Deru's Scars - Prologue

Deru’s Scars
Written by Mercifur (aka AstraMiral)

DISCLAIMER: This story contains graphic violence and adult content and is intended for people 18 years of age and older.

Prologue - A Forgotten Memory

The soft rustling of the leaves of the tree in which he was resting always allowed his mind to wander, to explore within his own imagination what he thought the world beyond his village was like.  He would lay back on the large branch he chose as his own personal hideout, staring up at the sky as the clouds rolled by.  Thousands of scenarios crossed his mind from adventure to romance, and he found himself desiring a life with more excitement than he had.  It did not take long for his thoughts to lead him into a deep slumber, dreaming of the worlds he created.

He laid still on the branch, sleeping safely from a lot of practice balancing on it.  He had been there hundreds of times before and had never fallen from it.  Usually he would only climb that tree for a few hours but tonight his thoughts led him into such a deep sleep that night had fallen.  He breathed the slow, deep breaths of sleep as he stirred, opening his eyes from the strong scent of smoke in the air.

Deru jumped down out of the tree, landing on his hind paws primarily, but balanced himself on the ground with his front paws so he did not fall forward.  He stood upright, the black fur of his slender anthro body absorbing the darkness of the night, nearly shrouding him in the shadows.  He looked toward his home which was a few hills away, and saw an ominous sight.  He could not figure out what it might be, and was rather afraid to find out, but ran as fast as he could toward the village.

An eerie black fog hovered around the entire village, blurring the red glow that could be seen behind it.  Deru could smell the smoke a lot heavier now, and realized that the red glow was the glow of fire, and slowed his pace as he ran.  The thick smoke made it difficult to navigate through the village, and the occasional collapsing building posed another hazard for him.  He dodged falling wood, rocks, cinders and other flaming objects as they broke free of their place on the buildings.  He ran back and forth, from building to building, searching for anyone, but there was not anyone to be found, it seemed.  Other than the sound of crackling fire and wood, and the wind howling between the buildings as the fire sucked the oxygen out of the air, there were no other sounds- no screaming, no voices whatsoever.

Deru stopped in the center of the village, near the well.  There was a gap in the smoke- at least, enough of a gap in which he could get a decent breath of fresh air.  The fast, deep breathes he drew in were cool compared to the smoke, and helped him to regain a little of his composure.  Every way he looked he was confronted with a wall of black, barely able to see beyond it.  He could tell from the position of the glowing “things” in the black which way he was facing, and ran between a few of the buildings until he saw the fence to his parents’ farm at the corner of the village.

His parents had always had the biggest farm in their village because it had been passed down from their last three generations.  There used to be nothing on the land before they built their farmstead, and shortly after, allowed friends and other family to build homes around theirs.  It was a true community in which everyone shared what they needed to survive, and it prospered, without outside influence whatsoever.  The fence around their farm was also the biggest fence, and also rather unusual.  It was made of wrought iron, extravagantly designed by the village for them as a gift.  Standing about seven feet tall, the fence held a gate in its center which was rather understated in its elegance in relation to the rest of the fence.

Deru froze several yards from the fence as soon as he realized just what he saw.  The smoke was still thick, even in this distant corner of the village, as it connected to the smoke from his parents’ burning farmhouse, but he was able to make out the silhouettes of the townspeople near the fence.  A few steps closer revealed a gruesome scene, and he turned his back and cowered to the ground, uncertain of how to react.  He trembled in fear as he slowly forced himself up again, almost losing his balance from trembling so much as he stepped closer still.

This close, he could smell the pungent scent of burnt flesh and fur.  The bodies strung up along this once beautiful fence held agonizing expressions of terror that made him cringe and cry harder at every face he saw.  He knew them all as they were his friends and family- not only that, but they were the only people he knew.  Their charred bodies only held patches of fur where the fire had stopped, and the burnt areas of their skin had broken open to drip an even more unsightly puddle on the ground.  As he neared the last bodies, all of the noise from the rest of the villages seemed to disappear.  All he could hear and feel was the beating of his heart- a fast “thump-thump-thump” that drowned out all other sensation from his body.  He could not even feel the stinging of his tears against his face anymore, even though the sight of the last two bodies made him cry in unimaginable grief.

His parents were strung up with what appeared to Deru as an old metal wire which cut into their flesh.  There was a pool of their bodily fluids beneath them as there was with the other bodies, and their fur and skin was singed in much the same way.  He noticed that their eyes, however, had been sewn shut before they were burned, causing them to swell noticeably from the heat. 

He noticed a glimmer, a faint reflection, around his father’s neck.  He reached up and yanked off the pendant quickly, noticing that it was a silver replica of the World Tree, a symbol representing the cycle of death and rebirth.  It was a gift he had given his father many years back, and was now reclaiming for himself.

Unable to remain in the area, looking at the slain villagers, he turned away, fastened the charm around his neck, and walked beyond the fence into the tree line of the forest and disappeared into the shadows.