I wake crouching against rough bark. Taking a few short breaths to center myself in this new realm, echoes of memories tell me the way forward. The scents and sights of the woods are as familiar as the comfort of home, but a stillness tells me my heart is still that of an outsider. Ahead, the gaps in the lattice of branches open like pathways. They invite me forward—beckoning my surrender to the hunt—the forest baring itself to me as I’ve been taught to expect. My quarry will not be far off. Moonlit lessons on the path to my ascension have painted a picture of it in my mind’s eye: my quarry and I will be alone as two, alone as one, and then alone no longer.
We were brought to this place together, our fates woven into the woods here by blood and birthright. A stag and I, here to dance together as I have with so much prey before, but with an even greater respect for the life he will give. My mind tells me I am more challenger than hunter—here to prove that I am worth the knowledge that courses through its keeper’s veins—and patience will see me through to the end of this trial. Whispered promises have told me all the unanointed can know about this place, as hesitant as they are to imagine these sacred grounds for themselves. Now, the forest’s soul does the whispering itself, urging a name into thought: the Fever Grove. A realm that will only release me once I’ve seen this hunt through. Anticipation piles into my body, overflowing out of the tension in my legs and threatening to burst through my chest with each movement. Years of experiences cage in that chaotic energy. Before any doubt can linger, even this forest yields to me with a practiced ease.
The trained recesses of my mind take in the forest as I work my way deeper, searing in the impression of a fall canvas dulled in the twilight haze. There are no clouds in the sky that I catch occasional glimpses of between jumps, only the silvery aura of moonlight seeping through the leaves and needles where it can. In the absence of the wind, that moonlight sings to me. I know I have felt its call before, but here it is like a chorus—one harmonious blanket laid end to end over the forest—resonating to the leaps and bounds of my search through the trees. It wails in my ears, challenging the beating of my own heart, and spurs me toward the end of all that I have worked towards.
Finally, that regal magnificence rears up. The body beneath the crown of antlers moves slowly, deliberately, choosing each step through the brush as though traps lay nestled in every crooked root and tangle of moss. It is a wonder that the stag can ever fit himself through the gaps between the trees—or that with the added burden of esoteric knowledge he still manages to hold his antlers tall and steady—but his movements are still deft. My own neck burns while I watch the crown, a physical apprehension for the path that lies ahead. The wonders that the stag carries will course through my own veins by the end of this hunt. It is offered up here by the forest: speckled mushrooms thriving on the moon’s glow and waiting to be passed from mouth to mouth. Euphoric experiences in musky lodges rise in my memory, past attempts at comprehending what is to come, but never pretending to be anything but weak imitations. The stag knows it is being watched, knows its vitae is tainted with wonders it understands as innately as only the natural world can.
The time to relieve his burden is coming.
The moonlight reaches a whistling crescendo, telling me that my presence has not gone unnoticed by the masters of this place, and signaling the real chase’s beginning. I must move quickly—the stag is burdened, but hardly weakened—forcing him towards the still water that I know lies ahead. Together, we dance between the trees. Taking to the forest floor behind him, I trace the path that the stag intuits through the low growth. The chaos of his jerking movements finds a rhythm in my following step. Experience makes me unlike any other predator: unquestioning of my energy reserves, unaffected by the desperate beating of my heart. Without a need to hasten my thoughts even as I hasten my body, I keep behind my quarry.
His movement slows, growing sluggish under the weight of exhaustion. What were once darting steps are now feeble attempts at shaking my pursuit. Even with the efforts the stag has made, I know this hunt is coming to a premature end. He struggles desperately against the knowledge boiling in his blood. Nearing the center of the grove, slowing our paces in tandem, I sense the transcendent unity of that struggle. I hunt, but don’t threaten, and the stag knows. We are one, chasing the same end, and all else has fallen aside.
My penultimate ascension is a return to the tree branches above my quarry. Ahead, the mirrored surface of the forest spring freezes the stag at its edge. Through its azure–hued clarity the stag’s eyes are speckled like the night sky. Perched above, my own eyes seem to smolder in the reflection between the juts of his crown. Desire outshines anything else. It is fierce enough to give me pause even in these last moments, but that is just another hesitation that must be buried. The stag bows his head once more, as I have been taught to expect, drinking deep from the spring in the knowledge that he is at the end of his life. The weight of my knives—buried in long, slender sheaths—remind me of my true purpose here. They have been waiting patiently for the moment my hands will find their way to them. Their weight on my back threatens to pull me out of the trees, feeling as I do that their time has come. The crown, and the burden that comes with it, calls out to me through the moonlight’s song.
The descent is a blur.
I feel myself crouching in the branches, a clear path below me, and at once I am under the stag’s bared neck with one blade lodged through his flank and into his still beating heart. I can only trust in our belief that he is far beyond the point of pain, knowing simply peace as I give the final thanks and drain his life away. Our reverence for the carriers of knowledge binds us to this forest, and I know I am fortunate that the time for my ascension has coincided with the end of this venerable stag’s time here. All these assurances are carried out of my body on bated breaths. Knotting my fingers into the stag’s fur, I steady myself for the last cut and what lies beyond that.
The blood burns against my fingers. Memories of scalding tea on hazy evenings flash into my mind, but the thickness of it is like nothing I have ever known. When I put my mouth to the wound, it’s like tar pouring down my throat. I want to, need to, drink deep from this font of life. Never has my purpose been so clear. The inferno blazes in the depths of my body, threatening to consume me as it did with the stag—but it would be a cleansing consumption, a renewal. Any moment I expect my belly to burst; to feel the flames shoot out around me would be a mercy. The heat sears through my eyelids, and through the treetops the light from millions of stars slide like needles through my pores, baring my soul. I want to scream out for their merciful judgement, but my throat is snared. Even in the vividness of the imagined immolation, I can’t find the strength to loosen my grip on the stag’s neck. I gorge and gorge on the blood of life itself, submitting myself to anything and everything it has to offer me.
Finally the stag sets me free. I stumble over and down, sinking to my knees at the water’s edge. I fear that if I fall in now it would certainly boil over. I frantically quiver against limbs that won’t be compelled to action. So many of the stars have stepped down into the woods, the scattered pairs of light framed by their own sets of extravagant crowns. They are the singers, carrying the moonlight chorus that has guided me through the grove. Their eyes—those stars—bore into me. The whistling building with their movements. Constellation-like lights of the seeing stars swirl with reds, greens, blues, and violets around me—a dazzling display that serves only to further confound my fevered mind. I reach down to the earth for support, but my hands slide through mud and stone and pull me forward into the spring’s depth.
On my back in the water, I drift into darkness but do nothing to stop it. The spring is a cool panacea to my scorched body, its crystal clarity marred only by the blood lifting off my lips and now seeping down from the water’s edge. The plumes rise and fall to meet each other, entangled red ribbons—ribbons that if I could only grab onto, could be used to pull myself free. My muscles scream as I strain upwards, but as the ribbons slip through my fingers I catch only stars in my hands. The night falls over and around me, knocked free by my careless reaching. Ink swirls into the mixture of blood and water. It swallows my sight and binds my body, guiding me in my freefall.
One moment stretches out into the space of a heartbeat, then slows even further still. The forest stretches beneath me. My whole world is a mosaic of greens shifting through to the fall colours of dull flame and quiet decay, and at its center is the spring where my body lingers beneath the surface, reaching for something I can never grasp. I see now that the twilight never brightened nor faded, and yet the silver glow permeating the landscape sheds clarity throughout. Those that came before me—no longer simply the images of their orbed gaze—mill like ants around the bloodied water and the drained body of the stag. The other ascendants relieve that regal creature of his crown, preparing the antlers for their next host. Their movements follow the rhythm of my throbbing heart, spurred to frantic motion with each beat and slowing to a crawl in the aching silences in between. Devoting their intent to the vestments that will be made for me as the stag’s final gift, they pay no mind to the body floating listlessly within their reach. Its time will come again.
As I take in the ritual, silver strands of moonlight solidify their embrace on my form. The chorus of its light continues around the water below, but a fresh, smooth whisper reaches me from what seems like all around the sky. Ancient and honoured, the moon herself pulls my perception away from the woods and around the night sky. Since I joined the celestial landscape, it has become dazzlingly full with starlight, but still pale in comparison to the splendour of her lunar surface. In this light I have walked my arduous path, guided to the stag’s crown and all these sights contained within his blood. She reminds me of all this and more, caressing my mind with well-earned memories alongside those yet to be made. The flood of images, future selves walking down every path I can imagine, becomes searing, overwhelming my still frail faculties. In time with the flashing visions, the moonlight sharpens and cuts, dissecting my form before casting me back to the forest below. The moon’s scrutiny bares the darkest recesses of my soul, and I can only hope that I’ve been deemed worthy of the gifts given and those still to come. She casts me back down into my physical form, my body mournfully reaching out as though asking for more.
More of what, I could never explain.
My head is heavy beyond imagination. One of those that has come before me—having returned here to witness my ascension—must have pulled me from the pool and rested me against one of the closer trees. Every grazing blade of grass sends bolts through my open palms. My legs ache as though from days on the hunt. Never before has my body stood on such an edge, then been pushed over it only to be brought back into place, pulled apart only to be pieced back together. In the calmed water’s reflection, I see that the sky has been emptied of stars once more. Empty, save for two crimson specks. They gaze hungrily into themselves, captured in the mirror by the stag’s forest crown.
Sean B. Muncaster is a fourth-year English student, learning to explore the weird and macabre through creative writing.
