Hundreds of wooden skeletons splintered off their branches when a great whistling gust blew through the woodlands, throwing their snapped carcasses to the sloppy earth until a menacing dartboard lie hidden amongst the scattered leaves, a forested minefield thrusting a million jagged hands out for the next foot to trigger an explosion of pain. A shadow crawled over the hidden danger, then meaty toes stomped down on several spikes, crushing pine needles inside each fleshy pad.
“A-youch!” The distressed foot dragged backwards through the muck, wiping the sharp intruders against the slick mud only seemed to deepen their hold. The foot sprang up onto the exposed knee of torn leggings, a brawny hand snatched at the wooden thorns attacking the calloused underfoot. Reuben curled his whiskered lips inside his mouth at each painful pluck, and though his foot had gone smooth his toes still throbbed like the heating coils of a stove. A sigh puffed out his nostrils and the abused foot settled atop the other one, standing cross-footed as his navy eyes swept over the downed leaves in search of a makeshift booting. Another sigh blew past his parched lips upon finding none, and his hairy chin turned down to the stretch of jagged mud before him,
“If I knew I’d be walking over the devil’s mud I mightn’t have loan my boots to that nun. Good thing I didn’t see this comin’.” Reuben bent towards the prickly mud and pinched his thick fingertips around a shaft, plucking the woodchip up from the brown sludge and over his shoulder. A playful melody bounced around his chest as his plucking hands cleared out a pathway through the minefield, though his eyelids narrowed into a wince at every sharp thing to push at his bare soles,
“…missed another one…” His browned cheeks were speckled in mist as his hunching figure approached a thick fog curled around the tree line, and his brow crinkled at the low visibility ahead, where the forest had been reduced to ominous shadows standing in the sunset bleeding through. His lips parted in a moment of silence, then a breath curled away from his mouth,
“Roses.” His nose immediately scrunched up into a tooth-baring grit at the stomach-churning sound, and a broad hand pat onto the dirtied shirt covering his stomach,
“Bloody Hell if there weren’t a more snot-colored name than Roses.” Mud encrusted his beaten toes with the consistency of a bucket of vomit, vomit that had gone dry sitting under an open window all noon and hardened into a drippy paste against the pale’s interior, crawling inch by inch down those wooden planks as a trail of snot would a leaky nose. Reuben’s mouth crumpled into a wincing frown at every
squish, squash, squick! of his bare feet sinking deeper into the brown vomit.
“Stop thinking about it.” Reuben banged his tightened fists against his temples, darting his crumpled face up to the ceiling of fog drifting overhead.
Roses are yellow. Violets are green. That gory fellow, is drinking his spleen. “Stop. Thinking about it.” Reuben’s hands clamped onto his tussled hair, nails scraping across his scalp as yesterday’s potato stew cooked itself again inside his warming belly. He stood in place amidst the darkened forest, his clenched eyelids traveled to the warmth of his wife’s bosom squished under his cheek at night. A sharp breath finally shot out his nose, and his square head shook side to side,
“I absolutely hate this town already.” His feet slapped down on tiny pincushions littering the soil until his toes finally brushed through slick grass upon passing the tree line. He immediately scrubbed his soles clean against the blades, a cold wind swept through his chocolate bangs spinning chaotically before his squinting eyes, and both hands flipped up the collar of his shirt against his unshaven cheeks, ‘There she is.’
A tribe of thatched roofs squatted over the rising hilltop, coughing smoke clouds into the setting sun through weathered chimneys missing several of their bricks. Brown grass rolled over the hilltop as if the sun steamed away their vibrant color, and the few trees spanning their canopies over the rooftops hunched over the muddied streets like old men.
“Man these people live worse than slaves.” Reuben crossed both arms over his hunching chest, trembling hands tucked into his sweaty armpits as another cold blast sent his eyelids squinting behind his tussled bangs,
“Why’s it so bloody cold out here? My island blood could cube a glass of water by now.” His narrowed eyes darted towards candlefire glowing down the middle of closed shutters, and his caked nails scrubbed at the back of his stocky neck as a puff of aggravation blew out his nose, ‘Where is this damned place alread…’ His head snapped towards a heavy door standing on his right and his eyes crawled up a chipped sign shapened into a woman’s figure,
“Ah, almost missed it. Did you miss me?” His mouth crumpled into a frown at the unamused door.
Reuben pressed a hand to the oaken door and pushed it forward a mere inch – a clamor of wild strings never smacked him in the face, nor the roaring of drunks bruised the other eardrum, only a silent wind blew out this tavern.
“Well then. Perhaps a little odd for these hours.” A creaky groan announced his entrance as the heavy door squeaked forward in its hinges, and the broad-shouldered man standing in the doorway swept his crinkled eyes over the bowels of the tavern. Any cutthroat would tell you never to sit with your back facing the entrance and his eyes immediately hopped to the round tables seated along the corners of the room, though poisonous shadows tended to lurk there. His chin raised to afford his eyes a better glance over the metal heads seated down a lengthy table stretched over the center of the tavern, and his muddy feet strode that direction on instinct where he could see everyone walking through the front door.
Reuben stepped foot over the splintered bench, dropped his bottom to the creaky seat, and his reddened nose scrunched at woodchips stabbing through his thin leggings, ‘Maybe I should have looked with my eyes instead of my bum.’ He glanced over his right shoulder at a shadow inching across the floorboards that grew into a barmaid balancing a wooden platter upon her fingertips before he felt comfortable turning away. He folded his burly hands together on the worn tabletop, staring down at brown nicks marking his thumbs before lowering his wrinkled forehead onto them, ‘I feel like I can’t close my eyes in this place.’ Though his eyes were turned to the table, his ears were still open, following the steady thump of approaching boots. The bench shook under the weight of another patron, and Reuben turned his head up to an armored man raising a mug to his bushy mustache, guffawing at a crew of bandits shielded in silver armor and furred hats squishing down their unruly locks as they smashed their overflowing mugs together.
‘Wonderful. I was in need of a distraction.’ Reuben shot upright in his seat, and widened his drowsy eyelids to a gaping stare at the front entrance. A gloved finger aimed across the table at his swollen eyes amidst a hearty chuckle: “Look like ya seen’ed a ghost good man.”
Reuben merely cocked a brow at a bearded helmet seated further down,
“Indeed I saw the maiden of sleep calling for me and made my eyes wide to discourage her.” “Ah sleep.” The barbarian dropped his tankard to the tabletop, rum splashed over the scuffed wood and wet his curved knife drawn across the panels. His gloved hand stroked the tarnished steel and a hay-colored beard hanging below his helmet shook as he chuckled, “Can hardly sleep a wink with all these bastard thieves and elves rolling through – ain’t caught eyes on any ‘a those have you?”
Reuben’s eyelids squished together, and for a few moments all he could muster was a rasping exhale through his nostrils. He opened his blue eyes to the brute awaiting his response, and raised both brows,
“No. Haven’t counted any thieves in these parts.” “Elves too.” He waggled a thick finger at him, before the hand fell onto the rim of his mug. “You see any goddamn elves, thieves, grave robbers, general scumbags stroll through these parts you holler at us.” Reuben furrowed his brows at them for a moment, eyeing their armor for any insignia and finding none but old dents and scrapes from the battlefield. He leaned closer to the man seated across the table, resting his weight upon his forearm,
“Why do you care?” The man only chuckled and flashed his yellow teeth through the hairs curled over his mouth, “Don’t want any competition.” At that moment a gnarled hand dropped out the man’s beard. Its broken fingers sprawled across a rusted plate like a gutted octopus.
Reuben’s cheeks fattened into a courteous smile, and he dropped back into his seat, where the smile dropped into a purse of his thin lips and a deep breath pushing down his chest. ‘Idiot.’ His eyes widened at the severed hand standing upon its grimy fingertips, pummeling its nails across the table towards him.
“Don’t! Don’t! I’m sorry Kristof!” Reuben’s head snapped up from his hands, chest heaving as widened eyes stared down at warm spit coating his knuckles, thick as cupcake frosting. He knocked a fist against the hard tabletop, and a shaky breath poured through his lips when a familiar thud greet his ears. He stretched a hand over the empty tabletop beside him and drummed his fingerpads against the splintered wood,
“Can’t sleep in this town, can’t sleep. Eyes open Reuben. Glory is yet upon you, shining her sweet rays—” He jumped when a shadow crawled over his arm, and turned his head towards a plump tavern keeper lowering a mug to the table. Reuben crinkled his brow at the retreating shirt creased under the fatty rolls padding his back,
“Sir, I didn’t…ah, whatever.” Reuben’s hand slipped around the mug’s handle and tilted the tankard towards himself. Nothing but darkness filled his cup.
“Mmm, strange.” He dropped the mug to the tabletop, and watched it roll sideways into a crusted pepper shaker.
“Now who gives a man an empty cup? Am I being insulted?” The corners of his mouth jerked into a childish pout, and his hand snatched at the napkin where the blasted thing sat.
“I can drink as much as I want…” His forefinger froze atop something slick, and his wrist turned the napkin over before his crinkled brow, eying a rose petal trapped under his finger. His thumb stroked the velvety texture, and his whiskered lips muttered to themselves,
“How did a midnight rose get here?—oops.” The petal fluttered down to his muscular thighs, and his eyes caught a word crudely scribbled into the napkin.
Stable. “Eh? Surely I am being mocked.” He brought the napkin close to his narrowed eyes,
“Sss,” A hiss blew past his grit teeth,
“Stah…” His slits stared long and hard at that first syllable as he would a criminal,
“Or is it stay-bull. Stable!” His cheeks brightened upon discerning the word, though his eyes rolled upward at a woman rushing through the main entrance, the door barely caught its frame before another woman squeaked it open on her way to the streets. ‘What’s going on here?’ Reuben stood upright and stepped over his bench into the aisle, glancing over his shoulder as his footsteps carried him towards ragged curtains draped over a weary windowframe. He slipped his face through the curtains which shone a soft brown in the evening ambiance, and squinted his eyes at the first woman traveling down the muddy road to a wooden stable nuzzled against the tree line. His tongue sat between his parched lips and his crinkled brow attracted more wrinkles when the woman stepped backwards from an invisible threat. ‘I thought stable was referring to a sane mind and not a place for horses—wait, did she see it too? The note?’ He glanced over his shoulder at the few heads seated around the tavern, one of which repelled hair from its ashen center and was surrounded by chestnut locks like a nest seating a great egg. A chuckle scratched up Reuben’s throat which he hid behind a robust hand, and his browned face turned back to eavesdropping on the curious woman rummaging through her purse, ‘And I thought I looked like hell until I saw the devil himself – what the heck happened to that guy?’ Even on these grimy windows did the image of an elderly man shine, and when his skeletal hand reached out for a napkin Reuben furrowed his brows at the dim reflection, ‘Is this a tea party or a job recruitment?’
