Chapter Four: The Little Boy in the Woods

Denmark was finally old enough to go on a hunting trip with his father, and he was exited. It had been an excellent past time for his father, and Denmark was glad that he could finally learn how to hunt, after so many years of watching his father leave with a group of other men on hunting trips. This was special, too, because Sweden and Norway were not going. They chose to stay at the house. Sweden was old enough, almost as old as Denmark, and Scandinavia would have let Norway come if they wanted to. But those two, as boring as they were, chose to stay at home.

This was just fine with Denmark. For once, even though it was a short hunting trip and only for a day, he had his father all to himself.

Currently, Father was trying to teach Denmark how to use a knife, but it was not going so well. Denmark missed nearly every target that he was supposed to it at, and he just could not seem to throw the dagger right with his small, clumsy fingers. Scandinavia sighed on the eighth try, debating on whether or not to just give up.

"Faðir, if I have something real to shoot at, I'll be able to get something!" Denmark said after his father had been silent for several minutes. "I promise!"

The young Danish boy glanced around the clearing that they were in with narrowed eyes. They were unusually shrewd, alert. Scandinavia raised an eyebrow and was about to say something, but there was a crunch of snow that made them both freeze. Denmark's eyes searched the perimeter, and finally seemed to lock on the source of the noise. Then, he raised his weapon and aimed it. Scandinavia noticed that the thing that made the noise was too late, for the dagger had already been flung out of his son's hand before he could stop it. The thing that was hiding just behind the bushes made a yelping sound and crashed to the ground.

"Faðir, I got it!" Denmark exclaimed, smiling broadly up at Scandinavia. Despite Denmark's happiness, his father put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed hard. Too hard. Denmark said "ow!" and frowned, while Scandinavia pushed him back a few steps.

"Stay there," he told his son in a stern voice. Denmark knew that strict voice, and it meant that he had done something bad. So instead of arguing, he looked down at the ground and tried to remain perfectly still - which did not work for very long.

Scandinavia rushed over to the place where Denmark's dagger had gone flying, and parted a few branches to make his way inside the forest. Just a few feet away from him, he saw a young boy laying on his back, fat tears streaming out of his eyes. When he saw Scandinavia, the boy made a small gasping sound and tried to back up. He was holding his shoulder, which had a little amount of blood coming out of it. Denmark's knife was lying a in between the two of them.

"Don't hurt me again!" The boy said meekly. He sniffed. "I-I didn't do a-anything, so p-please don't hurt me a-again."

Scandinavia smiled warmly, though his eyes were sad at the sight of the boy. This boy had to be younger than Norway (even though his three children did not age normally), and he was covered in dirt and grime, his clothes tattered and filthy.

"I'm not going to hurt you," Scandinavia replied calmly. He started to walk closer to the boy, but the boy back up again, uneven sobs emitting from his mouth. "It was an accident. I will not hurt you. I promise."

The boy seemed to consider this and finally nodded slowly, more tears making a trail down his cheek. "As long as you don't hurt me."

Scandinavia's smiled was amiable and welcoming as he walked over to the boy and bent down next to him.

"Do not worry," he replied as he lowered the collar of the boy's shirt down past his left shoulder ever so slightly, so that he could see the wound. It was a small scrape, and not too much blood was dripping out of it, but it must have hurt for the small child. "I will never harm you. My son thought he was throwing his knife at an animal, and for that I am sorry."

Denmark was getting impatient. "Faðir, what is going on?" He called from the clearing.

Scandinavia sighed and shouted back, "Stay where you are, Matthias! I'll be back soon!" He turned back to the other boy and began to examine his wound again. "Tell me, boy, what is your name?"

"My . . . my name?" The child asked quietly, as if no one had ever asked him the question before. Scandinavia looked up in surprise.

"Yes, your name."

"I don't . . . I don't have one," the boy sniffed, tears welling up in his eyes again. Scandinavia was starting to get an uneasy feeling about this.

"What kind of child does not have a name? Come on, boy, you must have one."

The little boy shook his head. "No, sir. Not one that I know of." Yet he seemed very polite. How odd.

"Are you sure?" Scandinavia asked, and when the boy nodded, he asked another question. "Then where are you from?"

"Nowhere."

Scandinavia looked and looked up at the boy's face, his eyes, as if those would give some kind of answer.

"Nowhere?" He asked.

The boy shook his head. "No, sir. I don't remember being from anywhere. I'm just from around the woods, I guess."

"Ah . . . I see . . ." Scandinavia replied, giving himself a moment to take all of this in. This boy, being in the woods all alone . . . that was standard for any new country. They popped up out of nowhere, with no parents, no names, no clue of who they were. They were normally young, generally a toddler or a child of around five or six. Denmark had been the youngest to be known to be found, as a baby. This boy looked around five years old.

"Well, why don't we take a little walk?" Scandinavia asked. He stood up and held his hand out to help the boy up as well.

"A walk?" The child asked.

Scandinavia nodded. "Yes. A walk. I think . . . I have something to explain to you. My house is only a little ways away. Why don't we go there and I can tell you on the way? I'll fix your arm up as soon as we get there."

The boy looked slightly wary, but nodded anyway. "Alright . . ." He used Scandinavia's hand to help himself up.

Scandinavia led the boy to the clearing. The child walked uncertainly, as if on new legs, and this gave Scandinavia one more hint to his suspicions.

Denmark regarded the boy curiously, and as Scandinavia walked past him he whined, "Faðir, who's thaaaat?"

"Be quiet, Denmark," Scandinavia replied. His voice was strict, but not too strict. Denmark figured that this was a good thing, so he fell silent, especially glad to after Scandinavia said, "I will tell you when we get home."

The first twenty minutes on the walk to Scandinavia's house was filled with him asking questions of the little boy and the boy answering them to the best of his ability. The last ten were entirely occupied with Scandinavia explaining to the boy what he must have been, and in turn what Denmark and Scandinavia himself were. The boy took this all in silence, and when they were in view of the house, only a couple minutes after Scandinavia had finished his speech, he stopped. Both the little boy and Denmark stopped with him, though the latter was a few feet behind them.

"So what do you think?" Scandinavia asked the little boy.

"It's . . . It's great," the child finally decided, after some hesitance. Scandinavia felt a little smile creeping onto his face.

"It's great?"

"Yes, I mean . . ." The boy took a deep breath. "Being a country. It's great. Kind of like I cannot believe it." He paused, and then added something in an unsure matter. "But I feel like it makes sense. Like it makes sense with me. Does that make sense?"

Scandinavia's smile only got bigger. "Yes, it does. I used to feel the same way when I thought it was young and did not know who I was. But you understand why we have to keep it a secret from people that are not like us, right?"

The boy nodded slowly. "Yes . . . yes, I think I do."

"That's great!" Scandinavia said joyously as he started walking to the house again. His pace was faster this time, and the boy had to jog to keep up with him. Denmark ran to catch up with them.

"Wait, Faðir!" He exclaimed as he stepped into line with the other two. "So is he like us?" He glanced at the boy with a curious eye yet again.

"Yes, he is, Son," Scandinavia replied, a delighted smile gracing his face.

"Oh . . . that's great!" Denmark said, grinning. He looked over at the other boy. "There's Sweden and Norway, too. They can be kind of boring, though, so if you ever want to have fun, you can come to me!" His smile brightened.

"Oh . . . yes, I will keep that in mind," the other boy replied, smiling slightly - shyly - at him.

This only made Denmark's ego shoot up, and he beamed as he stomped into the house, announcing very loudly, "We have a new brother!" 'We', of course, referring to him, Sweden, and Norway.

The latter two came racing down the stairs - it was a rare occurrence for them to be running, but they wanted to see this supposed "new brother" as soon as possible. When they came close to the little boy, he shrunk back slightly, and hid behind Scandinavia. The man chuckled and put a reassuring hand on his back, then led him and the other boys into their roomy, warm kitchen.

Once inside, the boy proceeded to pull of his dirty, shabby boots. They were made of a mushy sort of fabric, and seemed to be coming apart. He glanced at Scandinavia, and the man nodded, a sign that he could set them down. The young boy tentatively set his shoes down by the door leading to the kitchen. He then slipped his coat off - it was a bit large for him, now that Scandinavia looked closer at it - and looked back up at confirmation that it was appropriate. Scandinavia smiled at him and held out his hand.

"Here, let me take that. I'm sure we can find you a better one. One of the boys' old ones."

"Oh, no sir, don't trouble yourself," the boy replied with a shake of his head.

Scandinavia raised an eyebrow. "Oh, it is not trouble, my dear boy! You are going to be living here now with us, like one of us. Because you are one of us. I wouldn't have any other way." He smiled wider. "Now give me that filthy thing." His tone was jovial, and so the boy smiled a bit sheepishly and handed the coat to him.

After a short deliberation process, Scandinavia decided to name the boy Finland; well, that was his country name, anyway. Besides, his brother had warned him that he would find another country soon, with all of that free space northern Europe had. Scandinavia had asked his boys for help with the human name, and they had all finally (after some arguing) decided on Tino Väinämöinen. It was not a very Scandinavian name, but the boys had heard it from somewhere else, possibly from some southern European country. The last name had

As Scandinavia watched the boys, he could not help but feel a bit of sadness. Something was happening to him. A very slow process, but he was sure of it.

He was not going to be around forever, and he was not sure how much time he had left.

Of course, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Finland would take over his lands. Become countries of their own. But Scandinavia knew that his time was ending, that he would not always be around for them. Sure, he probably had a hundred more years to him, being a country and all, but his boys would still be young in country terms when he . . . what? Died? Passed on? Or what if one day, they just woke up and he was not there? What if he faded.

Instead of telling the four boys of his fears, he smiled happily at them and began to prepare dinner. There was plenty of time to tell them later, when they were a bit older. He would be around for at least that long.