Ink of Ages Fiction Prize

Warmth in the Woods

If one were to ask, my countrymen would say that they were disappointed at the success of the American rebellion. I would not.

I am glad to have left that foundering country across the ocean where it belongs.

My distaste comes not from those who inhabit it, but from an encounter I had in the early months of 1778. A small cohort of us, nervous of potential activity from Valley Forge, had decided to take up shifts watching the forests surrounding Philadelphia. General Howe called us fools, but did nothing to deter us. So I spent many nights in the Pennsylvania woods.

All but one have been forgotten.

The night in question I will put to paper to the best of my memory. It has haunted me for over a decade, and I have tried everything to banish it from my mind. Everything short of writing it down, for I feel I won’t believe it upon reading it over; not to mention its risk to my perceived sanity and decency. But I cannot call myself a true Englishman if I do not try.

There was a monster in that forest.

It was dark that night, save for the fire in front of me. I was comfortable in the woods. I had learned that I much preferred solitude to the taunts of the other boys in the schoolyard, and that I still preferred it as I progressed through the medical courses. I performed my duty for King and country and kept to myself. No one minded or asked after me, so long as I followed orders.

I was not asleep, but the fire’s warmth had lulled me towards drowsiness. The snow had set a hush over the forest, and nothing seemed capable of breaking the silence save for the crackling of my fire, and once – for a minute – a barred owl that settled on a branch above me, and whose call rang in my head after it had floated away.

The silence let me hear the snapping of twigs as the monster approached, and it gave me time to lay a hand on my pistol.

I have done my best – for my own sake, as I pray no one reads this – to transcribe this encounter exactly as it happened.

A voice cried out. “I don’t mean any harm!”

It was accented with the lax Rebel drawl.

“You’re a Rebel?” I called back, scanning the shadows. My efforts were rewarded, as something detached itself from a tree and began to move towards me once again.

“I think I prefer Patriot,” it replied. I drew my pistol, paying no mind to my shaking hand. Whatever it was froze. “I’m just looking to warm up before I move on; you’ve built a lovely fire.” It paused, waiting for my response. My pistol stayed raised. “I’ll step into the light hands first, how about it?” It took one step, then another, and then two empty palms came into view. Once it was in the light, it stopped. “There, see? Just…just an ordinary man.” Had I been less concerned with checking it for weapons, I would have noticed its hesitation. But from what I could see, it spoke the truth.

“May I have a seat?” it asked.

I nodded, and it collapsed next to the fire, its limbs splayed out like one of my sister’s discarded marionettes. It threw back its head in casual relaxation. The coat over its shoulders was the Rebel blue, and had the red trim that I was used to seeing in the Pennsylvania colony. It had an unkempt mop of brown hair. Its neck was so pale that it reflected the firelight back into my eyes. I was quick to look away.

“You’re quite young.” I had no desire to incite an altercation, and I hadn’t caught it doing anything untoward, so I found no fault in idle chatter.

At my statement, its head rolled back up and it affixed me with a delighted stare. “Oh not too young, I’d think. Why? Am I?”

I shrugged. I had seen many a captive Rebel argue that they were not too young to die for this phantom ideal of a country. I was tired of it. “Forget I said anything. This foolish endeavor is lucky to have you.”

“You think it’s foolish?” It tilted its head just so, and I was arrested by its eyes. The firelight had reflected out from within its pupils, like the flash of a cat’s eyes before it pounced. I had never seen a human’s eyes gleam in such a manner.

“Of course,” I said, hands grasping at the downed tree I was sitting on. It didn’t notice my fear. “What do you think of it?”

Its head drooped towards its other shoulder. “I don’t think much about it. It’s no great concern of mine.” It smiled wide enough to show teeth, and I gasped as I saw it had a second row in its mouth just behind the first. “I’ll turn out alright.”

“You’re a Patriot,” I said. It was a weak deflection, I knew it. It knew it.

It leaned forward. A twitch of its nostrils told me it was scenting the air. “It would seem so, wouldn’t it?” it said after a breath.

I could no longer contain myself.

“What are you?”

Its smile dropped first, that is what I remember most plainly. That smile’s change from bright and inviting to dark and sinister. Almost alluring. Like the colors of a poisonous butterfly. “I think that’s up to you.”

“Pardon?”

“There are many names for what I am…” It trailed off in thought. I had heard stories from the natives, of monsters that mimicked other creatures to better hunt. “What would you call me?” it finally asked, adopting an expression so earnest that I forgot to breathe.

I tried to defend myself as best I could. I considered myself to be a well-learned man who had no time for half-remembered legends. But my excuses died on my tongue. There was a story in my mind, a creature my grandmother would speak of in her hushed brogue. A mirror image that brought the death of its subject. “A fetch,” I murmured. “I would call you a fetch.”

“A fetch,” it said. A grin began to make its way slowly across its face. “What a silly name! A fetch!” Its nose crumpled up, like the snarl of a wolf. “Better look out, or I’ll fetch you!” It then collapsed into peals of laughter.

“Is that why you’re here?” I asked.

The laughter stopped, a too-wide smile remained. “Yes.”

“And it’s not me?”

“No.”

“Am I in any danger?”

It thought for a moment, then shrugged unconcernedly. “If you try and run, or try to stop me. Then yes.”

I nodded and fell silent. Despite its assurances of my safety, I could not bring myself to learn more about this monster. Its existence was enough. My silence did not deter it, however, as it crawled to where I was perched on the log. At such a close distance, I expected to feel awash with heat, but there wasn’t any. Its plea about getting warm was true.

“How could you tell?” It was naught but a whisper.

I cannot explain the sincerity of my answer. All I could think of were its open palms in the firelight, its bared neck and its too-wide smile. It had approached me with all the honesty it could, the least I could do was return the favor. “I am a surgeon,” I began. “I have studied the human form in great detail—”

“Oh you have?!” it cried in joy. “Wonderful! You could help me!” And it brought itself up to standing, and gestured at its front with enthusiasm. “What must I do to make this right?”

This was a creature built upon a lie, the lie of being human; and there I was, helping to make that lie believable.

“Your eyes.” They were the first things I had noticed, after all.

“Really?” Its brow furrowed.

“Our eyes don’t flash in the light. We’re not cats.”

It nodded and closed them. The wrinkles on its forehead grew as it concentrated, and then it relaxed. I could not tell if anything had changed when it opened its eyes, but I trusted that the change had been made.

“Anything else?” it asked.

My answer was instant. “Your teeth.”

It seemed a little taken aback. “What?”

“Your teeth. You have too many of them. We’re not sharks, either.”

It snorted as it ran its tongue overtop its front row of teeth. “You’re not much of anything are you?”

“I’m human.” The answer came quickly, out of some defensive pride regarding my being.

It hummed and bared its teeth. I cannot recall what it had done, but there was now a perfect, single row of white teeth. “A pity, really,” it said.

Anger warmed my face, and I snarled. “Oh and it’s better to be a fetch? It’s better to kill us and take over our lives?” I was standing before it now, this monster wearing another man’s face. This creature whose mere existence flung everything I knew about the world into the fire beside us. I pressed down upon my wonder and revulsion and curiosity and horror as I spat at it. “You’re nothing more than a featherless cuckoo bird.”

The fetch fell remarkably – inhumanly – still. I had only a moment to realize what was about to happen, and in that second I watched its lips part to let it take in a breath.

And then it pounced.

I was thrown onto my back as it fell upon me, and could not stop the cry that escaped as I hit the frozen earth. A knee was pushed into my thigh, and a boot was pressed onto my shin. Its hands fastened themselves at the bend of my elbows. Its face was still and impassive as it whispered into my ear.

“Exactly. And I am welcomed into your nest. This war has given me a larger hunting ground than you could possibly imagine. When I say it’s a pity to be a human, I say it as a being that hides everything magnificent about itself to pass as one.”

To this day, I consider it a miracle that I was able to find my voice.

“Why? Why hide?”

Its face crumpled, and it looked at me with unabashed want. One of its hands left my arm to press flat on my neck, then traveled up to caress my cheek, then moved down to rest over my heart. No doubt the thing could feel its frantic rhythm, even with the layer of red wool underneath its palm. Without another sound, the fetch dropped to lie fully upon me. Its hand curled into a fist over my heart, the other threaded through my hair. Its head settled into the crook of my neck.

“Because you are warm,” it said against my skin. “Because you are not solitary.”

How could I have assumed it would have known about me? About all I tried to hide? I shook my head and brought my arms around it. “But I am,” I said, for it was true. “I am quite solitary.”

“They dropped you out of the nest,” it murmured. 

A hysterical laugh was wrenched from my throat. “Something like that.”

I could not bring myself to push it away, and it seemed reluctant to leave, so we remained entwined on the forest floor. The fire had burned low by the time it twitched like a scenthound. Soundlessly, it brought itself to standing, and reached down to pull me upright with a surprising strength. There was no reflection from the firelight in its eyes.

It rocked forward and pressed a kiss to my cheek.

Then it brushed past me and vanished back into the forest’s shadows.

And what has haunted me most is that – for a moment – I desperately wished to disappear with it.