Read Hollow by Caroline Peckham Chapter 1 – My nights were filled with haunting music, spun from a tongue I’d once known to whisper jokes and pass gossip from ear to ear. The words struck chords in my heart which stung when I woke and ached throughout the days until finally I succumbed to slumber and her songs found me again.
I dreamed of trees so tall they blotted out the sun, their bark a rough and anciently marred map to the one and only want I held dear. Sometimes I found myself running between those wicked trunks, calling out to a girl who ran ahead of me, her song just out of sight, always coming from beyond the next bough, next branch, next bramble.
Of course, I’d never truly set foot in the cursed forest. The path was barred to all; the trees and the magic tangled through them made a wall of the forest’s border which was utterly impenetrable – unless the trees chose to admit you. And they only ever moved at night. But I knew better than to risk approaching them in the dark.
The lyrics which knotted with my dreams turned to screams when the sun went down and the wicked nature of the forest was unleashed to its fullest. I’d considered risking it; I’d planned to sit at the edge of the forest while the sun set and allow the trees to claim me, but I’d found reason in the one thing I truly trusted. The written word never turned me wrong. And if there was one thing all of the tomes and scrolls I’d scoured agreed upon it was that facing the trees at night was nothing less than a death sentence. The blood smearing those cursed branches on the nights the forest found prey was proof enough of that. And I was no good to anyone if I was dead.
The song I cherished and loathed wrapped itself around me in my fitful dreams, her words both a caress and a warning.
“Come to the trees where their faces grow pale,
Lean close to hear secrets of terror and scale,
My worth was well measured, my journey awaits.
You’ll only come find me when we un-bar our gates.”
It was painted in the whispered words of a child, its lyrics like a river which changed course and spun secrets, never the same yet always pulling me in one, unchanging direction. And I was done resisting the draw of the current. It was time I dove in and let it carry me away.
Music of another kind carried across the town, the jolly tune at odds with the knotted dread in my gut and drawing my thoughts back to the present. It was finally here. The day of the Great Hunt. It had been fifty long years since the last of its name and for eight of those, I’d been bracing for the impact of its arrival.
I swallowed. A shaky breath skipped down my throat, and I fought the urge to forget everything I’d been planning and simply accept the fate which had been dealt to our family all those years ago.
This path had been laid out for me for far too long to allow doubts to turn me from it now.
“Are you ready?” The firm banging of my mother’s fist against the weathered wood of my bedroom door jarred me out of the daydream which had seen me standing before my window, peering out at the not-so-distant treeline. “The drums are already sounding and the Bradeys will be wondering where you are,” Mother hissed, pulling my inner turmoil from fear into disdain. I couldn’t give a withered fig what the Bradeys thought of me one way or the other.
The panicked screams of my past faded, the frantic scouring of the village, the despair, the horror, the grief; all of it slipped back behind that mask my family wore, never to be spoken of, never to be acknowledged.
I glanced at the small pack I needed to bring with me, a lie silently forming on my lips, the rehearsal giving me something to focus on as the door was predictably pushed open.
Mother bustled into the room, her brown hair perfectly coiled, her deep blue dress recently re-fitted and trimmed to appear almost new. She stalled on the threshold to my room, looking me up and down while working to choke down the words I knew were expanding in her chest. She managed to contain them for an impressive six seconds before they inevitably burst free.
“You chose the green?” she asked, though what she really wanted was to ask me why I’d ignored the pale pink satin she’d laid out.
“I’ll wear that one later,” I told her, barely even flicking a glance at the new dress and wishing she hadn’t wasted so much money on it. “It rained for half of the week, and the Hunt is launching right outside the town hall where the mud is practically a swamp. The green is more practical.”
Mother pursed her lips, the sense of my words colliding with her desire to impress the Bradeys. I knew she expected the marriage proposal to come at the feast tonight. I knew she wanted that life for me, the comfort, the security. And truly, Axel Bradey wasn’t the worst option in this forsaken corner of the human lands, but I had no intention to wed anyone. Not yet. Not until I’d followed through on the promise I’d made to Rissa.
So yes, the gown I’d selected was plain compared to what most of the women in attendance would have chosen, the mossy green colour of it like a reflection of the forest which awaited us at the edge of town. Though truthfully, it wasn’t the edge any longer – the forest had devoured eight homes and the inn this last month, and we all knew we didn’t have long before we would have to abandon Arringfall altogether. Our town was one of the last still standing between here and the cities which lined the coast where the last hope for humanity lay. Beyond the cliffs at the southern border of Rathian, there was nothing but sea. If the trees ever made it that far, we would be faced with a choice between them and the waves and both, were certain death.
The skirt was long but not voluminous, the fabric thick but not too heavy. I’d always favoured it for that fact. It was practical, easier to move in, run in if needed. And it was needed all too often with the forest creeping ever closer to our border and the Hollows haunting us in the space between breaths.
“At least let me fix your hair,” Mother begged, and I conceded, sitting on the edge of my small bed and closing my eyes while she worked my warm brown hair into a braid.
I breathed in the scent of our home as she worked, the hint of lavender from the sprigs of the plant Mother hung in every window to ward against foul spirits, and the underlying warmth of pine from the beams which held the whole place together. It wasn’t a grand home, but it held the memories of all I cherished in this world within its walls.
“There are whispers that the Fae have selected twenty-five of their greatest warriors to enter the Hunt this time,” she said, drawing my focus away from the ache of this place. “Perhaps this will be the final hunt. Perhaps all isn’t lost…”
She didn’t need to say more than that. The cursed forest – or the Taking Trees as we called them – had spread further in the last few years than ever before and all the realms surrounding it were suffering, pushed to the edges of the land, resources running thin, their people plagued with hardships which layered upon one another until the weight of them had become suffocating.
I didn’t know whether to be pleased about the Fae investing so much into the Hunt or not. Their kind had turned their backs on us a long time ago – hundreds of years before I was born. They’d built their walls of dark stone and kept their borders well-guarded, leaving the humans to suffer the wrath of both the forest and then the Hollows without aid. Resentment for their kind had bred into hatred once the sacrifices had started. The cursed forest placed many burdens upon us but none so cruel as the Offerings it demanded. The Fae had been quick to decide that the humans would be the ones forced to pay the price each year when the blood moon rose in its fatal demand. A price which my family had been selected to endure.
My breaths grew thin and faltered as the weight of that truth pressed down on me. It didn’t matter how many years passed. It still felt like yesterday.
I’d seen a few of their kind, the ones who deigned to travel to our lands and trade with the lowly humans. My people were too desperate to turn them away and too weak to refuse them regardless. But I was never sure what exactly the Fae got out of the trades they made with us. The ethereally beautiful males and females I’d caught glimpses of had seemed better nourished than our kind and clearly far wealthier too. I’d often wondered why they travelled our lands, suspecting their deeds were motivated by far darker desires than they pretended. The Offerings proved they were capable of anything after all but despite their part in those atrocities, I’d never seen a single human stand against one of them.
The reality was, we needed all the help we could get out here, and the fact that they were able to dispatch Hollows in our land waylaid any questions the humans might have demanded of them. We weren’t strong enough to stand against Hollows regardless of our hatred of the Fae, so we scowled and muttered curses at their backs but did nothing to stop them passing through our realm whenever they deigned to.
Still, there was no explanation as to why they never came in force or why those who did travel through our realm never stayed in one place for more than a night. They never spoke of their own lands or offered much communication at all. They wanted stories in payment for their wares more often than not, and there weren’t many willing to deny them what they sought in favour of pride. Though I’d have spat in their faces should any ever dare to ask for a tale from my lips.
Despite my hatred of their kind, I couldn’t deny I’d wondered why they didn’t make a real stand against the Hollows, why they hid behind their walls. If they were able to fight the monstrous beasts the Necromancer had risen to plague our lands, then why not do so? Why leave us all to suffer their wrath?
Just ten days’ travel from here to the east of our town lay the border with the Fae. I’d never seen the wall which marked the division between our lands myself but I’d seen sketches, heard tales. And they all matched. The Fae lands were closed to humans. Just as the forest was closed too – unless it claimed you for its own.
My stomach knotted as I considered that, the nearness of those damned trees making me uneasy as they always did.
When I’d been a child, the forest had been a full week’s travel north of here. Our town had seemed safe from its grasp. But every year, its boundary spread, the trees inching outward, stealing land from the three realms. So far as I knew, no one had ever been able to slow the forest’s advance, let alone stop it. And so every living creature in Rathian was losing the battle to save themselves from its clutches, just as we were losing places to run to.
We were surrounded. The Taking Trees to the north, the Hollows and their Necromancer king to the west, the Fae and their wall to the east and nothing but the open ocean and a promise of oblivion to the south.
“There,” Mother announced, turning me so that I could appreciate her handiwork in the mirror on my dressing table.
My brown hair was braided in a style I could never replicate alone, the strands knotted and intricate, drawn together while still framing my heart-shaped face. I studied the warmth of my skin, the dusting of freckles which coated my cheekbones and touched my nose. As always, my eyes stood out the most, their sapphire colour flashing to a deep violet in the light. Rissa used to say they changed with my moods, sometimes as bright as a summer’s day when I laughed, others as dark as an oncoming storm when I frowned. I wasn’t certain that was true, but I had always appreciated their otherworldly allure. It was the one thing about myself which seemed to agree with my heart – they didn’t fit. Didn’t belong. Perhaps my eyes were the one thing about me which betrayed my intentions because they spoke of something outside of this place, they spoke of something…other.
I stood, smiling at my mother and hoping she couldn’t read what I was planning in the tempest of my expression. I felt as though my long-held secret was suddenly becoming so obvious, like perhaps she’d suddenly see it there in my face, plain as day, and realise what I planned to do.
“Ferris…” she said slowly, rising too and taking my hand in her own. “I wanted to-”
“The day is wasting,” Father called jovially from downstairs.
He had always been a jolly kind of man, the type to gather friends as easily as plucking weeds, the kind to have compliments scattered in his wake. But I could see through his smiles. For eight long years, they’d failed to touch his eyes. No matter the fact that we didn’t speak of it, no matter how hard we all worked to pretend.
“Mother?” I urged, squeezing her fingers as she made to withdraw them.
She squeezed mine in return, then smiled. “I only wanted to say…be happy. If Axel Bradey isn’t what it will take to make your heart shine, then you don’t have to accept him. You don’t have to do anything which would demand something you can’t offer.”
“I know,” I told her, my secret burning through the pit of my stomach.
It would break her. Father too. I knew it with a certainty that had stopped me from sleeping properly for weeks. It was the one thing which made me doubt what I had to do, the one thing which made me question this choice.
But it really wasn’t a choice at all. Even on that night, eight years ago, I’d known it would come to this. I’d been a girl then, only fourteen, yet overnight, the innocence of childhood had been ripped from me.
I’d have done it then if it had been possible. I wished with all my heart that I could have tried – I’d even attempted it before. But this was my only true chance to keep the oath I’d made to Rissa back then and I couldn’t turn from it. Even though I understood how high the price of it would be.
“I love you,” I said, my voice cracking on the last word, and Mother blinked at me as if she understood the finality of that declaration. But then the evidence of my betrayal cleared from her eyes and she breathed a laugh, drawing me close in her arms and kissing the top of my head the way she’d done ever since I was a babe in her arms.
“I love you more,” she told me, squeezing me tightly and making me hate myself for what I had to do.
We parted on an awkward laugh at our emotional moment, and I waited as she headed from the room, stooping to grab my pack once I was confident she wasn’t watching. The weight of it felt like evidence, the bulk too.
I grabbed my grey cloak and swung it around my shoulders, concealing the bag and tugging my hood up for good measure. The day was bright but a chill still clung to the air, so I wouldn’t be alone in dressing for the harsher edges of the weather.
Father made a show of fussing over our lateness and bustling us out the door. His hair had greyed in the last few years, his eyes and brow lined more heavily too, like his body was tired of the weight he fought to carry, the burdens he bore painting themselves onto his flesh in defiance of the smiles he tried to hide them behind.
He offered an arm each to Mother and me, and I took it, enjoying the warmth of his body beside mine, the rough wool of his brown coat a familiar, steadying point for my slick palms.
Our village was large – practically a city now by the old standards, if my parents were to be believed. But the flint houses and thatched roofs looked as tired as the people who dwelled within them.
Wooden doors were branded with scars, symbols to ward off evil scratched or burned into them, sometimes painted in blood. So far as I knew, nothing truly helped. But without our superstitions, I supposed we would all have succumbed to hopelessness long ago.
I glanced over my shoulder as I thought on that, the cobbled street empty behind me, a dozen houses just like our own gazing after us.
A shiver ran down my spine as if I were being watched.
I slipped my fingers into the pocket of my cloak and turned over the wooden relic there three times before releasing my hold on Father and crouching to scrawl an X into the dirt with my fingers.
Superstition or not, I took no chances in this lawless world.
My parents paused so I could catch up to them, the three of us moving towards the northern edge of the town where the music rang out loudly and the excited chatter of the crowd could be heard too. It wasn’t often the people raised their voices in jubilation like this, and I wasn’t certain if my spirits were lifted by the sound or if it only stoked my nerves.
This had to work.
The forest wouldn’t give us another fifty years. In that time, it would consume everything. Our town alone likely had less than a handful of months left. We’d all been preparing our possessions for weeks, packing up our lives in preparation to relocate south. Many of the people living here had already fled the forest before, some had done so five or six times, others had simply passed right through our village and kept going to the southern border where most of our population now resided in the towns along the shore, awaiting the inevitable at the end of the world.
No.
I stopped that thought in its tracks.
Not inevitable. If I believed that, then I would have run too. I wouldn’t be here, grasping onto my secrets like they were sand in my fist, the grains spilling away like the seconds they marked, my truth so close to revealing itself.
We stepped into the square where the town hall stood proudly, and I couldn’t stifle the breath which sawed into my lungs in a sharp gasp.
The forest had moved again. I’d been here only two nights prior. Beyond this square there had been four rows of houses, a tailor, a blacksmith’s forge, a stable…
“When?” I breathed, my eyes on the colossal trees which loomed like glowering statues just a handful of steps away from us. Their trunks were thicker than carriages, so tall they appeared to brush the clouds with their spindly branches. The space between them was thick with bracken and brambles, thorns knotting together to create a wall which I knew to be impenetrable.
No one could enter that forest at any time other than during the Hunt. Not by their own choice anyway. And legend had it that any taken in the night fell prey to the most monstrous of beasts within its wild walls.
My thumb rolled over the faded scar on my forefinger, the most prominent of those left to me by the same thorns which now tangled together so close to our home.
The music didn’t change in pitch but there was something about it which sounded less jovial and more hurried now that I was closer to it. Like those who were playing wanted an end to this celebration so that they might run from it.
The smiles on the faces around us were tight at their edges, whispers passing between the crowd which all carried the same message.
“We’ll be on the road by nightfall,” Father said gruffly, and I knew he was speaking for the entire town.
It was madness to linger once the forest crept this close. I’d watched countless others make the pilgrimage away from their homes throughout my lifetime and had always known our time would come too. But it had never seemed so real as it did now.
I swallowed thickly, thinking of the familiarity of my bedroom, the whorl on the edge of the table that I’d skimmed my fingers over at every meal, the stains of my childhood in each corner and crevice. Within days, it would be gone, seized by the forest and lost like so much of our land. This Hunt really might be the last.
“Ah, Ferris, you look dazzling this morning,” a voice crooned, and I turned to find Axel Bradey approaching with his parents. I gave him a smile, assessing the mud splatters on his pants and boots, the sheen of perspiration on his brow and the windswept look of his golden hair.
“As do you,” I said, the corner of my lips lifting a touch while he did very little to disguise his recent arrival.
His father frowned at him then turned to exchange pleasantries with my parents, the three of them moving aside to give us a chance to speak alone.
“The miscreants have been abandoned to one another again then?” Axel said conspiratorially, and I offered him a slight smile. We’d both quickly realised that the pairing our parents were so keen on was something of a practical one too. Neither of us were perfect, our reputations those of recklessness and defiance – which I supposed might have meant we were a good fit in theory. Axel was nice enough, handsome enough, kind enough… But I had no intention to tie my life to his and turn my back on everything I’d waited so long for.
“Was anyone lost in the Creeping?” I asked, glancing at our parents to check that they weren’t listening. Clearly no one here planned on discussing the shocking advance of the forest, but I couldn’t get it out of my head.
Axel glanced at the trees, hatred darkening his brown eyes before he nodded once. “The Penleys were in their house. The Truewards too, and possibly several more families besides. There’s disagreement over whether some of them left already or not. And there were nine horses in the stables,” he added.
My skin prickled at his words, my eyes roaming the impenetrable wall of vegetation, my ears straining to hear over the musicians. The shadows between the trees loomed with a darkness so thick that I had to wonder if even sunlight could penetrate the dense canopy of the trees.
“What about the carriages?” I asked, trying to keep my voice steady.
Axel’s silence was answer enough. Every carriage in the stables had been lost too. Without them, the people would have an even harder time escaping to the next town. The carriages were essential to transporting goods, but more than that, they were the only form of shelter that would be offered on the long road – the only place which might offer a chance of survival if the Hollows came.
How could this have happened? The forest never moved so far in such a short space of time. At this rate, the entire town could be consumed within days. The trees might even reach the coast within months, and then there would be nowhere left to run to. Beyond the cliffs which lined the southern border of Rathian, the ocean extended on to the edge of the world. We were staring at the end of our people, this Hunt the last hope any of us had for survival.
“Listen, Ferris…” Axel took hold of my arm, drawing me closer, leaning down to say something with urgency in his expression, but before the words could leave his lips, the music fell quiet and Chancellor Haydon called out for our attention.
“Don’t do it,” Axel breathed, his fingers locking tightly around my wrist, and I startled.
He couldn’t know. Surely he couldn’t have figured it out.
I shook my head at him, not trusting any words I might speak.
“I see you, Ferris,” he hissed, closing in on me as I tried to pull away, his voice low and his words intended for me alone. “I’ve always seen you. All those ancient tomes, the scrolls, the relics. Not to mention the way you run laps around Old Mitchel’s field when you think no one will see you. You move as if you’re running for your life.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” I muttered, the weight of the pack which was concealed beneath my cloak seeming to weigh me down more heavily as my cheeks stained in clear admission of my guilt.
I tried to tug my arm free of his hold and a few people glanced at us as he pressed closer.
“The trees only take,” he said in a low, warning tone. “They don’t barter or bargain, they don’t offer or gift. The boon could be a lie, a trap, a trick. You know they’ll never-”
“I don’t know,” I snapped, jerking my arm from his grip. “And neither do you.”
Mother was looking to us, reaching out an arm, and I hurried closer to my parents, moving with the crowd towards the small stage which had been erected as close to the forest as anyone in their right mind would dare to go.
Axel’s gaze bored a hole into the back of my skull, but I ignored it resolutely, refusing to acknowledge it, my decision made long ago and his words nothing to all the warnings and discouragement I’d offered myself.
My fingers twisted into the straps of the small pack I’d brought with me, its contents seeming to heat against my skin as if daring those around us to look at it more closely. But none did. No one was interested in me today. All hope was pinned on the collection of people who were moving up onto that stage.
“Today is a day unlike most others!” Chancellor Haydon called out, his voice silencing the murmurs of the crowd, his jowls wobbling with each word. He had led the people of our town for years unopposed. In part, I suspected, because no one else wanted the burden of his job – who would wish to lead a people doomed in every direction anyway? But it was also because he was in fact a good man by all accounts.
He truly cared. He did whatever he could to help us survive here. He even offered out aid to all who fled the horrors beyond our small sanctuary. He made sure we grew enough crops and guarded them sufficiently to survive each winter on the harvest they brought. Honestly, I believed he was the reason we were still here to bear witness to this moment at all.
“The Great Hunt is the one opportunity the forest gives us to break this curse upon our lands and the lands of our neighbours,” Chancellor Haydon went on.
Mutters broke out at the mention of the neighbours who had so wilfully abandoned us to our plight. Yes, they were all struggling to survive the forest and the Hollows, but our histories told of the way they’d shunned us when the outlook darkened. Humans had been willing to work with the Fae to face what was coming, but they’d chosen to abandon us to our fate. Hell, we would have worked with the Hags if there had been any way to secure such an alliance. But the wandering nomads who were blessed with the gift of foresight and use of old magic didn’t even hold loyalty to one another, let alone make deals with outsiders who didn’t bolster their own fortune.
“This day is one of hope,” Chancellor Haydon continued earnestly, and the brightness in his eyes said he really did believe that. “It is our chance to finally reclaim the land we have lost – to break the curses, unite the spirits and defy the fate which has been creeping closer like a tightening noose for so many years.”
Silence followed his words as the people acknowledged the truth of them. Arringfall was dying. We all knew it, we all felt it on the breath of the wind, we could see it in the decay of the land and decline of the homes we’d once treasured. Our world was running out of time even without the forest devouring it bite by bite. And the Hollows only made the clock tick faster.
I glanced over my shoulder, the feeling of eyes on my skin intensifying, making me wonder if some beast might be considering me for a meal. But nothing lurked between the rough stone of the buildings and it was impossible to see into the shadows of the forest.
“And so, without further preamble, I present to you our brave and ferocious band of Champions. As you know, each of them has been tirelessly preparing for this very day, gathering their strength and voracity in the pursuit of redemption for us all! They will risk everything for the slim hope of our survival, entering the Great Hunt and seeking out the lost spirits in hopes of finally freeing our land from the grasp of these forsaken trees!”
A cheer went up from the crowd, the noise an explosion which made me startle, my heart thundering in anticipation.
The sun was almost at its apex overhead, the hour drawing closer at last. I hadn’t been born before the last Hunt took place but I knew how it went. At midday, the trees would part to allow entry for the Champions, their twisted branches at last allowing admission to the daunting labyrinth within.
There weren’t any tales of what awaited those who entered because none had ever emerged victorious. There was no way of knowing what happened among those trees but the screams had been heard. Battle-hardened warriors crying out in terror, human and Fae alike finding nothing but death between those boughs.
I’d read every chronical of every Hunt I could find, screams and cries noted, sightings of spirits between and above the trees which had been glimpsed on rare occasions. There had been little I could call real fact, not much of substance, but I’d devoured every scrap of insight regardless, compared notes and complied lists of whatever information I could glean.
But I knew in my soul that there was more to the forest than simply death. When it took people in the night, we heard them singing long after they were gone, their voices travelling beneath the light of the moon, calling out to the loved ones they’d left behind.
The Offerings the trees demanded were more proof of some greater purpose. The children it stole in sacrifice couldn’t just be more fodder to the savagery of the spirits which roamed the forest. So I believed with all my heart that there was more than bloodshed within those woods, but that didn’t lessen the terror I felt as the minutes ticked on.
Chancellor Haydon was making a show of announcing the Champions who were ready to enter the forest, speaking loudly of their prowess and the preparations they’d made in anticipation of this day. There were twenty-five of them, and I knew them all by sight, if not to speak with. They’d spent the last few years like gods among mortals, the hopes of every person in our realm depending on them. They had every meal paid for at every tavern they visited, bedded half the people in the village too – even married couples allowing for a night of carnal worship at the altar of the people they believed destined to save us.
I didn’t see heroes when I looked at the warriors who preened beneath the attention of the crowd. I didn’t see hope. There had been Hunts before this one, and the Fae sent their warriors to compete in them too. It didn’t matter how impressive they seemed here and now. It mattered what they found within those trees and whether they were able to fulfil the task the forest had set. And I wasn’t convinced they could. Why now, when none had ever succeeded before? Endless generations had attempted the Hunt and none had ever completed it.
I feared we were all doomed either way. But that didn’t stop my heart from rioting as the sun shifted to its zenith and the trees began to groan before us. The point of no return was fast approaching.
The Great Hunt was about to begin.
