Fiery Moon

The moon waned overheard, another full moon gone. Cerek stared up at the sky, registering that with the shrinking moon marked that he was late, dreadfully late in getting home to his love, Clara. Or at least he thought she was his love at first, but the more time he had spent with her in the past, the more she proved indifferent to his feelings. The later he became, the more he began to wonder what it was besides her beauty that drew him to her. He could honestly think of no reason for his wanting her for himself. When he had told her that he would be going hunting, she had just shrugged her shoulders and responded, "And?"

He began a small fire and skinning one of the smaller animals that he had killed, a hare. As the skinned hare roasted on a spit, the slightly gamy aroma drifted to his nose, making his mouth water. Suddenly, the hairs on his arms began bristling. He could feel someone hidden in the forest, watching him. He stood up, plucking his bow from where he had placed it next to him, and, nocking an arrow, looked around.

"Whoever is out there, come out where I can see you!" he called out, doing his best to sound as commanding as possible. Nothing moved, but he could still feel eyes upon him.

"I will loose my arrow if you don't show yourself!" He pulled the arrow back upon the cord, and waited. Nothing answered, but then in thin rays of the moonlight, he glimpsed something fur-covered and close to the ground. 'Wolf,' Cerek thought and aimed at it.

When he loosed the arrow, it flew, and something yelped, hit. He nocked another arrow and rushed over to where the first arrow had flown. When he saw what he had struck, his eyes widened and he dropped the bow and knelt down.

"Oh no," he sighed miserably, and cradled a young woman's head in his arms. She had been pierced in the shoulder, and was shivering. Cerek looked down, and saw that she was stark naked. Her skin was dirt, streaked with mud and leaves, and blood from her wounded shoulder.

When he looked upon her face, for a second, he saw yellow eyes. He blinked, and when he looked again, her eyes were normal. She looked up at him, still shivering, and then fainted.

He carried her over to the fire and set her down carefully. He removed his cloak and covered her with it. The arrow that had struck her was still lodged in her shoulder. He gave it a quick yank, and in her unconscious state she still screamed in pain, but at least the arrow was freed. He used some of his remaining water to clean her wound, and tore a bit of his clothing to cover the hole, wrapping the strip around it. He also cleaned a myriad of other scrapes, cuts, and what looked like the mark of a blade across her side. She had been in quite an ordeal before encountering him, likely fleeing from somewhere else.

The rabbit was a bit more cooked than he would've liked, but it was meat, and he was hungry. He saved almost half of it for the young woman whom he had hurt. She gradually opened her eyes when her nose picked up the smell of roasted meat. She pulled the cloak around her and sat up, wincing at the pain in her shoulder. She saw the meat on a stone, cooling, sniffed, her nostrils flaring, and then started forward. Then she saw Cerek and froze.

"Please," Cerek motioned to the rabbit meat, "It is yours."

She rushed forward on her knees, grabbed the meat, and then retreated back a few paces. She watched Cerek as she tore hungrily into the meat, good manners being the furthest thing from her mind. In a manner of a few minutes, only the barest of gristle remained on the small bones, and buried them in a small hole. Still hugging the cloak around her thin frame, she belched resoundingly, to Cerek's amusement.

"Where have you come from?" Cerek asked, not really expecting an answer. She looked at him warily as if gauging his intentions, and minutes passed before she whispered, "Villagers chased me into the woods. They tried to..."

She hoped that Cerek would understand what she was saying without having to say it, and he nodded. In most villages he'd passed through, lawlessness was the key to survival, and such as she would not fare well in one. She appeared to be in her early adulthood, twenty or so, and in the fire, her hair was a glowing red, untouched by shears, and windblown. Her skin was pale, but her eyes were bright green.

She continued once Cerek had nodded, her voice tremulous and slightly high-pitched, "I had no clothes, so I hid under the leaves as they passed by. Once they were gone, I ran as hard as I could. I saw your fire, and smelled the meat, but I couldn't come too close because I thought you might be one of them."

"Oh. I have some extra clothes. They might be a little large for you, but they'll help keep you warm."

He handed her a bundle of clothes from his bag, and, giving him the cloak, she began to dress. He had to notice, being a man and all, her small, high breasts, and the patch of wild fire that led down between her legs. Despite being small of build, she was otherwise in good health. She winced as she covered herself in his tunic, and then sat down next to the fire.

"I was going to try and make my way home, but it's already so late," Cerek explained to the girl who seemed to be all but lost in his extra clothes, "You can come with me if you wish, or I can take you home first."

Her head hung, and tears glistened in her eyes, faintly caught by the moon's glow.

"I have no home," she sighed miserably, "It was burned down during the war."

"Have you no family?"

"All slaughtered. My mother, brothers and sisters are all dead."

Cerek shuddered, "You were not there, I hope."

Her lower lip quivered, "I hid in a crawl-space, but...yes, I could see through a small hole. When they had...done what they'd come to do, they stole everything of value and set everything else on fire."

She began shivering uncontrollably, so Cerek inched closer and closer until she was only half a foot away. In her horrible memories, she sensed him approaching, and her eyes grew wide in fear.

"Please," she pleaded, "I can't..."

Cerek saw her fear and tried to allay her fears, "I do not wish to do what the villagers did. I only seek to comfort."

So, her eyes still suspicious, she allowed her to be drawn into his arms, grudgingly admitting in her mind that she began to feel safe, as his arms were gentle.

For the first time in weeks, her tears fell. She sobbed in his arms, and he smoothed her wild, red hair.

For almost ten minutes she cried, and he did his best to comfort her as he said he would. When her tears finally stopped, she drew herself away with difficulty, as she was truly warm for the first time in years.

She looked up at him, wondering, "Why are you nothing like those villagers? I do not understand. You don't seek to do what they wanted to."

"There are far better ways to live than as they do."

"I do not know your name. Mine is Cerek."

She looked down at the fire for a second, and then answered, "Sarina."

Cerek's heart was pounding, however, filled with the indescribable affection that he felt for her, all having come out of nowhere. He could not claim having ever felt the same way for Clara.

He cleared his throat, "We should rest. I can better bandage your shoulder when we reach my town. And, from there, if you wish, we can part ways."

She didn't answer, and she curled up next to the fire.

He moved away from her to give her some space, and bedded down as well.

His words flowed through her mind again and again. She had sensed a longing in his voice as he had spoke of parting ways. At least she had thought so. She had nowhere to go, no place to live, and she wasn't sure that she could live in the woods by herself. But then, what if she agreed to stay with him, and one night he found out her secret. He would shun her, maybe even try to end her life. It had almost happened before. After all, the actual reason that the villagers had chased her was not to rape her, as she had led him to believe. Their lust had only been for blood. On this thought, she drifted into an uneasy sleep.

Who was this odd creature sleeping only feet away, and why should he have such a quick affection for her? He could not really tell if her feelings were the same, or if she might even just vanish into the forest, never to be seen again. As he was drifting off to slumber, a thought suddenly occurred to him. 'Her eyes had changed from yellow to green. That was not a hallucination.'

His sleep was a bit better than Sarina's. When the birds began calling in the forest, and the sky brightened, he drifted from sleep gradually, and noticed a warmth against his chest. Rather than wonder what it was, he let himself enjoy it, perhaps thinking that he was in his own home again, drafty as it was. Then he remembered that his home was still at least another day's walk away. His eyes opened a little, and he saw red. Locks of it growing from his chest, but then the hair moved, and he now saw that it belonged to Sarina, the girl from last night. Rather than sleeping where she'd been last night, she was pressed up against him, perhaps drawing warmth from him, as he had with her.

Either feeling his heartbeat speeding up, or just sensing it, she stirred as well, and found herself looking up at a man with gentle gray eyes the color of storm clouds. As she realized that she had drawn up in his arms to sleep, her face grew almost as red as her hair.

"I'm um..." she started to say, but how, really, could she explain him waking up with her in his arms. She drew away slowly, embarrassed, yet reluctant, since she'd never felt such warmth and safety before. He silently wished for...what, this girl that he barely knew, that he had wounded with an arrow, whose eyes had changed from yellow to green? He had to get a hold on his emotions. He stretched, almost afraid to look in her eyes, and scratched his head.

"I'll get some food ready," he murmured and collected sticks and leaves for a fire.

"You're cooking more meat than you had intended," she whispered, almost too quiet for him to hear.

"Well, I hadn't expected company, but I appreciate your presence enough so that a bit less meat when I get back is just fine for me."

She nodded, "You can build the fire, but I will hunt some food for us."

Slightly amused, he wondered how she was to accomplish this feat when she had no weapon, no belongings at all, but she seemed quietly confident that she would do as she said, so he agreed, "Okay. The fire will be ready when you get back."

She saw the look on his face, and resented it a little, but rather than argue with her, he had let her go. Odd one, this man was. She rushed off into the forest, mentally marking trees near this man's camp.

He watched her run off, and he had to admire how fleet of foot she was. She had barely made a sound as she vanished, aside from the crinkling of leaves underfoot. He stacked the sticks and leaves, and started a small fire that quickly grew the way he had wanted, and he sat down next to it, breathing plumes of mist that curled from his lips. He wondered how long it would take for her to catch something, or if she would even catch it.

She shed the clothes he had given her, made her quick changes, and caught the trembling boar as it urinated itself in fear. She had to hold her hunger at bay, lest she consume the entire boar whole. She forced herself back, putting the clothes back on, and cleaning the blood from her face with a handful of leaves, she dragged the dead boar back to the camp, where she could smell the fire.

His eyes almost dropped from his head in wonder as this frail girl dragged the dead boar with no difficulty, still warm, in fact. He wanted to ask how she had done this, but couldn't utter the necessary words.

She saw his bafflement and smiled proudly, "I lived in the woods after my home burned down, and met a man who taught me to hunt. I was a good pupil."

Cerek laughed, "I'd say so! I guess I should start preparing it."

He cleaned the boar carcass, setting the bristly fur to the side for future use, and saw the ragged marks in its throat. If he didn't know better, he would say its throat had been ripped out by teeth. He chopped a few hunks of meat from it and set another spit to roast over the fire. The fragrance that arose from the cooking boar was more mouthwatering than the hare last night.

They ate their fill, Sarina eating this morning with a little more restraint, savoring the strings of meat with great enjoyment. Cerek covered the rest of the boar up. If she decided that she would go her own way, he would package the rest of it up for her. His mood grew melancholy as he imagined her walking away from him, never to be seen again. And he was confused by this mood, for she was still an enigma to him.

When they had finished eating, he uncovered the other kills he had made before encountering Sarina, and, at her insistence, they both dragged the kills.

"I should pull my own weight," she frowned at his reluctance.

"You already have with your own kill earlier."

"I wouldn't want you to be too weary to fight for me lest we come across the villagers ahead."

He considered this, and found it to be true, so he split his workload as evenly as he thought she could handle. Then he put the fire out, packed his bag, and led her deeper into the forest, managing to find a deer path. They trekked for a few miles, and she admirably kept up, and her complaints were minimal. Her hair flowed in the breeze as she determinedly heaved her share of the kills along.

"Whoa there, hunter!"

Sarina halted, recognizing the voice. Cerek stopped as well, and turned to the voice. A grizzled man of about forty years, followed by various individuals, none gentleman by any standards.

"What is it, stranger?" Cerek replied amiably, but in his mind, he had located the bow and his arrows already.

"We're after a large red wolf, hunter," the grizzled man growled, "It killed four of our goats yesterday. Have you seen it?"

Cerek shook his head, "I've seen no wolves around this area in the past week."

"Aye, so I believe you, since you seem like an honest man." The grizzled man looked from him to the red-haired girl at his side, "And who would this be?"

Cerek shrugged, and lied, "This is a friend. Her family is gone, so she came with me to hunt." Well, it wasn't quite a lie.

The man looked with heavy scrutiny at the girl, who defiantly stood there, although, on the inside, she shivered continuously.

"Just so you know," the man lowered his voice conspiratorially, "I'll trade you some silver for an hour with the lass, hunter."

Just managing to keep his head, Cerek shook his head, "I made a vow to keep this girl safe, as I knew her father."

The grizzled man laughed, and the men behind him laughed along.

"You do realize that between me and the men behind me, we could have her as long as we desired for no silver."

Cerek did not wince, "Perhaps, but not before about five of you lie with your entrails hanging out. And I would make sure you went down first. Besides, don't you men have a wolf to hunt?"

The man bristled at Cerek's response, but then nodded, impressed, "Aye, I would say that we do. Good day to you, hunter, and you as well, lass. Pray we do not meet again when there are no other pressing matters."

With this last exchange, the grizzled man and his cohorts disappeared past them into the forest. When Cerek let out a breath he had no idea he'd been holding, he turned to find Sarina as white as snow with dread, shivering noticeably.

"That would be the villagers," Cerek said quietly, not as a question, but a statement.

"That was them."

"They claim to be hunting a wolf."

"With red fur..."

Cerek nodded, seeing her meaning.

"Will you be okay?"

She nodded, her eyes down, "You would have been torn apart by them."

"They don't expect any real fight from such as me."

"But you defended me. Nobody has ever done that for me."

Cerek shrugged his shoulders, "Then it was long overdue."

He began walking again, and she followed. There had been something in her eyes as she had admitted these truths, something that might have been feelings, perhaps feelings that mirrored his own. As they walked, Cerek continued to puzzle over what he had thought, or hoped, he'd seen. Sarina kept a watch behind them to ensure that the villagers would not be sneaking up on them. By the time that the sun grew heavy and orange in the evening, they had reached the town that Cerek called home. Town folk eyed Sarina, curious, as they had never seen her before. Cerek nodded as they passed, and finally came upon a small butcher's shop.

They had the meat cut and wrapped, and Cerek paid the butcher, chatting with him about rumors around town.

"Oh, you haven't heard?" the butcher laughed, "There's talk of a blood-thirsty wolf running loose out there. Why, you're lucky to have made it back alive, so you are!"

"A wolf, huh?" Cerek grinned, "There were some villagers hunting one in the forest. If I was lucky, it was that I didn't have to fight the black-hearted bastards."

The butcher roared, "That they are!"

After some parting words of wisdom from the butcher, Cerek and Sarina carried the packages of meat to a house. Cerek opened the door for her, and led her to a small room in the back where he would salt the meat and store it.

She looked around, noticing the furnishings, and asked, "This is your home?"

Cerek nodded, setting his bag aside.

"It is very nice."

Cerek turned to her, "And now, I need to know if there is somewhere I can take you, or if you would like to stay here."

She had been trying to decide this already, still unsure if this man would have defended her in the forest if he had known her secret. What if her staying brought him nothing but misfortune? But, honestly, in the woods with those villagers was far worse for her survival. She looked down shyly at the floor, "I would like to stay, please, for a while, at least."

Nodding, he smiled, "You are welcome to stay as long as you please. I will prepare you a room upstairs."

She watched, astonished, as Cerek disappeared upstairs. Without any hesitation, he had opened his home to her, a stranger! She waited only a few minutes, and then he returned, beckoning, "Follow me, and I will show you your room."

It was not a small room, she noticed, her eyes wide. This room was much larger than hers had been when she was little. The bed was huge, with thick blankets. There was a small fireplace in the corner.

"This is much too kind," she blurted, "How can you be so kind to a stranger, one you met in the forest, no doubt?"

Cerek considered her question for a moment. He replied, "With a life that has been as difficult as yours has been, I would think you deserve some kindness."

"This is most kind. But I have nothing to give you in return, except for my thanks."

Cerek smiled, "Then your thanks will be enough for me."

Then, to his surprise, she rushed forward and planted a kiss on his lips. When she pulled away, she had apparently been as surprised as him.

"I am sorry, this was uncalled for," she mumbled, her face reddened by her actions.

However, Cerek assured her, "Now, Sarina, there is no need for apologies." She saw that he appeared pleased for such a kiss.

During the day, Cerek regaled her with stories of the town, and of his life here. It seemed such a nice life, and it had produced a man worth a hundred of those villagers and more. And all it had taken to meet him had been an arrow in the shoulder. When she raised her hand to move her hair from her face, she winced, remembering the wound it had left. He noticed her wince of pain, and remembered as well. He went to a closet and brought out some strips of linen, and a bottle of brandy.