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To style oneself invulnerable is to play with fire. But as The Beast once joked to his Neighbor, he is already that, so what is the issue?
It is a dangerous game. Stories and reputation. One the Beast has taken a fondness to playing.
For he is the Beast. The forest. The death of hope. What could be done to him?
They– his prey, those silly little humans– they speak so highly of him.
Their songs may as well be flattery, with how they portray him. Their whispered warnings stroke his ego, their tales whispered at night only add to his reputation.
It is flattery. There is no other word for it.
Some say he can control sound, or can steal your voice from your throat, can make you lose your way on your way to your own grandmother’s house. He is everywhere, they say, can see from every eye and knot in the trees, can spy down from the moon far in branches, that he sees all that there is to see the dark, dark night.
It is flattery. He cannot do even half of those things.
Flattering as it is, is also helpful. The doubt such stories paint bleeds hope from wandering wayward souls. It is a good thing, to be feared so that your legend reaches beyond where your voice has ever echoed.
But.
But.
As regretful as it is, The Beast is not a shadow. He is not a concept. He is not a tree that has uprooted itself and started walking.
He is, regretfully, in a vast majority, physical. And all the limitations that comes with.
He is physical. A being that exists. And, unfortunately, a being that is, at this rather misfortunate moment, being pursued by a rather extremely angry man with a rather extremely large axe.
It is unfortunate, really.
Perhaps there is a bright side, here. An axe is better than a musket. He did have one of those, this man, until the Beast managed to knock it astray to the treeline.
Normally, being pursued this would perhaps be less of a problem. He is swifter in trees than any human, and knows the forest more than they would ever be able to fathom.
Unfortunately, there is a cliff behind him.
Where trees meet sky.
He may have, perhaps, miscalculated how this would go.
…
He had been trying to recruit himself a new Lantern Bearer. His prior one has gotten quite… old in his servitude. Somewhat stale. Boring. He has grown somewhat too close to realizing that when he dies, he may be reunited with his wife.
That is who The Beast has the man convinced is in the Lantern, and it isn’t wrong, per se, he did consume her, she is within it, within him, within the lantern.
Just not in the manner the fool thinks.
This new lantern bearer, she had been perfect. It should have been a simple task, to convince her. Grief-stricken, she was. They are always the easiest to target when they are.
Her husband had drowned in the well, and after a few whispered voices here and there, she had been convinced that he was still within the mortal plane. Waiting for her to find him.
The Beast had it all planned, to proposition her a deal. He had heard her husband's pleas from within his woods, and he could offer her a vessel for his form. He wants her to, she just must keep his soul lit.
It had been the perfect scheme.
Of course, he had miscalculated.
He has not done that in some time.
He had not known the woman’s father was inside, having traveled to her cabin because, so far as he can assume, her likely sending him letters of increasing madness.
Furthermore, The Beast had not know he was armed.
This is not the first time he has been shot. It will perhaps not be the last, with the terrible growing popularity of the weapons.
The lead ball had blasted one of his legs to splinters below the knee, and the trees are thin enough here he is visible against the sky as he limps.
It had been a poor plan. To try anything with his back to the sky.
Later, he will tell it as a learning moment. Make no mention of the misfortune.
Now, though? Right now, it is a pricey miscalculation.
The cliff is ahead. A stone’s throw.
To tumble down a mountainside, to his woods below, or to be axed to splinters, and to need to piece himself into something approximating useful after.
The mountainside seems preferable in that he will only be somewhat cracked, as experience has told. That is preferable to the alternative.
Unfortunately, he does not get to choose.
Metal hits his antler. Hard, severing. Splintering. Crashing. White-hot pain. A piece of him on the forest floor, another still yet running.
It is odd, to be severed from yourself.
It is odd, to be splintered.
Another step on twisted leg, undergrowth against antler fallen to oil soaked earth.
He will need to return for it, he finds mind to think, as oil spills from his body. Leaving a fraction of himself in the hands of a mortal has never bode him well in the past.
His fingertips brush open air, and the Beast tosses himself to fall.
For now, he must... well, he must not have more of him carved away.
(At least, he thinks, his lantern will be tended while he is between the now and whenever he will be conscious again.)
He rolls, cracking, snapping, he hits a tree, feels something crunch within him, break. Then continue to roll.
It is not that he falls unconscious. That is not something he has yet found himself capable of. Still, it is also not that he is unaware. His eyes still do see, and his body does feel, but—
Well, when your body is wooden, and you have tumbled down a mountainside, would you be quite so inclined or able to sit up, as all the oil within you bleeds into the earth?
It is a while, is all, before he gathers enough of himself to sit. It is longer still before he does stand, lopsided, splintered leg.
He is hurt.
It is a mortal thing, to hurt. To have nerves that send pain signals, to feel your body. He is not this. He is not something of flesh.
Despite this, as he takes stock of his oilstained and fractured bark, of his twisted new leg, of his single remaining antler, and, importantly, how difficult to stand it is with only half a head, he is, perhaps, hurt.
Perhaps somewhat a lot.
Fuck.
The Beast does not visit Pottsfield in daylight all too often. This, he rationalizes as he limps toward the quaint town, oilstrewn and staggering, is a passable reason to make an exception.
His leg creaks, still unstable, and it is more than a bit disorienting to know his antler is very much not attached to him, and, if he pauses to feel it, within some sort of box.
This is dreadful. And the Beast would like very much to rest in Enoch’s barn loft until things do stop spinning quite so much.
Which they are. Spinning.
There, in the barn, at the very least the only one privy to his embarrassment is Enoch, who has seen him worse.
(It is terrible, and embarrassing, but he has.)
Within the barn (he does loathe to admit) he does feel somewhat secure. As paradoxical as that does seem, to be secure outside of his trees. His woods. But Enoch would tear the sky from its seams or rip the ocean from shore before anything got to him within Pottsfield. Hospitality is important, after all.
And his neighbor is nothing if not hospitable.
Enoch is overseeing the fields when he catches a glimpse of the Beast. Bright eyes, billowing cloak as the West Wind makes her journey across sky.
He is at the border.
This is not an odd place for him to be, all things considered. He is, of course, where he usually stands. Against the large pole, slightly crooked, where he waits, the creature of habit.
But what is odd is the fact it is daylight.
And, as Enoch draws closer to his neighbor, there is a more glaring flaw:
He is missing an antler. And he is leaning against the fence, exhaustedlike. His gaze is piercing, as he watches Enoch approach.
Concerned.
And Enoch, in this moment, perhaps would like to destroy something.
More than perhaps. Has every intent to.
His anger is not a quick thing, normally. It is a slow creeping, a tide of resentment, a thousand slights, a slow-dripping drop of tar.
Right now he is lightning.
Who, what, thing or being, whatever has harmed the Beast, will crumble beneath his rage, will be destroyed so utterly that it will never be remembered, never to be named again.
“What has happened? ” asks Enoch, aghast. Violent. Protective. Reaches to him, reaches ribbon forward.
“Yes, Hello,” says his neighbor, who tries to wave off his encroaching ribbons. “Might I request temporary lodging?”
His voice wobbles, not quite uncertain, but dazed, nearly.
Enoch cannot quite recall when he was quite this furious.
He does not need to ask. The Beast knows, Enoch is sure. But he is a thing of decorum, and rules. He will never walk into Pottsfield without permission, despite how Enoch may wish him to visit.
Enoch reaches out, draws more ribbons about the Beast, pulls him across and through the border, closer, within his entanglement of ribbons, where he cannot be seen, where the day’s light and prying eyes would not see him.
His Beast freezes up, but does not pull away.
“Enoch,” he snaps, embarrassed, but there is nothing to be done for prying ribbons.
Nothing to ward him off. Not right now, in the least.
Enoch knows his neighbor. Knows how his body is formed, knows the tunnels and hallows within it intimately, and as ribbons explore, press within, he knows that he is hurt.
He is damaged, but how damaged? And from what ? His antler is an oilslick mess, a hole into his cavernous Self. Unsealed. There are cracks betwixt his wooden ribbing, his leg a mangled mess of woodfiber and scaffold.
“You will stay in my barn,” Enoch announces, curls a thinner ribbon inside and into The Beast’s chest, where a human’s heart might sit. Within him there is breakage, oilflow within typically dry tunnels. He presses deeper, through him, tries to find damage, to see the extent of this all.
The Beast shudders, makes a sort of keen of a sound, and Enoch pauses, loosens his grip, does not release him from his ribbonry, but does pull his ribbons out, only by a few inches, from within him, not in entirely.
“I am fine, ” the Beast gasps, despite that he is not, and Enoch can tell. “You needn’t—It— that is perhaps too much, right now, Enoch.”
He does disagree. But perhaps he should not push this, especially in the state his neighbor is in.
From the border to the barn is not a short distance on foot.
To Enoch, it is inches.
He deposits his Beast in the loft, looms over him as he turns, trails ribbons over sealing wood.
He is small. Broken in places, cracked in others. He will mend, but…
“You did not answer my question,” Enoch reminds, protective. “What has happened, Beast?”
“I rolled down a cliff.” It is too short. It is not the full story. Anyone can tell, the break of his antler is far too clean, and he would not have left it.
He waits a moment, to see if he will add anything. He does not.
“You certainly did more than that, Neighbor.” Enoch trails a ribbon across his neck, around it, across his shoulder.
“Enoch,” the Beast complains– to the ribbon, or to the question, Enoch is not entirely certain.
“You will tell me. You are in my barn. I do think,” he presses another ribbon through his neighbor’s leg, then wraps himself over the Beast, around him, encapsulating.
“I, perhaps ,” he sounds offended to even need admit it, “had a scuffle in the woods with a human. He had one of those new weapons.”
“And your antler?” Enoch presses, both in word, and within him, through him.
“Will be recovered in due time, Enoch.” The Beast tilts his head up to meet Enoch’s maypole face. Closer.
“I will destroy them,” Enoch declares, leans down his head, meets the Beast in what could, in some manner, be described as a kiss.
“It is my forest, Enoch. It will not happen again.” He shifts, leans back into the hayloft.
“You came to me, Beast, you will allow me to help you. You are in my hayloft, you are covered in oil, you are a mess, Beast.” He curls a ribbon into his neighbor’s chest, feels his body hitch. “Your leg is shattered, your head all cracked. I will kill them all. I will send my townsfolk—”
“No, you will not—” he argues, falls silent as Enoch wraps all around him, through him, affectionate, and, as Enoch hopes, at least a bit overwhelming.
“And what of your lantern, Beast?” Enoch interrupts, coos, really. “Must I find that as well? Bring it back to you, while you are safe in my loft?”
“It is tended, Enoch,” he manages.
“No. No. You shall stay here,” with him, "and I will recover your lantern, and I will unmake who did this to you..”
“Enoch.” Rickety fingers find ribbon, talonous fingertips pull them, complaining, “You will allow me my peace— ”
“Is that not here?” he croons.
“—and I will tend to my woods on my lonesome.”
Enoch does disagree, and perhaps the Beast does too, too proud to admit it, because for now, Enoch folds himself over his beast, content to make… absolute certain he is perfectly fine, by all measures.
He will tend to his neighbor first. And after, to that which brought him here.
It is an easy thing, The Beast thinks, to slip from Pottsfield into the darkness of his wood. He has done it before, under cover of dark and sky. He will slink from loft window, to shadowed ground, then up through the fields back to the wood.
It is easy, or will be, now that he is entirely in one piece. Or two pieces, if you count his missing antler. His leg reformed, cracks gone already.
All he must do is step through the gate or over the fence, turn his back to fields, and carry on as he has.
…and turn his back to the fields, and carry on as he has.
Enoch sits on the fence, looks at him with a particularly disdainful expression.
He has been caught. He has not even left the fields.
“On your way already, Beast?” There is a smile to his tone. Enoch’s head tilts to the side. He is smug.
The Beast stands there, clears his throat, attempts to look nonchalant.
“…Yes.” Best to be certain. What would he say otherwise? ‘no, Harvest Lord, I was on a stroll towards the boundary, I did not intend to make a dash for it so you would not interfere with my woods.’
“Well.” Enoch hops from the fence, towards the woods, “On our way then.”
Our way.
No. Unacceptable.
“Enoch. You do not need to chaperone me, ” he argues. “ I am—I am more than capable of managing a simple—this is not even a dispute with someone worth our time; it is a mere human. I will burn down the house and barricade them within, and plant them as they die.”
“That does seem like a good plan, yes,” Enoch purrs.
“I do not need you for it.”
“I disagree.” He is smug. The Beast would like to scream.
“Enoch. You are trespassing.”
Enoch pauses, turns, squints at him, “If we are using that defense, Beast, I allowed you time spent within my border. You do owe me the same.”
He has a point. The Beast wishes to strangle him.
“Well, then, I will give it in due time. For now, Enoch, you shall not– Enoch. Where are you going, Enoch. ”
Enoch pads into the woods, and—
And there he goes.
…
The Beast is, perhaps, not getting out of this.
…
Enoch is not slow, the Beast loathes to admit. He has no issue keeping pace within the dense branches and brush. Although, as they venture further into the wood, he does appear less and less of a barn cat, and more and more something of longer legs and whiskers.
But he keeps pace.
So who is the Beast to complain? He has never asked about Enoch’s cat form. He has never had need to.
At Enoch’s insistence, paranoid as he is, they recover the Lantern. Enoch insists on filling it with his clumsy cat’s paws, something about how a mere mortal should not be tending to something as important.
He just wants to keep it in Pottsfield. He is greedy like that.
As they head skyward up the hills, and once they are within an echo's distance, the Beast begins to sing. Something of hunting, of warning, a threat.
Enoch joins.
A duet in the trees.
It is, he must admit, not all that unpleasant.
…
The house burns beautifully.
Nothing in the woods burns so bright as the lantern, and no fire catches so eagerly as his own flame. To burn larger than in his lantern feels good, powerful. To be a housefire, more than a flicker within a metal cage.
It may not be Edel, but the memories within the house burn just as sweet. The hope wringing dry, the memories going up in smoke.
Enoch, regretfully, proves himself much of a help in moving logs to the doors. As well as securing exit points, and being a useful distraction as the Beast sets it all ablaze.
(He had been worried they may notice him, may threaten his antler. Attached to him as it is, cut it to pieces, he would feel it, and it would not be particularly pleasant.)
The house burns. Two trees are planted within. They sprout from the ashes, look to be tall ones.
He pulls his antler from the embers. Holds it to his head. It grows to his skull, as if, perhaps, none of this ever did happen.
Whole.
Enoch looks at him, from his spot atop the roots of one of the new Edels, still befleshed and faced it is. Enoch tilts his head, squints, “You know, Beast, I do not think it was always at that angle. Your antler.”
“Hush, you.”
“Is this why they are occasionally different?”
“What, shall I cut it off and let you attach it to your liking? A pest, you are.”
Enoch laughs, and the Beast wonders if he should leave him to find his own way back to the border.
But that would be far too much telling. Enoch does not need to know more about the woods than he already does.
The Beast leads him back to Pottsfield. Drops him off whole and in a pleasant mood to his people. And, as he finally does leave, blissfully alone, swears to himself that he will never allow this to be mentioned again.
(It will be.)
(Enoch would never let this sort of thing rest.)
(That is, of course, exactly like him.)