My midnight dreaming was interrupted by a shuffling. Still half asleep, I opened my eye and saw a figure shifting to a hitching tree. I didn’t think of it and lapsed back into sleep.
❃ ❇ ❃
The next morning was fairly typical, save for Jax. James harnessed me as always and brought me out to the clearing where the human leader told the men the day’s schedule: harvest on the eastern edge until midday, then spend the rest of the day on the south.
Jax was agitated all morning. He flattened his ears and stomped his feet the whole time the leader was giving orders. When James and Baylor led us east to start cutting, Jax was absent-minded and slow.
“Jax, what is with you today?” Baylor tugged his rein to get his attention. Jax just snorted and flicked his ears.
I turned to him when we reached the tree and the men began to work on it. “He has a point, Jax. You seem... distracted today. What’s going on?”
His head snapped to attention when he turned to face me, “Wha- oh. I’m just... I don’t know. I can’t focus.” He looked to the woods with a panicked expression.
My eyes rolled. I hoped he wasn’t having another hallucination like the shiny mare one earlier. I tried to make him think that it was normal, but I still thought he was going crazy.
In the middle of the day, we moved to the south as planned. Baylor turned to James and spoke to him. I understood only the basic meaning of what he said. He told james something about going into the woods-- when he said this, Jax looked up at him terrified-- at the western edge--to which Jax calmed-- to take a break and explore a bit. James agreed. They unhitched us and checked that no one was watching, then swung up on our backs and began leading us west.
We rode for quite a while. Jax kept looking to to the north for some reason. I assumed he was paranoid. Baylor was still noticing it, too. “Jasper, is something wrong with your leg?” He dismounted to examine his right front leg, which he kept pawing and stamping. “James, come look at this...” I stepped forward to see as James stepped off.
He had what appeared to be a scar across his leg, but it wasn’t a scar. There was proof that he had gashed it, even some dried blood left over in some of his feathers, but no actual scar. The only thing that appeared to be different was a missing patch of hair just below his knee in a perfectly straight line.
“Jax, what is that?” I asked over James’ head.
“Oh, it’s just an old scar I had. I guess the hair never grew back. It doesn’t hurt, though.” He turned his head away from me. He seemed skittish at the question.
Of course, the men had no clue that we had just spoken about it, so they thought it was hurting him and decided to take a break. James took off my bridle, but didn’t tie me. We didn’t have saddles to begin with for the trip, but James did take an axe with.
“Baylor, wanna chop this ‘ere tree?” He suggested to his companion. “We can bring it back for a lil’ private stash of firewood. Ye know that wood rationin’ gets on ma nerves, especially considerin’ how much wood we all got.”
Baylor grabbed his axe and strode over to the older man. They whistled as they hacked at the base of the tree. It was almost done when they sat next to it, taking a break before pushing it over finally.
A creaking sound split the silent forest air. Baylor saw it, the tree tipping over, but James wasn’t paying attention and didn’t move.
“James!” Baylor yelled, running to him as the tree began to tip. He pushed him off the rock he was sitting on and stretched out to run. He was too late. The tree crashed to the earth and jammed Baylor’s leg next to the rock. He yelped in pain and tried to sit up. He looked up at Jasper. Words began to form in his mouth, but when he began to make sound, his head drooped as he blacked out.
James, stunned, shook his head quickly and ran up to mount me. I took off running toward camp as fast as my legs could carry us.
