Chapter 8: Words in the Woods

"Jarlath." Annafrid walked up to her new husband, who'd been so jubilant just a few hours ago. "Jarlath. Listen to me." She grabbed him in her arms, pulled him up to her chest and hugged him tight as she could with her muscular arms, stroking his hair. He relaxed just a little. "We will get out of this mess. We will save our Astra. We've all survived a lot worse than this. And I'm sure Vincent can fix your eye, or something..."

"It's never coming back," rasped Jarlath. "My eye. When they healed me, gave me my sight back, it felt... wrong. Like it wasn't meant to happen. And... My other sight is coming back now. I see visions. Only in flashes, like half-remembered dreams, but they're there. I knew I couldn't escape them forever."

"What did you see? If you want to talk about it."

"I see... Myself, standing in a dark forest. Much thicker and wilder than this one. And there's a woman--a woman in white. [5724, 6349] I think she's dead or--no. She's not what we'd call dead or alive. Beyond that, I don't know."

"OK. We'll take care of that, then. Whatever it is in this world that needs its ass to be kicked, we'll kick it," said Annafrid. "Our Astra is brave and strong, and so are you." She scratched his head and he smiled, just a little. But soon he slipped out of her arms and sat beside the tree, staring off into the distance, muttering and chuckling to himself. Annafrid stared at him, but he didn't even seem to notice her.

"Pssst. Hey," whispered Andrea from from some bushes. "C'mere." Cautiously, Annafrid joined her. She was sitting under a tree, and thumped the ground beside her, motioning for Annafrid to come sit beside her. She did.

"He gets like this sometimes," said Andrea. "You just gotta wait for it to pass. And it ain't half as bad as it was in the old days, back when he first got picked up. Astra can tell you all about that. She told you about some of the stuff he went through, right?"

"Yes, but... I've never seen him like this before, Andrea. I thought I knew him... Did I make the right choice? Marrying him when I'd known him for less than a month? It felt so right yesterday."

"I dunno, did you?"

"I don't know. I don't even know who I am, damn it!" Annafrid slammed her fist on the ground. "Half my memories come from a grown man, a dragonslayer, and half come from a peasant girl! And I'm some sort of--of--construct, or something. A--what was that book from those other worlds that Probe mentioned? Frankenstein. What if--what if I wasn't really making a choice? I was created to serve Prang's will--he was a mage. Just like Jarlath. Was I just--"

"Following your programming? Maybe. Why'd you think you wanted to marry him?"

"I--I don't know. I wish Astra were here. Everything seemed to clear when she was around." She smiled through her tears. "That was part of it. Astra. I knew there was something going on between them, even when they didn't, but I was never jealous of her. I liked the way they were together and I wanted to be part of that."

"Awww. So--OK, I gotta ask you a question."

"What?"

"What's going on with you and Astra, huh? Are you a thing?"

"I--we--look. It's not like that. We love Jarlath and we love each other--as friends--it's--we're like sisters. Like the Amazon warriors of old."

"Mmm-hmmm. There's a lot ya don't know about the Amazon warriors of old, kid. But that ain't my business." Annafrid felt the warmth of a blush spreading across her cheeks.

"I--all right. One other thing. Are you ever still angry at Jarlath because--"

"Because he tried to sacrifice me for that prophecy? Eh, not really. That life's all over now. We're both different--even if he thinks he ain't. See, we both were trapped--we wanted to be free but just got stuck worse. He ran away from home to be a mage, then got too close to scary, deep magic and got burned. He lost his sight and got cursed with those creepy visions that ran his life. As for me--I ran away too, 'cause I wanted romance and all that crap. And then I got the werewolf fever--I felt so free, so alive--but I wasn't in control. When I got the chance to go to a whole new world, and be a demifox--to be like free like that all the time, but still be me? No way I'd turn that down. Doesn't matter who I was before. Now, I can be whatever I want."

"And so can I." Annafrid squeezed her hand. "And we'll get Astra out and make everything right. Somehow."

"Yeah!" said Andrea. "See, Astra would have wanted us to make peace. But it's too late for that now. I just wanna rip them to pieces." She growled.

"I like the way you think," said Annafrid.

1. While Jarlath considers his next course of action

Add New Option

Go Back

View Forward Story Tree
View Back Story Tree