Chapter 21: 19 : Dark Tale of an Abandoned Soul

The warm sun was starting to set on the old village infused by the salty winds of the sea. Most ships were already back from their hard day of fishing and now the last few still at sea were coming back, painting the water with their colorful sails.

Tsuki was still talking to the old man – in truth she was mostly listening to him talk about his past. He retold that when his wife died and left him alone to take care of their newborn son, things in the world had changed and the forest he was born in was now filled with dangerous monsters. He couldn’t go back. Thus, he, with the help of a few people who escaped the raging war in the east, built simple houses to protect against the cold winter nights. Slowly, they expanded the settlement and welcomed more people fleeing from famine and war.

House after house, the land was cleaned from roots and stones to create someplace people could call home. Carlson left the village when his son was old enough to care for himself. He wanted to see Yassil and tell him the news of his daughter’s passing as he deserved to hear it more than anyone. He knew the journey was going to be dangerous, but he wasn’t expecting to find the forest he was born in to almost be desolate of living beings he knew and loved. He walked like a vagabond in the kingdom of death, his body a shield protecting the misery he was tasked with delivering. His knees bent and his hands outreached into the doorframe that once opened and closed with the innocent laughs that were able to disperse the night; that day with his burden in hand, the door could only scream like a pained banshee.

Carlson looked to the man who had seen their little angel grow, her father who deserved the girl’s love more than he, in the hope he could share one another pain. But a fool Carlson was, and he left, fearing for his life, after handing a letter written by a dying mother and a blue ribbon, she was gifted at her tenth birthday…

Carlson came back to the village he had built; his mind was wounded, and his body fractured. He wasn’t able to lift anything, and his shaking hands made anything he touched unstable. But he wasn’t needed anymore. The small settlement had grown and had a life of its own with people helping one another. He found his son who got married and was waiting for a child of his own. Carlson was sure death was to come for him soon, but it never did. His fate was to live with his self-made suffering.

“She made me promise to make others smile,” said Carlson after a long pause. “I guess she wanted me to find happiness somewhere else. It took me too long to realize and I was already used to solitude when I did.”

“Hmmm mister, it’s getting late. I should maybe leave in a bit. Also, do you know what this might be saying?” Tsuki passed the letter she found in Yassil’s house and wasn’t able to read.

He took it gently from her and read with great interest its content. His expression became sour and heavy quickly and gave it back to Tsuki only halfway through. “I don’t get it, but you should be able to read it. It’s not something an old man like me should read.”

“Huh? But I can…t? Huh?” Tsuki looked at the words and could understand their meaning. She didn’t know how to pronounce them, but ideas were forming in her brain when looking at them. Something like logograms instead of words. Still, it didn’t make sense to Tsuki that she was only now able to understand them.

“Yassil might have done something with you… You should read it when you have time. Yuzuha told me you heard someone get murdered… I don’t know the whole story, but I think it would be best if you simply forgot about it.”

“Are you kidding me? Forgetting about something like that! I thought I was next!”

“It’s a bit complicated that’s all –”

“—I don’t care!”

With only a small comment, the serenity of the house vanished. She wanted to escape from this place, not feeling safe anymore and so she did. Not wanting to have her fate entangled in a web made from the suffering of others; she had to be like the wind. Unbound and unseen.

“Wait!” said Carlson trying to stop her as there was more that he wanted to say but before he could do anything, she was gone. He was alone once more, two warm cups of tea left unable to warm his heart. “I supposed I acted strong and made myself believe I was fine with her death… It’s almost as if reality can’t stop repeating the same event…”

❀

 

In the end, Tsuki ran quite a distance and hid in a dirty alleyway. She was trapped between two buildings with barely enough space to sit on the ground. On her left was the dark unknown leading to nowhere while on the right was the only entrance to this alleyway. She looked for some time at this entrance producing light for her dark cave that would often be marred with people shading long and creeping shadows as they went on with their life.

“Alice… Do you remember when you taught me how to cook? Not that I retained much of it, I was just following your lead and guiding voice,” murmur Tsuki looking at her own projected shadow. “You said: ‘A life spent eating bad things is a bad life’… Alice…you’re a liar. I have to do things I hate to avoid a bad life. I can’t escape having to deal with people forever.”

For now, at least, she wanted to be alone and looked inside the large bag Carlson gave her while talking to her shadow as if it was Alice.

The bag itself was quite well-made and spacious. There was a small coin pouch whose value was unknown to Tsuki because she never handled money in this world. After this, she picked up a wooden box that contained two cups similar to the one she drank from in Carlson’s house and a whole set to make tea with instructions added. There were even a few jars containing either leaves or honey. Lastly was a small music box which started to play when she opened it. Its delicate cylinder turned slowly but the sound it produced wasn’t that good because of the noisy street close by. There were a few lyrics written on the inner lid which she chose to read at a later time when she wasn’t in a loud location.

Her stomach started to rumble soon enough, pressing her to move forward with her fear and get something to eat. A plan formed in her mind, simple and inoffensive in nature: she needed to spend her money and leave this village alone after sleeping. She was also quite tired, being used to sleeping during the day, she stayed awake, ignoring the two times she lost consciousness, for about 20 hours. It was bad for her weak body, more so that she barely ate any real meal in a long time: a fish, a few berries, water, the strange spongy fish, and a few cups of tea.

And so not wasting time, she began to make a list of everything she needed to buy by writing it in her book. She was now used to it: take the dagger, cut the wrist, pool the blood in a concave stone she collected at some point, and write while not letting the blood cake up. Her body healed quickly from the cut, and it was good for Alice’s strange constitution. But she was realizing there was something wrong. She noticed that every time she bled herself that her blood was getting thicker.

Tsuki didn’t quite understand the reason the doctors back in her world had to periodically drain blood from Alice and her condition was still a mystery. She could only blindly try and emulate what little she understood was best for Alice.

Not able to do anything about her lack of knowledge, she wrote with a broken feather she should have thrown long ago.

Rescue. Endless list of. Grocery list. List of . . . provisions.
Provisional list of endless groceries for rescuing the stars!

Three possible paths:  
    1: Take a boat south and avoid the dangerous forest. Costly, really long, safe.
    2: Find guards and directly go to Daybreak. Costly (Less? More?), long, safe.
    3: Go alone. Cheap, fast, dangerous.

Will ask for pricing before bed...
One week minimum of traveling. Need food. Water. Clothing, blanket, water container, fire kit . . . tent? . . . An axe? A weapon also. Will have to figure out everything else while shopping. Compass! Then I also need a whistle or a flute! Blanket

Destination for today:
. . .
. . .
Where do I need to go? I don’t know where to go…
Food shop, cloth shop, container shop, fire shop, traveling shop, weapon shop, music shop.

First, I require sustenance to move my body around. I will observe people trading and find the best sustenance available for me and barter it with Carlson’s money . . .

He might be mad. I ran for no reason. Because I am magnanimous, I shall render him plentiful with a visit of mine! Ho, watch me Alice as I bless his sense with an excuse for my action just as you have always preached me to do. Watch as I grow and be amazed at who I shall be, for I am Tsuki.

❀

 

A young girl could be seen moving in the bustling market alone. Her hood hid her long hair, and she moved too fast for anyone to see her facial features. She tried her best to stay away from people and made her purchase go fast.

“Such a sweet child. Did your mother send you for groceries?”

“…”

“Missy, if you buy one, you get half-price on your next purchase!”

“…”

You are reading story Forgotten Sky at novel35.com

“Good eyes, good eyes. But can I interest you with this cute hair tie?”

“…”

She never listened to what the merchant had to say and simply gave them their due money and left without saying a word.

She couldn’t find any tent and decided to make do by buying a total of three blankets and a simple pillow. She planned to make a fort, forgetting that tents existed to also protect against rain and such, which a blanket couldn’t.

It wasn’t that tents didn’t exist, it was just that this town didn’t usually need them and so they were mostly owned by guards, mercenaries, and hunters. If Tsuki had simply asked, someone would have guided her to the right place to buy one.

She managed to buy a large amount of preserved food. The village produced a lot of them since many ships stopped at the port for trade and to make provisions for their long journey. Dried meat, dried fish, dried peach, and hard bread, Tsuki was salivating looking inside her backpack. She even bought a rope to tie her many blankets below her bag since it took up too much space inside.

Right now, she was heading for a place that might sell weapons to a kid like her without batting an eye. A shop kicked her out thinking she was up to no good and this gave a sour taste in the girl’s mouth. If the next shop didn’t let her buy something like an ax, she would simply steal one when no one was looking and escape into the many dark alleyways.

Meowwww

“?”

The meowing of a cat came from somewhere, but she wasn’t able to find its source.

Mrwooooowww

It sounded young and its cry resounded in the now empty street.

“Where’s everyone?”

Tsuki looked all around herself but neither movement nor sound was seen or heard. She walked slowly while nibbling on a skewer. She wasn’t even thinking as she walked, keeping her mind free from any sound to better hear the cat.

Meoww

“THERE!”

Tsuki turned to her right, pointing her skewer like a spear toward a dark alleyway where a young cat sat just at the edge of the endless creeping darkness. It had a brown coat with so little fat that its bones poked out from its skin.

“Hungry?” asked Tsuki, giving it one of her many skewers.

The cat innocently took the food in its small mouth and ran into the unsettling darkness of the alleyway.

Tsuki with nothing to do returned to the main street and mixed with the people who seemed to have reappeared out of nowhere.

Once again, she realized she was alone, and the sound of a cat came annoying her ears. She did her best to look for it and after 15 minutes of looking, saw an adult cat with a brown coat, still as thin, looking at her from the roof of a house.

She had no way of knowing if the events taking place were created by her cursed senses. Still, she placed another skewer on the ground which the cat quickly descended from the roof to take and escape into another dark corner of the street.

People returned to what they were doing and Tsuki followed the busy path until she was alone and yet another cat cried from somewhere. She only had two more skewers with one that she was slowly nibbling from. With a tired groan, she tried to find the cat again.

It was hiding inside a gutter, still as thin, but now old. Its skin was sagging, eyes cloudy, and tail droopy. Tsuki gave it the last untouched skewer which it slowly took in its mouth with missing teeth and left deeper in the gutter while dragging its left hind leg.

The people return in an instant as if someone had switched a light. It scared Tsuki and she let out a loud yelp after falling on her behind. The pain shot up, closing her eyes under the shock which she opened back to see everyone, headless, pointing to her as they walked.

“Calm down calm down calm down calm down—” Tsuki knew those strange events weren’t powered by her cursed sense. After all, when it came to her vision, it would change her surroundings as if a bad artificial intelligence was trying to paint the real world.

There was a sense of realistic dread assaulting Tsuki, making her mind scream about an unseen danger. Yet, she simply helped herself up with a cold brick wall by her side. Touching the structure, she felt as if the stone itself was breathing but ignored it. She looked at the walking band of headless people with sadness in her heart. Not scared, but sad that she could be one of them in more than one way. She knew something wrong was happening and albeit being worried about her future, she didn’t feel like she was in any real danger at the moment.

“I gave you my food, why are you so greedy?” She said while looking behind herself.

A dark empty street, seemingly endless, was laid in front of her. The waning sun should have been able to cast warm rays into this preluding abyss. Alas, it wasn’t something light had access to.

Tsuki, not minding it, entered the empty street. She was used to dealing with scary stuff with her time serving Kanga. That world was horrible and the thing she was currently facing wasn’t all that different from what she saw or even did.

If whatever was causing this wanted her dead, then she would have died long ago. She met some dear friends in situations like this. The favorite being she met was a gigantic spider who could see the world with its web but knew nothing of the heart of those it saw. It was even this spider that helped Tsuki escape the tower with Alice.

The girl wondered if this spider, which wanted to learn emotions, felt anything when she disappeared. She thought about everyone she met in the past and the weird nickname she gave them until she reached the end of the dark street.

The more she progressed the darker everything became and now she was facing the last remnant of light in the form of a small lantern on the paved ground. She picked it up and the flame inside seemed to smile slightly. A few more steps were all that she needed to see the corps of the small cat she had fed. Rats might have picked at its guts as they were filled with holes and out in the open.

Tsuki picked up the dead cat, caressing its rotting neck, and embraced the small animal in her arms. She never really liked cats. The only animal she had, other than her flock, was a large dog that was trained with protecting her and the weak lambs that every predator tried to hunt. To say the least, this cat in her arms reminded her of how she found her dog one day after a tiresome night. Whatever happened that night wasn’t something she remembered. Only the depraved images of the morning after were imprinted in her memory like an unending nightmare. After this was another blank in her memory for an unknown duration.

Tsuki slowly walked back to the path she had taken to return to the main street, the lantern in her left hand, the cat in her right arm. After what felt like hours of walking, here she was, back where she saw the first cat, back when it was but a baby. The lantern in her left hand, in her right arm, rested a plushy of a one-eyed cat.

“There should be a blacksmith down this path, I think,” said Tsuki as she adventured deeper into the bustling street of The Enclave of Scylla…

You can find story with these keywords: Forgotten Sky, Read Forgotten Sky, Forgotten Sky novel, Forgotten Sky book, Forgotten Sky story, Forgotten Sky full, Forgotten Sky Latest Chapter