《Onward》


 1-

    A tongue of flame extended, licking the memory of hands, enveloping thoughts and blowing them to dust. The smoldering remnants of a house, bricks and blackened posts curling in on the corpse of a humble carpenter¡¯s home, a spider curled up upon itself.


    It was the home of a 53-year-old human male, Kenith Orchards. He was once a bright and boisterous youth; ever ready to laugh and drink. But life began weighed on him I think, not necessarily what had happened but the emptiness of it all. He never married, to self-assured and flighty¡ªI think¡ªto stick to an e''lehondren, a life bonded, a wife. His drinking had changed sometime around his 34 year, April I think. He no longer raised his cup to be social but sorrowful, lonely, and quiet. But even with his life, an unfinished story, there were his bones¡ªblack in ash¡ªcruelly cut by a soldier¡¯s sword.


    He deserved better than to be thrown to the dogs, he may have not been a good man, but he was never evil . . . it is perhaps pointless to think of now, however. His agony will be forgotten by those who were around him, but I took solace in that I would remember, and some part of the world will not forget; he has finished his race. My marathon is still ever beginning.


    I rocked off my knees and brushed off the ash, soot, and embers, I stared into that night wondering why it is I bother. I knew and know that answer all too easily: to cease to care is to cease to live, a problem when you¡¯re like me, and fail to die. I made my way down the well-torn trail through the high grass, the occasional shrub or stump always broke up the monotony.


    They used to say the grass once grew as high as the trees. The children would all gather around to ask me if it was true, I can still hear my voice echo back to them with laughter hidden behind my eyes, "No, the trees were taller then."This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    With nothing but the crackling flame, and quiet mid-day breeze carrying over sparks and ash¡ªthe remnants of the small township¡ªI doubted I would hear those words cheerfully spoken anytime soon.


    I broke off onto the main road and turned right on a well-remembered route, past what was left of Agatha¡¯s old home and the loom that was ever-spinning there not even 70 years past. Behind the ancient willow, where the young had had their trysts hidden beneath its boughs and just to the right of the rock little Hagiar had once proudly pronounced his own. I shook away the memories and slid aside the sheet and beads in the door way on my final visit of what I still call home.


    What once was small burrow had been extended for rooms outside the hill, the original cave now put aside and painfully forgotten, a room long since locked-off in the hill. My eyes began to wet as I moved the locks to that forsaken room aside, one by one, click, snick, chunk, click, snick, chunk, squeal, chunk, click, snick, chunk, and I arduously pulled away that last lock and entered a room that was sparsely decorated. I remember what was there, left exactly where everything had been left to lay, deteriorating over the 40 years of abandonment. The room of someone who loved me, who knew me, and now knew no more. Stiffly walking over rugs mostly rotted away on cold stone, feeling the eyes of lost memories watching me, I picked up the portrait of my long dead e''lehondren and left as swiftly as I could, bolting a single note to the hard oak, I slowly closed the door, and with shuddering breaths verging on sobs, looked up and force myself onward. Beginning to breath evenly, I took some alchemist fire not yet lit and spread on my house¡¯s wooden frame. There is nothing left here now, nothing to keep me. A sharp strike to flint and steel and the powder trail leapt to work, burning all but the remembrance of my beautiful beloved away. The flames flowed over what I had the pleasure of calling for 217 years, a home.


    It was cruel that that day was bright and gay, even as a massacre¡ªpain and suffering¡ªhad spread over those plains. With no-where to walk, but a need to run, I had left

 2-

    The sun seemed to blaze along the sky alltogether to fast, whirling and warping faster then a day should go. The soft pading had turned to a hard slap as I walked from Red Willow, to yet another city built on the foundations of the last--Evilon ithink it is called now.


    "I wonder if Evie would be honored or horified?" I muttered with little more then my own grin acomponing the following scilence. "Yes, the honored hero Evidon whom established the counsel and birthed the great kindom of Evidon, asending to become a god after his kingdom secure . . . . What would you think Evie?"


    The ground was hard as i lay on my side in the subsuming darkness. A wolf came to visit me ,leaving its droppings beside my head in the morning--a pile of hide, fur, hair and blood.


    I thought to track her down and did after a few days searching, the wolf was wimpering and bleading freely from the anus. Searching the forest I found some iron cat then pulped it then added willow bark before giving it to the wolf to chew. She--judging from the markings, stature, and lack of male genitalia--shortly fell unconsious. I picked the wolf up and left to a stream I had found when looking for the iron cat, setting her down on the edge i washed out her anus and inspected the entrence.The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    She had nothing embeded in her from what i could tell but instead a growth on the inside of her prostate that had rubbed raw and was bleeding rather profusely. Whispering apologies I opened the wolfs mouth and tested the teeth and finding none lose decided on a tooth in the back left, judgeing it would leave her with the least permenent disability when gone, I through some effort was able to remove the tooth and root without exesive damage to the gums. After cleaning the tooth in the stream I went to start a fire and placed a bit more pulp onto the bleeding gum.


    After a fire was started and a small prayer to Conflaghence, I held the tooth between two sticks and over the fire for just under fifteen seconds. After removing the tooth I re-examined the wolfs groth and with time but no mistakes was able to remove the growth in entirty which was rather a bit larger then looked, leaving a recess in the side of the rectum. To prevent hemorage I removed a rock that had been under the fire and with some second and third degree burns to my hands was able to seal the hemorage. After removing the ofal and blood from my hands I returned to the cracked stone pathway t''word Evilon