The Boy From The Forest

Vincent made his way across the Hamlet of Om. It somehow seemed smaller than ever. Aunt Loretta said that Vincent was getting halfway big these days, so maybe that was the reason.

There was Old Wayne. Vincent had not talked to him since the time he had tried to ask about breadeaters. Vincent had seen some small trees, which might be straight enough to make a spear. The shortest way to get to them was past Old Wayne’s hut.

“Young Man!!” Phooey. Old Wayne was not asleep after all. He would get away from him as quick as he could.

“Young Man!! I’ve got to warn you! If you go no more than a mile in that direction, you will come out of the Forest. There will be no trees, just open land. Better listen to me!!” Old Wayne waved in a westerly direction.

“Old Wayne, thank you so much for telling me that. I would not want that to happen.” Old Wayne was crazy, that was for sure. Vincent kept his feet moving.

“Young Man!! You are going in the direction I just told you not to. Young people these days.”

Vincent found the small trees at a bend in the stream. He cut one of them down with a sharp piece of flint he carried. Now to get a spear point. He thought he had seen some sharp stones in that direction over there.

He realized with amusement that he was indeed going in the direction that Old Wayne had told him not to go. Were the sharp stones over there? No.

What was over that hill? He could not remember at all. Just for idle curiosity, Vincent climbed the hill.

And emerged into the open. Everything was so bright; at first he just stood there blinking his eyes. The trees did indeed end. There was a straight line where Forest suddenly became open field. After his eyes adjusted, he was amazed at how far he could see. In the Forest, line of sight was limited. Here you could see things a long way away. This was a whole new world for Vincent to explore.

Old Wayne was still crazy, even if he did happen to be right about this one thing.

Norman roamed over the countryside. Uncle Ron made him leave his bow and arrows at home. But there was not that much game anyway. He found forgotten little ponds. At the bottom of a hill was an old well. After he walked for half a day, he found the ruins of an old temple in a copse of trees.

Uncle Ron told him the temple was from a long-forgotten Calvinist cult. About the ponds and the well, Uncle Ron said that there had been a number of farms abandoned in the past decades. Uncle Ron was getting up in years, and he did not do that much, not any more. Norman had thought he would be helping him farm, but there was really very little for any of them to do.

They never asked why he was suddenly visiting them. They must have figured that he was in some kind of trouble at home. One day, Norman realized that Eric’s wedding was coming up, and he was going to miss it. Eric and Icelandia’s wedding, that is. Norman was not intending on stealing her from Eric. But the Second Son was really not supposed to do much of anything at all. A Second Son could hang around the castle while his Father was still living, but when the older brother gained the throne, the Second Son needed to go away and become a soldier of fortune or some such thing.

Vincent continued to move further away from the Forest. There were all sorts of plants, none of them familiar to him. He realized that some plants grow in full sun, and some grow in the shade of the great trees in the Forest.

Speaking of unfamiliar plants, there was a huge area with all the same kind of plants growing in it. How could that happen? The plants were a sort of greenish golden, all waving in the breeze.

Uncle Ron saw Vincent at the edge of the wheat field. He was acting like he had never seen a wheat field before.

“Hey!! You there!! Keep your filthy hands off that wheat!”

Vincent moved away a little bit, but he did not go away. Uncle Ron decided not to go out and confront him. This character might have a knife or something.

“Norman!! Get out here!! Get your bow and quiver!”

Norman came out of the house, bow and quiver in hand. He strung the bow and even nocked an arrow. Ready. Norman had been instructed in the manly art of war since he was out of diapers, so he felt pretty confident.

“Go tell that vagrant to get out of here. He is acting kind of strange.”

Out to the wheat field. Yes, there was somebody there.

“Hi,” ventured Vincent timidly.

Norman relaxed. This was no threat; it was just a boy about his own age.

“My name is Norman.”

“I’m Vincent.”

A few feet away, a squirrel bounded along in the grass.

“Vincent, do you see that squirrel?”

“Ummm… yes.”

“See his left eye.”

Whish! The arrow flew and pinned the squirrel to the ground. Norman ran and brought back the now-deceased squirrel. The arrow had gone through its left eye.

“Coo. Coo.” A turtledove sat on the branch of a small tree.

“See that bird.” Vincent picked up a rock and threw it, hitting the turtledove in the head. It fluttered lifeless to the ground.

The boys skinned the squirrel and turtledove. Starting a small fire, they ate their game. Vincent felt envious of Norman’s fine steel knife. Norman was impressed that Norman could throw a stone and kill something like that.

They spent the rest of the day together. Norman showed Vincent how to skip rocks off the surface of a pond. They compared what knowledge they had about girls. Neither one knew very much. The boys became friends.