THERE IS NOTHING OUTSIDE THE FOREST, part 4

   I had barely made it up onto the lowest bows of a large chestnut tree ,  when I heard some of them, roaring to each other in their incomprehendable language. The sound, and the stench, grew closer. I climbed to 10 paces above the ground, hid as best I could, and had my weapons ready.

   There were three of the Orc- scouts, no doubt. I could see them coming towards me.

   I hoped they would pass by.

   But they did not.

   One of them sniffed the air, then hit it’s fellows to get their attention. They bellowed at each other for a few moment, the headed directly for my tree. They circled my tree, sniffing and growling like wolves, then they saw me.

   I threw my first knife, hitting an Orc in the guts, and enraging it. It ran towards my tree and made a frenzied atempt to climb, but a knife in it’s head sent it down again.

   The other two advanced more carefully. One had a spear and a knife, the other a sword. One threw its spear at me, and missed, causing it’s fellow to roar and strike it across the face. They growled at each other for a moment, then got back to hunting.

   The Orc with the sword began climbing the tree. I threw my last knife, but the Orc was fast and aware, and blocked it with its arm, getting only a cut.

   I had only my axe, and was ready to fight and die.

   When it was close, the Orc slashed up at me with its sword. I squatted on my branch, steadying myself with one hand and blocking the sword with my axe. The Orc was too far away for me to hit. All I could do was defend. The Orcs knew this then, and roared with victory, or hunger, or joy, I could not know.

   Then I heard the crashing of many feet coming towards us. The sound was like distant thunder in a terrible storm when the sky breaks in many places.

   I thought some vast army of Orc were coming to eat me.

   The Orc in the tree was too busy trying to cut my legs to care, but the Orc on the ground bellowed madly.

   Then I saw it. Not an army, but a bull aurox charging at full speed. The bull of the arox are rare, and I had never seen one so big, or traveling so fast.

   The Orc on the ground ran, but the aurox was upon it in a moment, smashing the Orc beneith its hooves like eggs under an axe.

   Then I saw the impossible- there was a man riding the bull aurox. Sat at the bull’s neck, holding it’s red long hair in one hand and a knife in the other.

   The man shouted at the bull and it slowed its charge to a trot, turned, and came to the tree. The man threw up his knife and hit the Orc in the back. It made a terrable roar.

   In the Orc’s moment of weakness I acted. I swung from my branch, holding the branch in one hand and axe in the other, and kicked the Orc in the face with both feet. It fell down to the lowest branches. I dropped on it, landing heavily on it’s chest. Still it fought, reaching for me with its huge, clawed hands.

   It stopped when I put my axe in its head.

   ‘Who and what are you,’ I asked him as soon as I had caught my breath.

   He looked at me as if seeing me for the first time. I saw that he was male and not Orc, but apart from that I knew not what he was.

   We, the People, are tall and thin, closer to the deer than the aurox. Our scin is the colour of dried leaves in the sunlight, our hair white or    yellow, our eyes green, purple or black. This man was the tallest, thinnest, darkest male, with the whitest hair and blackest eyes that I had ever seen.

   We do not ride the aurox, and we do not, normally, travel alone in the free lands of the forest.

   ‘Tomm Gim the Rider,’ he said, in my language.

   ‘You are of The People?’

   He laughed, without joy.

   ‘I am a Ranger,’ he said.

   ‘What?’

   ‘It is like a scout, but we travel alone and far. We are rare, and you would not meet us unles you need us. And you? Why are you here?’

   ‘Charlotte, daughter of Mary. I am walking.’

   ‘Where to? The nearest family nest is ten thousand paces from here.’

   ‘I am working untill the end of the forest.’

   He looked thoughtful, then dismounted his bull.

   ‘Have you eaten yet?’ he asked.

   ‘No yet.’

   ‘Come down from your tree. I have boar meat, it is still freash.’

   ‘How can you ride the aurox?’ I asked as I climbed around the Orc and down.

   ‘It is easy.’

   ‘It is not easy. How?’

   ‘I found him when he was a calf. The Orc killed his mother. I raised him. When he was strong enough, I rode him… I am his father, he follows me.’

   He passed me some meat and we ate in silence.

   ‘No one rides aurox,’ I said when my hunger was over.

   ‘I do.’

   ‘The bull is very dangerous.’

   ‘True.’

   I looked at him carefully. He was very strange.

   ‘Where are you really going?’ he asked.

   ‘To the end of the forest.’

   ‘There is nothing outside the forest.’

   ‘If you can ride a bull, I can go out of the forest.’

   He looked at me silently. I did not like his silence. People ought to say what they think.

   ‘Why are you a lone scout? A ranger?’ I was curious about him.

   ‘I was born a ranger.’

   ‘How?’ I did not like the way he talked without saying anything. ‘Are your family rangers?

   ‘My family are dead. All but me. A ranger found me, alone in the forest when I was very young. That is how people become rangers.’