Sometimes when strangers come to the Zemeidy household they stray of a night into the dark and trackless woods known as the Goteskin. These woods are weird and frequented only by Bindlers and charcoal cutters. I know that none of our household would encourage strangers to go into the woods, for they are too dire for mortals to survive. But sometimes, owing most likely to confusion or their inferior, barbaric educations, they will go wandering into sure danger.
Of the four I know to have wandered into the woods alone of a night, two disappeared entirely, one never came back but I heard that he was seen raving mad in Storaul, and one found his way to the outer fields from whence he was led to the household by a peasant. He was covered with scratches and weak from the loss of blood, but otherwise bodily healthy. He was hopelessly scatterbrained, but not insane in an unpleasant way. I took down his story. Here it is.
"I see you have pen and paper. Good. Pen and paper making little scratches
like in those woods. What is their name? Goteskin. Yes, mmmhmm. Very dark
in there. Try making paper all black and you'll get it right. Heh heh. Or
like when I went in, at first I thought it was just clouds over the moon.
Outside the woods it was waxing, nearly full, but once I passed the border
clouds went over the moon until it became dark, and a fog crept in until I
was weighted down with the chill, and I stayed in the woods, no need, don't
know why I did so, and the mist was like the breath of wet, soft, black
moths that fluttered silently, spots of deeper, wetter blackness against
the blackness of the woods, 'til the moths were dripping their little
intangible moth steps up and down my skin, into my throat, silencing my
ears, cloaking my eyes. Draw all those black moths in the darkness of the
bent, gnarled, grasping trees with their claws for scratching and their
roots for tripping and their stiff, knotted trunks to slam into your
falling body. Most unpleasant, and every time I began to think I had
figured out a clear path they would move, and a root would come whipping in
the darkness with an audible hissing noise and it would twist around my
ankle and bring me down with a scratched forearm and a solid thunk against
moth crusted wood. Things went on like this for a while, and I wished to
leave the woods so I prayed to the Goddess to bring light. Soon after, I
thought my prayers had been answered. I saw a pale, green light bobbing
fifty paces or so away among tree trunks, and I followed it. Another light
joined it and I followed it, but was continually thwarted by the tripping
roots of the trees. The lights were moving faster than I was, and so that I
should stop falling and getting hurt I began to crawl on all fours after
the lights. Strangely enough I made faster progress on four limbs than two.
Most confusing, and most enjoyable. Memories of smells began to come to me.
I remembered the aroma of cakes cooking on the hearth, the smell of lemon
water that the old men used to splash on their skin, the musk of the newly
shorn sheep, the honest tang of oiled tackle and horse lather. And so I
followed, dropping behind, but keeping those bobbing lights in view every
once in a while. Then they came to a clearing, and stopped. I slowly
crawled nearer, and hid behind a tree a good fifty paces away. The lights
did not illuminate those who held them. Their carriers were shielded from
the light by some cunning wicker construction, and under this strange
illumination a great cauldron already in the clearing was uncovered. There
was a boulder beside it with steps cut into its side. Then a chanting
began, and once again the black moths burst from their hiding places and
covered the blackness of the night, drops wetting the ground all around
from their dewy, silent wings, drenching the dead leaves, soaking me to
the skin so I should, indeed must, shiver in that dreadful darkness. Then
in rustling, quiet but unnaturally, unbelievably tangible so I could *feel*
it, not merely hear it, but also *feel* the rustling, the footsteps in
every atom of my being, one of them left his fellows and went up the steps
to the side of the cauldron. The chanting rose in volume and intensity, and
another one of them walked up the steps to the side of the first, and they
annointed themselves with some fragrant oil, then something was withdrawn
from the folds of a cloak, and I know not whom was the agent and who was
the victim but a leather strap was slipped around the neck of one of them
and tightened with such force I could feel it, agonizing, terrible around
my own neck. There was then a gasping, a choking, from many throats and the
leather slip tightened around the victim's throat, strangling him, and I
could feel it, and so must have the watchers, for the lights swayed and
some dropped. The blood was pounding in my temples, and my heart was
bounding in my chest, and I hoped that I should live through this, and then
the victim was pushed forward and collapsed into the cauldron with a splash
and began to drown in the foul, stagnant, moth given water. I smelled lemon
water again, so unlike that foul water, and remembered the last time I had
smelled it, when we interred my grandfather, and his body and his old
cronies practically reeked of the stuff, which must have meant something to
them. The chanting, which had faltered, picked up again as the victim
jerked and died in the water. I couldn't make out all the words, but there
was a single syllable that they repeated again and again in the midst of
their chaotic screaming... 'Gan' it was. And then, *something* that was
not there, suddenly was. Huge. Towering. Aware. Evil. Black Moth Fly Eyes
looked at me, whispered 'Gan,' and as I quaked fearing the hell in which
they dwelt, were gone from me. The trees quivered, their attention, their
raspy bark, their scratching limbs directed elsewhere, and the great Evil
presence spoke to the trees, waving its limbs, shaking its deep sunk roots
many fathoms below the ground, and rumbling octaves above they answered
this 'Gan' of the woods. The lights, pointing upwards at the tree branches,
showed no black giant, no tree-like Evil monstrosity, no Moth Eyed enemy of
all that is good. It was not there, and in its absence, in the oppressive
attention of the forest all around me, the gloomy green lights, the
silently fluttering wings of thousands upon thousands of listening moths,
its existence was proved. No vision was necessary, for it could be felt
everywhere around. In a fright, shaking with fear and cold from the wet and
from my own sweat, I lost consciousness. Laying there as one dead, I did
not watch as the worshippers left the ritual, but I met moths in my
dreamless sleep. Perhaps they ate the dreams, or ate my memories of them,
or perhaps I had none. But they were inside my mind the whole time."
"When I awoke, for an instant before I heard the distant cock crow, it was
that magical moment just before dawn. It is common knowledge that at that
moment, if one looks at something which is magical, one can see it as it
must appear in other worlds, and it will flash and coruscate with a visible
aura indicating its degree of power and malign or sublime purpose. I looked
into the clearing, and at its center was a huge tree, fully 30 manheights
tall, covered with black moths, and on the wings of every moth were two
eyes and a mouth, and the eyes glared their green thoughts into my soul
while the mouths whispered their name, 'Gan of the Woods.' So did all the
moths glare, and whisper, and the aspect of the great tree altered as it
swung to face me, and the crushing weight of its hatred fell on me and
threw me to the ground, while I was suddenly aware of streamers of
twisting, bubbling blackness blasting out from the tree and grasping the
entire forest in its evil grasp, and then the first light of Yelm touched
the top of that horrible tree, and the clammy feeling of evil departed from
that place. I ran from that place, tripping over roots and scratching my
cheeks and eyelids on briars and finally found my way to your fields."
I shuddered at his story and finished writing it down.
It was now night, and he was asleep.
I took the torch from the bracket and heard a sizzle as something burned and popped. A half burned black moth dropped onto the manuscript, and as I hurriedly blotted and sanded the ms. and collected my things, several more moths alighted on the table. I scattered the moths with the torch and fled the room, carrying the ms with me and abandoning the stranger to the moths of the night.
In the morning he was gone, leaving no trace behind.
Since that day, I have gone to the edge of the woods in the late, late night. And in the moments before the cocks crow, especially on misty, foggy nights, I can see the shapes that some of these trees take in other worlds. There are goat shaped trees, moth shaped ones, and they nod knowingly when I see them. None of them are as huge as the monster the stranger described, most are no more than five manheights, and yet the clammy touch of fear springs from them like a shout at the magical moment before dawn, and as Yelm's light touches the top of the mountains I flee for my life from the Evil woods and their terrible lord, 'Gan.'
Powered by hypermail