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The Woodsman wakes up in pitch black.
He never wakes up in pitch black.
Not for years.
Not once.
Not since he got…
The Lantern.
Head reeling from the sheer blindness, he tries to get up, tries to think, tries, tries, tries to remember. What does he know? What has he ever known? He knows… he knows…
The Beast.
The Beast was here. He knows that. The Beast called him out here with that mournful melody, almost (more than almost) summoning him at will. What happened after he came is a blur. He remembers horror, and anger. He remembers setting the Lantern down to do something, something. He remembers (how can this be?) fighting the Beast. Fighting him… and losing. Oh, even if his mind had forgotten, his every muscle would remember losing.
He sways, almost on his feet, then finds his hands and knees in the snow again.
The Woodsman had been in and out of consciousness then. He remembers the hard crash to the ground, though he’d been too weak even to try and break the fall. He remembers voices. The Beast’s, rumbling in his bones, thundering in his head. Something higher, chirping irritably in his aching skull. And…
The Boy.
His struggle to stand stills, and his laboring breath catches for a moment.
The Boy was there. The elder child. He’d heard his voice—oh, what had he said?? Why can’t he remember those words? Why couldn’t he have woken up to heed him?
Wherever his memory fails, guess steps in. If the Boy was there, perhaps he has the Lantern now. Could he have escaped with it? Or did the Beast take it from him? The Beast is certainly not here now. And he can hear and see no sign of anyone else. Living, or…
“Boy” the Woodsman manages to rasp, then coughs harshly. Something isn’t quite right in his chest—probably from the Beast’s punishing attacks. He still recalls—feels—the claws choking the breath from his throat and lungs.
But he can’t stop searching. He has to find him. He has to know if that boy is here. Even if the boy still doesn’t trust him, he has to know. At least to hear his feet running away would mean he’s escaped the clutches of the Beast.
“Boy, where are you?” he forces his cracked voice to call out, groping blindly. “Boy?” Oh, how he wishes he knew the lad’s name!
His sightless hands collide with wood. A familiar sick feeling rises in his chest—edelwood. He knows the grain and texture at once, as well as he knows his own skin. Horrid trees! Even more horrible, now he knows what they were. What he made of them.
He fumbles along its surface, trying to find a handhold to help himself stand. It hardly seems tall enough to support him. Distorted and hard though it is, it seems less old, less like a thing that has always been entrapped by its own roots. Newer. Younger.
His fingers brush something cold amidst the branches. And his heart leaps to his mouth.
Metal.
Tin.
Dear God, no.
Frantically, the Woodsman feels out the shape, begging to be wrong. He isn’t. The tin is rounded. It has a handle. It has a spout. Desperately, the Woodsman fumbles along the wood, searching—pleading—for a chance. There isn’t. It is pure, lifeless edelwood. It is… was… the shape of a child.
And now he remembers why he set the lantern down.
The Woodsman has not wept since the night he lost his daughter. He weeps now. In the sheer black, in the cold snow, he weeps before a little edelwood tree. Mourning a child that was not his. Whom he did not know. Who did not trust him. Whose sickly face refuses to leave his mind, and whose smile he knows he has failed.
When the black turns to gray, he rises. He takes the kettle from where it hangs, precariously, from a branch. He dips his finger in the oil, already dripping from the cracked wooden visage like tears. He applies its stain to the tin. Then, he fixes it in the branches where it will not fall.
He has heard the little one’s brother say his name, four or five times since they met. Now it memorializes his teapot hat.
One more coughed-out sob, one more tear, at the sight.
“Farewell, little Greg,” he whispers (for that is all he can manage), using the name for the first and last time. He reaches out to touch its branches. Guilt withdraws his black-stained hand. His eyes shut out the image, but not the memory. The memories.
“I am so sorry I could not save you.”
His heavy head bows. He does not put his own hat back on as he walks away.
~~
The Woodsman wanders the Unknown for weeks. He searches—for what, he never knows for long. Sometimes, he searches for the Boy. Sometimes, he searches for the Lantern. Sometimes, fearing the loss of both, he searches for the Beast, and what vengeance he and his axe might take before he dies.
But his body is in no condition for vengeance. His injuries keep him painfully slow as he hunts through the woods.
The Woodsman sees very few beings of any sort as he wanders. Everything is hiding from the winter of the Beast. He is alone. Alone. Oh, even when he had the Lantern, he never let himself call it that. At least he had her. At least his life could mean something, could keep her life safe. Now? Without her, what does his life mean?
What is there to live for now?
As he wanders, the forest floor looks ever more inviting. His aching body is so weary. His body, his heart, his soul. And it would be so easy to lay it down, to rest. “Just for a while” comes into his thoughts, but he throws it away at once. He knows it would be a lie. He knows too well what would happen.
His gaze drifts down to the snow-soggy leaves.
Does he want it anyway?
His boots plod onward.
No. He will not give in to the Beast’s influence. Not this time.
~~
It has been weeks beyond count since he has heard the song of the Beast. Now, the night is dark and the woods are cold. They ring with mournful melody once again.
As soon as he hears it, the Woodsman’s head jerks up. The Beast. His head swivels round, trying to spot any sign. But there is nothing to see. Only to hear. So he stands, listening close, trying to catch the direction.
But… it is different. The song itself is unchanged, or nearly. The words, the same that have rung in his head. The tune, the same that has rumbled in his bones. And yet, there is something that is not the same. Something in the voice, the tone. It is familiar, but in a different way.
He shakes his head. It is nothing. The Beast must be attempting some new tactic, to draw more lost souls into his crooked hands.
Gripping his axe, the Woodsman creeps through the woods. And he does not wander. Or at least, he doesn’t feel like he’s wandering. As he follows the sound of the song, his feet find invisible paths through the snow, as if he is walking the path from his house to his well. As he follows the sound of the song, his shadow passes through shadows, like a tree among the trees.
Then, at last, he sees a light ahead. A ghostly glow he knows better than his own face.
The Lantern.
His daughter.
In that desperate moment of hope beyond hope, a cry of hoarse, wild joy tears itself from his throat. It is ill-timed.
The song stops. The antlers—which he had not even noticed amongst the branches—rear up. Then, with the flap of a black-stained cloak, the creature holding the lantern runs.
With a snarl, the Woodsman takes off after it. He’s finally found her, after weeks apart. He’s not about to let the Beast take her away again.
They run through the Unknown, two shadows in chase. The Beast tries to lose him, but the Woodsman will not be lost. His injuries scream at him to stop, but he refuses to listen. He’s gaining on it. Light blinks and vanishes. The wild woods flicker by.
Suddenly, the light goes down. Shadows stain the snow. It’s almost as if the Beast—what a thought!—has tripped. It must be a trick. But he can’t miss his opportunity. The Woodsman runs. He finally catches up. He raises his axe high above his head with a roar.
“AHHH, DON’T KILL ME, DON’T KILL ME!!”
The Woodsman freezes in place.
He looks down.
There below him in the snow is a boy. Not the Beast. A boy, curled up in a fearful ball, shielding his head from the blow still poised for his life. His cape, though stained with oil, is blue beneath.
It’s him.
“Lad?” asks the Woodsman, his weapon slowly lowering.
The Boy looks up, terrified, with wide eyes. And the Woodsman stumbles backward. His eyes are not his own. The blue iris is gone. The black pupil is gone. Even the whites of his eyes are gone. They are replaced with rings, in three glowing colors. What’s more, where once had been his tall red cap, only a tattered husk remains. It has been torn apart by branches, like antlers, sprouting from the Boy’s own head.
The ringed eyes suddenly flood with recognition. “Mr. Woodsman.” The Boy sits up, gripping the Lantern in one hand, staring at him intensely. “Oh my gosh, Mr. Woodsman!”
In revulsion, the Woodsman takes another step back, leveling his axe defensively. At that, the Boy cringes back, curling in on himself. Curling in on the lantern. “Nonono, don—d-don’t axe me, please!”
We just wanna get home with all our legs and arms attached!
The words sting through his memory like an echo of the past. How long ago that first day seems! He lowers his weapon once more, this time deliberately, though he still keeps his grip. “What have you done, Boy?” Or else, what has been done to you?
The Boy only bows his antlered head lower. His limbs are shaking. The lantern light almost illuminates him from the inside out, as if through hollow holes in wood.
“Please… p-please don’t. I ha—I have to take care of Greg.”
The axe nearly slips from his fingers. The image of the stubby little edelwood flashes like a stab to his heart. “Your… your brother?”
“I have to keep him alive,” the Boy mutters, shaking his head. “I have to, I—th-the Beast said I had to choose, and—well, for weeks, I’ve been trying to get oil, but I don’t—Gr-Greg’s in—”
“The Lantern.” The Woodsman stares, hardly able to form the words. “Soul… in the lantern.”
The Boy looks up with wide eyes. The water on the rims of them glows with the light from his eyes. “Yeah.” He scoffs out of wry surprise, wristing away his unfallen tears. “Y-yeah, that’s exactly it. That’s what the Beast said. But now—now I’m taking care of him. Right?” He turns a shaky smile down to the Lantern, cradled in his arms. “A-and he’s okay, and I’m taking care of him like I should’ve been doing all along. I…” He takes a wavering breath, and his smile falters. “…I was supposed to be the elder child. You were right, I was. I was. But now I’m doing it! As—as long as he’s still alive, I have a chance to do it right, so it’s okay.” His voice cracks on the last syllable, and he crouches over the little lantern. “It’s okay…” he whispers brokenly.
Chills sweep over the Woodsman’s arms. Every beat of his heart pains him. And the image before him—the poor Boy enveloping the cold Lantern with himself, hunched over it—haunts his thoughts horribly.
But he saw young Greg’s tree.
He knows the truth.
“Boy…” he falters, unsure of how to speak, “your brother is…”
“Don’t you DARE tell me that!” shouts the Boy with sudden fierceness, whirling to his feet faster than ever he could have when he was only a boy. His knuckles tighten on the lantern handle. “If you think that, you’re wrong, just like Beatrice! Greg is fine! His soul is right here in this lantern, and he’s fine, and I’m taking care of him, okay?”
“But lad—”
“This is my burden to bear. Just like you told me.” The anger in his eyes suddenly vanishes into realization. “Just… just like you.” They stare up at him, round as moons. “You know, don’t you? What it’s like? The—the whole lantern burden thing?”
The Woodsman stares back, into eyes both utterly unfamiliar and yet so exactly like his own.
Oh, he knows.
The desperation. The terror. The grieving joy of a desolate chance. The loneliness.
But he knows the pain, too. His skull knows the throbbing from the sprouting antlers. His eyes know the ache from the unnatural glow. His body knows the struggle, the years of strain and self-discipline, that it took to get it under control, enough to keep all his features human, enough to keep from frightening off the first stranger who got a look at him. His gut knows the loathsome feeling from every time he relapses.
And he knows the haunting.
The voice in his head. The dread in his dreams. The tune in his bones. The song-summons that brings him to the woods, no matter where he is.
The presence that has crept beneath his skin and into his will more times than he could fend off, though he has always (…almost always) tried.
Why not let me take the Lantern awhile?
I’ve fought you for the Lantern before, and I’ll fight you again.
And now, as his gaze falls on the new lanternbearer—a boy, barely more than a child himself, all his emotions running wild from guilt and fear—the thought of the Beast daring to possess him builds a sick sensation in his chest.
“Oh, child,” he murmurs hoarsely, “I know everything it is like.”
The Boy stares at him for a moment, as if staring into his very soul. Then he lets out a gasping sigh. “Th-then help me! I mean, you know, y-you get it! You can show me how to get the oil and stuff to keep Greg alive, and—and then I'll be out of your hair!" He scoffs a sort of laugh. "Yeah, I-I can do this whole Unknown thing. I can do this. I mean, I mean if you did it…”
“Boy…”
“But why? I-I mean, why'd you get stuck with the lantern? You said it was your torch to burn or whatever, but there's no way you had it for the same reason. It’s not like you had somebody! Un…unless…” Horror flashes across his face, a sickened grief in its wake. “Oh gosh… d-did you? When you were the lanternbearer, did you… I-I don't know...”
"Did I what?"
He hesitates, almost choking on the word. “Did you have a Greg?”
The question twists a knife in his heart. Images flood him. The image of his daughter. The image of Greg, beaming the same brightness and sheer innocence. The hopeless image of the stubby little tree… and of the sight he saw that night so long ago.
“I… I did.” His eyes slip shut and he nods, swallowing down a rocky lump. “Oh, I did have such a one,” he whispers.
A silence lingers over them as the Woodsman’s eyes keep closed. He does not see the Boy’s face. But he hears, hushed and solemn—
“Then you really do know.”
The Woodsman opens his eyes. And in that moment, he stares at the Boy as if he is a mirror. For they are the same. They’re exactly the same. They both failed the one they were meant to protect. They both were given the same choice. They both…
Sorrow suddenly turns lead in his gut.
They both were told the same story.
Your dear, beloved charge is lost. Take up this lantern, and you can keep their soul alive. Become the bearer, and you can make up for what you failed to do. They can never come back, but you can sustain what’s left. Only keep it lit.
They are lost. You are not. Let me in.
Shivers run up and down his skin. Faint snatches of songs bounce through his brain—not the Beast’s songs, but songs about him. He’s heard them drifting from campfires and taverns in years past. Don’t believe his lies, they sing to the far from home. He’s hoping never to let you return.
Lies.
Don’t believe his lies.
The reflection stares, believing what the Woodsman knows is a lie. Knows by the evidence of his own eyes and hands and the oil-stained epitaph on a teakettle to be a lie.
Don’t believe his lies.
Are they all lies?
The thought grinds his teeth. How trustworthy is the word of the Beast? Does he really know what happened to his daughter? Was she ever in the Lantern at all? Or is it the more likely that the Beast killed her, or found her dead already, and simply told the Woodsman what he wanted to hear?
The answer doesn't need to be spoken.
For so long, I thought I could save her lost soul. I thought I was saving her. But all I was doing was grinding edelwood into oil—edelwood! Oh, what I was truly doing! Every one of them, some poor Greg... God forgive me, how could I not see? What blinded me so to the purposes of the Beast? My daughter was never…
He stares in that mirror. And his pounding, furious thoughts slow.
The lost soul was never the one in the lantern.
“M-Mr. Woodsman? Are you…um…are you okay?”
A pause.
“What is your name?” he asks softly of his reflection.
The Boy blinks up, taken aback in surprise. “M-me? I’m just…it-it doesn’t matter, really, I…” He presses his lips together tight. “Wirt.”
The Woodsman sighs, in something he could almost call relief. Wirt. Wirt. A name. He commits it to memory, swearing not to lose it as he lost his own so long ago.
“Well… Wirt…” (how strange it feels to call someone by name!) “…I fear you were right, when you met me by the tavern. I… I was the Beast all along.”
“What? Oh—no—no, that’s not—” Wirt’s shoulders hunch up, and he grimaces. “Ahh, sorry, that was stupid, I-I shouldn’t have said—”
“He who bears the Dark Lantern must be the Beast,” he murmurs recitation. “I have heard the saying myself, time and again, but never believed it. But it is true.” His fist tightens on the handle. “That is true.”
Wirt’s ringed eyes go wide, darting down. His muscles tense.
The Woodsman sees the axe still in his hand. He sighs mournfully. “This land is no place for any but the lost. And you and I are more lost than I realized.” With a great deal of uncertain faith, he casts the axe to the ground, and turns to the desperate lanternbearer.
Wirt glances to the fallen axe. Then back up. Warily. Watchfully.
Fearfully.
If the Beast took him now, the Woodsman could not bring himself to pick up that axe again, even to defend his own life.
Regardless, he steps over it. Steps closer to the vessel of the Beast. Steps without looking at the ground, holding Wirt’s gaze as if he might vanish from looking away.
“What you are,” he says carefully, “is in every way what I was. I have walked the very path you tread, feared the very things you dread, and endured, in both body and spirit, the very pain you feel. I did so alone. You, Wirt… you will not.”
With a breath that he knows could be his last, he sets his hand on the blackstained-blue shoulder.
“I offered, when we met, to help you. I wish now more than anything that I had. For your sake and your brother's, I wish I had not left you then. But I will not now. And I promise you this; that whatever may come to you, whatever you must endure, I will face it with you, and do what I can to see you through it.”
“Why?” bursts out suddenly. Then, faltering, remorseful, “No… I-I mean… I…”
He tries to smile. He only manages to conjure the ghost of one. But the ghost is real.
“Son, we lost souls must never walk alone.”
At that, the Boy—the Beast—Wirt—falls utterly silent. Stares at him. Gapes at him. One moment. Another.
(The Woodsman can feel the shadows now, as if they are drawing themselves to the Lantern.)
Those beast-eyes begin to glow liquid at the edges, utterly unblinking.
His teeth grit visibly.
(The Woodsman braces himself.)
Then, eyelids snap shut like jaws, Wirt lurches forward...
And suddenly, the Woodsman finds a child clinging to him. A child, crying in his arms. Dear Lord, his arms haven’t borne up a child in so long. His breath shudders. But he doesn't let go. He folds his arms around the oil-stained figure. He holds on. Though Wirt coughs out apologies, sniffling that he doesn’t usually do this, stammering out hopes that his antlers didn’t jab him, the Woodsman only wraps him tighter.
A son with no father, a father with no child. A lost boy and a lost man.
What a pair they make.