Cerberus Rex, Nameless

Part 1| Tree Keeper, 1

Auburn lashes trembled upon faintly green cheeks of a young man reclining in the forest shadows. He sensed shafts of sunlight near and stretched his hand sideways to let the beam fill his palm. His fingers twitched. One curled. Pollen and dust floated until some settled on his naked shoulder. Then, a rustle in the ferns opened his gaze halfway. The white stag of that wood stepped free of the trees, and a squirrel crossing its path paused to dip its head. All creatures bowed before the stag, but it had nurtured a kinship with the nameless one. Its golden eyes met his, and it walked to him and leaned into his light-caressing palm. Nameless's obsidian stare grew tender as he enjoyed the soft hairs on the stag's cheek. Nameless had woken one fall morning from the forest's black brambles. No people. No parents, or kin. He'd simply become, and the stag had welcomed him as a fellow creature of nature and the arcane.

The stag pulled away and walked on, and Nameless settled back into his tree, but restlessness spun his insides. He shifted. Anxious. He'd sensed danger in the woods before and had chased poachers out once or twice, but trouble didn't often visit them or disturb their magic. And yet, feeling as if plucked like a spider's web, he stood from the shrubbery he'd not left in several months.

Mana woven through the woods--the magic that birthed him. It was fading.

The ferns and ivy of Nameless's bed climbed his legs, providing him protection from the natural threats that might otherwise scratch his bare flesh. It merged with his skin and covered his limbs and lower torso. He caught up to the stag, which paused when it sensed him and then continued. They were drawing near the moon wells, vessels into which the two moon gods could pour their divine energy and convert it into magic the moon wells freely spread. Nameless passed them whenever he decided to move. That magic flowed slowly during the day, but its essence covered the forest like a silver fog at night—all to spread its mana to as many creatures as it could reach.

The moons, Nameless had observed, were kind albeit cold.

A snap in the brush jerked Nameless to a halt. He looked that way, bark now accompanying the other foliage that covered his limbs. It conjoined with his flesh, and his figure formed a dark statue overgrown and fragile in appearance, yet the crust which armored him threatened to shatter daring predators or their weapons. He searched for his voice, but he'd not used it more than twice in the six years he'd existed.

A thin, black shadow shot from a place in the trees. Nameless's eyes grew wide, and he watched stunned and helpless as it tore through the fleshy, white neck of the stag setting its front hoof on the other side of a mouse trail. The rim of Nameless's sight darkened. His flesh felt dewy and became an uncomfortable mix of high noon in summer and snow in winter. Blood, which Nameless had not ever seen before, exploded from the wound like crimson sunlight on the leaves.

The stag, a creature which had cared for Nameless all his existence, moaned in pain and fell onto its side. Nameless gawked. He trembled. His sight warmed and blurred. Something painful pricked his eyes. Finally, he gasped. The black of his gaze filled the white spaces and then shadowed his face. The vegetation protecting him shot across the rest of his body and swept over his head, and the sound that burst from inside it was that of a dark, anguished, and terrible roar.