Autumn

All characters depicted are 18+ years old at the beginning of the story.

1

Ulf had a limited understanding of humans. He had learned their language when he was young, he had traveled through their kingdoms following old roads and new, and watched their farms and towns from afar. So he learned plenty about their ways, but it only confounded him.

The basis of his knowledge had come from his father's captive wives from when he was a pup. They weren't so different from his blood relatives. They ate the same food, slept at night, were awake during the day like they were, and had strength and fierceness in their own way. To Ulf, they had been more nurturing and careful than his actual parents ever were. They never left in raids or war campaigns, being the ever-present figures to feed, teach and discipline the offspring of the hut. Yet, their pinkish and brown skin was very different from the purples and blues of the people they lived with. Both women were of plump complexion, one with dark hair like coal and the other with brown hair like riverbank mud. They weren't proper warriors, being too short and too weak to swing an axe or a throw spears, but they lived surrounded by them and possessed the will to thrive among them. Ulf remembered fearing them as much as he would fear any other adult.

Those women had led him to believe that most humans would be like them. Shorter and cuter versions of his people, without tusks or claws and cold-resistant skin, but just as brutish.

By the blood gods, he was wrong.

He was so disappointed when he learned the truth.

The same feeling overwhelmed him that afternoon, many years later, as he stared down at the sobbing woman beneath his knee. She whimpered and clawed at the floor, but was otherwise paralyzed by sheer panic, incapable of defending herself or handling the consequences of her recklessness. She was no fighter to be wandering alone into the trees, away from the road and the protection of her community, being inept in all fighting skills, without any endurance and power in her body. All she could do then was beg and cry like a child, pray that her captor could find mercy in his heart, but Ulf had no compassion for stupidity. He grabbed the back of her black dress around the neckline and kept her in place to take his weight off of her. He pulled her up to better observe. She was covered from head to toe in many layers of fabric, so much so that even her hair was enclosed with a white scarf. The only skin she showed was her pink face swollen and distorted by distress.

She seemed young, but not childish. Round cheeks, but sharp bones. The reddish lips quivered as her big blue eyes studied him. Not enough sunlight pierced through the branches to make anything in the forest shine, but still bright were the speckles in her tears. Ulf's big pale hand covered her mouth as the dread settled in her heart and made her scream. The sound died muffled against his skin. He was in no hurry. He waited until she had exhausted her voice and body, going limp and dizzy in his arms after the anguish had run its course. Ulf couldn't imagine what it was like to feel so powerless.

The woods seemed to grow quiet in response to her distress. No cries of insects, no chirps of birds. Only her whimpers echoed, seeming to make the trees tremble. Ulf felt like the forest itself watched him and waited for his decision.

"Listen to me, and pay attention."

She sobbed. She seemed surprised he spoke her language, and that there was intelligence behind what should have been only a monster.

Ulf held her by her arms, turned her around, and bent her over his thigh. She was so soft and squishy that her body molded itself against his hard skin. He hushed her whimpers with a loud hiss, then pulled up the fabric of her skirt and the many layers of her petticoat until he found skin above her socks. A long thin branch came into his hand and Ulf moved it fast to strike. A line in her creamy colors that in no time became bright red.

She screamed again. This time, he let her.

"These woods are now mine. If you speak of me to anyone, I'll have them killed. Don't test me. Don't come back."

The monster let her stand, but she didn't have any actual strength in her legs to stay upright. He hit her rear hard, and she stepped forward without balance, falling to her hands and knees before gathering herself enough to run away. Ulf didn't watch. He had no stomach for weakness. Never had.

The first time Ulf traveled by himself, he was barely a grown individual. The clan already considered him well-trained and sent him south into the human kingdom of Sirien, following the elven roads. For the first time, Ulf saw the villages and met humans the northern clans hadn't reached. He found they were nothing like his foster mothers. They weren't a society of strength, bravery, and coalition like Ulf's clan was. Some among them could be called tough, but they were few, and rarely smartness accompanied their prowess. Ulf learned that the human warchiefs easily forgot the people in the outskirts of their countries, and those forsaken were left to take care and teach themselves, to waste their fates if they so desired. They kept the weak helpless so they could prey upon their shortcomings.

Ulf spent years in Sirien by himself, only twice traveling back north to bring his maps to his warchief. Each season, his contempt for those creatures only grew. And when the clans raided Sirien, he didn't stay to join them. He didn't want to watch those weak people conquered. It was not fair that they couldn't fight back. It was not a genuine victory.

The pathfinder kept those thoughts at bay with the solace that the ones taken north would find as much happiness as his foster mothers had, and focused on traveling further. Sirien was behind him now, physically and metaphorically, in time and space. The country where he was now, Lilen, was beyond the alps that protected their southern border. As far as Ulf understood, winter rain and summer winds had devoured any path built in those peaks long ago. He wondered what treasures would be beyond the difficult terrain and dreamed of mapping a path that went all the way down to the other continent. By then, he was no pup anymore. He was a skilled survivor, a good pathfinder, and even though his skill in combat hadn't gotten any better, it was more than enough. Sometimes his knee would pinch in sharp pain and his back ached if he took days on end marching without rest, but he knew the medicines to those ills and there was no one to push him but his sense of duty.

He enjoyed his life a lot.

Most of the time, at least.

Where the mountains finally gave in there was a valley that revealed itself abundant in breathtaking sights and luscious vegetation, inhabited by very few people - only a small village of isolated dumb humans and its farms. The kind of dumb humans that trudged alone into dangerous turf without any means or preparations, that let each other starve and die instead of sharing what they had, that scarcely received visitors. It was a place forgotten by the rest of the world. A place where there was plenty to explore and where he could work in peace. He'd seen the village only twice through that last year. For the most part, when he approached the tree line, there was just one farm in his sights, the last one up the road where a sheepherder lived alone with his wife. That men would take the sheep to the green pastures uphill a few days a week, until last year. The sheepherder had retired, it seemed, and a younger woman took his place. Ulf would hear her singing at the end of each day - a wailing high pitched sound that echoed through the entire valley, calling forth the sheep back to her.

Only when Ulf saw the two lost sheep foraging in his woods did he understand what had happened, and who was the woman he had struck.

Ulf thought about the damp winter coming ahead once more and how much he would enjoy sleeping under fresh woolen furs. He approached the sheep and passed rope around their necks. The gentle animals had no fear in them, and submitted when he pulled them uphill.

To the shepherd woman, Ivy was her name, panic wasn't a strange sensation. It was constant company, an everlasting state of impending doom that would leave her feeling empty if it ever became absent. It was the first time, though, in a very long while, that she could do something about the threat. It felt good to run. To see a way out. Her body had gathered all those months of anxiety to jolt her forward. Half mad with fear, the woman only stopped when she reached the mountain trail, and only because her knees were giving in, not because she felt safe.

She screamed, bending herself in half and holding her skirts. Her howling was a horrible sound of pain. She sat down and cried. Her body ached with the strain. Her mind raced with shame of her failed task, her fear, and the pernicious idea that she should be dead.

Her father found her an hour later when the sun was setting. He had a lamp in one hand and a cane in the other.

"Useless slut!" He cursed, and the cane came down on her head, her arms, her face. "Where are my sheep, you wretched child?"

From him, she couldn't escape. There was nowhere to run, no mercy.

"I'm sorry, papa, I couldn't find them."

"Lazy! Useless!"

Ivy deserved every strike. She knew, accepted them, even as the despair in her heart grew. When they got home, Ivy wanted to go to bed, hide in her small room and cry, but she had to endure the screams and the hits, the sad eyes of her mother on her, and kneel in front of the fire to pray without supper, for hours, obedient, tamed.

In the dark beneath the blankets, though the house was quiet, there was a loud voice in her head, and it screamed at her. It called her names and pointed out her mistakes with stern cruelty. That night, for the first time, the voice had gained a fixed face, one with bright yellow eyes and piercing teeth poking out from a mouth that wasn't big enough to fit them.

What kind of monster was that? Maybe one of the unenlightened heathens she had been warned about? Or a demon coming to plot against the prophets? Should she warn her father, have him write to the elders? But no one would believe her. Worst yet, they would only say she was trying to escape her duties. Her punishment.

She clung to the mantle and prayed. "I'm not worthy, but protect my family, God, please. They don't deserve this." The rising sun came and she hadn't slept. Ivy didn't sleep that night, nor the night after, and for many nights subsequently, she barely rested for over three hours, waking up from terrible nightmares. Still, every day, as soon as dawn painted the dark sky with pink highlights, she dressed and gathered her bag, her shawl, and her staff; tied her shoes, and left to take the sheep to the field. She had no excuse to stay in the small cottage with her family. The job was not something she could abstain from, not even for one day.

The field was her chastisement but also her hiding place. Once she was out of the farm, her world became simpler. It revolved around her and the animals, and they didn't care for her crimes and sins. They kept her company and trusted her judgment as no one else in the world did anymore. There was a peace that allowed her some rest. Yet that ended after the two sheep got lost. When she took the herd to the open field beneath the bright sun of the morning, Ivy also usually could rest and sleep. Not for long and not too deep, but enough that she could carry herself back home and endure the hardships her family planned for her. But then, there was the threat from the monster of the woods. A beast almost twice the size of any man with gray, sickly skin, long fangs, clear ghostly hair, dressed in weird clothes stained dark green and dark blue. Ivy started to check the tree line while traveling her path, waiting for the bruteish figure to come out of the shadows. She looked over her shoulder every few steps. She prayed she was left alone. Scared and incapable of trusting fate enough to take her naps, afraid more animals would strand or that the monster would come for her, she kept awake, on the edge of panic.

Ulf hadn't processed animals so big in a while. It was a job for at least four butchers, but he had no one to ask for help. First he had to make the structures he would need for preparing the furs. A frame for stretching and scraping the raw hide, and another for allowing it to dry. He would need a pan to cook the brains and turn them oil for hydration. Subsequently, to prepare the meat he would need a structure to keep it in a constant flow of smoke, where the fire would barely cook anything, but dehydrate the pieces. He didn't have anything like that already built.

He set his days onto gathering good wood. Ax in hand, he searched for tall and strong trees to chop. For days he walked around the aslant forest on that mission. And he didn't realize for the first few times, but he was anxious for something. He imagined blue eyes looking up to him, begging for his mercy. He dreamed of hunting down that pretty woman and holding her beneath him once more. He waited for her to sing every dusk. It had become a certainty he craved for, a reassurance that the world was right. He had been captivated to stop and listen to that howl chiming in the mountains, that moment when the soft ghostly note of her song filled the air with the eerie aura of impending night. But that day, it didn't come.

Ivy fought hard to keep the routine, even though it felt pointless. Every day, she prayed for forgiveness and relief from pain. Every nightfall came and dragged her back home to be screamed at and beaten, and to another sleepless night. Slowly, hour in and out, she lost herself in the fatigue. Her headache became an everlasting presence. One day, as she watched the sunrise from the high path, one mountain by her side in blue shade, the other being painted in gold as the aurora went by, Ivy forced her eyes back down and studied the trees. She could swear she saw yellow eyes staring back. The sheep walked by her and went ahead before she found the courage to move. Someone was coming out of the woods. However, it was no monster, but one of her friends, whom she missed so much. The girl ran to her and hugged her tightly, soon followed by the rest of the group of young women. They walked with the sheep, played with them, and called for her. She told them how she craved their company and asked about the boy whom she had hurt. No answer made sense. Their voices were siren songs of madness.

The sun shone so brightly; it made her body feel warm and sickly. A figure of intense light came down and stood in front of her, bent forward, his one flaming eye taking all of her in every detail, and Ivy just knew he would find her lacking. No virtues, no merits, just a sinner who had no place in the world. His light made her feel small.

Ivy woke up. The world was dark, pitch black. The sky was stained with stars, but no moon. She realized she had never reached the pasture, only fainted halfway there. She was hungry, in pain, and her head spun in nauseating dizziness. Ivy turned around, coughing, and placed her hands on the dirt to push herself up. As sickness overcame her, she managed to find some balance to look around. The animals had scattered. Dread overwhelmed her heart with the idea that more of them had run away, and it was her fault.

Ivy could already hear her father's screams as if he was just behind her.

Night fell and Ulf stopped in the pitch-black woods, unable to let go of the sensation that something had changed in a way that he couldn't ignore. That her singing wouldn't be back on the next day, or ever at all.

Ulf ran down the difficult terrain until he reached the road. He heard a few of the flock astray, going around their business, by themselves, and heard the old Shepard cursing as he rang a bell from his belt to try and gather the animals.

There was no sign of his daughter.

Ulf crouched down on the floor and waited. Then, in the distance, uphill. A short, weak whimper.

He thought about the damp winter ahead and how he could enjoy a warm soft body close to his.

Ivy took what felt like days to move again. Her entire body shivered and trembled if out of exhaustion, hunger, or fear, she wasn't sure. She couldn't leave. If she left, she would have to deal with the consequences, and she was so tired. So, so tired. There was no end to her punishment. No relief in sight.

Ivy had no way of knowing a hunter was in her tracks until it was too late, and his loud steps were just by her side. She tried to make herself small and invisible, but big hands grabbed her dress and dragged her out and up, then covered her mouth to muffle the screams. She couldn't see him, but she didn't need to. She recognized who held her so effortlessly as she trashed and kicked around. He just stood there like a stone wall until she had no fighting spirit left in her. Until her body gave in once more. "I'll be killed now, this is my end." Ivy thought as her legs stopped thrashing, and her hands relaxed their grip on the monster's clothes. There was a strange peace on the other side of fear.

But death didn't come.

Ulf gave a few seconds to make sure she was spent. Then he fumbled with her skirts, just as he did last time. He dragged her forward a bit, laid her down on the mud, and lifted the fabrics. Fearing a worse beating than the first one, Ivy braced herself for pain. Her stomach sank. But the monster only pulled her shoes, then her socks, then her undergarments, and used one of her petticoats to dry her legs, squeezing them softly. She realized she had pissed herself out of fear. The monster let water run out of some sort of container to wash her, dried her once more, touching her without any sort of shame or regard for her prudish ways.

His fingers were like icicles, making her skin burn in cold fear. When Ulf seemed satisfied with his work, he grabbed her by her wrists, lifted and pulled her over his shoulder like she weighed nothing. He adjusted her position and held her knees like fresh killed prey. He considered his impulsiveness, but only for a moment. Then he was running uphill.

Ivy realized she felt out of her body, her mind drifted behind as he carried her away farther and farther from the world she knew. Her hands held onto his back so she could lift her head, but it was too dark and too confusing. She didn't know where she was going.

The giant held onto his prize as he strode through paths unknown to any living man, all the way to where the forest turned into a mountain and the wind howled against the gargantuan altitudes. There was a rift within the stone. It had been long forgotten until Ulf found it and turned it into his shelter.

The cold night air gave in to a cozy warmth as he waddled through the narrow path inside. The darkness smelled not of dampness and mold as one would expect from a cave, but of ashes and fire, of musk and fresh cooking. The sinuous way ended in a rounded and ample space. In the distant past, people had used primitive tools to expand it and made what could be considered a house. Ulf had turned it into his living quarters two years ago. He needed very little. Apart from the furs that served as his bed, he had benches, a table, and storage shelves. However, the centerpiece was his stone and clay oven, his hearth, so well-built that it had kept the embers alive even without being tended for hours.

It was too dark, so he just went by his touch and his knowledge. He let the woman down on the warm slabs around the fireplace. Calloused rough fingers explored her shapes, and cupped the small face, cold and wet with tears, making her whimper, a sound he already enjoyed very much. He found the small shoulders that trembled and underneath, a torso that fought hard to take each breath. She had a leather bag and wore an overdress, an apron, and a belt of fabric that he pulled apart until he could untie knots and loose ties to tug and lift them over her head.