Soggy Snow

“And only when it’s chosen your grave for you, will you see it.  The dead eyed lamb will follow you until you die.” Janice grinned as she leaned in close to the fire.  Its flickering light gave her face a haunted look.  The other two  children around the fire screamed and held each other, and Janice leaned back to laugh. “Oh, it wasn’t that scary!  Wait until you hear why they find kangaroo bones under Australian churches!  They’ll kill you themselves, you know.”

Nicolas shuddered. “No!  No more!  I want to go back inside now!”

 

Welcome to the Forest

The day was warm, and a balmy breeze blew across the fields just outside the old forest.  The sun shone down without a single cloud to block its loving rays.  The scent of sun-kissed blueberries clung to the noses of the three boys who laid in the fields, their backs resting on the cool, damp ground beneath the grass.  With closed eyes and slow breathing, they napped.

Each of them was supposed to be working at their family shops, but none cared to on such a lazy, sunny day. Every one of the three boys simply soaked up the sun as he dreamed of the only thing any solid boy of thirteen cared for: girls. One dreamed of the baker’s daughter, plain and pretty.  She always smelled of cinnamon.  Another fantasized about the smith’s daughter, and how dark and mysterious she was.  The young woman always avoided talking to boys, and none of the other girls in town spoke of her, save in passing.  The third boy dreamed of the tailor and her round, womanly figure.  She was a widow who was kind, but kept distant from the local children, as though she was wary of becoming too friendly with them.

 

Splitting the Brigade

The village was helpless before the onslaught of soldiers.  Half of the travelling troop split off while passing and marched on the locals.  Steel weapons cut through raised tools.  The old men and women fell before invading blades of an army that bore their own land’s device and colors.  One crafty woman led children into the forest, but she could not gather all of them.  As the village’s fall became certain, more people fled to the supposedly-haunted forest, eager to avoid certain doom in favor of a more vague doom.

As the village behind began to burn, those surviving villagers pushed deeper.  The forest began to drown out the sound of screams.  A few looked back, but were pushed forward by others behind.  At the back, a man named Tanner, with arms like great tree trunks, paused and looked back.  His frown was haunted as he looked back.  His wife and two children were killed before he could find them.  In his heavy heart, he carried his dead family, along with his flame-engulfed smithy.