this is one of two vignettes i wrote at work while on my phone.
The ground became damp, and then muddy. Aleksei trudged through it, unknowing why some parts of this hellscape were wet while others had pools of magma. Perhaps that was the trick of it. Perhaps there lay a surface above from whence water trickles down. Aleksei did not truly know the geography of this place, or care.
What he did care about was the water. Demons, at least some he had encountered, ate and drank like men it seemed.
Maybe, his mind cruelly mused, this is some latrine you've found.
"Fuck you," he told himself in a voice dryer than bone. Not in tone, but in quality. His mouth tasted sour from lack of hygiene, and it was so dry he felt it a wonder that his tongue didn't shrivel up and die ahead of his body.
It was with a pounding headache that he set to work. His mind ached, his heart ached, but most of all his body ached. Aleksei's mind kept returning to his uncle, who he had otherwise not thought of for decades. So long ago he wasn't sure of the man's name anymore. Yet, he had been a forester. Trapper, hunter, craftsman, survivor. Survivor most of all.
He was the one that taught Aleksei to look for places like this when Aleksei was still a boy. Then to dig a hole, and to wait for the water to accumulate inside it.
This water he knew would be poison to drink. He also knew he could simply conjure water, and food aplenty. In fact, food enough to feed a whole army. He could gorge himself for days and under any conditions. God would provide.
Aleksei also knew that those spells could be tracked. Aleksei could smell magic, he could see it, the purple bruises left behind by the arcane. The white stains left by the divine. A white stain left on the ground here might be the remnant of a lusty demon. A white stain on reality could be nothing but one of the blessed.
He had always thought of people too quick to resort to magic as fools. The same kind of man to traipse through the woods stepping on every branch, and marking the tree only on one side with a knife. He had been that ignorant once, and when he turned around to find his way back he realized that when one marks only one side of a tree, they're blind to their own markers. Anyone trying to follow you though, now they have a very clean trail.
In those days, long before the glamor and pageantry of gallant palace life, he knew all he had to do was wait. His uncle would come for him, and Aleksei only had to wait a few hours for him to. Now, he could not wait. Now, if he waited in one place it would not be his uncle that found him. He had to always be on the move. In his mind's eye he saw the little campfires he left behind. An impression on soft ground where he slept. The bones of food left behind.
With any luck, the scouts that found it would think it was one of the wastrels that Aleksei had seen from afar from time to time. Lone, wretched demons that he always saw alone. He didn't know what they were, if they had any affiliation or if this is what an independent life looked like in Hell.
As the hole finished, Aleksei rose and left the water to slowly accumulate. Everything in this land, almost everything anyway, burned like tinder. It was with the smallest effort of will that he made fire in his hands. His helmet, which had once been so noble and proud, had to make due for a pot. He had already beaten and bent it into shape and tore out all of the lining and the straps that weren't metal. He didn't throw them away, of course. Even bits of will and strips of twine had a use now. If not immediately, then they would later and he couldn't afford to let anything go to waste.
He took some scraps of cloth that used to be his clothes, and with them he made a makeshift filter. Stretching them out over the helmets, he dunked it in the muddy water and let it filter through the cloth. It kept our most of the sediment, and he had a little less poison to deal with. He made a small fire near the hole, and he took off the filter. While he dared not use certain rites in this place, fire and heat never scorned a disciple of the purifying flame. So he held the makeshift bowl that was once his helmet on his hands, and he let the flame lick his hands and the helmet. Frankly, it felt nice to have the dirty residue of these long weeks in Hell burn off his fingers.
When the water was hot, he drank it immediately after it came down from a boil. Again, heat could not harm his mortal flesh. Too much steam and roiling liquid once made him vomit though, and he did not want to repeat that nasty experience again.
It came like an intense relief. The water intensified the sour taste in his mouth, but it made him feel better. It made him feel much, much better. He repeated this ritual until his stomach felt so full it was almost bursting. By the end of it, his head didn't ache anymore and he could almost relax.
As he sat on the muddy ground he looked over his body. Only one shoe, and a makeshift sandal on the other. One leg of his trousers torn off at the hip, and the other so stained and bedraggled one couldn't tell what color it used to be. His shirt was what he used for the water filter, and his armor was shredded to such a degree he had to take what little he could salvage and leave the rest behind. Not to wear, but as makeshift little tools. That's what his noble armor had been reduced to. A bowl, a plate, and a few scraps here and there. He was otherwise almost naked, and he felt it.
His mind drifted once more to that uncle, as he lay in the misbegotten wet field in only God knows where. He remembered the last time Aleksei saw the man. It was a lingering, cold winter and last year's harvest had been poor. Uncle had gone out with another member of the community into the woods who was little liked, but strong enough to help.
Only one came back from the woods, with a pack full of meat. Uncle said that they killed a deer and we're trussing it up when a fel beast happened upon them. Uncle said it had been drawn by the meat, and so they took what they could and ran. Only uncle made it home, and he figured the misliked neighbor must have died.
A tragedy to be sure, but the village was fed for days. With their full bellies, they searched the woods for the neighbor and this beast but never found him. Questions were asked, and everyone wondered what had really happened. No one dared actually accuse uncle of such a thing. He had always been an upstanding member of the community, and after all, had just saved their children from starvation.
In another few weeks when it happened again with another one of their own going missing, the village knew what had happened. Some refused the meat, those who didn't only began asking questions after their bellies were full again. Quickly things turned against uncle, and he was exiled from the community and into the woods. By this time, spring had begun to blossom and more people could brave those woods to hunt, fish, forage, and trade until that autumn's harvest. Some were so disgusted by uncle that they threatened to kill him, and all the rest wanted him gone.
Aleksei had to know if it was true. They couldn't legally kill him, for they had no evidence. No judge on their circuit would convict him. Only community sentiment, and community sentiment could only see him exiled and sent far away.
"We become who we must be to survive." It's all he said. He refused to state further.
Only, uncle never returned to who he was after the time for survival passed. He was always who he had become to survive, even after he didn't have to survive anymore. Aleksei never saw him again, no matter how hard or how deeply he looked into those woods.
We become who we must be to survive, he mused to himself. His mind lingered on that as he drifted off to sleep.
The ground became damp, and then muddy. Aleksei trudged through it, unknowing why some parts of this hellscape were wet while others had pools of magma. Perhaps that was the trick of it. Perhaps there lay a surface above from whence water trickles down. Aleksei did not truly know the geography of this place, or care.
What he did care about was the water. Demons, at least some he had encountered, ate and drank like men it seemed.
Maybe, his mind cruelly mused, this is some latrine you've found.
"Fuck you," he told himself in a voice dryer than bone. Not in tone, but in quality. His mouth tasted sour from lack of hygiene, and it was so dry he felt it a wonder that his tongue didn't shrivel up and die ahead of his body.
It was with a pounding headache that he set to work. His mind ached, his heart ached, but most of all his body ached. Aleksei's mind kept returning to his uncle, who he had otherwise not thought of for decades. So long ago he wasn't sure of the man's name anymore. Yet, he had been a forester. Trapper, hunter, craftsman, survivor. Survivor most of all.
He was the one that taught Aleksei to look for places like this when Aleksei was still a boy. Then to dig a hole, and to wait for the water to accumulate inside it.
This water he knew would be poison to drink. He also knew he could simply conjure water, and food aplenty. In fact, food enough to feed a whole army. He could gorge himself for days and under any conditions. God would provide.
Aleksei also knew that those spells could be tracked. Aleksei could smell magic, he could see it, the purple bruises left behind by the arcane. The white stains left by the divine. A white stain left on the ground here might be the remnant of a lusty demon. A white stain on reality could be nothing but one of the blessed.
He had always thought of people too quick to resort to magic as fools. The same kind of man to traipse through the woods stepping on every branch, and marking the tree only on one side with a knife. He had been that ignorant once, and when he turned around to find his way back he realized that when one marks only one side of a tree, they're blind to their own markers. Anyone trying to follow you though, now they have a very clean trail.
In those days, long before the glamor and pageantry of gallant palace life, he knew all he had to do was wait. His uncle would come for him, and Aleksei only had to wait a few hours for him to. Now, he could not wait. Now, if he waited in one place it would not be his uncle that found him. He had to always be on the move. In his mind's eye he saw the little campfires he left behind. An impression on soft ground where he slept. The bones of food left behind.
With any luck, the scouts that found it would think it was one of the wastrels that Aleksei had seen from afar from time to time. Lone, wretched demons that he always saw alone. He didn't know what they were, if they had any affiliation or if this is what an independent life looked like in Hell.
As the hole finished, Aleksei rose and left the water to slowly accumulate. Everything in this land, almost everything anyway, burned like tinder. It was with the smallest effort of will that he made fire in his hands. His helmet, which had once been so noble and proud, had to make due for a pot. He had already beaten and bent it into shape and tore out all of the lining and the straps that weren't metal. He didn't throw them away, of course. Even bits of will and strips of twine had a use now. If not immediately, then they would later and he couldn't afford to let anything go to waste.
He took some scraps of cloth that used to be his clothes, and with them he made a makeshift filter. Stretching them out over the helmets, he dunked it in the muddy water and let it filter through the cloth. It kept our most of the sediment, and he had a little less poison to deal with. He made a small fire near the hole, and he took off the filter. While he dared not use certain rites in this place, fire and heat never scorned a disciple of the purifying flame. So he held the makeshift bowl that was once his helmet on his hands, and he let the flame lick his hands and the helmet. Frankly, it felt nice to have the dirty residue of these long weeks in Hell burn off his fingers.
When the water was hot, he drank it immediately after it came down from a boil. Again, heat could not harm his mortal flesh. Too much steam and roiling liquid once made him vomit though, and he did not want to repeat that nasty experience again.
It came like an intense relief. The water intensified the sour taste in his mouth, but it made him feel better. It made him feel much, much better. He repeated this ritual until his stomach felt so full it was almost bursting. By the end of it, his head didn't ache anymore and he could almost relax.
As he sat on the muddy ground he looked over his body. Only one shoe, and a makeshift sandal on the other. One leg of his trousers torn off at the hip, and the other so stained and bedraggled one couldn't tell what color it used to be. His shirt was what he used for the water filter, and his armor was shredded to such a degree he had to take what little he could salvage and leave the rest behind. Not to wear, but as makeshift little tools. That's what his noble armor had been reduced to. A bowl, a plate, and a few scraps here and there. He was otherwise almost naked, and he felt it.
His mind drifted once more to that uncle, as he lay in the misbegotten wet field in only God knows where. He remembered the last time Aleksei saw the man. It was a lingering, cold winter and last year's harvest had been poor. Uncle had gone out with another member of the community into the woods who was little liked, but strong enough to help.
Only one came back from the woods, with a pack full of meat. Uncle said that they killed a deer and we're trussing it up when a fel beast happened upon them. Uncle said it had been drawn by the meat, and so they took what they could and ran. Only uncle made it home, and he figured the misliked neighbor must have died.
A tragedy to be sure, but the village was fed for days. With their full bellies, they searched the woods for the neighbor and this beast but never found him. Questions were asked, and everyone wondered what had really happened. No one dared actually accuse uncle of such a thing. He had always been an upstanding member of the community, and after all, had just saved their children from starvation.
In another few weeks when it happened again with another one of their own going missing, the village knew what had happened. Some refused the meat, those who didn't only began asking questions after their bellies were full again. Quickly things turned against uncle, and he was exiled from the community and into the woods. By this time, spring had begun to blossom and more people could brave those woods to hunt, fish, forage, and trade until that autumn's harvest. Some were so disgusted by uncle that they threatened to kill him, and all the rest wanted him gone.
Aleksei had to know if it was true. They couldn't legally kill him, for they had no evidence. No judge on their circuit would convict him. Only community sentiment, and community sentiment could only see him exiled and sent far away.
"We become who we must be to survive." It's all he said. He refused to state further.
Only, uncle never returned to who he was after the time for survival passed. He was always who he had become to survive, even after he didn't have to survive anymore. Aleksei never saw him again, no matter how hard or how deeply he looked into those woods.
We become who we must be to survive, he mused to himself. His mind lingered on that as he drifted off to sleep.