Out of the Woods

Cecily threw a waterskin into the sack, blanket, clean shift, linens for Val. She tried not to hesitate, moving swiftly from one side of the little room to the other, deciding quickly what of their lives was essential, what must be let go. Her hand shook as she counted the money in her purse, enough it would have to be enough.

She was almost quick enough, that was the memory that would haunt her. She almost made it in time. When they came they didn’t knock, suddenly they were beyond such courtesies. Jan Ferney was first, he looked around without surprise, ‘Spring cleaning are we?’ He quipped, and she hated him for that. Behind him looking determined but a little guilty Roland Thorne, Lettice Fairfax her face oddly blank, and more, it must be half the village more than enough to make it clear there would be no escape.

She turned towards them, hands gripping the table behind her. ‘I don’t want any trouble, just let me go quietly,’ she said the words almost at random buying time. Jan rolled his eyes, ‘none of us are enjoying this’ he said eyes gleaming with excitement, ‘but I can see you’re not going to be sensible about this’ he stepped forward and moved to grab her wrists but she twisted away from him, in her hand was a knife she had taken from the table she slashed wildly at him.

‘You little witch’ he shouted, startled, she tried to use the moment to run by half a dozen hands were already on her.

She had the chance to see him look dazedly at the blood seeping through his shirt before they pulled her to the ground. Roland wrestled the knife from her hand, both of their fingers were bloody. She breathed heavily, holding herself very still, feeling for any chance of escape. Lettice picked up Val from his cradle, he was staring at her with his wide black eyes but not crying yet. ‘The poor child’ she heard someone whisper and then the air was filled with a terrible feral wailing, it took Cecily a moment to realise the sound was coming from her.

She stumbled as they dragged her towards the stable block by the inn but the hands never faltered. They were wary of her now. ‘Witch’ she heard more than one person hiss at her, and other things, worse things. They had wound a thick rope around her wrists and it chafed against the delicate skin with each step. She was almost glad when they left her alone her wrists now tied to a post, her ankles hastily fastened together. At least now she would have a moment to think. She tugged against the bonds, testing the knots. They seemed firm enough, she wriggled her hands wondering if she could somehow slip them free, her wrist caught against something sharp, tearing at the skin, she felt a stab of hope so powerful it was like pain as she glanced up. A loose nail was poking its way out of the post they had tied her to. Perhaps if someone was very desperate and very patient they might be able to drag the rope across that nail over and over, cutting flesh as well as fibre until suddenly, very early in the morning the rope might snap leaving her preciously, precariously free.

Sneaking out of the village was the easy part, she wanted to return to her hut, to see if she could retrieve the bundle of their meagre possessions. But she wouldn’t risk it, not even by the slight frost hardened light of dawn, it was too much to hope that they wouldn’t have left someone there to watch. She crept into the dark shelter of the forrest, she couldn’t see anyone stirring yet. She hesitated wondering if they had taken Val yet. Should she watch for the morning hoping she could follow them when they did? But if they had already taken Val, her heart beat quick in her throat hands stretching out to take the measure of the ice woven air.

The thought was too much, her feet were already moving, her pace increasing, faster and faster as she moved further from the village until she was almost sprinting, a mad dash through the undergrowth that clung to her skirts and tangled under her feet. She fell more than one, scraping skin from her already bloodied hands but pulling herself back up again moving deeper into the forest.

She didn’t know exactly where she was heading, a small panicked part of her wondered if she was simply running in circles miles from where she needed to be, but she had some ideas. She headed roughly north, her pace gradually slowing as she got closer to what she guessed was her destination. There were a few places in the woods sacred to the old gods but Jan was a devout man, in his way, so she was heading for the shrine dedicated to St Georgia. She had been here once, maybe twice before - years ago she could remember the shape of the clearing, a low stone wall, the remains of some ancient town or road long since reclaimed by the forest.

She was walking quickly now, scanning for anything that looked familiar. The trees were older here, she brushed her hands across the rough bark of an oak, wishing she could press herself into its skin and disappear completely. Without Val how much would be left of her anyway?

She swallowed hard and forced herself on, she stumbled across the clearing quite suddenly, she was picking her way through a stubborn tangle of undergrowth when she saw a gleam of early morning sunlight glinting off mental. There it was, almost exactly like her memory, the long crescent shaped wall, the carved step into which someone had inserted a crude bronze image of the saint, the sunlight glinting off the tip of her spear.

Her breath caught a little in her throat, there in the middle of the clearing was Val, loosely tied to a stake like a puppy someone was afraid would wonder off. But stepping into the clearing was something else, almost as tall as the tallest trees, with a long sinuous neck it moved catlike, eyes fixed, towards the small boy bundled in his blankets. It was the dragon.

Too late, too late. Cecily instinctively flung herself back against a tree. Somehow she hadn’t quite believed it til now, or hadn’t been prepared for it. The size of it, the strength buried in those vast talons, the basilisk gaze of its yellow eyes. She felt in her waistband and then remembered Roland wrestling away her knife. Her fingers scrabbled vainly over the empty space at her belt, no weapon at all. Still she was here to do or, and she fixed her eyes on the Saint as she finished the thought, die.

She pushed herself out into the clearing before she had time to think, flinging her limbs into the gap between Val and the dragon.

‘No’ she shouted forcefully raising her head to meet those yellow eyes.

It paused for a second as if surprised, Val toddled forward, curious rather than afraid. She pushed him back behind her.

‘You can’t have him’ she said, voice surprisingly strong ‘there’s been a mistake’.

The dragon stretched its neck out towards her its tongue darting forward to taste the air.

- I confess I don’t understand at all.

Cecily jumped back in shock, she didn’t so much hear the voice as feel it, as if its meaning had been pressed into her bones. Val reached forward again, hand stretching towards the strange agile face of the dragon.

Cecily licked her dry lips and tried to push him back again. ‘You can’t have the boy, you can have me if you like only then I don’t know who would take care of Val’

- but why should I want either of you?

‘Oh’ said Cecily ‘oh’ she looked again at the dragon, the alienness of its glistening green scales, the teeth longer than her forearm and the eyes - not hostility, something like curiosity, not the cold curiosity of the villagers watching her out of the corner of their eyes, waiting to see what she might do wrong next but an intelligent curiosity, questioning but without the threat of judgement.

‘The villagers thought that a…a sacrifice’ she chokes out the word ‘would make you go away.’

- I see. Rather unwelcoming. It has been many years since I dealt with humans.

The dragon sniffed towards Val again who was squirming with excitement and apparently not an ounce of fear.

- Why thiss boy?

It probed tongue once again tasting at the air.

‘There was a ballot, they put in all the names, they said it was the only fair way’ the words were spilling out of Cecily now, how strange, how wonderful to have someone to listen.

‘But I don’t think it was. Fair. I think they had already decided, Val was the one they could most afford to lose.’

- I see. They determined him to be of less worth. Was he the smallest of his clutch?

‘No, he’s quite big for his age, and that smart too. It’s only that he’s a bastard and I’m a whore.’

Cecily pushed her chin out as she said the ugly words.

The dragon shook its head from side to side.

- These are human concepts they mean very little to me. Still I do not think it is right to turn on your own kind. In fact we are a kind of kin, as you have been turned away by your people so I have been by mine.

‘Did you…did you do something to offend them?’

The dragon made a rough choking noise that it soon became apparent was laughter.

- No, they forced me out of my territory because it is a good territory and they were strongest. Now I must find a new territory but I would not have settled here, it is too flat for dragons.

Cecily mulled this over ‘so you were leaving anyway?’

- Yes I was, I only came this way because I smelt your hatchling. I am not interested in eating you. You may return to your home now if you wish and tell your people that.

Cecily suddenly and unexpectedly felt terrified, she had expected to run away, to be hunted, to die. Not to return.

‘I can’t go back. No one will believe me.’

She knelt and started mechanically unpicking the knots that still restrained Val. The dragon tasted the air around her again.

- I smell that you are unhappy. I do not like what I have heard today. I do not like the dragons who have banished me from my home, still less do I like the people who have banished you from yours. And I am insulted, I would not take so weak and paltry a bribe even if I did wish to eat your kind. An so Cecily of Morwenne's Hole I shall offer you a blessing - Wherever you shall go you shall find a home.

The dragon moved forward and touched its head gently to Cecily’s forehead which burnt very hot then very cold. She touched a hand to the spot but all she felt was smooth skin.

The dragon then turned towards Val.

- As for you little one, I think we shall meet again.

Val smiled hugely and flung his arms around the head of the dragon in an enthusiastic hug. Cecily would always remember the moment Val bright and fearless clinging to the head of the dragon.