Page 2 of The Satyr's Wood

Tiffany turned slowly on the road in a circle, noting the spark of a lamp in the far distance as someone’s household slowly began to rouse. She couldn’t waste any more time. Sinking her teeth into her bottom lip hard enough that she tasted the sharp metallic bite of her blood, she spun back to the tall grass and ran forward into it. The grass scraped along her boots and pants as she fled, her heart racing with a mingling of fear and excitement. It was heady and some crazy part of her loved it.

Her smile widened and she giggled quietly to herself as she caught herself practically skipping as she pushed her way through the tall grass. She could barely contain her gloating as she gave one last fleeting look over her shoulder at the dark shadow of the town before bounding deeper into the grass with an elated, inner cackle.

Keeping herself low in shelter of the grass—which was easy to do for a woman of her size—she moved as quietly as possible at first. The further she got, however, the freer her movements became and the less concerned with remaining quiet she was. She couldn’t have remained perpetually silent even if she wanted to as she hit upon a safe distance without signs of pursuit. There was no helping it. Her spirit lifted until she was humming happily to herself. She would keep going for a distance until she found a safe place to hole up and sleep far enough away that it was unlikely that anyone from town would come across her.

The grass seemed to stretch on and on it, though it was frequently dotted with trees, their leaves rippling with the wind. Tiffany stopped and set down her pack for what had to be the dozenth time since leaving the town, and lifted her hands aboveher head as she stretched her back with a groan of relief. The summer sun was beating down on her, making sweat gather beneath her shirt and along the band of her bra. Fanning herself with one hand, she sighed heavily as she removed her canteen and took a deep swallow of the lukewarm water. The water was spit warm, but it still provided some relief to her parched throat. She wiped the sweat from her brow with her sleeve and squinted at what looked like a line of trees. Not a forest but a brief respite from the sun.

Her heart pounded with exhilaration, she shouldered her bag and set a quick pace for them, her pack bouncing on her back. Fluffy clouds rode overhead and not a single one of the bastards decided to do her the favor of covering the sun. Because of that, her hair was sticking to the sides of her neck and on her jaw when she finally reached the shade of the nearest tree, but it was worth it. Wiping the sweat from her face, she peered down the neat line of the trees before her gaze fell upon what looked like an old, abandoned highway that had likely fallen into disuse even before the Ravening. The pavement was rough and broken in some areas where grass was overtaking it and growing through the cracks, and so narrow that it wouldn’t have supported more than two cars even though the lines that had once been painted on it had disappeared completely with the passage of time. It was hard to recall at times that even old roads like this had once been occupied by cars traveling at high speeds to reach their destination. With the tree cover and the state of the road, it looked like a safer option than the main roads leading from town to town. She had no real idea where it would take her but that wasn’t particularly important at the moment. She would just keep going as far as her feet would carry her.

Adjusting the weight on her back, Tiffany headed down the side of the road, keeping close to the trees in their dappled sunlight.

Chapter 2

The highway meandered for some distance, the birdsong overhead providing a peaceful backdrop to Tiffany’s surroundings as she walked along it for days, the melodic sound of insects and birds only broken by the faint tap of the fallen branch she used as a walking stick. The grassy stretches had given way as the trees grew thicker, providing more shade. She didn’t worry about it being one of the fae forests. As long as she was near human roads, she was certain that she was safe. Its beauty didn’t possess the haunting danger and ethereal glamor that she had heard the fae forests possessed. That was fine with her. It was beautiful to her.

It was certainly a marked improvement from the town. She didn’t know what she had been thinking when she settled there. Here the air was fresh and clean, and the breeze refreshing. She tipped her head back as the wind whipped through her hair and drew in a deep breath.

No choking smell of unwashed bodies crowded into the small confines of the buildings, but she was going to need a bath herself soon. Her hair felt greasy, and her scalp and skin itched from the accumulating sweat. She sniffed delicately at her underarm and wrinkled her nose. Yeah, a bath was called for.

Following the sound of insects, she plunged down a dirt road that broke off from the highway, disappearing into what appeared to be an old forest that had long grown by the road. The road looked like the sort that would be taken by recreationalists in the past when they were looking for ideal camping and fishing spots. She had memories of doing those things as a child with her family though they were distant and faded like old photographs she occasionally found.

Old branches grew out over the narrow road the further she went until she was forced to push her way through them as she attempted to avoid those laced with webs from perfectly normal spiders. She heard the water first and caught the fresh scent of it before she saw it. The road flattened out at a grass turf beside a river. Tiffany sidled up to the water’s edge and looked down at the gentle current. It appeared brisk enough so that the water didn’t grow stagnant there and wouldn’t breed many mosquitos—or so she hoped.

With a hopeful smile tugging at her lips, Tiffany followed the river a short distance so that she was not directly in sight of the dirt road—just in case. Setting her backpack by a rock, she bent down and quickly drank her fill of the fresh, running water. Once that need was taken care of, she immediately proceeded to seeing to her other need as she stripped out of her shoes and clothes and tucked them between the two large stones before digging out her soap. She couldn’t wait to get clean! She hopped a little in excitement, her breasts jiggling with the momentum, as she turned to the water and looped the netted bag holding her soap over her neck so that it wouldn’t get lost. Jewel-colored dragon flies chased each other over the water, seemingly in invitation.

“Don’t mind if I do,” she told them, and laughed quietly at her own giddiness. She dipped her foot in the water and shivered. “Brr that’s a bit chilly. Perfect.”

She splashed forward into the river, the small, smooth stones digging into the bottom of her feet. She squealed softly, giggling as she made her way out there, hopping from one foot to the other briefly as she chased away the shocking chill. It felt good though. Even though the river only came up to just below her breasts at its center, she could feel the cool water working into her muscles and washing against her skin soothingly. Tiffany bit her lip and crouched, sinking deeper into the water so thatthe water lapped against her neck as the gentle current rolled around her.

Dropping her head back, she soaked her hair and ran her fingers repeatedly through it, rinsing the grime from its length. Gods that felt good. How long had it been since she had a decent bath? She didn’t believe she had a proper one since moving into town. Water had to be drawn daily, and there was a limit per person that left little to wash properly if one wanted enough to drink during the day. Most of her baths were little more than a rag dipped in water and hastily washed while using what little water she had left from the day to scrub her hair to the best of her ability while bent over her washing basin. Fully submerging in clean water was a luxury she hadn’t felt in a while.

She lifted her head from the water and quickly lathered her hair with the soap. It didn’t smell like fresh flowers like she had hoped it would when she helped her neighbor make it—actually, it kind of had a bitter tea scent that didn’t really appeal to her. But at least it would get her clean, so she ignored it as she rubbed her scalp vigorously, the refreshing tingle of the mint and rosemary rushing over her head in passing. Dunking her head, she rinsed her hair thoroughly before tackling her body with the same spirit.

She was standing in the river, water pooling around her thighs as she soaped her midriff when a crack of branches from the shore sent several birds into startled flight. Her muscles tightened with fear. Who could possibly be out in the middle of nowhere, far from any settlement? Veiling her privates with her hands to the best of her ability, her head swung in the direction of the sound. As her gaze flicked among the trees, a small tremor raced through her.

Her first instinct was to call out, but she snapped her mouth shut and pinched her lips tightly together as she slowly sank down into the water. The last thing she ought to do was drawattention to herself. Even if someone suspected that there was a lone woman, she certainly wasn’t dumb enough to confirm their suspicions.

Tiffany held her breath and sank even deeper into the water so that everything except her eyes and the top of her head was submerged as she quickly drifted back behind a fallen tree leaning at a steep angle in the river. Only then, when she was certain that she was well concealed behind its trunk and its mass of branches dipping in the river, did she slowly rise from the water enough to spy on the bank from her vantage point.

There was another loud crack and another as the nearby undergrowth within the forest shook aggressively with whatever was moving through it. As much as encountering a predator frightened her, she genuinely hoped it was a bear. At least a bear would get bored and amble off even if she had to wait it out for a short time.

“Timmy, over this way,” a coarse voice broke from the trees.

“Coming, Burt. Damn brush caught me by the ass of the pants,” the man’s companion replied plaintively. “Are you sure that there’s someone out here? I don’t recall seeing sign of any females this way. I sure as hell don’t want to be chasing after some guy. We don’t need any more men in our camp, that’s for sure.”

She instinctively stopped breathing, her entire focus narrowed in on listening and watching as they crashed through the brush. Her lungs were already beginning to burn by the time they finally stumbled from the trees. Her eyes were watering from the effort to remain silent before she consciously dared to risk taking a breath. With great effort, she slowly, and quietly, released her pent breath to sip in another. Although she doubted that they could hear from so far away, every sound she made was unusually amplified to her. Every breath sounded like a gust of wind, every drip of water or ripple in the surface of theriver when she moved sounded like a violent splash. Even her heartbeat thumped far too loudly in her ears. Because of that, some paranoid part of her was certain that they could hear her and use it to discover her location.

Her teeth sank into her bottom lip hard as she worked desperately to control her breathing so that she didn’t break out into a panicked pant. They were getting closer and closer. The leaves were rattling and branches breaking ever louder with their passage.

Suddenly the brushed parted and two men half-stumbled from between the trees. They hadn’t come from the path that she’d taken but it was as if they had emerged from the heart of the woods itself. She shivered as they watched them. They did not look like any of the men from the settlements. Their beards were long and even with wild growth and their clothing stained and worn thin in many places which meant that they hadn’t bothered to salvage in any of the deserted towns nor learned to weave cloth like some of the men in the settlement town that she had escaped from. Instead, dirt clung to them to such a degree that she was certain that if she was any closer to them, the sour smell of their body odor would have made her eyes begin to water anew.

But that wasn’t what she was most concerned about.

There was something about the way they moved and the way their eyes scanned the banks as they drew closer that made her cling harder to the fallen tree and ducker lower among its branches. It was the sharp hunger in their eyes that reminded her of a starving predator tracking its prey. Only they wouldn’t merely kill her to feed as some of the monsters have done to humans they hunted. No, her fate would be one of endless suffering at their hands.

Her teeth sank deeper into her lip until she tasted the faint bite of blood. They were now at the edge of the river’sembankment, scouring the water’s edge as they tromped up and down the length of the small clearing.

“You see anything?” the one called Burt shouted but Timmy shook his head and tucked his hands in his pocket with a sharp jab of frustration.

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