Deeper Into The Forest, Thence To A Village

I try to project an aura of confidence that I don't feel. "We should follow the game trails out into the forest, they will lead to water and edible plants," I declare. (Yet again unsure how I know this, but hoping I am right.)

Jane Doe looks at me oddly, then shrugs her shoulders and we set off. Soon, we are marching along the paths worn into the dirt of the forest floor by the passage of countless small scurrying creatures. Not long thereafter we come to a stream. Each of us takes a turn on guard while the other quenches their thirst. Then we fill our water skins and canteens before setting out again along the stream's edge.

While we've traveled we have heard many animals in the distance. A riot of birds from the trees above, but in the immediate vicinity nothing moves. Soon even the birds fall silent. An oppressive and waiting hush falls about us, even as, ahead, the light grows brighter...

Rounding a bend in the stream we press through a thicket of shrubbery and rose cane which snatches at our clothing. On the other side we come upon a pastoral vista.

Fields, walls, fences, and hedgerows frame a wide valley. At its center nestles a quaint village of tight packed stone houses sheltering behind a low-ish, stout, curtain wall. On the far side of the village from us rears a forbidding castle of dressed stone blocks. From its four corners flies a banner of a leaping yellow dragon on a purple field with a scattering of stars. The same device adorns the two gates of the village we can see, likewise the banner above the castle gate. The stream we have been following winds down amongst the fields to join a larger brook. Thence it joins small river which disappears from sight at the lee of the village's walls.

Some echo of a memory tells me that it is likely that the castle was built where a bend of the river formed a natural moat for it. The village then grew up at its feet, its people taking shelter in the fortress in times of peril. As the village's prosperity grew the surrounding lands were tamed and tilled to feed the people there. Meanwhile the village itself increasingly housed fewer farmers and more craftspeople. At last a secondary fortification was erected so that the surrounding farmers could come into the village in times of danger. This freed the castle to house the rising number of soldiers required to keep the peace and dissuade robbers and brigands from moving into the area.

All these conclusions are bolstered by what I observe here. Small farmsteads are scattered throughout the area. None seem untenanted. No significant damage shows that raid and plunder haunt the countryside, nor do great plumes of smoke and dust indicate an encamped army. Sheep, cows, chickens, and pigs can be seen in farmyards. In several places husbands and wives work together hanging out the wash to dry in the blazing sun of this lovely cloudless day. I also hear, somewhere in the near distance, children at play. Their carefree joviality does not sound **** or strained.

It all seems perfect: I am on my guard at once.

There is one key flaw with this idyllic scene: less than ten miles away lies the ruins of a mighty city clearly built in an age far more advanced than that which produces this midieval pastoralism. Yet, (for all that these people could clearly be making good use of the materials left behind in those crumbling ruins,) no path, no trail, no track, leads from this obviously well established village to what is doubtless the greatest treasure trove of relic-tech, (to say nothing of salvageable steel and plastic) for hundreds of miles in every direction. That might be easily explained away; the danger of what lies in the ruined towers of glass and stone has rendered them Taboo. Yet, (if that were so,) why were there no signs, no fence, no wall; nothing to mark the boundaries between safety and the forbidden?

Something is rotten in this affair, and until we get to the bottom of this mystery both I and my companion are in danger...