AN- I decided to go with the faun mythology instead of the satyr. Fauns are supposed to be more beautiful than satyrs, but are considered more foolish and liable to make bad decisions.
OoOoO
There were many small worlds within the Labyrinth. As ruler and crafter of this fairy realm, the Goblin King Jareth created them all with equal amounts of fickle whim, cruel intent, and powerful magic. Some of these places were meant to teach a lesson, others to tempt fools from their quests, and even more to instill horror and perhaps even death upon anyone who dared enter the Labyrinth.
Such places tended to exist side by side in strange cohabitation so one needed to be wary of where they wandered, and keep their wits about them at all times. A harmless looking pond could lie at the heart of a black rose garden, the heavy blooms smelling strangely sweet of fever and meat about to turn. What looked like reprieve from flowers that held teeth behind their petals would actually turn out to be waters filled with landlocked mermaids who were just as hungry as the roses.
The powerful yet capricious ruler of this bizarre kingdom was inclined to forget about these strange places and realms within realms he made out of his own dream stuff though. The framework for the Labyrinth would always remain in place, but the things that chose to live there or were lured there were pretty much left to their own devices, to live and die by their own rules and laws. A prime example of this was the Meadows of Wolf Trap and the Baltimore Woods of the Ripper, a hidden world surrounded by a particully high hedge maze.
The Meadows of Wolf Trap were home to the fauns, slim lithe creatures made to please and for pleasure. Fauns was gentle enough compared to what else lived in the Labyrinth, good natured beings who danced and sang and thought about little else other than food, wine, and fornication. Half human from the waist up and half goat from the waist down with the exception of two little horns that sprung from their forehead, the fauns looked harmless enough, but were not to be taken lightly. Nothing in the Labyrinth was as it seemed after all. Any being foolish enough to offend, or try and harm a faun would find themselves caught in the music of their panpipes and subjected to their whims which could run cruel. If they felt so inclined, the fauns could send anyone who had drawn their ire into the Ripper's forest.
The Meadows of Wolf Trap, full of sparkling rivers, great rolling hills and valleys, faded into the Baltimore Woods where no faun, or any sane creature with any ounce of common sense, would go. Dark, deep, and so very dangerous being a maze in its own right within the Labyrinth, the forest was home to the wendigo. Part stag, part raven, part human, but all nightmare, the being who lived in this forest was so feared he was only referred to as The Ripper. Little else was known about him, but much was told in stories traded over goblin wine and across firelight.
Entertainment value aside, little thought was given to the wendigo by the fauns though. The dark creature could only exist and hunt in the dark permanent cover of its forests, and fauns lived for an open sky, sun, and moonlight. The herd knew as long as they stayed out of the forest and sent in the occasional meal, they were safe from the wendigo who seemed content to stay in his own small kingdom of sorts. When they remembered, the fauns would even warn travelers off from the woods…..
….if they remembered….
The herd consisted of nine fauns in all, Jack and Bella being the unofficial leaders of the herd. Beverly, Jimmy, and Bryan would often be seen in their company while Alana, Abigail, and Freddie rounded out the group, the ladies coming and going as they pleased. While all the other fauns tended to stay close together, always in each other's companionship in one form, couple, or another, the exception to this was a faun named Will.
The dark furred faun with the stormy blue eyes and somber nature could often be found in his own company, choosing to keep close to the streams and ponds that dotted the meadow. His isolation was self imposed for Will had a terrible secret, one that seemed to taint him from within, keeping the other fauns away. If his herd ever found out his secret, Will would be on his own for good, exiled by the other fauns.
Unlike the others of his herd who only grazed on fruit and grass, Will ate meat, craved it even. He hadn't meant for it to happen. It had started out small, tried out of curiosity. A small bird here, a fairy there, anything relatively freshly dead was nibbled upon. Will tried his best to hide his new fascination with this strange food, even going so far as to catch fish out of the rivers to try and keep it to himself.
It the end though, it was that longing for blood and fresh red meat that drove him into the forest. Will wasn't even sure what he was looking for there. All he knew was that he had to find something to eat, discover food that would fill the endless void growing in his stomach and mind. Nothing seemed to fill it anymore, that emptiness that gave him fevers and nightmares. Music, goblin wine, and the grapes that grew in the meadow left him feeling empty and hollow no matter how much he ate and drank.
Starving for what he could not name, Will didn't even know what he was hoping to find as he picked his way carefully through the dark slumbering forest, the high canopy of leaves so thick and tangled no light could enter, casting everything in shadow and lingering dark that clung to every trunk like a heavy velvet cloak. Lichen that grew on the dozing trees shed some light, soft glowing patches of blue moss that seemed to weave in and out of lost foxfire mists.
A squeal of pain shattering the pretend night caught Will's attention, drawing the faun to a small clearing nearby, careful of waking wood, some of the trees cracking their eyes to hazily find the source of the noise themselves before losing interest. Hiding behind a still sleeping tree, Will peeked around its glowing girth to find the source of such torment, nearly biting off the tip of his tongue in an effort to stay quiet. Standing tall and wicked in the center of the clearing with a dying goblin in its claws was the Ripper.
The bottom half of the wendigo was like that of a deer if the animal had inky black fur that held raven's plumes within its pelt. The feathers tinted the fur with shades of shimmering violets, blues, and greens like a corrupt opal from the wendigo's lean hips to its cloven hooves. The wendigo's top half was like that of a man's with pale scarred skin, a silvering hairy chest, and face looking carved out of stone for all the expression it gave, but like a faun's, the wendigo had horns growing from out the top of his head. Unlike Will's own tiny goat horns that budded from his forehead, the wendigo's horns was a full rack of antlers made all of black bone and razor points, stained with a patina of dried blood and crusted gore.
The foolish goblin in the wendigo's talons was dying bloody, the creature breathing out the last of its pathetic existence in pained gasps. Its passing was witnessed by a sanguine gaze full of distain and loathing for it. Will could read that much off the wendigo. It wasn't killing the goblin because it was hungry. The Ripper's latest victim had annoyed him, the goblin probably stumbling into his forest uninvited on a fool's errand.
The goblin was treated like the garbage it was considered to be by its killer, the wendigo throwing the creature to the ground to leave it where it landed. Stalking off, the Ripper didn't even bother to watch the goblin die, its blood soaking into the soft forest's floor.
Waiting until the wendigo disappeared from sight and hearing, Will tiptoed out on cloven hooves, tentative and wary as he approached the cooling corpse. As scared as he was, Will could already feel his mouth beginning to water as he scented the air ripe with wet iron and fear. Shaking from tip of horn to toe of hoof, Will reaching done to press his hand up against the mangled body, letting the still warm blood thickly coat his fingers.
Raising his hand up, Will stared at it, admiring how the goblin's lost life seemed to cling to his skin, how pretty it looked in the low light, like liquid rubies and onyx running together. He found that it tasted even better, Will pressing his fingers into his mouth to greedily suck at the digits, licking them clean sooner than he would have liked.
The flavors burst on his tongue, more bright and brilliant that anything he had ever tasted before. Before he had only eaten meat he had found, left out to rot a bit, perhaps a baby bird who had broken its own neck by falling out of the nest or the occasional fairy who hadn't been paying enough attention to avoid better predators than it.
This death was fresh though, vivid in flavor without a hint of rot. It was sublime, the taste of it making Will groan out loud around his fingers, his eyes fluttering shut as he gave himself over to pleasure like his kind tended to do, focusing all his senses upon the feeling. Delight and strange fulfillment tickled his tongue and throat, easing down into his stomach to warm it. The thought of shoving more than just blood into his mouth, filling himself with fresh meat made the faun moan and sigh, his sex beginning to grow heavy and full with the promise of contentment.
"What are you doing?"
Will's eyes shot open at the sound of accented words, cultured and well formed, that phrases coming from the lips of the terrifying being who towered over the tiny faun. The wendigo was so close all Will could do was stare up and up, faun's frightened grey blue eyes meeting keen maroon that regarded him with an open curious look.
Doing the first thing that came to panicked mind, Will did the most unlikely thing. Considering his only viewed option was to become the wendigo's next victim, the faun sprung forward to head butt the wendigo in the stomach. The blow didn't hurt the creature of course, but it did startle it enough to make it pause in surprise, giving the faun the chance it needed to run away.
Fauns had their own magic, based in music and their pipes. Will's own instrument hung at his side from its braided grass cord that looped over his shoulder, but to weave that sort of magic took time, effort, and breathe he didn't have. Speed was the other weapon in a faun's arsenal. Few creatures were faster than a faun on a good day. One that was frightened out of its mind could outrun the wind if need be.
Breaking through the tree line like a shot, Will looked back over his shoulder to see the wendigo stop at the last safe shadow, the creature staring after him. It could come no further until nightfall and even then only if there was no moon and cloudy skies to blot out the stars. Will was relatively safe for now as he slid to a stop, leaving dual furrows in the turf from his hooves. His instincts told him to keep going, to run all the way back to his herd, even if they were reluctant of his company.
What stayed Will's retreat was that the wendigo didn't appear to be angry. If anything, it still regarded him with curiosity. Its frustration stemmed from the fact it could go no further, forced to keep to the safety of shade and shadow.
"What is your name?" Will called to it before he could stop himself, his own interest peeked despite his trepidation. He lived with fear of some sort or another on a constant basis so really what was one more.
The wendigo seemed surprised by the question, or least as far as Will could tell, the creature straightening to its full height so that its antlers brushed up against lower branches, making the trees stir grumpily in their sleep. It made Will wonder if anyone had ever dared to ask the wendigo such a question before.
"Hannibal. And yours, little faun?" the wendigo responded in that cool voice of his, reminding Will of a brook he liked to take fish from.
"William…" the faun answered hesitantly, shivering as he tried to keep himself from crouching low to the ground in an effort to hide himself. "…but I like to be called Will."
"Then I shall do so as well, though I must be leaving now. The sun hurts my eyes." Hannibal smiled, the expression slow and wicked with the glint of sharp teeth. It made Will tremble, the faun tucking his stubby tail between his legs as he sunk into the tall grass. "But Will…..before I go, I have to tell you…..
"Yes?"
"….I know your secret."
OoOoO
TBC?