a beautiful woman. With long black hair, pale white skin and a dark black dress with a robe over the top, she seemed quite the mysterious figure. Beam assumed she was burying a pet rabbit, or something of the like, for it was rare to see a rabbit of such white in the wild.

But as he continued further down the trail and he was able to better see past the bushes, he realized that was not the case at all. She was on her knees with her hands deep within its guts, as though she was searching for something. Beam had seen rabbits skinned and gutted many times – never did anyone spend quite so long with their hands in the animal's stomach.

The woman must have felt his gaze, for she stood up suddenly and locked eyes with him. There was a terrible expression on her face, an expression that frightened Beam more than anything else could have. There was not anger, or irritation, there was just complete blank emptiness, as though she were a mere puppet, a puppet without a soul.

Her pale hands were dyed a deep red as they hung by her side. She stared at him without blinking, before turning on her heel and suddenly walking deeper into the forest.

Beam watched her go for a second, before gulping and continuing on his way.

After a few minutes of walking, he emerged from the trees of the forest and his horizon opened up again. He was shocked at how good it felt for the world to feel so spacious. "Well, I suppose I have been in the forest for a good few days…" He'd never normally stayed hidden for that long.

Solgrim village was located on the expansive plains south of the Black mountains. An area filled with long-grown grasses that had yellowed from the summer sun, and wildflowers and thorns that claimed their bit of the wide expanse of territory.

Clusters of forest would spring up periodically, though most were small. It was at the foot of the mountains, just before they truly began to rise, that the true forest began. And it was in one such forest that Dominus and Beam resided. A few miles south of the mountains themselves, but with altitude to them in places that it felt like the heart of the mountains already.

He looked out across the vast plains to his left, as he often did, admiring the expanse of rolling.

There he saw a woman, stood staring at the sky.

He ground to an immediate halt.

"What the hell…?" He murmured.

There, standing, staring at the sky, was the exact same woman he had seen in the forest. The same black hair, the same dark dress and robe, the same emptiness. And yet her hands were clean. She turned to look at him, just as she had before, unblinking, unmoving.