Chapter One / Worst. Day. Ever.
My vision was blurred by tears as I ran between trees, through a forest I'd never known, dried leaves and branches snapping under my feet. I tried pushing the images of what had caused me to run from my mind. Unfocused, I stumbled over an overgrown root, breaking the heel of my satin pump. It didn't stop me as I continued to barrel through not caring where I was going. It wasn't until a gnarled branch attached itself to the delicate fabric of my dress that I lost my footing completely and fell to the ground. My hands slid into the underbrush of the forest, soft mossy dirt collected in my manicured nails as I clawed at the ground in frustration. Lying there trying to catch my breath between sobs, my throat sore as tears flowed down my face, the memory of what had occurred flooded back into my mind.
The image of my best friend gripping a chair, my fiancé thrusting into her from behind, grunting like an animal. I had been unable to look away, like a bad dream you had no control of, all I could do was stand there and watch the ultimate betrayal. Watch the supposed love of my life as he continued to hold another woman's hips, moving frantically against her, his face contorted in pleasure. So engrossed in the act they hadn't even noticed me standing there until I got sick all over the floor.
After eight months of planning, not neglecting even the smallest detail, all dreams of my perfect day had shattered around me in just one moment.
A sob escaped my lips at the painful memory.
It was my wedding day, dammit!
o+o+o+o+o+o+o+
I woke up with dirt and leaves sticking to my face. For a moment I'm not sure where I am but then my stomach dropped as I take in the state of my wedding dress. The dress I had spent a month looking for and years dreaming about, now pooled around me in a twisted mess. Slowly I stood up and ran my hands over the once beautifully beaded corset now smudged with dirt, beads missing and stitching snagged. I shook out the full skirt of tulle and satin, ripped in places from my haphazard journey through the woods. My heart clenched as emotions rolled through me.
This was supposed to be my fairytale.
I ran my hands over my face, removing small bits of debris and remaining wetness. My dark hair was still being held up by the hundreds of bobby pins the hairstylist had put in early that day. I looked at my hands. They were brown from the dirt and some of my nails were broken. I let out a defeated sigh.
I pushed down the urge to cry, looked around and realized I had no idea where I was. The trees seemed to hover over me, blocking out the sky. It was getting dark. The hurt and anger I had been holding suddenly turned into unease as I took in my surroundings. After a few uneven steps I remembered one of my heels had broken. I bunched up my skirt until I could see my feet, reached down and pulled off my good shoe. I banged it against a nearby tree trunk, trying to break off the heel, imagining for a moment I was slamming it into my fiancé's face.
A gust of wind kicked up the leaves on the ground sending goosebumps up my exposed arms. In the canopy of the forest, large limbs swayed and a faint whispering sound filled the air. Hesitantly, I smacked my shoe once more against the hard bark. Relief flooded me when the heel finally broke off.
I put the shoe back on and started walking. Trying to figure out which direction to go in, I heard a guttural sound from somewhere in the trees around me. I told myself to stay calm as I looked around for the source, seeing nothing only made me more uneasy. I began to move but couldn't shake the feeling of being watched. Which would be worse a crazed psychotic or a wild animal? Regret washed over me, instead of running through the forest it would have been safer to face the two hundred guests, deceitful fiancé and backstabbing best friend.
I jumped at the sound of a loud crack that echoed around me. My heart started beating a mile a minute. I bunched up the front of my dress, allowing my feet to move more freely. The forest had become denser and darker and it was becoming harder to make out what was in front of me.
"Don't panic," I whispered to myself, not recalling the woods next to the hotel being this big.
Another sound rang out in the darkness, it sounded like metal, followed by voices. Shouts. It must be a search party looking for me, I thought, relief flooded over me.
"I'm here!" I called out, walking quickly toward the sounds.
Suddenly the ground disappeared from beneath my feet. My body re-connected with the ground painfully as I tumbled down a hill. My wedding dress enveloped me in a mass of white as I continued my frenzied descent. My heart raced as my arms flailed about trying to grab at anything that would stop me. I slammed into something solid, knocking the breath out of me. The sound of a loud crunch filled my ears and then everything stopped.
I laid there for a moment, the tulle of my dress a tent over me as I tried to catch my breath. A groan escaped my mouth as my brain began to process the pain and soreness spreading through my body. I brought my hand up to my throbbing head. With my ears still ringing, I somehow sensed movement nearby.
"I'm over here," I managed to croak out.
The shuffling of leaves grew louder near me but I couldn't see anything through the tulle.
"My lady?" It was a man's voice.
Startled, I quickly brushed off the light fabric from my head so that I could see my rescuer. I looked around until my sights settled on a figure approaching through the darkness. He seemed hesitant as he got closer. I supposed I would be too if I came across some girl who had just fallen out of the wood wearing a wedding dress in the middle of the night.
When he was closer I noticed he was wearing a lot of leather. The only reason I noticed this was that it was bulky and it made a scrunching sound as he moved. My eyes were drawn to the image of a white horse on his leather clad chest before looking up to his face. He must have been out here a while. His face was covered in a mix of sweat and dirt. His brown eyes stared at me as if he was questioning what he was seeing.
I noticed something in his hand. What little light there was caught on a hard metal edge.
My breath caught in my throat.
Was that a knife?!
Panic engulfed me as I realized it wasn't a knife but a sword. A long bloodied sword. A wild animal suddenly didn't seem as bad as I scrambled to get up, my eyes not leaving the sword. My legs kicked at the dress tangled around me as I pushed back away from him.
He stopped and followed my stare down to his hand and the sword he held. Realization spread across his face and he slowly released it, letting it drop to the ground. He held up his hands showing me they were now empty. The gesture did nothing to reassure me.
A rustling nearby startled us both.
My head jerked around and I spotted more men approaching. Some wearing leather as the man crouched in front of me, others wearing some sort of metal. Some wore helmets and others had long hair and beards that made me think they were a biker gang. It wasn't until I saw the swords and spears that I really began to panic.
I would like to think sometimes that I was the type of girl that would stand tall in the face of danger and fight her way out of any situation. Instead I sat there frozen to the spot like a deer in the headlights. Then for some strange reason, thoughts of my fiancé came to me and I wondered for a moment if he regretted what had happened. Did it even matter now?
I was gonna die out here – or worse.
Terrified of what was about to come next I just sat there and watched as the man held his hand up, signaling to the others.
"Grimbold, hold," he said without looking away from me.
I looked from him to the others and saw that the other men had stopped their approach. They looked at me with uncertainty.
"Are you injured?"
Looking back at the man in front of me I saw concern in his eyes and it eased the tension a bit. I shook my head slowly, still too afraid to speak.
The man was encouraged by this and he shuffled forward a bit. My body stiffened and he stopped at my reaction. "I mean you no harm," he said slowly and a little part of me desperately wanted to believe him. The alternative was not a comforting thought. "Where do you hail from?"
Confused by the question, I looked around at the other men. They all seemed to be waiting for my answer. I reasoned if they were going to kill me they would have done it by now. Maybe they were a biker gang volunteer search party.
Who carry swords and spears?
"I'm staying at the Marquessa," I answered, naming the hotel I was staying at.
My answer seemed to puzzle him. "I know of no such place. Are you not Eorlingas?"
Eore – what? "What?" I said, this time aloud.
He looked me over. I could see now that he was just as confused by me as I was of him.
"You have the dark hair of the Dunlendings but your dress is too fine I think," he said but I got the feeling he was talking more to himself.
I looked toward the other men gathered. They were looking at the man in front of me as if waiting for direction. Then it hit me as I looked over their appearance.
"Are you larping?" I asked the man in front of me. Suddenly everything started to make sense. The woods and the swords. All the tension I was holding quickly evaporated and I couldn't help a smile. "I'm sorry guys. You must think I'm part of – whatever it is you do - but I'm not."
The man stood up, still looking confused. The others whispered amongst themselves, some of the words I didn't recognize. When the last of my anxiety melted away I couldn't help but be a little impressed. I thought back to a friend who had told me about larping but I'd never actually seen it in person. As I looked at them I could tell they had done a really good job with their outfits I now recognized was armor.
The sky had started to lighten with the sunrise. Had I been out all night? I couldn't help a little yawn that escaped. Wanting to get back to the hotel, find a box of band-aids and a bottle of wine, I pushed back thoughts of my fiancé. Finally off my roller coaster of emotions I wasn't ready to get back on just yet. I lifted up my dress, freed my legs and pushed myself up off the ground.
Now that I had broken the illusion some of the other men had disappeared back where they'd come from. One man came forward. He had long blonde hair and a scruffy beard. Thinking about it there seemed to be a lot of blondes in this group.
"Lord Theodred," he said, bowing his head to the man next to me. He looked at me suspiciously. I figured he must be pissed I interrupted. "My lady."
"Okay you can stop doing that now," I said, patting his arm. "It's making me a little uncomfortable."
The new guy gave me a disconcerted look then looked back to Theodred, who seemed amused. "My lord, I'm glad that you are safe," he said.
"Yes Grimbold, as am I," Theodred said. "I'm afraid I let my lust for revenge take me when I chased down that wildman. I think I would not have lived through the encounter if not for this brave maiden."
Grimbold seemed taken back by that. He turned to me and bowed his head. "My lady, the Riddermark owes you much."
I couldn't help but laugh. These two were really getting carried away with this. When I noticed that they weren't laughing with me I stopped. I didn't want to seem like a jerk. "Sorry," I said. "Can you guys just take me to the highway? I can find my way back from there. Oh – can I borrow a cellphone?" They looked at me again with confused expressions.
As Grimbold and Theodred whispered to each other I realized one of my shoes was missing and turned to look for it. I figured it must have fallen off during my fall.
It was then that I noticed a large form on the ground near where I had fallen. When I looked closer I realized it was a man. He wasn't wearing armor like the others and by the look of his clothes I figured he was homeless. I was about to move away and leave him to sleep when I wondered why he hadn't woken up during all the commotion.
"Hey," I said not too loudly. If he was in a deep sleep I didn't want to startle him, although after what had just happened I figured he must be a heavy sleeper. When he didn't move I stepped a little closer. I just needed a sign of breathing, movement- anything. As I tried to get a better look at his face I noticed the ground and the fallen leaves near his head were covered in blood and suddenly I became panicked.
"Oh my god, something's wrong with him!" I called out to Theodred and Grimbold. "He's bleeding! Call 9-1-1!"
Theodred and Grimbold rushed over to me as well as some of the other men alerted by my screaming.
"My lady, is everything alright?" Theodred asked, looking around for signs of trouble. Grimbold stood nearby with his sword in hand.
"He's right here," I said frantically pointing at the man on the ground. "Something's happened to him!"
Theodred looked down at the homeless man then back up at me. Again there was the confused look on his face. "That is the wildman you killed," he said matter-of-factly.
"What?!" I screamed, looking down at the man – the very dead man. My hand went to my chest, my heart pounded against it and my breathing became difficult. "I-I killed him?!"
Then suddenly I felt strong hands gripping my shoulders as everything faded to black.
