Brambles That Hunt

Written by Crimes

CONTENT WARNING(S): Death, mutilation

“Starting a fire is such a pain, why do I have to be the one that does it?“

“Because you“re terrible at literally everything else.“

“Hey!“

“Don’t start, either of you.“ Our leader scolds in a gruff whisper that may as well have been a crack of thunder as far as the rest of the camp was concerned.

“Sorry, Chunja.“ Both voices practically echoing in this ravine, neither of them even thinking to lower their volume. I can practically see the headache forming on our leader's face as the sound slowly fades, Asorut and Ivik are going to get us killed with their bickering less than five minutes after being told we have to be quiet this close to the Famine cult grounds. Why a cat and a dog decided to produce those siblings I will never understand.

It's best I turn my attention back towards my own task if I want to have adequate shelter by the time the dark really sets in, this load-bearing twig isn’t going to slot itself into place along the side of this tent all on its own. Our location is far from ideal, if we get caught by any followers of Famine we'd be killed on sight and we wouldn’t fare any better trying to traverse Lepidop once the sun sets either. Abandoning our village had been a hasty decision, only time would tell if it was the correct one, but one thing was certain.

Not a single one of us was going to stay after our village leader was swayed over to Famine.

In my musings, I hadn’t noticed that I“d used up the rest of the shoddy twine we’d managed to grab before our departure, I couldn’t let go of the tent until I finished fastening it down, so-

“Does anyone have any more twine? Or a rope? Or, anything I could use to tie this last part up? I’m out over here.“

Asorut is the one who responds, “Uh, maybe? Give me a minute, I“ll look.“ He was much closer than I was expecting, must’ve finished setting the fire already? The way he was complaining about it like it was some herculean task, I would’ve thought it would take longe-

“No, I’ll look, you keep gathering more dry wood, we still need that fire if we want to cook anything Shiraz brings back.“ Ah, there it is. Asorut looks like he wants to argue with his brother again, but holds off, after all, still being monitored by Chunja - keeping lookout on the other side of the ravine, but being a bat, nothing got past her hearing - and Ivik having completed his chores already, he really had no leg to stand on.

Asorut, sulking, stayed near the tent I was working on, although there didn’t seem to really be that much spare wood over here?

“.. Hey, Cuishi?“

“Yes?“

“Have you ever...“, a short pause, “left the village before?“ Something in his voice tells me that“s not what he was going to say, I answer the question he did ask anyway, regardless of my own confusion.

“No, I was born there, my grandmother told me stories about where she lived in Faefield before coming here, but that’s the closest I“ve ever been before this.“

... I miss home, sometimes.“ The village was never the brothers home, not to them anyway, they fled Sol Valley when they were children, refugees, though they would never say what exactly they were fleeing from, just that they had no family left because of it. Whatever ‘it’ was.

“Yeah?” I’m not sure where this conversation is going, “What was it like?“

“Peaceful, until it wasn“t.”

... and it happened again.“ Shit, it hadn’t occurred to me, the chaos cult, they were probably fleeing the chaos cult.

“Exactly.“ I don’t get to think of a reply, Ivik is back.

“Shiraz had some rope in her pack, she’s back with fish by the way.“ The end of that sentence said pointedly at his brother.

Asorut lets out a curse and sprints to the nearest tree, pulling out an axe from the left side of his belt. We really did need to get that fire started. Ivik pinches the bridge of his nose.

.

The moon rose about an hour ago now, Asorut finally managed to get the fire sorted, but we ended up sitting in the dark for a little longer than was strictly necessary. Whatever, Shiraz was cooking the fish and we finally got to sit around the campfire warming our hands. It gets cold really fast at night this time of year, I“d pray to whoever created fire in moments like these.

The brothers are nattering amongst themselves, surprisingly not arguing for once, but they look serious, I wonder what they're talking about? Shiraz draws my attention away from them with a giggle, they're looking straight at me? Chunja interjects before I have the chance to ask why she's laughing.

“This reminds me of something my family used to do while camping.“, Capturing everyone's interest, “We used to sit round the fire and while we were waiting for dinner we'd tell each other urban legends to scare each other.“

Shiraz pipes up in that nasally way pangolin“s usually have, “That sounds like a riot! We should do that!“

Asorut and Ivik’s attention now drawn to Shiraz“s hushed excitement by the campfire rather than their own conversation, “Ooooo, I think I“ve got a good one!“

“I think Chunja should go first, it’s their idea.“

“Hmmm, true.“

“Alright, alright, my story is one passed down through my family, we’ve told it so many times, none of us are really sure which version is the original, we have a running gag that everyone who tells it has to change something- ah, but I’m rambling, you all want to be scared, yes?“ Chunja uses their pause to adjust their glasses, “My story is about a fly called Bubezleeb who lived in Aegrotune a very, very long time ago. Bubezleeb and his siblings had all come together and ousted their awful parent, who had been ruling their household very much like a tyrant, so that they may all live in peace - but before their parent left the home for good, he cursed all of the siblings in different ways. Bubezleeb, in particular, was cursed with parasites, worms that would burrow into his brain and spread a sprawling rot throughout his mind and body. The siblings had never known their parent to be a user of magicks, so paid the nasty old man no mind... at first.“

“Bubezleeb began to behave... strangely over the following weeks, when once he was a bright and sociable fellow, now had become reclusive, lashing out at his siblings, barely speaking unless it was to mutter odd things about feeling things moving inside of his skin. When he began to physically attack his siblings, they knew something had to be done about the curse. To protect themselves while they worked on finding a cure, they locked their once kindly brother in the basement of their home, all while dealing with their own curses too and on the day they found a way to break the curse, they went down into the basement to free him, to find their parent sat with him, both covered entirely in worms, dead.“

"Creepy,“ Asorut cleared his throat, “where did that story come from?“

*Passed down from parent to child for... I have no idea how many generations. I assume it references an event that occurred a very long time ago, but the truth is lost to time.“

Ivik turns to his brother, “Do you mind if I tell the Evil Potato story?“

Asorut lets out a long suffering sigh, “Sure, go for it.“

“What’s that?“ Shiraz asks.

“My story is something that happened to Asorut as we were travelling out of Sol Valley, somewhere close to the border when it started. From my perspective, Asorut gained a sudden fear of opening his provisions weeks into our journey... but for my brother, he was containing a great evil.”

Asorut cringed as Ivik got into telling his tale, though he was being a good sport about it.

The tale ended in uproarious laughter and Asorut“s clear embarrassment

Shiraz managed to force out despite their lack of breath, “I can’t - believe- believe that you - that you-“, and then fell further into her hysterics.

Chunja, hands over their ears to protect themself from the noise, “A potato! All that over a potato!“

Asorut, indignant, “I was a child! And! And! Have any of you seen a sprouting potato out of soil? They’re creepy as all afterlife!“

“I thought it was sweet, little Asorut protecting his brother from the terrifying veggie.“ Asorut turned a few shades darker, while his brother’s grin spelled out a job well done, I’ve never been able to understand what“s going on with them, maybe that“s an only child thing.

Chunja takes mercy on the poor boy, “Shiraz, you should tell that story about- about the Three Toad Killer!"

“The one that kills you?“

“The one that kills you!!! And takes your toes!!!“

.

“Asorut, you got one?“

“I might.“

“Ooooo.“

It was Ivik’s turn to be embarrassed now, the story only qualifies as ‘scary’ by the loosest terms possible, Asorut was clearly more intent on a tit for tat, why else would he tell a story about the time Ivik’s clothes got soaked in the bath house and he had to go streaking through the village, narrowly avoiding being seen?

.

“So, Cuishi, what's our final story of the night?“ Asorut leans forward a little in interest, knee knocking against mine.

“I think you might like this one, about the Brambles That Hunt,“ my smile turns sinister and Chunja lets out a squeak, “a terrifying entity that stalks the woods of Lepidop for its next unsuspecting meal.

“The Brambles bear no fruit, for it cares not to sustain others, only to satiate its own never-ending hunger

- it made its home in these woods for a reason, after all?“

“- flesh is what drives this mindless beast. And it is coming for you, Chunja.“ I snap my head up to look at them. “It's behind you right now!“

Chunja practically leaps up from their seat and whips around, it takes everything in them to stifle the scream at the white, spongy looking vines on the wall of the ravine behind them. Not brambles, but the half-exposed mycelium network of the mushrooms above. The perfect backdrop for the story she heard one of the elders of their old village tell a few weeks back.

“Oh, you bastard! You scared me out of my skin!“ I only laughed in reply, I knew that was going to get them.

“That was fantastic, Cuishi! Your descriptions really made my skin crawl!“ Asorut’s observation lit a warmth at the bottom of my stomach, I was almost too focused on it to see the looks or groups other three shot at each other.

.

The moon had risen high in the sky and was almost directly above us when my eyes snapped open, the sudden scream had me out of my bedroll, stumbling to the entrance of my tent. Shiraz, hoisted up in the air by the mushroom roots and... with half of her body missing? As Shiraz continued to scream, Chunja appeared from her own tent as I stood frozen.

“the fuck is that thing?!“ Ivik’s voice sounded so distant even though we were only a few feet apart, Asorut was lagging behind, groggy from sleep.

Chunja and Ivik, the most alert and pragmatic of us, started towards the maze of roots almost like veins of rotting milk in the moonlight, to try and pull what was left of Shiraz free. Chunja made it first and as her hand reached in, the monster exploded around her in an instant, unable to comprehend the growth, I continued to stare. Chunja shrieked for all of us to run.

Asorut grabbed my arm and pulled me with him. I couldn’t do anything except match his movements, couldn’t hear anything but Chunja’s cries and Ivik’s footsteps sounding behind us and .... rustling, fast and large rustling. Shiraz had fallen silent.

Ivik stumbled as we exited the ravine and Asorut let go of my wrist to go help him up. The beast engulfed them both before Ivik could start moving again. Whatever was holding me still broke then. I rushed forward and grabbed Asorut by the shoulders as the thing wrapped around his legs, wrapped around Ivik’s entire body as looked up at me trying to yank his brother free.

“Save him, please, Cuishi, save him.“

Asorut's legs suddenly... weren’t there anymore, his trousers ripped where they now ended and the roots... didn’t follow, didn’t grab at the rest of Asorut or try to grab at me, seemingly more focused on devouring Ivik... even though it clearly didn’t have to.

I looked into the brambles. Even now I’m not sure why, but I saw it. The beast. The monster. The Brambles had a face, or it was pretending to have one, when the mouth opened into a smile, it was clear there was no teeth, no tongue, it made no sound, the inside of the hole was the same spongiform flesh as the rest of the ‘face’ - the eyes were functional though, I’m certain of that, they tracked us as I moved further and further backwards.

As I pulled a sobbing Asorut onto my back, the only word out of his mouth was a broken syllabled “Ivik” over and over again. I tried my hardest to run with the weight. I didn’t make it far before I ran into you.

I let out a sob. Unable to hold it anymore. I almost thought I had already been killed when we crossed paths, I thought there weren’t any rats left.

.

‘It’s okay, you can stop now.’

“I just.….. I didn’t know it was real, that the story the elder told wasn’t a story, but something we needed to watch out for, that thing, Ratil- I could have-“

‘There wasn’t anything you could have done. She’s an ambush predator but she has a lot of pride. Once you stepped into that ravine, you weren“t going to leave alive, she would have followed.’

“... She?“

‘The one that killed your friends was a Priest of Famine, her name is Alphonse.’

“That- that thing was a person?“

‘Not exactly, the God of Famine created her, she’s more plant-experiment than anything else.’

“But to be a priest they must be intelligent, sentient, not a mindless beast, she chose to do what she did.“

‘... Yes.’

“Is it just the Gods you want to kill?“

‘Cuishi, I promise, I will keep you all safe- none of them will hurt you.’