Unfamiliar Territory

I was almost thrown backwards by the sudden, howling, gale of wind and torrential downpour of rain. With a great deal of effort, I managed to pull the door closed behind me. I decided not to give Kat or Mr. Copper one last look.

Turning back to the dark and windy world, I could see The Sorrow was mostly gone save for a light mist which settled near the damp ground. I could see little else save for the large, dark shapes that were surrounding me. Relying mostly on memory, I knew them to be the trees that stood on the outskirts of the Quincy cabin.

The largest of them all stood before me. It was a tree I did not remember ever being there before. It was far too large to be any of the pines that made up the forest on the mountain. Through the storm and the shadows, I could see it’s hundreds of twisting branches stretched out into the rain-soaked sky.

As my eyes adjusted to the sunless sky and the blanket of rain, they took notice of something big tangled up in the branches and, when I stepped closer to get a better look, a sudden flash of lightning showed me everything.

Dr. Quincy hanging in the air, tree limbs twisted around his arms and legs, and something, covered in blood, stuck through his chest. The mansion on the mountain beyond him and the tree was nothing but a ruined mess of tangled vines and flora.

The light faded away, leaving me alone again in the drenched darkness.

“Quinn!” I shouted, running up to the massive tree. “Quinn, hang on! I’m coming!”

The left ankle was still sore, but becoming more bearable. The real issue was my left hand--I still couldn’t move it, let alone use it to help me climb. I flipped the knife around and took a few steps back. Running back towards the tree, I jumped at the last second and hit the trunk.

I tried to drive the knife into its bark, but I had hit the tree too soon and simply fell back down into the mud.

“Goddamnit!”

I tried again, and this time managed to stick the blade in with a satisfying crack of bark. My entire arm ignited again in pain, mostly in my shoulder, and I scrambled to get my feet planted somewhere. But I hadn’t thought it through enough--there was nowhere for my feet to go.

Before I could fall again, something grabbed my wrist. For a moment, I thought it might have been Quinn, but when I looked up I only saw the horrible, impossible sight of a dark, twisted, and leafless tree branch wrapping itself down my arm.

I didn’t have the time to yell out before it swung me into the air. The rain and wind stung my face as I was propelled through the sky. The branch released itself and was I left floating, for a moment, before gravity pulled me back down. As I fell, I looked down as another flash of lightning clearly revealed to me the numerous jagged branches rising up to meet me. Ready to pierce right through me.

Darkness quickly returned and I blindly swung my clawed hand in front of me. The branches met me as I fell. A few were somehow torn aside when they met with my swinging hand, but one managed to cut across my side. I had only a moment to cry out before I fell into the tangled mass of branches.

It was like a thousand small hands trying to tear away at me. I could hardly see anything through them and the darkened sky, so I clawed, I bit, and thrashed blindly against the prodding forces. Pokes, scratches, and cuts littered my body as I smashed through the possessed limbs. It was like being attacked by Gust and his siblings with their weapon of choice, but hundreds of times worse.

However, it couldn’t have taken more than a few, intense, moments of struggling before the attacks stopped. I chanced another moment to catch my breath. When I realized I had been fighting on top of a thick branch of the tree, and then nearly fell from it, I gripped it tightly. I could not see how far it was to the ground. Part of me didn’t want to know.

“Gust...” a weak voice called out into the storm.

“Quinn!”

I could just make him out. He was still hanging where I had last seen him, only now he was just a few feet away. I crawled towards him, my entire body stung with the cuts from the tree. Something cold and damp was dripping down my side.

“Maple, is that you?” Dr. Quincy mumbled.

The tree limbs were twisted tightly around his arms and legs. I realized with a sharp intake of breath that there wasn’t something piercing into Dr. Quincy’s chest. Something was growing out of it. A blood red rose with thorny vines stretched out across his chest and wrapped around his neck. Everywhere that the vines reached, dark red lines stained into his clothes.

When I reached him, all of the tree’s limbs appeared to twitch at once. “It’s me, Quinn.” Mr. Quincy opened his eyes. In the dark storm, I could not tell if he was looking at me or not. “I’m getting you down.”

The knife was still probably stuck in the tree, far, far below me. I looked at the nails on my right hand. They really did look like claws. Sharp, unyielding.

The tree limb tried to move when I dug the claws into them, but I was too quick. I pulled with all the strength I could, and almost fell back with how easily the limb was torn free from his arm. I could hear the sounds of snapping and rustling from somewhere in the storm above. The rest of the tree was coming down on top of me.

“Damnit damnit damnit!”

I racked my claw across a limb that held one of his legs and it snapped away without any resistance. The creaking and groaning above me sounded much closer in response. I looked up and only had just enough time to jump to another thick branch as a few of the piercing limbs shot down and tore through the one I had been standing on.

Dr. Quincy remained in reach, so I swiped through the other limb that held his last leg. I jumped again. There was no time to think about it. I couldn’t stay in one place, I had to keep moving. I jumped onto Mr. Quincy as the attacking limbs nearly struck me again. Even though I tried to avoid touching any of the veins on his body, I heard him groan in agony nonetheless.

“Hold on. I’m getting you down. I’m getting you down!”

I brought my hand up, preparing to strike the last branch holding on to his arm. But I couldn’t move it. If felt like it was locked in place. I looked back and my heart sank into my stomach.

It had me. A limb had twisted itself down my arm again; it was going to pull me away.

I wrapped my legs around Dr. Quincy and tried to hold on. The limb pulled. I screamed at the new fire that erupted inside my arm.

My arm was going to come off. It was going to get torn off.

I pulled back against the limb and felt another wrap around my waist, more fire bursting from the deep cut that was still there. I screamed more and more as I pulled, bringing my mouth closer and closer to the last remaining branch.

I could see it moving, as if sensing my intent, but, with a last scream and burst of strength, I brought my teeth down on it. I clenched my jaw and felt the branch snap like a twig between my teeth. Or maybe that was my arm.

No, there was another snap. The branch pulling me had lost the tug of war, it snapped away completely with one more tug. A new strength in my soul replaced the previous burning fire, but I had no time to rejoice.

Dr. Quincy was falling.

I easily ripped free the branch that held my waist before falling after him. Reaching out in the darkness, I managed to grab him, then pulled him towards me. Despite being almost twice my size, I found him to be light enough to turn over so that I was the one to hit the ground when we made impact.

More pain raged through me. I could still see the dancing branches above us, reaching down to claim us. Holding on to Dr. Quincy from below his armpits, I dragged him past the tree. I growled at the branches that stretched out after us. I screamed at them. I did not stop pulling Dr. Quincy until the branches stopped, reaching their limits, and until my legs gave out under me and I fell, reaching mine.

But I forced myself up. I forced myself to crawl from under Mr. Quincy and inspect him. He was lying on his back, the red rose reaching up into the sky, as if it was soaking in the continuous downpour of rain. His arms and legs remained unmoving at his sides. There was no way I could tell if anything was broken. Only his chest moving up and down told me that he was even still alive.

“Alex...”

“Yeah, Quinn, it’s me. I’m here.”

I kneeled over him. His scruffy beard was matted with rain water. His skin was very pale.

“My wife. My...My wife...she’s here... She’s...”

“It’s alright, it’s gonna be alright, Quinn. I know she’s here, that’s why I’m here. I’m going to fix this. I’m going to stop her.”

Mr. Quincy looked at me. His dark eyes were wide, glossy. His arm moved, tried to move, but he shut his eyes and winced in pain before stopping. “My kids, Alex. You have to take me to my kids.”

“I...I can’t do that, Dr. Quincy. You need to let me take you somewhere safe and dry. I’ll bring your kids to you, I promise.”

“No! No, you don’t understand!”

He tried to move again, his breathing grew more labored, but he managed to grab hold of my arm with one of his hands. Despite his apparent desperation, his grip was weak. “I’m not going--I’m not going to survive this, Alex, for much longer. Please, bring me inside my home, let me see my children one last time. I beg of you.”

I grabbed his arm back. I stared back into those dark, wet eyes. “You’re going to be fine, Quinn. I told you I’m going to fix this. You aren’t going to die!”

“Please, Alex, my children...”

He wasn’t holding on to me anymore. His eyes were closing.

“No, Quinn, you hang on okay!? I told you to hang on!” I let go of his arm and went around to his head and grabbed on to his shoulders again before pulling him back towards what remained of his home. “You’re going to be fine, Kat’s going to be fine, everyone is going to be fine!”

I pulled him along the muddy ground, almost slipping a few times. Actually slipping the other times. The rain never stopped. The blinding lightning and booming thunder never stopped. Through all of it, I almost missed the person sitting on a fallen tree, wearing a yellow raincoat and a pair of bright red rain boots.

The person waved at me when I saw him. Again, I nearly fell backwards. I carefully laid Mr. Quincy on the ground. His eyes remained closed.

“Are you the witch who did all of this?” I shouted at the figure.

Through the biting wind and rain, I could barely make out the one in the rain coat shake his head from side to side before pointing over to my right. I followed, finding only the ruined mansion, now looking more like an overgrown greenhouse. “She’s in there?”

I looked back to the fallen tree, only to find that the person in the raincoat had vanished. I whipped my head everywhere that I could. I waited for him to turn up, to attack me, but he never came.

“The hell was that all about...”

I kept my eyes searching through the blinding rain, but went back to dragging Dr. Quincy back towards the mansion.

“Look, Quinn, we’re almost there. We’re almost home.”

He didn’t answer. Didn’t move at all.

“That’s alright, Quinn, probably a good idea to rest. I bet with six kids you don’t really get to do much of that anymore. You know, you told me when we first met that you’ve been sleeping outside, but you never told me why. I thought maybe you just enjoyed the view, but that can’t be the whole reason.”

We were under the archway for the front doors. There was not much left of them. Large blades of what appeared to be oversized grass had cut through, shattering the glass and splintering the wood.

I placed Dr. Quincy against a pillar of the archway. It was dry, but by no means safe. But at this point, where was safe anyways?

“She wasn’t going to stop until she caught you guys.”

I looked over to Dr. Quincy. He really did seem like he was sleeping. His hairy face did not appear to be in pain. “When you wake up, your kids will be back and you won’t ever have to worry about that witch again, okay?”

He didn’t answer. Didn’t move at all.

I stood up and turned away from him. Another strike of lightning helped to show me what lay inside the ruined remains of their cabin as I stepped in. Though I had stayed here for months, I hardly recognized anything.

Vines, giant leaves, wild and foreign flowers, trees growing up from the wooden floors. It was as though I had stepped into some fantasy wonderland. Or into a home that had been abandoned for centuries.

There were not many places I could get to easily. Many trees that had been raised seemed to have been done so in order to block access to certain doors, hallways. Tall grasses and ferns and shrubs were growing all around, I could easily cut my way through, even without the knife, but there was just so much of it. I tried to move quickly through it all, but the pain was growing ever fiercer in my side, and what was left of my clothes was stained heavily with water and blood. I tried not to see how close the veins in my arm were getting to my shoulder.

After a few minutes, I had managed to cut a path into a room. The kitchen, from what I could tell by the remaining white tiles in the ground.

This was where I found Meadow.

She had been swallowed by some translucent flower. I could see her, huddled, covered by yellow powder, through the petals. The grass that nestled around the flower grew rapidly and tried to reach out for me as I approached, but I easily cut them down when they got too close.

I dug my hand into the petal and tore it open. Meadow made no indication that she noticed. She appeared to be sleeping beneath a veil of pollen.

“Meadow? Can you hear me?”

The flower started to wilt when I picked the young girl up in my better arm. Some of the pollen smeared off against my wet clothes and skin. I didn’t take more than a few steps back before I faintly registered the sensation of some of the yellow power hitting my nose and, all at once, I lost control of my body.

It was like Mr. Mallard had told me to ‘Heel’. My legs-- my entire body--grew so incredibly heavy. I held Meadow against me to try and keep her from falling, but eventually I was forced to set her down in order to grip the ground.

My eyes grew heavy. When was the last time I slept? Really slept? Even in Dr. Quincy’s cabin, my dreams were always plagued by those nightmares. A helpless creature in the woods, hunted, at first by Kat, Mr. Mallard, and the others. But, lately, I could not see who hunted me. Only shadows and whispers chased me through those dark and tangled woods.

But this sleep felt different. If I fell asleep now, there would be no shadows, woods, no nightmares.

Only peace.

“Don’t fall.”

A whisper. So faint, like air, I almost did not hear it in my state. Meadow still lay beneath me, but her eyes were now open and looking back up at me. She always had the largest eyes of her siblings.

She was drenched. I must have been dripping over her. Red water was running down her face, but she didn’t seem to notice.

She reached out a small, wet, hand and rubbed it over my nose. “Please don’t fall.”

Then the feeling was gone. All that was left was the burning pain and the cold.

I smiled down at her. “If that rotten Mallard couldn’t make me fall, did you really think a little pollen would?”

She did not say anything back. Instead, her large eyes filled with tears before she wrapped her arms tightly around my neck.

“I was so scared, Foxy!”

She cried heavily into my chest. I had never heard her say anything louder than a whisper before, not since our moment on the trail all those months ago.

I sat back while holding her with my better arm.“I know. It’s okay. I’m here, so it’s going to be okay.”

“No it’s not.”

She sniffed, pulling herself off of me a bit. I looked into her eyes.“Why do you say that? Of course it-”

“Mommy came back and hurt daddy,” Meadow said, trying to speak through her hiccups and sobs. “And she chased us and she screamed at us and she-”

Meadow broke down again. All I could think to do was hold the girl to me. I stared at a large window where some of the enlarged grass had broken through some time ago.

“I hate mommy,” she said after her sobbing had died down a bit. “I wish she was dead.”

“It’s going to be okay now, Meadow. Like I told your dad, I’m going to fix this.”

“Are you going to make mommy dead?”

I didn’t know what to say to that. Would I kill her? I had never killed someone before. I had come close a few times...but when it came down to it...

“I’ll do what I have to to protect you guys.”

“Okay.” Meadow released herself again but continued to hold on to my neck. “Can I see daddy?”

“Maybe it’s better if you stick with me. At least until I know where the witch is, alright?”

Meadow looked down at the grass covered floor of her kitchen. “Okay.”

She pointed out where the sliding glass door was-- in its place stood a wall of tightly wrapped vines. “Before I fell asleep, I saw mommy’s scary pig chase Lilly and Leaf outside.”

“What about Maple, Gust, and Trout?”

“I don’t know.”

She buried her face into my chest again and I held her to me as I stood up. The flower she had been trapped in was now a small, wilted version of its once grand form.

If their mother wanted to kill them, why was Meadow still alive when I found her?

“Hey, Meadow, I’m going to have to put you down for a second so I can cut these vines, is that okay?”

She nodded into my soggy and ruined shirt. When I placed her down, she immediately grabbed hold of my shorts with a hand.

As we walked towards the wall of vines, I tried my best to keep the purple veined arm from her sights. But I could hardly even move the shoulder anymore, and my efforts only led to her catching on.

I heard her gasp, but she did not say anything for awhile. I focused on tearing down the vines. It was easier than trying to explain it to her. Better if she doesn’t ask.

Even with the unnatural claws, my right arm was burning from use. The vines would tear away easily, but I could only do few at a time and each attempt felt like would be the last my remaining arm could manage. It was when I heard little grunts of effort that I realized that Meadow was no longer holding on to me. She was still close by, but was now busy trying to pull free a vine.

“Meadow, what are you doing?”

She froze mid-pull. Her large, dark eyes avoided me when she let go. “I...I don’t know.”

“Were you trying to help me?”

She glanced at me for a moment before looking away again, her face turning a shade redder. “Maybe.”

I had my first good look at her since freeing her from that flower. She was barefoot, like most days, but her dress was torn, frayed, and covered in so much muck I wasn’t even sure what color it was supposed to be. Her long, wavy hair was splayed out in every different direction. When I got the full picture, I couldn’t help but chuckle.

“What’s funny?” she asked, looking at me fully, the blush gone.

“Nothing. Nothing at all,” I said, fighting harder to stifle a laugh. “But hey, if you want to help me, how about you just give me a little...encouragement?”

Meadow wrinkled her small nose and furrowed her brows as she thought deeply on what I had said. “What’s that?”

“Encouragement? Oh, well, it’s...” I had to seriously think about it for a moment. “Just cheer me on. Like, holler and scream and tell me to ‘keep going!’ and ‘don’t give up!’ Things like that.”

“Oh.” Meadow grabbed on to her frayed dress. “I don’t think...I’d be good at that.”

“You wouldn’t be good at that? What about when Mr. Mallard tried to make me do what he wanted? It was because of you that I didn’t.”

Meadow shook her head. “Maple and everyone else did it. They always do it for me. When I get scared, they helped me. I never helped them. Not really.”

I got to my knees again and put an arm on her shoulder.“You helped me, Meadow. You’re helping me right now. Part of me thought you might not be happy to see me, it helps a lot that you aren’t scared of me right now.”

She looked up at me. Her dark eyes were so big. I could not see anything else in the room. “Really?”

“Yeah. I thought you might still be scared after...” I swallowed. “After how I acted last time you saw me, after what I did, what I almost did. I was so angry that I couldn’t control myself and I seeing how you and your family looked at me and-”

Meadow reached out and grabbed the bitten hand before I could stop her. I held my breath when a sudden warmth began to break through the chilling numbness. “Don’t cry, Foxy.”

I looked at the small hand that was holding the blackened hand.

Had I been crying?

I touched my eyes with my good hand. The fingers came back freshly wet. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t say sorry for being scared,” Meadow said without missing a beat. I looked back up at her; she held my bitten hand with both of hers, her dark eyes bore into me. “Daddy always told me that when Gust or Leaf or Lilly would get mad at me. He made me promise never to say sorry for being scared. You promise to.”

“You want me to promise? Why?”

“Because you’re scared.” She held my hand against her mouth and she kissed it. “Promise you won’t say sorry for it.”

“I-,” The warmth was spreading up my arm. I saw the muscles twitch, my fingers twitch, “Meadow, how are you doing this?”

She kept my hand pressed against her lips, her eyes firmly closed. The purple veins in my shoulder were moving, but instead of snaking towards my chest as they had been, they were retreating back down my arm.

I watched in awe for a moment until I saw how black Meadow’s lips had become, how many of those purple veins were now stretching out across her dirty face.

“Meadow...What are you doing? Hey! Stop it!”

“I’m cheering you on,” Meadow whispered, her lips still pressed against the hand.

I tried to grab her, but I could no longer move my other arm. Nothing appeared wrong with it, but I could not move it off of her shoulder, couldn’t push her away. I tried to stand then, but my legs were in the same state. The unnatural warmth was spreading ever further throughout my body now. As the purple veins snaked back down my arm, the cuts, the scrapes, and the bruises were all closing and fading away as well. Not just from the arm, but from everywhere.

I could barely breathe. Meadow quietly cried as cuts and bruises and scrapes began to form all over her body.

“Please, Meadow, stop,” I begged. I knew there were tears in my eyes that time; they burned my face as they scalded their way down. “Don’t do this.”

She did not respond. She was crying worse than me. Her hands trembled. But she continued to hold me, continued to kiss my hand.

“Stop it, Meadow! Let go of me!”

She held in a terrible scream and I watched in horror as a side of her filthy dress became stained heavily with blood in a matter of seconds. The pain in my own side was gone.

“Damnit, let go! You’re going to kill yourself!”

“Go, Foxy,” she whispered between heavy breaths. The purple veins were now just at my hand, the black skin was gone. “Go Foxy, go Foxy. You can do it. You can do it.”

The purple veins vanished, Meadow collapsed, and, all at once, I could move every muscle in my body again.

I grabbed the young girl before she could fall. I held her in my arms, I hugged her to me, I sobbed. She wasn’t holding me back; I couldn’t even feel her breathing.

“Don’t you do this to me, Meadow. Don’t you dare do this to me. You have to be alive. You have to!”

“Foxy...”

I held her out. I could not look at all of the cuts, the bruises, the purple veins, the black hand. They were supposed to be mine. Her eyes were barely open, tears still streamed down from them.

“These were my mistakes, not yours!” I shouted at her. “Why did you do this!? How could you do this!? Meadow, answer me!”

Her breathing, at first rapid, had become so shallow and slow. Her big eyes were fading away from the world. Her little hand, now blackened and riddled with purple veins, reached out for me.

I grabbed it and pressed it to my lips. I tried to will all the pain back.

Give it back. Give it back. Give it back. Give it back!

“Please, give it back,” I breathed into her hand as I chocked on the words.

“Foxy.”

I forced my eyes to see her. Riddled with my mistakes. She kept her eyes on me, but they were slowly closing. Shutting away from the world forever.

“What is it? Meadow, tell me, what do I have to do?”

“Don’t fall.”

Her eyes closed, her chest stopped moving, and all the warmth that was once in my body poured out from the new hole in my chest.