The Butcher of the Forest

by Premee Mohamed

Never, never, never. It had been drilled into them their entire lives; they had taken in the fear of the place with their mothers’ milk.

(unwise to shed blood, even a drop, of anything that lived in those woods),

maybe even knew her family, everyone around here did in some way, they were not arranged in neat spiderweb strings like the families in the big city, but tangled together close like wool, with roots that ran into each other’s histories like the trees in the forest.

“I have returned. I am one known to you. Please allow me safe passage to bring back those who are lost.”

But it was beautiful in a way the south woods were not beautiful; it held this quality of age, weight, of mass and depth like a mountain.

she took the handkerchief from her pocket and rubbed the chestnut with her thumb. Nothing changed; no Knowledge settled upon her in a golden mist;

“It’s the symmetry, you see,” she said, getting out her own food. “Real fruit always looks a little funny, it’s got bulges, bruises, wasp bites . . . I mean look at these things. They’re like sculptures. And the color, really. Come on.”

He could not betray her if they both agreed on the conditions,

“Make no sound. That is all I know. That may not be true; but may I be struck down if I tell you a knowing lie.”

Nothing in the Elmever was as it seemed; and many things were imitations of what they wished to be. And if she forgot that, she would never leave this place.

Like the creature Veris had shared her food with, its voice was strange—inhuman, but also not animal. Composed of lake-hiss, rock-click, tree-breath. Almost a song.

if she retreated as the guardian advanced, she would be backed into the lake, and for reasons she could not even explain she fervently wished that not happen.

after she felt she could not go on one more step, the noises faded, and they were alone, or so it seemed, in the starlit woods.

“That’s a boy’s name,” said the shorter child. “It is not,” Veris said crisply. “I am a woman, and it is my name, so it is a woman’s name.

In such a fashion had guns been described to her. They would change the whole world, they said, once everyone had one.

And the beast cast it, and it was great and terrible, and its head rose to nearly the canopy of the forest, and the single horn scythed from its forehead curved and gleaming as a sword.

At any rate: I sell vegetables, if you must know. And I breed and sell rabbits and rabbit products; and I read and write letters for the village.”

“Do you have your own children?” “No. Children are very troublesome things.”

She was tired, she whispered to the things, and so were the children, and she was fearful of making mistakes—of misinterpreting their twitches and subtle shifts of weight.

Monsters, the children of monsters. But innocent. You do not inherit what you are born to; and you do not inherit your own theft. Their innocence will not save them from harm. And it has not. Still it must be remembered.

“Come in. I will tell you their names.” “And then you’ll teach me magic?” “No. Then we’ll have a cup of tea. And then we will discuss what may and may not be learned.”