All was quiet last night, all was dark and I slept like someone conked me with a brick. It was quite nice actually. I think I was just exhausted as I normally don’t sleep like that. Nice change from insomnia. So let’s jump into the day. Timers ready and off we go.
I think this is something I will have to re think. It took me a while to get the story my brain wanted. I fumbled with one before locking in on another. I do like some of the elements though. Definitely something to come back to.
Wednesday, March 13th: The path was winding.
The path was winding. It curved and bent, and many times seemed to be going around things, almost doubling back on itself. She peered through the trees. Anne was almost certain she could see the section of the path they had just walked through the trees. The lightning struck tree she remembered walking past gleamed in the shadows.
‘It is the same path,’ she thought. She looked over to her guide and narrowed her eyes slightly. There were tales of these woods. She had heard them since she was a child. They were horrific stories that gave her nightmares as a child. It caused a fight between her parents. Her mother thought she was too young to hear the tales and her father thought she needed to be warned.
The stories remained, but from there they were toned down and often she could see her father biting back some detail or other. She was fairly certain her parents reached some sort of compromise that made neither of them happy.
Despite living in the village near the woods, she never ventured into it. There had never been any reason. Dead trees and branches were left at the edge of town, well out of the edge of the wood and it was from that pile that the village got their firewood. Their village woodsmen chopped up the larger trees and branches in the pile sorting it into usable formats. They did not take their axes into the wood.
Most herbs and plants were grown in small cottage gardens and most mushrooms were harvest4ed in the small forest on the other side of the village, near the easter road. Occasunally baskets of mushrooms and other collections of herbs would be left with the firewood. The herbs were claimed by the healer’s guild and the mushrooms portioned out. Once in a while, one of the midwives or healers would place a list by the edge of the wood, requesting strange medicinal herbs. Sometimes they were given other times not. It was a request made rarely and only at great need.
Today, Anne went into the wood. She was offered no choice in the matter. Her guide told her they would stay on the trail, yet the trail was winding and doubled back on herself. She was beginning to wonder about the wisdom of following the path and if it would ever lead them anywhere.
‘It is like that piece of ribbon candy from the city sweet shop.’ Once, when things were better, she traveled to the city with her family and she and her brothers were given a piece of ribbon candy to share. It was a long strip bent back in upon itself and this path reminded her of it.
‘Surely it would be shorter to cut straight through the forest,’ she thought. Yet she didn’t voice the thought. Her nightmares may have faded but the memories were still strong. ‘And my guide looks half scared to death.’
He was one of the older woodsmen and he had ventured into the woods when summoned like this once before, which is why he was her guide. His face was pale and his skin shiny with sweat even though the day was cool enough that Anne had to pull her cloak close. His fear more than anything stayed her questions.
Ten til Midnight 