The Hooded Figure

The woman fled through forests, across plains and over deserts; and the hooded figure followed.

Then the woman stopped. She couldn’t continue without rest. She'd been moving at a steady pace all morning and through most of the afternoon. The sun was at its peak, and it let loose its rays on everything below it. But for all she knew they had it out for her alone.

Before her stood decayed shrubs; dying stalks of grass were scattered about the desert floor. The stump of an ancient tree stood in the middle of this dead oasis, right next to a pool of water that, she hoped, was clean. It wasn’t much, but she was grateful. It was a miracle to find anything in the desert. She would know; she had spent days seeing nothing but sand and horizon before her. Behind her was nothing but all the sand and horizon she had traversed. This was good. It meant she had lost him… for now, at least.

But he would come soon, and she needed to be gone by then.

The water was bitter, but it was water, and it had been hours since her lips had tasted any. She downed it all in a few gulps, and even took a second helping of the bitter liquid, before taking repose on the old stump. Mildly uncomfortable as it was, it was large enough for her to sit on, and she hadn’t known much comfort in years anyway.

The world was quiet here. She enjoyed it. She loved it even. She felt like she could make a home and live in this dead oasis forever. She certainly couldn’t, but it was lovely to dream.

How long had she been running? It was probably days, or maybe weeks, but if felt like years. She hadn’t aged as much as she thought she would, but she knew she had wizened. She had rushed past people she knew, and strangers, and what was probably millions of people. Some had stopped to speak to her, some had walked on without a glance. Few headed in her direction. Many others walked towards the setting sun. Some just stayed where they were, already fatigued by the journeys that life had forced them to make.

He'd taken them all, and he would take more. He would stop at nothing to take her, just like he had taken her son from her.

The sun was starting to set.

She turned to look at the desert she had travelled, as bare and empty as before, maybe more so. Could she dare to think that she had finally shaken him off? Without a doubt, no.

Would she ever escape his grasp? Could she? Could anyone?

He would take her away, she thought, to where he took her son and the others. Into the unknown where he resided. She didn’t know what would or did happen in the unknown, but she didn’t doubt it was terrifying. The aura of menace that followed the Hooded Figure told her as much. Everyone knew he was evil, something that should never be even spoken of, for fear of invoking his presence.

What would she do when he found her finally? Nothing significant, she knew. Her satchel, useful as it was, contained only things of sustenance for her journey, and tokens from the life she had left behind. No weapons. Nothing that could give her a fighting chance, no matter how futile. Being dragged helpless into the unknown, kicking and screaming, was scarier than the unknown itself.

And that was why she ran, and why she refused to stop until she reached the sunrise.

No one cared. The world had moved on from her.

It was nightfall.

She heard the twig crack even before she heard the soft, almost scared voice. She was sure it was him; it didn’t surprise her that he would cross a large span of desert while she barely slept.

And there he stood, his face and body concealed under his robe. Ever silent, ever ominous, as he had been on that day, after the fire, where he had first appeared. His robe billowed in the wind that carried the chill down her spine.

She stared at the Hooded Figure, into where the deep voids of where his eyes would be. This was the first time she had seen him from this close since he first appeared, and she was filled with the same awe. The same raw, almost primal fear. This was the being she had fled from for so long. The driving force behind of this journey she had been forced to endure.

She had a choice to make, and she knew what it was. With a heavy sigh, the woman bent down the retrieve her satchel. She slung it over her shoulder and stared at the Hooded Figure, who seemed to beckon to her.

With another sigh, she turned around and ran off into the full moon.