Raspberry Blood

Drawing breath takes effort. Your skin itches, and muscles protest every movement. You'd kill for a rabbit, but the wind carries little besides dust. Even forest colors have turned to ash.

You slump against a tree, shut your eyes against the white sun and groan.

"You hurt?" A girl no older than seven peers at you from beneath a straw hat tied with green ribbons that match her dress. Small fingers close around your wrist. Your insides flutter like the butterfly you swallowed earlier. "Are you sick?" The freckles beneath the brim bunch together with concern. "Open your mouth."

"Aaaah."

She wrinkles her nose. "Didn't your mama teach you to brush your teeth?"

"What about your mama?" You glance around. "Where's she?"

"Oh. There." She waves vaguely behind her. "Gone. With all the grown-ups." She points in the opposite direction. "We go this way."

Before you believe it, the miracle is gone.

"Hey!" You lurch after the straw hat. "Where to?"

"We need to wash you up!"

You move as fast as your starved body allows. The branches part for the girl, then snap back, whipping your sides, snagging your legs and holding you back.

Ahead, a stream flashes in the sunlight. You throw yourself in. The water washes away dirt and fatigue.

"That's better," chirps the girl, picking something from the ground. "Stay there. Soak."

You roll onto your back, snorting. Your nose clears. A sweet scent drifts across the stream. Bright splashes of wild raspberries blaze on the opposite bank. Things are looking up.

"What are you doing in the forest?" the girl asks. She tosses you a bunch of leaves. "Chew these, then swallow."

You don't need convincing. Dinner is looking better by the minute.

"Whad ahm I doin'?" you say around a mouthful of mint and something equally aromatic you've never tasted before. "Walkin'. Lookin' 'round. What 'bout you?"

"Same." She climbs onto a rock jutting from the stream, brushes leaves from her skirt, and smoothes the folds.

"What are you looking for?"

"Berries. Plants. Caterpillars. Sun-dried ones taste better. My brother taught me. He also told me never to drink from the village well." She bends down and drinks from the stream.

"Why?"

"The water makes you what you are. Hungry become monsters. Cruel become murderers." She traces a cross in the water with a stick. "Cowards run. People blame the wolf."

"What wolf?"

"The one they chased into the well when the hunger came. The one that cursed the water. My brother says--"

"Where is he?"

She falls silent, looks at her feet in boys' boots.

You change the subject. "No rabbits, no birds. Even the worms . . ." You stop talking. She may catch on.

But she has already crossed to the other bank, her face now smeared red. The raspberries vanish fast from the bushes. The sound of chewing waters your mouth, but you remind yourself of good things and those who wait.

No need to look for dessert. You drool as you squint into the sky. The sun filters through the canopy, shedding its heat as evening approaches. Time to climb out, but the water is soothing and the smell of raspberries is so sweet. You linger, contemplating monsters, murderers and cowards--

"How much longer you going to soak?" The girl's voice brings you back. "I need to go home."

You rush out of the water, but she's gone. Dusk has seeped into the forest, smearing coolness across the dead grass.

The sweet smell leads you to a flash of straw among the trees. "Catch!" Whether it is the girl's voice or your own hunger, you cannot tell.

You follow. Roots snare your feet, stones shift and send you sprawling, hollows gape beneath you like waiting mouths. You drag yourself up and on, chasing the beat of a heart ahead, full of raspberry blood.

Before you catch her, the canopy thins and roofs emerge beneath an orange sunset sky.

From the edge of the woods, you watch her run toward sagging huts with shattered windows. No light. No movement. Only an old well and the bones of fences.

What if she has figured you out? Why didn't you do it earlier, when her thin neck reflected in the stream? She would not have had time to be frightened. Instead, you wasted time thinking.

A wind sweeps in from the fields, runs through the roadside grass, rattles the rusty chain of the well. The sound tugs at something buried deep inside you. You chase the memory. Hunger snaps the trail.

The girl won't survive anyway, alone in a world gone savage. Sun-dried caterpillars. What kind of life is that?

She reaches a shed that looks familiar but for its collapsed roof. She opens the door and looks your way.

All the grown-ups gone, she said earlier. In a few leaps you are beside her. The green bow beneath her chin trembles slightly. She stares at you with darkened eyes as she steps inside the shed.

You follow the smell of raspberries. "Don't be afraid." You grin. "You won't even--"

The ground vanishes from under your feet. You fall onto sharp spikes. One punches through your belly. Another pins your leg. Stones come from above. They break bones, knock out teeth, rip your ear.

You swoon, but pain drags you back.

Dozens of children surround the pit, whistling, yelling, raining down stones. Their hungry eyes sit in faces that look too old.

The girl holds the hat in her hands now. Green ribbons spill from it like snakes. Her tangled hair hangs wild around a face suddenly older than seven.

"Good job, sis." The tallest of the children pats her shoulder. "It's a big one. Tonight you get the first pick."

She licks red from her teeth.

The air smells of crushed berries.

Drawing breath takes effort.