01 02 - Leaving the Forest's safety

The sounds of the grass ruffling, and the breeze of the cold night. Only the moonlight shined to show a path. The sounds of a woman panting heavily as the clangs of metal and mean shouting could be heard far behind her. " Aeras,," she spoke through all the panting. "forgive me my darling, I can't let them kill you with their filthy hands." The woman with luscious black hair spoke tiredly, her face blurry. The woman continued to run until there was no land left, only the view of the holy forest from above, she was on a cliff, and she had nowhere else to run.

"It's not your fault, I promise." she spoke in a sweet voice as she held the baby within her arms tightly. "My dear Aeras." clearly out of breath, the men in armor came rushing in. "There's no point in running! Betrayers shall die!" A deep voice shouted, the cries of a small child echoed in the night, receiving howls of the beasts from the forest. "I'll rather die within the forest, that to be killed by men who know nothing but do wrong!" she shouted in anger, backing up even more. "This wench!"

She held the baby tighter around her. "forgive me for not giving you enough days to breath my darling. If only your father wasn't so selfish." The lady had a soft smile, but her eyes stayed hidden before she fell back off the cliff. The men shouting, as the feeling of the tight hug was left. "forgive me..."

"w...wait..." Aeras was asleep on a tree branch. "no....No!" The girl suddenly sprang up in surprise, panting and looking around in cautious. Right, she was now on her trip. Was that a dream? It felt so real. The human girl then placed a hand on her heart, taking deep breaths. The feeling felt so real to the girl, could it be, a memory? Impossible, that day was when Aeras was merely a baby, her heart was racing, and she was left confused, but there was no more point to think to deeply on it, she had to keep going before the day ended.

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It's been over a three, and it was truly exhausting. Aeras had the mindset that the forest was easy to leave and would only take a day, but she really mistook how large the Holy forest truly was. The forest grounds were dangerous at night, the larger nocturnal animals were awake, so she usually had to climb up onto the trees as wolves or forest tigers and many other beasts within the forest would roam the night floor. Sleeping within the trees while having to be on alert wasn't really the best kind of feeling, but it's better than getting ripped to pieces. She now reached one of the land marks, with her pace, it would probably take her around 3 more days before she's out of the forest, but to reach the capital, it'd probably take even longer than that.

Aeras sat down on the grass that had a great view of the lake, taking a small break before she continued her journey. Taking out a sandwich that she had prepared when she was still at the city, it was her last food source though, and she'd probably need to start hunting for her food soon. She ate quietly and peacefully, loving the soft breezes that flew in-between each leaves of the trees. It was a sweet moment, until she saw movement by the lake waters. At first she thought it was just an animal going for a drink, but instead, she saw hands, it was a person. Not an elf, a human.

She stood up and ran over, this was exciting but also a bit scared, humans aren't supposed to be in the holy forest. Once the black haired girl walked closer, she saw a trail of blood. She moved quickly, now sitting beside the man, at first she thought he was dead, but the boy coughed and was clearly still alive. "Oh dear, don't move I'll help you okay?" She spoke quickly, turning the male over, he had the same features as any elf, but without the usual long ears and pretty face, the male had much more of a "masculine" face than the male's like the elves, though some did have masculine faces.

She took the white haired boy's hand and made him press on the wound on his side. "Stay still, press down with the energy you have left." She spoke as she stood up and went into the woods, finding herbs that could help to lessen the pain. "Ah, yarrows, now all I need is Anethum." Just as she spoke those words, she spotted Anethum graveolen leaves. She grabbed a few then ran back over.

Aeras first ripped a part of her pants, dunked them into the lake and used it to clean the wound. "It'll hurt, try to bare through it." Once the wound was cleaned, she crushed the yarrow flowers within her hand as much as possible, then placed it over the wound. The person began to groan and winch from pain but the girl kept him still. "It's almost done, just a little more." She then grabbed the Anethum leaves and placed it over the wounds, covering it, then using the left over and dry cloth she ripped off, wrapped it around the other's waist to cover the cut. She panted heavily, using the wet cloth once again to wipe off the sweat from the human male, it seemed to have eased the male, and he was now just resting. "It seems I'll be spending the day here."

It was a random stranger, a human at that, but he couldn't really just leave an injured living person alone. She looked around for a place for them to stay, finding a small cave underneath a large tree, the roots making space, it was well hidden. The girl first grabbed her stuff and threw them inside, then carefully carried the other into the cave, laying him down on her blanket and backpack, as she made a small fire, making sure to keep the fire subtle to avoid the tree above them to set on fire. "Hah.. I could have just ignored him.. what if he's a criminal?" The black haired let out a sigh, standing up then crawling out the hole, holding her sword beside her. "For now let's focus on finding food for tonight." She took a deep breath, then rushed off into the forest to find wild boars or rabbits.

The white haired male, groaning in pain, opened his eyes and suddenly sat up in surprise. Pretty blue eyes wavering and looking all around, but the boy gripped his side fast. The human girl going over to help him. "Why did you get up so fast? You're hurt, lay down." She tried to push him down, but the boy stared at her with such furious eyes. "Who are you? What have you done to me?" Aeras was caught off guard before suddenly flicking his forehead. "I saved you, how ungrateful you humans are." He was surprised and held his forehead, before looking at his wound, then at the girl's ripped clothing. "Oh, sorry, thank you." Aeras looked at the male before chuckling and sitting down in front of him, continuing to cook the rabbits she had caught, handing a cooked one to the other.

"Why were you in the holy forest? Aren't humans supposed to stay out?" She spoke as she took a bite of the rabbit, not caring if she looked messy eating. The snow haired male stared at her before eating as well, before beginning to answer. "Well yeah, but it's not as if it's forbidden for humans to enter, it's just not safe.. wait I should ask you the same." He looked at her with suspicion, while the black haired girl just continued to eat like nothing. "I didn't enter it, well I guess in the start- but I'm leaving now, I want to explore!" She said with such determination before looking at the other. "You're from outside, so tell me, what's it like? The cities the humans." She spoke as her golden eyes shined with such curiosity, the man being taken a back. "Wait, you speak like you're not human yourself, and are you not cautious of me? A criminal or anything?"

Aeras stared at him as if he was a weirdo but shrugged it off as she ate. "You're right, I am human, just not used to seeing other humans I guess haha." She chuckled looking down before continuing to talk. "You were hurt, and even if you tried, you wouldn't be able to kill me right now, you seem like you were running away from something anyways." She shrugged it off like nothing, because it truly was nothing to her. It didn't matter really, the girl wasn't getting any bad feelings from the other which also helped her feel less cautious of the man. "Anyways, are you gonna answer my question?" The other just blinked before letting out a little scoff. "Alright I'll tell you about my adventures."

The man spoke of the different places he visited, the dessert, the jungles, the cold mountains and the different beasts and people he met on his trips. Most of his trips though were related to war, which made something click in Aeras' head. "Wait, did you get hurt because of something war related?" She asked as the man nodded with a little shrug. "You could say that, though there is no more war now, that reminds me, what's your name? Do you have one that is." The girl was in her head before she was asked for her name. "Oh yeah, we haven't exchanged names, you can call me Aeras, that's what I've been named." The man nodded with a smile. "Then my saviour Aeras, if you ever need help you can come to me, my name is Russell." The name had a nice ring to it, but the girl just laughed at the guy's remarks. "Help? Maybe when you're all better." She spoke before standing up to stretch. She looked out of the little hole to look up at the sky, it was clearly dark now.

"Well, tomorrow you should be able to move, I'll help you get out of the forest, but I'll be on my way once we're out! So get some rest, and try to be quite, the beast here are quite an annoyance to Handle." She spoke as she looked at the male, starring at him deeply as Russell just nodded, she smiled then with a few stomps, the fire went out, and the only light left was the moon's light shining through the hole of the cave.

"You're quite strange Aeras." The white haired spoke. "It's my first time meeting a human who had basically lived within the holy forest. How did you survive?" She wasn't sure how to answer his question, she knew it would be too risky to tell the man about the elves, she feared it could cause destruction to her family, so she decided to lie, even just a little. "I don't remember much about my childhood, I know I wasn't born here, but the moment I began to crawl, it was here, deep in the forest, animals and beasts helping me survive." She sat against the cold walls of the cave. "You're like me." The man said, making the other confused. "Well, of course a bit different, I was born within the city, but I was basically alone, like you, surviving on my own and animals in a way." He spoke in a low tone, serious tone, Aeras could hear the man's sadness. "Well, no matter our start, what we do for the rest of our lives is what defines us. We had a hard time, but we'll survive." She spoke, leaving the male in awe before smiling. "You're right. Well, I'll be taking a rest, I promise I'm not weak like this all the time." Russell chuckled, making the girl smile a little. "Don't worry. I won't blame a hurt man for being dependent."

Not even out of the forest and she was able to meet a human, though it was bad circumstances, it showed that Aeras was getting closer to see the world beyond the trees.

To be continued..