I write this to you from what I think is my deathbed, although I can’t be certain. Someone should know what has happened to me since yesterday. Was it really just yesterday? This fever has made time hard to keep track of. I was asleep, when he woke up screaming in bed, and I admit I woke with a little scream myself at the unexpected shrill he produced. I got out of bed and hurried into the guest room, and found him sitting up, sweating and breathing heavily. After he got his orientation back, I asked him what was wrong, and he told me he had a nightmare. He said that it all had a vague familiarity, like something he had done in the past. I told him we all get that from time to time, the feeling that our dreams have already happened. Sometimes they even have, I imagine. In time he fell back asleep, but slept in a fit. I think I remember hearing him mutter something about a curse in his half conscious state, but I cant be certain. Everything seems mixed up to me. Those fevers, they always make it hard for me to find the balance between what was really happening, and what I imagined in my delirium. But when he told me about his dream, it made a bit more sense... Let me explain.
* * * *
He was running as fast as his legs could muster up the strength to churn, and tumbled his way through the brush into the open. He pushed on, leaping logs and rocks in his way, scrambling up and down the small slopes of the wilderness. He came to the crest of a larger hill and stopped, looking ahead of himself. Catching his breath, he leaned over and rested his hands on his knees, inhaling deeply. The smell of burning flesh and hair still hung in the air. He checked his immediate surroundings, and followed his line of sight to a small river below him at the base of the hill. More corpses were lying along the banks of this side. Most of them were completely naked, with burns all over their bodies. None of them had any hair left, all of it had been singed away, along with most of their skin too, it seemed. A lot of their heads were still smoking. He noticed that some of them had been wearing clothes, but the charred remains of them had simply fused into the flesh. His stomach muscles squeezed together, and he vomited onto his feet and some nearby bushes. Dizziness rushed over him, and he found himself on the ground, not fully fallen, but down nonetheless. He started towards the river, half crawling, half sliding down the hill on the dead leaves and loose dirt. He grabbed small brush on his way to slow his descent, and got to his feet, lurching towards the river with some difficulty keeping balance.
Upon reaching the banks, as much as he tried to avert his attention from the bodies lining this side of the river, he couldn’t keep his eyes from the atrocity. In the hand of one corpse nearby, a metallic object gave off a dim reflection from the light leaking through the trees. He couldn’t tell if it was being held by a male or female. The body was charred badly enough to have ruined those features. He stepped closer, cautiously, as if the remains would suddenly rear up and grab at him, and saw that it was a small knife, covered in soot where the metal wasn’t bouncing the light back at him. Was he being chased? Why was he running in the first place? His head ached, and he tried to remember, but came up with nothing other than a slight case of feeling dizzy. He reasoned that it was better safe than sorry, and pried the knife from the corpse’s hand. This knife looked so familiar, had he seen it before? Did he know these people here on the riverbank, smoldering? His stomach tried to burst forth again at the touch of the flesh, but dry heaving was all that he could managed. He knew that for the rest of his life, it would be impossible to forget how that hand felt. Like an overcooked steak that could somehow still be red in the middle. He felt very vegetarian at that moment, and doubted if he could ever even look at meat the same way again. He felt a rush in his head again, and splashed some water on his face from the river. The water was warm, and didn’t help him very much, other than mentally making his body believe it did.
A horn blared from behind the hill he had recently descended, and he reared his head up in the direction of the sound. The hill was obscured by smoke, but he could still make out the forms of trees and brush at the top. He saw no movement at first, but then spied shadows creeping slowly between the trees, barely visible in the smoke. His hand tightened around the handle of the knife, and somehow he knew it would do no good. There looked to be three of them, but he couldn’t tell who they were behind the veil of smoke. One of them, seemingly shorter than the other two, and hunched over, stepped forward through the thick fumes into view, nose raised into the air, sniffing at it like a dog. With a nasal grunt, its head snapped down, and looked directly at the river. A chain snapped back, clinking on itself, and the creature jerked backwards with a yelp. It stood on two legs, but didn’t act human in any manner other than how it walked. It stared right at him, that gaze penetrating like arrows pinning him in place. Did it smell him? He could hardly smell anything but smoke himself, but he swore that this thing had sniffed him out. No hound could smell anything through this. He had hunting hounds of his own, and they had a hard enough time finding game on a clear day, let alone through a thick layer of smoke. Especially with all of that cooked flesh in the air. His eyes caught the chain, and he followed it into the grey, losing sight of it. It was clinking again, and started to hang lower, letting on that whatever held it was coming closer. Where he lost sight of it, another figure started emerging out of the haze. It stepped fully into view, robed completely in black. The chain arced up to the sleeve, and he could see that there was no hand at the end of it. It was simply a dark hole in the robe. The chain went right up the sleeve.
The robed figure looked to stand over seven feet tall, but a harder look showed that it was actually hovering slightly over the ground by at least a few inches. He looked up to the hood, and was terrified when he saw there was nothing there at all. Just a gaping black void, black as midnight during a new moon. He could tell it was looking directly at him regardless. More, he could feel it looking at him. He felt dizzy looking into the blackness. He could feel himself starting to sweat and the hair on his arms and back of his neck stood at attention The robed figure looked to the sky, and the world seemed to vibrate and distort around it for a few seconds, as it bellowed out the same sound of the horn he had heard earlier. It lowered its head, and raised the chainless sleeve, pointing it directly at him.
The other figure emerged from the smoke, looking to be a replica of its counterpart. He looked back to the figure holding the creature on the chain, just in time to see the sleeve distort the space around it, like it had when it had made that awful noise. A line of flame traced a perfect line along the ground right at him, speeding up as it approached. He dove into the river right before it reached him, and he heard a loud waterlogged explosion. When he surfaced, fire was burning almost 5 feet high right where he had been standing. Both of the creatures reared to the sky and bellowed again, the whole world seeming to shake and vibrate around him. He clapped his hands to his ears, and dove under the surface, swimming for the opposite bank. He clambered onto the shore and looked behind him, seeing that now both of the creatures were standing where he had been on the opposite side, untouched by the flames. The chain still dangled from the sleeve, but the creature that was attached to it was gone. He looked around in a quick panic, sure he was about to become lunch to some unknown beast, but he didn’t see it anywhere. He turned, and fled into the woods beyond, not looking back and uncertain if the river surrounding that island would keep them from crossing, as it always had in the past.
* * * *
He awoke in the early morning with a start, before the sun had crested the horizon. He was leaning against a tree, and his legs burned with a fiery rage that could have only come from running a very long distance in a short amount of time. He stood up quickly, and collapsed back down again, reminded of his spent leg muscles. There was no smoke around him, and he had the sensation, a memory almost, that it had been a while since that had been so. He tried to remember, but couldn’t. Nothing would fit itself into place in his memory. Just the instinctual feeling that he couldn’t stop, that he had to keep moving. He vaguely remember circling closely around a village he came to in the night, a village that had looked to be mostly reduced to ash, at least a day prior. On the large gate where the main road led into town, someone had painted a large red crosshair in a circle. He stomach reminded him he was hungry with a blatantly loud gurgle. Half of the last thing he had eaten, or what remained of it before his body had stolen the nutrients it could, had ended up in some bushes, and on his legs. The other half ended up a few feet away from him, and on his shirt and chin. The sun started to make its appearance ahead in the distance, through the tree clustered landscape, and soon it was light enough to see a well kept crop field. If there was a field out here, there had to be a farm nearby as well. He could hopefully find food there, help from a well meaning farmer, and possibly some clothes to change into in exchange for a little work. He started towards the clearing, and was overcome with the sensation that he was forgetting something. He went back to the tree he had slumbered with, and picked up the dull knife beside it. That knife reminded him of something, but what? Or whom?
He reached a small farmhouse within an hour. It would have normally taken him far less time, but he was reduced to a very slow walk, his legs screaming and protesting every inch of the way. How far had he run yesterday? Ten miles? More? That would be nothing compared to the distance he had made in a day on some of his other travels, but when you were at a flat out sprint for its entirety, it certainly made a things a little different. He rapped on the door of the farmhouse, and waited. There was no answer. Whoever lived here was probably out doing his daily work. It also meant that there was a good chance there was no housewife here. He walked around to the back of the house, towards a large barn, and heard a clattering from inside it. The door stood wide open, and he heard someone howl in pain from inside. He walked quickly over, his legs swearing to him that if he did this one more time, they were going to leave him, and he could crawl with his hands for the rest of his days. As he reached the door, a man came out, holding his thumb and muttering under his breath. The man jumped at the unexpected visitor, and stepped back. His entire thumbnail was purple, and bleeding slightly.
* * * *
This is where I met him, and can attest to the truth of everything from this point forward. The rest of it was what he recalled from his nightmares, but seeing as what happened afterwards, it lead me to believe that his dreams were fairly accurate. But mind you, I can’t be sure.
“I mean no harm to you sir, I heard you yell and came to see if you were ok.” He said.
“Im fine, I smashed my damn thumb with my hammer while puttin’ a new set of shoes on my horse. Good for nothin’ clout busted another one tillin’ my fields yesserday.” I told him.
He explained that he was tired, and very hungry, and had no place to go. He was flat out lost, was having trouble remembering things, and needed some help.
“I can work in exchange for a meal, and a bed, and some new clothing.” he said.
But I shook my head and told him “Nar, you needn’t worry ‘bout workin’. I been a traveler once myself. I got no problem helping out a person in need fer nothin’. Name’s Aaron, pleased to meetcha.”
After being well fed and clothed, he felt refreshed, and spoke with me for a while. He told me of the island he had come from, or what he could remember anyway, but he left out the things which had tried to burn him alive in those dreams of his. I guess he felt there was no reason to scare a lone man out of his skin, but we’ve all known about that island since we were kids. They say demons and evil spirits live there, and that all they live for is to kill humans. Kill humans and feed ‘em to those misshapen hounds they have. They aren’t able to cross that river that surrounds it, from what we were told. Some kind of voodoo wards or some sort put up centuries ago. Not a one of us ever went over there. We went close, sure, curiosity always wins, but even being on the opposite bank gave me the jitters, so it did. Can’t imagine why anyone would try to go there, after a feeling like that.
“Well, yer surely able to spend the night in my home.” I told him. “I got a guest room with a bed and a fireplace in the back there. A good nights rest will do you well, sure enough.”
He couldn’t agree more, and after some more conversation of mainly no importance, he turned in for the night. His sleep was full of fever, chills and those terrible dreams. Just watching him sleep made me feel scared, so it did. I turned in myself, and lay there about an hour, wondering if I should go to sleep, or if I should keep an eye on him to make sure he didn’t burn up. That’s about when he awoke up screaming. He couldn’t remember where he was, or who I was. I told him, and I asked him if he was ok, and that was when he told me about that nightmare. I got him some water, and put a dash of chamomile in it, to help him sleep easier. Then I turned in myself, but I didn’t sleep to well. I had a good share of terror myself, after all that commotion. The next morning, we ate some breakfast, after which he again apologized awkwardly about his memory, and asked questions about last nights visit. He mulled over what I told him, and stood in front of the window thinking over everything. He had the look of a man searching desperately for a memory, anything to grasp onto, really. It was a long ten minutes before he noticed that there was smoke in the distance, coming from down the road connected to my house.
Both of us stood outside at the edge of the road, staring at the rising bellows of smoke on the horizon. It was a long silence, broken by myself.
“Looks to be the whole damn village.” I said. “I ain’t seen that much smoke my whole life, and I been here long, I tell ya.” And its true. I never did see that much smoke comin’ from anywhere. “I’m guessin’ I should be goin’ on down, seein’ if I can’t help some folks. I have quite a few friends in town.” And with that I turned and walked to my barn.
We started towards town, riding double on my horse, after fixing that damn shoe from yesterday. Never felt comfortable doing that with another man, but if people were hurt and in need of some help, that would just have to be put aside. The air was acrid with the smell of burning wood and cooking meat. About then was when I first started feeling a little dizzy, and hot under the collar.
I said to him “You know, I feel a bit under the weather myself today as well. Its been gettin’ colder, for sure, but I feel pretty damn hot at the moment. My head feels a little like a fish pond, if you catch what I’m sayin.”
He only nodded in response to what I was saying, but I could tell he did, even with my back to him. Drawing nearer to town, It was getting harder to see, and what we could was becoming obscured by the thickness of the smoke. I was able to spy a notice hung on the post of a fence surrounding a field full of mostly corn and select few other vegetables.
“That wasn’t there yesserday. Lemme have a look at that.” I said to him, and got off my horse. I walked over to the paper nailed to the fence, and could feel my balance getting to be off kilter even then. There was a drawing of a man on it, and after a look at the face on this notice, there was no question that man on it was sitting on my horse, right behind me.
“Well I’ll be, son. Lookin’ like someone’s tryin’ to find you. Least it looks like you. Pretty poorly drawn if you ask me, but its you, one in the same.” I said to him, and strange enough, for a wanted man, I didn’t think this boy could physically harm a fly. “Got your picture right here on it. It don’t appear that they be jokin’ bout it neither. This here’s a warrant, with a license to run you through if need be.”
He dismounted and went over to the fence, looking at the paper in disbelief. Sure enough, that was him all right. I’d bet my fathers grave on it, for certain. And in big letters underneath the picture, the word DANGEROUS in large print. Below that was printed “If seen or captured, the High Chief has ordered that you are to come promptly and directly to the High Chief’s quarters. Immediate reward will follow after verification of useful information. Reward will be doubled after capture. Wanted Dead Or Alive.”, and it had the High Chief’s seal, right there on the bottom right corner of the paper, making it official. That familiar red crosshair inside of a circle.
“I don’t know what you could have done that they want you so bad. But if the High Chief himself wants you, you can bet its not for nothin’.” I said. “Whatever it is, they sure want you pretty badly. I’ve never seen posters for this sort of thing up this far out of town.”
He explained that he didn’t have any idea what they would want with him, but, that, he also didn’t remember anything before this morning, so, he couldn’t say for sure. He looked at the picture again, and shivered at it.
“Well, don’t matter much to me, son. I ain’t gonna turn you in. Seem harmless enough for me, and you ain’t given me no troubles. You best get on out of here before someone comes up that road and sees you. Rest assured, they wont stop and think twice about it, if you follow what I mean. Especially with a double reward! Thats more than some folks make all season. I’m a simple man, and I have no use for extra coin that I cant make tillin’ my fields. It spoils the blood, so it does. Get on goin’, for it winds up too late for ya.”
The thing is, I would have knocked him a good one and turned him in myself, had I thought it possible. Of course an old man like me could use the extra money, seeing that my wife had passed some years back, and I was working all alone, and very hard for a man my age. Extra income would be heaven sent at this point. Plus, the High Chief doesn’t come down on people personally unless something really foul has happened. That’s why he has guards and his higher lawmen. But, I was feeling worse by the minute, and there was no way I could restrain a man like him. He was much younger and stronger than an old man like me, even in his weakened state. We shook hands, he thanked me, and went under the fence through the field, into the woods beyond. That was the last I saw of him. I kept going on into town, no use stopping now. I figured I’d just tell some of the High Chief’s men about him, and send them back in this direction.
I got into town, and even then I could see more smoke in the distance, and with the smoke now billowing from behind me, it seemed to come from everywhere. That pungent smell of roasting flesh and cloth. The smell of burnt hair was still stinging my nostrils, overpowering my senses and crushing my ability to calm and think rationally for a moment. At least I thought it was the smoke, but I’m pretty sure now it was this sickness I’ve gone and caught. I tried to think, to pull my wits back about me. I had to get out of this place. Where was I? I tried to remember, but all I could think about were the fires. Those raging fires consuming the piles of dead humans and animals. Children and pets, all ablaze, dead already thank the Lord. At least, I think they were already dead. Adults, some sure to be the parents of the latter, lay in other piles. Every house in the village was on fire, and the trees and fields of crops with them. On just about every street corner, the High Chief’s symbol was painted in bright red on the side of any building made of stone, and those not made of stone were being burned by the High Chief’s guards, swords in one hand, torches in the other.
I remember talking to some of the High Chief’s guards, ones who were not busy burning everything to the ground, and explaining about the strange man on the poster. I told them where he had gone, money and dizziness both clouding my mind at the same time. I saw their eye’s all widening in a weird sort of unison, and then one of them was screaming out “He’s been with the carrier! Kill him! Kill him!” Suddenly guards were surrounding me, seemingly out of nowhere, with swords already drawn. I looked at my surroundings, and saw that the only one way to run was into a building behind me that was already in a raging fire. I turned back to the guards, who all seemed very cautious and afraid of me, even though I was obviously unarmed, and knew where my best chances were. I turned and ran into the front door of the burning house, and heard the clattering of light armor running behind me. I also saw torches flying past me, thrown in an attempt to either knock me down, or light me on fire. I don’t think they ever came into the house after me though. They probably assumed that I would be burnt alive, and that their job was taken care of for them by none other than myself. They would just fish out the remains when the fires were out, if they even bothered at all.
Once inside, I saw that the fire actually looked far worse if you were looking at it from out in the street. Don’t get me wrong, it was most certainly burning, but the inside was actually made of stone in most places. The fire was burning away at the outside, which must have been covered in wood for appearance, and gave the impression that this was a certain death trap. The smoke was far worse than the fire in here. I climbed out the window in the back of the house, into an alley. All of the adjacent houses were burning too. I left my horse behind, and staggered back towards my farm, looking over my shoulder every few seconds to see if I was being followed by the High Chief’s guards. I never saw any though, which was a relief.
Halfway to my farm, covered in soot and sweat, swaying back and forth as I walked, I fell to the ground. My lungs felt like they were on fire, most likely caused by all the smoke I breathed in when I moved through the house. I felt too tired, too sick, and too old to go on. But to my good fortune, two men rushing to the town to see what the smoke and commotion was about came upon me lying in the street. I told them of what I had seen, and they both apparently decided that it was better to stay away from town, with the guards in a uproar and burning everything in sight. I left out the part about being chased by the guards of course, knowing that it would most definitely not help my case. I told them where I lived, and as they were bringing me to my home, I slipped into a half awake, half unconscious state. In the state I was in, I only vaguely remember hearing two people talking about wanted posters, and a man with some sort of plague that he was immune to himself. Something about how he had already spread it to two other villages, and that from those, there were no survivors and no houses remaining. All burnt to the ground. Then I heard a voice mentioning something about putting the man into his bed, which I can only assume was me of which they were speaking. Then I must have fully slipped into unconsciousness, because when I came to, I was in my own bed, stripped down to my skivvies and tucked in far neater than I could have done by myself.
And now here I am at home, writing this note. Things are getting harder to remember by the minute, so, I’m just going to lay down. Some rest should make me feel better. Tomorrow, when I’m back to my old self, I’ll find out what the real story is...
* * * *
It had been a little more than a day after going under the fence into the woods before he backtracked across the remains of small farm. After rummaging for food and supplies, he saw that the owner had been burnt alive in his house, along with his barn, his crops and his cattle as he slept in bed with a terrible fever. There was a red crosshair in a circle painted on a large rock near where the house had once stood. “Why does that symbol seem so familiar?” he asked aloud to himself, in a confused whisper. His head hurt, and he felt dizzy, swaying a little. There was obviously no one here alive to help him, and anything useful had been destroyed. After regaining his balance, he took a moment to rest his hands on his knees, and kept moving.
![[send message]](https://www.writerscafe.org/images/mail.png){kind=small}
![[befriend]](https://www.writerscafe.org/images/friend.png){kind=small}
Share This
Email
Facebook
Twitter
Read Request
My Library
Flag Writing
