The Seven Worlds

With determination, yet a focus on every sound, I crept through the damp forest. My footsteps were muffled by the moist earth. Rain had fallen not long ago from the sky, veiling the nature around me in a shroud of mist. Droplets clung to the branches and leaves like jewels.

The scent of damp earth filled my nostrils, intermingled with subtle aromas of moss and foliage. The forest was a symphony of colors and sounds. Between the dense trees, sunlight danced on wet leaves, making them glisten like precious gemstones. I felt a gentle breeze gliding through the trees, a reassuring caress on my skin, a soft touch as if nature sought to comfort or console me.

I was clad in clothing designed for comfort, specifically tailored for hunting. My outfit embraced me like a second skin. I wore close-fitting pants with spacious pockets on my hips and thighs. Above them, a black shirt adorned my body. A belt graced my waist, bearing knives of various shapes and sizes. In my hands rested a relaxed bow with an arrow already nocked.

A soft, melodic whistle drew my attention to the right, to the east. I answered the call, one I could recognize from a thousand, by whistling between my teeth. The song of an Azuretail, a beautiful bird with violet-purplish plumage, emerged from my lips. The Azuretail was a native bird of this forest, the forest where I had hunted alongside my friends all my life.

When we were young, each of us chose a bird as our recognition signal. My choice had been an easy one, and in no time, I mastered the sound of the Azuretail. Since then, I refused to mimic the calls of other birds.

The quivery, high-pitched call of a Lightcrest returned, not far from my location. I quirked a corner of my mouth and suppressed a chuckle upon recognizing Leora's response.

The prey was not far from us.

Carefully, I took a step toward the 'Lightcrest.' The wet ground made squishy sounds under my boots. I cursed under my breath but kept my breathing steady.

Not far from me, I heard rustling among the green leaves. I drew my bow, raised my arms, and looked over the arrow resting on my weapon, straight into the brown eyes of a deer. The animal saw me but didn't move. She stood frozen, her mouth full of the wet foliage she had been about to consume.

With a sigh, I relaxed my bow. The arrow sliced through the air with a tense whisper, and the sound echoed through the forest that was still recovering from the downpour that had soaked me and my friends not long ago.

With quick steps, I hurried to my prey. She dropped to her knees, emitting a horrifying roar. The noise was deafening, and a shiver ran down my spine at the sound of terror in her cries. Deliberately, but swiftly, I placed my bow beside me and drew a knife from my belt. In one fluid motion, I cut her throat. Within moments, the forest was once again shrouded in serene calm. What had just happened was only betrayed by the metallic scent of fresh blood flowing over my fingers and covering the forest floor.

I looked up at the sound of breaking branches and saw Fiona striding toward me with long steps. And she wasn't the only one coming towards me. The silence had been broken, and everyone was on the move. In a tree opposite me, a shadow moved, hiding amidst the lush branches of an old oak. With a thud, she landed on her feet not far from me. Maria put her hands in her pockets and shook her head, causing her dark brown braid to slide over her shoulder. Her hair was still soaking wet, as I saw the drops dripping from the tip.

"Not very nice, Ari," she rightly chastised me. I suppressed a grimace. She was right and expressed it subtly. It wasn't appropriate to require multiple actions to take a life. A single arrow should be enough. The animal had given us its life; it didn't need to suffer just because we needed meat and fur.

"I know," I hissed as I wiped my bloodied knife on the wet ground.

"Ariana," I heard the voice of the girl who had just mimicked a Lightcrest. Leora rushed toward us, with two large birds slung over her shoulder, tied to a hook. I suppressed a grin.

"Lightcrests, eh?" I said to the girl who had always had a morbid choice of calls.

"If you'd made a clean shot, Ariana," the girl said fiercely, "I would have had more than just a few Lightcrests. I was so close to my own deer, Ari, so close." She came to a stop in front of me, and held her thumb and forefinger less than three centimeters apart to indicate how close she had been to her own deer. "Because of that miserable death gurgle from your prey, mine got away."

A fourth voice approached us. "We've had a good week, Leora. One less clean shot still makes Ariana our best archer."

"That's not the point," Leora groaned unhappily. She turned to Wilma, who was walking towards us with her arms crossed. Her short, blonde hair was disheveled, and there was a proud gleam in her eyes.

"Yes," replied Wilma, the oldest of the four of us at thirty-five. She was the most experienced and extremely skilled in the art of knife-throwing, but due to her slightly poorer eyesight, she rarely used a bow and arrow. "We've got three deer, eight Lightcrests, four mossy hides, and six Forest Whispers. I think we'll return to Beekdale with our heads held high."

"Don't forget the Shadow Fox," Fiona added to Wilma's enumeration.

I sheathed my knife and cleared my throat. The Shadow Fox was my catch from yesterday, a rare type of fox whose fur was often sold for a high price. The animal had a beautiful coat with dark brown spots, and its soft fur was often used in cribs or lining the hoods of coats. The foxes were small and quick, so fast that they were difficult to catch.

Not to mention that you had to catch them before killing them, as you couldn't damage the fur. An arrow was effective but destroyed the fur before you could skin it.

"Exactly," said Wilma solemnly. She held a knife with a hollow handle in her hand, through which she could insert her finger. When she stood still, she always played with her razor-sharp weapons, spinning them around her finger or sliding them between her nimble fingers. The weapon in question now spun around her finger like a windmill's sail, leaving a soft, humming sound in the forest.

"I wonder if we'll win or the other team," Maria sighed. She held her long braid between her fingers and gently tugged at the strands to rearrange them.

"Come on, help me with that deer," Wilma said to her. They crouched beside the animal, bound its legs together, and together, they dragged it back to our camp, where the last of our group was waiting. Stasia, who stood by a crackling campfire, waiting for us with our loot and tents.

In our village, Beekdale, there were several hunting teams. Each team consisted of five girls of different ages responsible for hunting. In Avelora, it was customary for women to hunt, while men worked the land. Where men had the muscle to handle heavy plows and control bulls and oxen, women were of slighter build, allowing them to move more stealthily through the forests. Not to mention the difference in flexibility.

Every season, we - we called ourselves the Shadow Hunters - held a competition with the only other team consisting of girls our age. They called themselves the Windbirds, a peculiar name, but they were proud of it, so we teased them only behind their backs and not to their faces.

The winning team received gifts collected by Beekdale for us. Sometimes it was an extra pot of pickled vegetables, like sweet-sour cloud cabbage or winter carrots. Other times, the traders who occasionally visited from the larger cities brought gifts. Wood carvings or crystals, for example.

Spring had just begun, and the meat from our hunting competition was highly valued. Both the older women and men of the village looked forward to our return. The upcoming weeks were dedicated to salting, drying, and preserving the meat, ensuring its availability in case our future hunts were less fruitful.

Not that we were really afraid. From all the surrounding villages and even small towns, we were known as the village with the most skilled huntresses. We were blessed with an abundance of young, vibrant women who took pleasure in caring for their fellow villagers, and hunger had been a stranger to us for years. After the period of preserving, drying, and salting, some of the older women even took part of our food to neighboring villages.

But that sense of caring, the sharing of prosperity, and taking care of the weaker ones were considered normal in Avelora. Being the smallest of the seven worlds, unlike the other six, we had no magic. We had to rely on our physical strength, intelligence, and flexibility.

I had never met anyone from the other six worlds, but stories about the magicians in each world were still told daily around the campfire or at bedtime for adventurous children who wanted thrilling dreams. Stories of shapeshifters or frozen tundras.

"I think we have a good chance of winning," Stasia muttered, her eyes gleaming as she looked at our haul. The hunt had only lasted four days, but we had managed to amass a considerable collection.

"The shadow fox goes with me," I said firmly, so everyone heard it. "We won't report that to Elerea."

"You've only said that three times," grumbled Leora.

"If we lose because of you, Ariana, I'll break your bow," Maria's voice sounded angry, but I saw the playful sparkle in her bright blue eyes.

"As if you could get near my bow," I challenged her. I walked toward an improvised clothesline I had knotted yesterday from fishing line and crossed branches. Hanging on the line was the shadow fox fur I had taken down yesterday. The soft fur glistened in the bright afternoon sun, and I ran my finger along the inside of the skin. It was almost dry, not entirely, but enough to fold up and take home.

"What do you need the fur for? If you get pregnant, will you tell us in time?" Leora teased. "Then we'll know that we'll have one less archer for next season's hunt."

"Come on, Leora," Wilma defended me with a serious look, which disappeared in a flash as she added, "As if Ariana has sex."

All four of them laughed while I made an obscene gesture with my hand. "Thanks a lot," I hissed, but I did my best not to laugh as well.

In our village, Beekdal, a Nature Festival was organized twice per season. Nature festivals were open to everyone of a certain age. During these festivals, often held after successful harvests or hunts, we served a spicy drink with an extremely high alcohol content, after which men and women retired to tents or houses for a lively night.

Married, unmarried, young, or old, everything was allowed as long as it was consensual.

But me? I didn't participate. Only once, when I was nineteen, did I join the revelry, but I soon left the drunkards to their enjoyment. They were clearly having fun, but it just didn't appeal to me. There was not a single man in our village with whom I wanted to share a bed.

Except for Isaac, but I didn't need alcohol for that. He was my secret, and I was his. He was a merchant from Zilverbeek, a city about two days' journey from Beekdal. He had been coming to Beekdal for my entire life for various reasons. He bought our furs to sell in Zilverbeek but also visited to see his mother, who lived two houses down from mine. Elerea was one of the three older women who went to surrounding villages with the rest of our food to distribute it to orphans, the weaker, or the elderly. She had been the most skilled huntress in Beekdal in her younger days, but her gray hair and inflamed knuckles had since won over her flexibility.

In addition, Elerea was the woman to whom we had to report our hunt. She kept track of which team won, which would be triumphantly announced during the hunting festival tonight.

Isaac was slightly older than me, although not by much. While I had seen twenty-three summers, he had already seen thirty. He was a handsome man, but I deliberately made sure I didn't see him too often. Although we often literally bumped into each other on the street or in the pub, I avoided inviting him to my bed too often. It was no secret that he wanted me. He longed for marriage, for a life together in Zilverbeek. But I was absolutely not ready for the life of a wife.

I relished the freedom, the ability to go where I pleased. I only had the responsibility of looking after my slightly younger sister, Elena, who was a year younger than me but different in every way.

While I loved the forest and nature, she was more skilled in the arts—painting or crafting nets for crab fishing. Where my abdomen was toughened and shaped by muscles, she had the soft, feminine curves that made her the most popular during the Nature Festivals. While the look in my eyes always had a serious edge, hardened by the many animal lives I had taken, she possessed a cute naivety that made her warm. Endearing.

With all my heart, I loved her, but sometimes she could truly drive me to despair. We clashed regularly, and in recent weeks, there had even been silence between us. But I was sure it wasn't my fault.

I stroked my fingers over the soft fur, hoping my peace offering would soften her heart. Maybe she would talk to me again.

Or at the very least, tell me who the father was.