The whole forest sways with the wind. The stormy season is approaching, and the godsblood dynasty of Iskariot prepares for the thunder festival, where high priests gather to divine the wisdom of the God of Weather through lightning communication. Yet such joys do not reach deeper into the forest, where the rule of the godsblood is merely a suggestion, rather than a rule.

  Deeper and deeper within, many do not even know of such festivals, or merely of the concepts of them without any regard for when they happen. These Forresters, as called by the people outside of the forrest, live a life of humble work. Their services are critical, yet they rarely gain recognition… Nor do they especially want it. The lumber they cut slowly makes its way out through the forest and into the surrounding vilges, the game they hunt is skinned and sold, the paths they slowly forage are used by merchants crossing the forest,

  and deeper within even still, near the very center, lives a woman who serves a very specific and important purpose that not even she recognizes.

  Some people are loved by the gods.

  She is loved by the most dread of them all,

  “One day, I will die, yet I do not fear because I know you will be there.”

  “All I love is gone, yet I do not mourn, for I know they are with you.”

  “The inevitable is but a warm embrace from you.”

  “There is no name but Death, and I speak it every day.”

  “Your name is Death, and I am your humblest attendant.”

  Hands csped together, long thin fingers in prayer, ethereal and quiet voice mumbling as the hunched figure bows her head over and over at the effigy she’s nailed onto the wall of her small, humble home. Any altar would do, really. Death is everywhere and ever present, always with us despite being so far away for some. A mark on the wall, stones stacked together, a mirror reflecting your own image: Death is in all these things, and thus death can be worshipped there.

  This effigy is merely of sentimental importance to her. Her voice keeps whispering out prayers, body lightly swaying from side to side as she does.

  A mean observer could call her homely. Greying, almost corpse-like. Unnervingly tall by standards of the time, at about six feet and some inches on top. Big, bug-like eyes that seem to dart away from eye contact without further thought, bony limbs, long and messy brown hair that curls and twirls no matter how you brush it.

  The kinder one, however, would say that she’s ethereal. There’s a grace to her movements, a quietness to her step, an elegance to everything she does. Her eyes are quite pretty, blue and deep, and despite the pallid tone of her skin she seems to take good care of herself considering the humble abode.

  … But all will agree that she is just a little off putting at first gnce. Like death is closer to her than others. Her name is Maia.

  With her prayers done, the woman rises and dusts herself off. She really should clean around here, but her days are spent in so much busy contemption… Ah well. Maia instead grabs her watering can and pail and heads out of her hovel- built (or rather dug, really) into a hillside over the years by her parents and towards the well behind it.

  She has to do so much groundskeeping today. Water the bck roses at the grave of her parents, tend to the garden, see if any of the traps around the hovel caught anything… A quiet life of contemption and prayer, and nothing else.

  At least until she gets to watering the bck roses. Then things go off the rails, a loud *thud* behind her almost making her jump. The gangly woman turns, bug-eyed gaze looking around rapidly before settling on the ground right behind her to see…

  A bird. A dead one. From what she can tell, it’s a hawk of some kind, although her mother never taught her all the types. Big too, wide wingspan. Maia’s gaze darts around, trying to spot any cause: yet she finds none. No arrow nocked by an hunter, no clear signs of disease like boils, it doesn’t *seem* old (not that she’d know for sure*) and it hasn’t been predated upon.

  It’s just like before.

  This isn’t the first time, after all. She sighs and puts her watering can down to gently lift the dead bird: gone from this world as it may be, it should still be treated with respect.

  For some months now, maybe even the better part of the year, things like this have started to happen. Birds dying mysteriously above her abode, pnts withering before mysteriously being fine after a night’s sleep, only to wither again… Even the wooden flooring of the hollow has started to sometimes creak threateningly, as if time is chipping away at it.

  Perhaps the strangest case has been her skin color. This ghostly grey is new. She’s pale, for sure, always has been, but never this grey. Almost like a corpse. Yet she’s felt healthy and hale, so she hadn’t worried… The god of death watches over her, after all. If she was to go, then it is her time: yet she hasn’t.

  But maybe something should be done about all of this.

  She cleans and defeathers the bird, carefully deboning it to the best of her ability so that she can store the meat for ter use. She usually eats whatever she procures from her garden and the traps, so she shouldn’t be compining…

  . . .

  Relying on faith is just natural, isn’t it? She’s no ordained priest, but she was raised to be a god fearing woman, as is right. Normal people like her should respect both the gods and the godsblood dynasties, like the Iskariot, she should live a humble life of thought and prayer. That’s why her parents came here, after all. That’s why she stays here. There’s nothing else to life but humble prayer and contemption.

  She’s been staring into the eyes of the dead bird for some time now, unmoving and unblinking. It feels like someone’s watching her. Is it you, noble creature? Are you watching me?

  Or is someone else?

  With the bird done and stored away in her pantry, Maia heads back outside. She still has to tend to the garden, and…

  her eyes linger upon the bed of bck roses.

  They were pnted there on her father’s grave when he passed, back when mother was still alive. She said he liked roses. When she died, and was buried next to him by Maia’s own hands, the roses seemed to almost magically gravitate to growing over hers too.

  It was a kind gesture. A loving one. Like a hand from beyond csping another to welcome them to the other world.

  And now the roses were wilting before her eyes. Drooping, petals falling, as if- as if-

  had she done this?

  Eyes nail to the ceiling. Somehow, it’s already night. Like she saw the roses wilting and suddenly the whole day had passed. She doesn’t remember what she did. Maybe she ate? Her bottom lip feels greasy. Maybe she fried up the whole bird. Or maybe that’s blood. Is she rotting from the inside now too? She’s scared.

  She shouldn’t be scared.

  It’s just death.

  Tired eyes nail at the ceiling, counting pnks. Maia remembers how her father always told her the pnks were there to protect them from water dripping through the earth above. She’s not really sure if that’s how it worked, but that was never her business. Just her dad’s. Are the pnks starting to rot too? Is she imagining things?

  She shouldn’t be worried.

  That too is merely death.

  Birds falling from the sky, flowers wilting, skin greying like that of a cadaver, this is all merely death, she should not worry, Maia should not worry, she should not think poorly of any of this, this is her role as a woman of the gods, this is her…

  . . .

  In the morning, after barely sleeping, she rises. She goes through the pantry, preparing herself what she can. Good thing mother taught her about preserving mushrooms and drying meat, so she won’t go hungry. Will be quite salty, though. She’ll have to gather as much water as she can from the well just to be safe, and she has to hope that none of it will go bad.

  Can water go bad?

  Probably?

  Can water die?

  Probably.

  There’s no lock on the door, but she can hide it with brushes. Father always told her that they didn’t need a lock; the only time that’d been put to the test was when a wanderer had come in uninvited, but one sight of her had made him run screaming. It wasn’t /her/ fault he’d walked in while she was still brushing her hair. Then again, that’d been when her skin started to turn into a more pallid shade.

  Ugh. Well. There’s nothing worth stealing. She just hopes she can remember to get home after all of this has been solved. Maybe she should draw a map. But she doesn’t really know how to do that…

  The more she starts to think like this, the more she starts to doubt this trip. She’s only visited the very edges of the forest to go to the local vilges a few times, but to leave entirely? Maybe she shouldn’t… But her parents always told her that they should all make a pilgrimage to the capital sometime, just to visit the only temple of Death.

  They never made it.

  She would.

  Her eyes linger on the bed of bck roses once more. They’re still wilted. Not as bad as before; petals she clearly saw fall off have returned, but they droop and hang, like a great depression looms above them. She wants to go and fix them, water them, and then return to the hovel to pray… But she knows that if she does, if she comes closer, the roses will just die again.

  Something is wrong with her. Not with death. There is never anything wrong with death. But she seems to attract it like a moth to the fme, and she has to find a solution. With these thoughts Maia sighs and holds a hand to her chest for a moment, breathing deep as she begins to walk. There’s a forest trail ahead, and from there it leads to a road, and from there it heads to the vilge she’s visited, and there-

  … well, there she’ll have to ask for guidance on how to get out of the forest and towards the capital. Maybe she’ll have to hire a bodyguard. She’s not very capable of defending herself.

  With a heavy heart and a cane in hand, Maia sets out. Yet occasionally she peers over her shoulder, squinting, before continuing. That feeling of being watched has returned. Her hand rests on the bark of a tree for a moment, as if to rest, yet in that time the bark curls and rots.

  Someone’s watching her.

  Someone truly is. Yet that someone’s eye is glued to her like a disease, like a wail unheard, staring from somewhere beyond mortal ken. That eye is unblinking, unmoving, glued to the one soul that it can hear daily with such reverence in her voice.

  And then some leagues beyond the sea, in a nd irrelevant to this story, in a kingdom unknown to many, a fire breaks out. Thousands die. Tens of thousands. One of the greatest catastrophes of a continent never mentioned again in this story, so many souls withered and sent to a better pce-

  and the eye closes, for it has work to do.

  Death’s gaze upon Maia pauses but for a moment, for Death must reap what life has sown.

  After all, Maia truly is beloved by death itself.