Look Through the Eyes of Its Skull

Kill the beast, look through the eyes of its skull, and you will see the way home. That’s what the fae-mother told you in exchange for a memory and the pin in your hair. You don’t remember what you gave away, but you remember the tale she told you and the red arrow she placed in your pocket.

It lives on the outskirts, she had said, guarding them. They were where you had tried to escape innumerable times before. They call it The Wander because it is all you can do there. Walk for a mile and you will find yourself back where you started. Turn left and you will have taken two rights. Dropping stones or unraveling twine had only caused you to find yourself trapped in a web of your own making.

The beast knew how to walk The Wander, how to make sense of it. It would be at an advantage. It would not let you leave.

You stepped into the tangle of the road, this time paying no heed to the illegible signs, to the desperate markings cut into the trunks of the trees. This time you were looking beyond the road, acting as a hunter rather than a traveler. Whenever you felt lost or hopeless, you would twirl the shaft of the arrow between your fingers and the head would point you in the right direction.

Time did not matter. Distance did not matter. You played the role of the hunter and you played it well. For that, the wood rewarded you with your trophy. At last, you saw something move in the depth of the forest. You tracked it through the shadow until the beast stepped into a pillar of shimmering light, its mossy antlers and human-like eyes just as the fae-mother had described them.

You knocked the arrow and the light glinted against its crimson tip. You hardly needed to aim; Its target was already true. It loosed itself and pierced the beast’s heart. It fell with a harrowing cry.

You watched it and it remained still. When you were sure it was slain, you approached to see the flesh itself dissipating like silver dust into the beam of light leaving only an ivory white skeleton and its antlered head behind. The arrow itself seeped into the soil like blood.

Look through the eyes of its skull and you will see the way home.

For its size, the skull was oddly light. You placed it like a crown atop your head and peered through the empty sockets. Beyond the world that had trapped you for so long took on a much different form. The tangled Wander appeared now as a simple country road strewn with twine and littered with stones. You could see the trees moaning, tending to their slashed open wounds.

You could see it all now, everything you took from the fae folk to be nothing but allegory. When the hawthorne said he could speak to the flowers, you did not truly believe him. But now you could see their mouths made from the soft tips of their petals. They whispered to each other but laughed at you when you tried to speak with them. When the frittening folk scurried away to their homes, seemingly disappearing into nothing, you had assumed they had truly vanished. Only now could you see the tiny wooden doorways in the trunks of the trees, their washing strung up between the branches, their dinner spread set out upon a mushroom shelf.

You saw so many doors, not just the little ones, but the great tree tunnels that lead out of this place. But through the beast’s eyes, you could not tell which one led home. You saw many villages beyond but none were familiar. You felt afraid of them, afraid of the unfamiliar people. Even from the safety of the wander, you could see their wicked hearts through their devious eyes.

You remembered now which memory you traded to the fae-mother. A single memory of home had undone so many others.

You wandered for so long, though time did not matter, and so far, though distance did not matter, just trying to recall where home was. You did not dare remove the skull and lose its gift of sight. You sought help and kept near the roads, hoping for another wanderer like you had once been to happen along and tell you where to go. You watched and waited, peering with your human eyes while your magnificent mossy antlers moved swiftly through the glade. You heard the rustle of a traveler and made your way to intercept them, to stop them, and keep them from leaving before you got your answer.

You played the role of the watcher and you played it well. For that, the wood rewarded you with a red arrow pointed at your heart.