Artur

Artur crawled through the void of darkness that surrounded him. A deep pitch of black tar that obscured his sight and infected his mind, clouding his judgement with panic and fear.

He finally felt a moist carpeted section of the cave floor that he collapsed onto in relief. After a marathon of endless wandering over rough terrain, bypassing stalagmites and crystal edifices that rose before him out of sight, only detected with searching hands. His fingers and palms are now raw and sensitive, his bloody knees were patched with tattered hemp bandages, salvaged from his clothes.

The young Satyr hesitantly inspected the weeping bruise on his head, a solid bump protruding like a third horn. It marked the source of dried that covered his face and neck. He tore up the mossy flooring to scrub away at the wound, hissing in pain as he dabbed the sensitive flesh.

Panic floods the mind he discovered, bypassing logical decisions and forcing the body into action. Why else would he sprint through the darkness at full tilt? In this hell of foreign smells and obsolete vision.

The screams of his friends and brothers, chasing him from all over, as their terrors echo off the walls and the stalactite that Artur collided with.

The abyss that engulfs all and provides little took his sense of time along with his friends. Once the youngling awoke from his dreams of playing games in a sun rich fern meadow, he initially believed he was dead.

But where was Mother to guide him to her pastures? He had always been a faithful follower, thanking her for everything she provided and respecting her realm with no hidden ill content.

So where was she now that he was dead?

The mindstrain had answered his questions with a reverberating stamping from the impact, the pain telling Artur he was still alive, and still lost in the Depths.

No sunlight or shadows to tell time in the world under Mother’s lands. He heard only the droplets of water from the rocky ceiling, the same hard surface that listened to his friend's final screams.

For they are gone now, silent like the void that surrounds him.

After lying on the rough ground, adding to its trickle of moisture with his salty tears, Artur made a choice.

I will not die in the shadows, lost from Mother’s gaze. He crawls, following the upward slope in the hopes it will lead to the surface. A slow pace of constant fear and scraping fur, knocking stones with hands and knees that clatter to betray his position.

The tension of being discovered by the nightmares that had earlier chased them into the ground would build with each sound he made, the fear crushing him like an immense weight. Until the elongated silence that followed would confirm his safety.

The memories of their scraping claws on the stone walls, the cackling laughter of their hunting calls as the pack closed in. The screams of his friends as the horrors caught each of them, the wet meaty splatters of flesh being torn and the rich metallic scent of blood filling the air.

Fresh tears ran down Artur's cheeks as he crawled on, praying for Mother’s guidance and Uke’s good fortune.

His hand reached the rough base of a formation rising before him, the sheer size startled him with it being mere inches from his face and completely hidden. Climbing his way up slowly, the shape flowed and weaved around, Artur managed to manoeuvre himself around and felt more of the rough surface. Feeling each one, the varying sizes and shapes finally triggered a nostalgic memory of gathering Timbre root with his Father.

An underground forest of roots, each one dense and hard like the surrounding walls and unyielding when he tried to push through. Luckily the young Satyr was skinny and small for his age, allowing him to crawl and squeeze through gaps.

As he reached for another root to pull up on, his hand gripped a smooth object with small grooves in the side. Attempting to decipher this strange material in the dark was too much of a riddle for the exhausted youngling, instead, he tugged it free and placed it into his deep woven pockets.

To find anything soft amongst such hard roots could mean food, Artur hoped as his stomach rumbled in protest of neglect.

Shimmying, wriggling and weaving himself through the forest, he finally reached the edge as a faint glow gave shape to his surroundings. The light was incredibly faint, but in absolute darkness, even a single glow worm becomes a bonfire.

As he moved forward, the outlines of the hanging stalactites came into view and with it the sense of being inside a Verox’s jaws. The grim feeling was evaporating away with each step, replaced with the glimmer of hope that grew with the light.

Artur, still on his hands and knees, peaked around a bend in the tunnel to discover a mirrored reflection of the top world. Gnarled roots hung from the ceiling and exploded out the sides of the walls to crisscross the cool air to form a dense forest. Unlike the obstacle course of solid roots that Artur just bypassed through, these roots swayed and wobbled as the sources of the soft glow crawled along their flowing upside down branches.

The nostalgic reflection of what Artur saw was mostly triggered by the fat glowing slugs that were latched onto the plants, reminding him of Mother’s light above. Instead of a rich green, the swollen molluscs radiated a warm yellow that is produced from one end of their slimy bodies. Wildly varying in sizes, from tiny grains to full handspans of an adult Satyr, the slugs covered the surface of the roots like a plague. Their overall numbers amplified the light levels enough to allow Artur to see properly for the first time since delving into the Depths, and what he saw brought a smile to his face.

“Mia.” He whispered too loudly in the silence.

Another young Satyr was continuously touching slugs as she skirted around over-encumbered roots, she snapped to attention in fear from the call. The furry creases of worry on her face are matted with dried blood that leaked from patches of exposed flesh on her head. All down one side was raw from long strips of removed fur, with dirt and gravel plastered into the red flesh. The relief in her eyes at seeing Artur fueled his hopes of surviving this ordeal.

“Artur, thank Mother. I’m not alone.” She embraced her friends and collapsed into his arms, her body trembling with quiet sobs. They held each other for a time, comforting in the simple fact they could face the Depths together.

“How did you get away?” She whimpered from between his arms.

“I ran. Uke knows I’m craven but I was so scared. I am so scared.” He admitted with guilt.

“Survival does not make you a coward, Artur. We could not fight those creatures, they see you in the darkness, and can do strange things to your body.”

“Strange things, like what?” He asked, the worry evident in his voice.

“I do not know, it was dark and the effect of fear can be odd. Let us not dwell on it or our friends. We should be rejoicing that at least we survived.”

He mulls her words over for a moment, understanding her reasoning without admonishing the emotion of his shame for his rapid flight.

“Have you seen the others? Jaak or Peeter?” He mumbled the question, not truly wishing to know the answer. His lifelong friends were brothers to him, especially after their real families were taken by Hunters.

She shook her head in reply, fresh tears dripping to the tunnel floor. He wiped his face clean, looking to distract himself from their depressing reality Artur inspected the nearest slug.

“Why were you touching these things?” He pointed at it, keeping his hand away from its slimy sides or the trails of shimmering sludge on the roots.

“Watch.” Mia released herself from their embrace and prodded the focal point of the glowing tail. A syrup droplet of honeydew is secreted from the tail and onto her waiting hand, she holds it out for Artur to inspect.

“It is more delicious than a shroom core, try it.”

“Mia, have you lost your wits? That is bug muk.” She gobbled the droplet down, licking her lips in an exaggeration.

“Come now Artur, you must be half starved.” Probing a smaller slug this time for the honeydew, it secreted only a teardrop's worth onto her fingertip.

Without asking for permission, she shoved it into the young Satyr's mouth.

“Rutting hell Mia… that is wonderful.” The sweet nectar washed his dry tongue in a rich fruity flavour. He immediately pressed more slugs, quickly gorging himself with an abundance of the gold syrupy substance, his stomach in ecstasy from the sudden influx of nutritious calories.

“Is it not heavenly?” Mia stated between gulps.

Artur could only nod and smile while he feasted like a gluttonous lord, they smirked together at the wonderful bounty they’d discovered in such a harrowing place of the world.

As they poked a thick root of slugs, Mia leaned over him to push on a bulbous chunk of a slug. As she did, her gruesome wounds came within inches of Arthur's face. Amongst the pink crusted blood were dark spots of blackened flesh that glistened in the faint light like rotten meat. What he originally perceived to be fine hairs in the centre of the spots, were tiny broken spines puncturing her skin.

Artur stopped drinking down the honeydew and gripped Mia’s arm softly, stopping her constant foraging so he could inspect the injuries carefully.

“Mia, have you seen…” A tiny movement caught his eye. Nestled between the intertwining roots, a single fat slug bulged at the sides. Its illuminated end emitted an intense light that rippled with the contained nectar that threatened to burst its sides. Artur was entranced with wet lips at the sweet harvest on offer, a deep craving ached for the taste of the slug honeydew.

“Seen? What have you seen?” Mia whispered with sudden vigilance, following Artur's eyeline into the weaving forest.

What did I see? Artur questions himself, suddenly remembering a movement that caught his attention. He looked through the roots where the lonely chunky slug’s light cast shadow and gloom into the surrounding area. Artur focused his vision on another slug in the foreground, leaving the field of its fellow harvesting kind, and scaling a root toward the singular fat Queen slug. He followed the slug's journey and assumed this was what had originally grabbed his attention. As it crawled across a root, two smaller slugs briefly lit up.

The young Satyr cocked his head with curiosity at the odd mimicry in their movements, until the glow illuminated rows of pearly white teeth and reflected in giant globes that stared with predatory awareness.