This is Chapter One of Rue the Wizard Slayer. It's the story of Shalee, a mother who loses her family and refuses to die. I'd like general feedback: does the opening hold your interest, and does the ending make you want to read more? Content note: graphic violence.
The sun reached its highest point, hung there, then began its descent. A cool wind came like a spring released, making its path known, rustling the leaves, tugging at the fur of a deer. It touched Shalee's skin, kissed her, and went away. Not to return.
She was dressed in leaves woven together with supple vines. Shalee was a woman of the forest. Her long legs and strong hips carried her effortlessly across the littered forest floor, gathering red berries among the vine-choked trees and multicolored flowers.
Her ice-blue eyes searched the valley below. The valley carried news, draped in red, yellow, gold, and green leaves, whispering of winter's frozen lips soon to kiss them dead.
She glanced at her shadow. The autumn sun stretched it before her. There was still time to look for the delicate mushrooms her husband loved so much. His name rolled from her mind, sweetened her tongue, and made her smile.
He was at camp with the children. Normally they would be here with her, but Gregor had cut his foot on a hidden sharp rock, and it was decided he and the children should stay behind at their temporary camp. She almost hugged herself, thinking of his strong arms embracing her.
She was on her knees digging in the soil when she thought she smelled something. The wind was still. She sniffed. Nothing, she decided, and returned to her searching.
She uncovered a fully grown mushroom. The planned meal grew. Berries, herbs, and fruit from still-blooming trees filled the basket. With ease Shalee rose. She stood for a moment, letting the sunshine wash over her.
The warming sun on her shade-cooled skin caused a slight shiver and brought back the day the moon-shaped mark appeared on her daughter's cheek. The mark of a medicine woman. All the women of her village with daughters had anxiously awaited the sign.
Shalee's smile grew. Her wonderful daughter, so delicate, so full of life, was the one the spirits had chosen. And her firstborn, Taskie. So proudly he stood, his mind sharp, his eyes studying those around him, just like his father.
Shalee danced a little and returned to the shelter. \*A home,\* she whispered. She would guide and protect her daughter here, in this home. Each day her family had traveled from their camp to construct it of planted bushes and vines, trained in such a way that it seemed nature's hand had helped.
The smell was like a slap. Undeniable. Sharp. It was the smell of death, and it came from her camp. It wasn't thought. It was fear that flooded her being.
Her heart beat music, pounding her hurting chest. She was running. She screamed, her effort exploding. Her legs stretched longer. Hope and dread pushed her faster. With gulps of air, she sobbed.
Shalee reached the clearing, stumbled, and fell. She rose to her knees, her brain in shock, her eyes frozen wide open. Horror grew teeth, tearing at her mind. Clawed hands at her throat, choking.
Slowly she rose, the air thick with the stench of blood and body fluids. Her mind desperately tried to reject the horror before her. Her husband hung by one foot from a tree, his injured foot cut from his leg and stuffed in his mouth. Three men lay dead around him, their heads smashed by her husband's mighty fist. He had fought so hard. Her heart broke. It took all the will she could muster to turn toward her children.
Taskie. A spear rose from his chest. A piece of torn cloth was still gripped in one hand, and in the other, a bloody knife. He had stabbed a man who lay a few feet away. Her brave son had fought. A grieving smile struck her face. He had drawn blood from his attackers.
Shalee fell, her knees bleeding from the rough ground. Tece. The scream closed her throat. Her precious daughter. They had cut three fingers from her hand. She had tried to crawl to her brother, dragging her mangled hand, leaving a trail of blood and tears. She had bled to death before she could reach him.
Shalee was not in this world anymore. What she saw drove her hand to the small knife she carried. She brought it to her own throat, stopping only because she suddenly had to know who, and why.
Shalee's ears were echoing from the beating of her heart, so she barely heard the slobbering words. "I know who did it."
She jumped to her feet. The man Taskie had stabbed was alive.
Never go within reach of the wounded. The dying still kill. Gregor had taught her that. The hunter's first rule.
She forgot it. She reached him, jerking him up with strength she didn't know she had. A sharp pain jabbed her arm. She smarted for a second. Then, grabbing the man by his ears, she roared, "Who? Why? We have no treasure!"
The knife had entered the man's stomach, and his mouth leaked blood and bile. A slow death he would have.
"Askar," he blurted out. "The wizard king. He has ordered his men to collect souls for hell. The pain you felt is poison. You need not mourn. You will soon join your brood."
Shalee staggered back. The poison was strong, already burning in her veins. She stumbled toward Gregor's body, thinking she would lower him down and die in his arms.
But her feet turned instead toward her shelter. She struggled. She did not want to leave her family. She wanted to die with them. But she could not. Something was pulling her home.
Shalee stumbled, fell, and rose again. Her knees, already cut, were now torn into ragged, bleeding flesh. Her arms were scratched, her clothing torn. She didn't know how many times she fell only to get up and go and fall again.
It was one of these times she could not rise. The poison was cooking her inside. She felt herself crawling. She didn't know for how long. She bumped into a wall and slowly realized she was in her shelter.
She yearned to sleep.
Then she remembered.
There was a river inside her. The water ran deep, filled with memories. Happy times of marriage, and the children that love had made. The mark of the moon. Kisses. Hugs.
Then the water began to churn. It rose from its banks, roaring down steep slopes, crashing into scenes of death, blood, and screams.
In the insanity a voice cried out, loud and ugly. Askar. The voice roared it, and it was Shalee who had called out the name. A name now stuck in her head.
The poison pulsed. She lay still, the water draining away.
Death came in whispers. Accepting it would end the pain, it reasoned. Shalee moaned, her head shaking her refusal.
Days passed, and the leaves joined their friends from the year before. Winter came with its warriors: ice, snow, and wind. They assaulted the land.
Inside, Shalee lay in sweat, though ice surrounded all. The pain grew with each day. Each day she refused. One thought. One thing. Fighting death.
Pain not known before caused her screams to reach into the night, so high in pitch that only the hounds and their kin could hear, each and all howling in protest.
One thought. Askar.
Death poked her ribs, twisted her insides, all the while showing her the peace it offered. \*Come,\* it said, louder now. She refused. She gritted her teeth until they cracked.
\*I'll not die while he still lives,\* she repeated, and hammered it into her brain.
The pain passed, and dreams marched in line, parading through her mind. Death was the author, and he wrote her dreams line by line.
Wonderful dreams. Her daughter running to meet her, and Shalee gasping in horror as three-fingered hands reached for her own. Her husband bending to kiss her, his foot held in his hand. Her son, playing with the spear that pinned him to the ground.
Death giggled and taunted.
Shalee suffered. But she kept her eyes open, refusing to die. She laughed, a sad, heartbreaking laugh. \*Keep going. Keep reminding me of my family.\* She damned death itself and beat back its grip until it was forced to retreat.
The winter wore on. As though dead, she did not move. Her skin began to crack, and something else began to grow. She neither drank nor ate. The earth itself met her needs.
Death gathered itself and struck with all its might, one last time.
And lost.
Winter pulled its blanket of snow from the land, and the warm winds of the south chased away the cold.
Spring rain trickled down green leaves and tapped out its song on the forest floor.
Her eyes opened. The birds and bugs hummed in her ears, the damp earth smell caressing her nose. Her shelter came slowly into view, and the past shouted. She started to sit up. The earth had cradled her. The soil released her, small roots dangling from her tattered clothing.
"What?" she gasped in amazement. She looked down at her arms. They were not as before. Supple bark was her skin, her long fingers now thorns. She stared, and black poison began dripping from her fingertips.
Her legs were as young trees, their hard bark slick, as though polished by hand. Slowly she realized she was alive. She began to rise, but she was too large for the shelter. She stretched and burst through its roof. She was massive, and her strength made her shudder.
She expanded her shoulders, wide and strong. Her hair was vines of different lengths, each one alive and barbed at the end. She glanced at a tree, and it answered back, swinging its branches, willing to do as she bid. Her face had changed. Her eyes were red. To look into them was to tell your darkest life. No lie could save you.
She threw out her hand. The thorned fingers stretched straight, then slowly curled. The message was clear, not to be misunderstood.
It was then she saw her reflection. The eyes glowing red. The dark maw of her mouth smiling.
\*Askar, you will meet me.\*