Kindling Forest

Serenity walked along the street of her village, in her priestess robes as usual. They were of red and white, with patterns of flowers here and there. Yes…she’d become a priestess again, after Felix had died. Or rather, she’d wandered until she found a village worth staying in. She’d found this particular one by accident. After Felix had died, she’d left her old village and started wandering from place to place, recklessly spending her money on things she didn’t need. Eventually she’d just started giving it away to people on the streets who needed it far more than she did. For a long while she’d found herself drifting in and out of conscious being. She wasn’t allowed to fade, so she just let her body move without her mind. There was a lot from the past century or so that she didn’t remember. She’d thought about getting back into treasure hunting, but what was the point when she could already buy everything she could ever want? Well…everything except Felix or Jake or Liora or her son’s or daughter’s lives. When you lived forever, you started realizing that happiness didn’t have a price. Maybe you could buy happiness as a mortal, but Serenity found herself feeling utterly alone. When she ran out of money, she’d found herself at this village: Kindling Forest. Or rather, the villagers simply called it that, because it was surrounded by the forest with that name. It was very quaint, and peaceful, and away from all the dramas of the Vallies. It accepted all types of people and gave them second chances. Kindling Forest was a self-sufficient village, and many of its peoples were either hunters or farmers. They had no set religion, and few doctors that knew how to heal.

Like mentioned, Serenity had found it by accident. She’d been wandering again, and had come across a man in the woods who had been mauled by a bear. The bear had been nowhere to be found, and the man laid dying with a chunk of skin torn from his side. Or rather, Serenity had assumed it to be a bear. She didn’t know of anything else that would be wandering the human world that could make such a mark, and despite her traveling, she’d come across no creatures of madness that bore mentioning. She’d healed the bloodied up man back to health, and let him rest while she promised to ensure that nothing would harm him in his sleep. When he awoke again, and Serenity was still there, staring off into the distance, he urged her to follow behind him. The man, who was clearly a hunter, took her to his village and introduced her to the head of Kindling Forest. He questioned her on where she was heading, and when she told him nowhere in particular, he welcomed her to stay at the village, only requesting that she help his people, because there had been many hunters dying from attacks by strange wild animals. Having nowhere else to go, Serenity agreed to it. By the end of the day, word had spread around that a mysterious and beautiful healer had come to live in their home. She was taken to a place she could stay, a simple, yet somehow enchanting little house.

It was only ten years later that people started noticing her lack of aging. While Serenity had thought that the villagers would chase her out with torches and weapons blazing, they seemed to grow even more fond of her at this fact. When she allowed them the knowledge that she was immortal, they immediately grew to worship her, against her protests. Requesting that she become the right hand to the leader of the village, she declined and made her own request. To simply become a priestess that would continue helping them in the same way she’d been. She couldn’t bear the idea of the people there worshipping her for a curse. When she made it clear that she disliked the idea of having a religion set up in her honor, the people got the hint, much to her relief. As the years passed, Serenity became more than just a priestess to the people, sometimes teaching the children in the schools about the past, and telling them all about the Vallies. She became an icon to them, but eventually she stopped minding so much, instead drawing on the comment from one of the villagers that she was like the “mother of the village.” Since then, she’d become happier there. She was okay with that, even though she knew that eventually her “children” would die, and she would remain.

Today was an ordinary day for her, nearly eighty years after her arrival at the village that accepted her with open arms. She’d become a far more mellow person than she’d been before Felix’s death. Where she’d used to smile brightly and laugh often, now she smiled softly and chuckled lightly. She felt older than the nineteen years she’d felt when her and Felix had been happy together. She never remembered the bad things about her silver haired friend. She couldn’t bear to. They’d had rough times, but she’d still loved him all the same. Now he was with Meridian, and she was happy for him. He’d waited so long to find peace, and now he finally had it. She, on the other hand, was still waiting for her peace.

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“Priestess, priestess!”

Serenity slowly turned her head towards the young caramel haired, freckle-faced boy that ran towards her with a large smile. The blond priestess he addressed smiled softly at him. “Yes Jin?” Today was a chilly day outside, but for the sake of appearing as the priestess everyone loved, she kept her hands folded in front of herself.

“My grandpa, he said that today’s the day you came to the village a loooonnng time ago,” he giggled, to which Serenity chuckled lightly. She didn’t much care about people speaking of her age anymore. “He said that you’re even older than he is, but I don’t think that’s true, because you look as young as Elisa!”

Serenity knew Elisa to be this boy’s older sister. She wasn’t sure, but she thought she remembered that the girl was eighteen. Walking over to the young eight-year old, she knelt down to be face-to-face with him as she spoke. “You should listen to your grandfather. He’s right, I’m much older than he is. I’m older than even the trees around here,” she told him, patting him on the head lightly.

The boy’s mouth dropped open in mock-surprise. “No way! But you’re so pretty!” Serenity couldn’t help but give a small laugh at that.

“Why thank you,” she smiled, her blue eyes surprisingly warm.

Giggling, the small boy took Serenity’s hand. “The festival’s going to be starting soon, priestess,” he told her.

The blond haired immortal gave a small frown of confusion. “Festival?” Usually word traveled around the village very quickly. Why didn’t she know of a festival?

“Mmhm! It’s a surprise for you that all the villagers did to celebrate the day you came!”

That explained it. Serenity gave a small sigh and stood, following behind as the child pulled her along. While she did love this village, she didn’t like that the people borderline worshipped her. Treating her as a mother-figure was one thing, but treating her as a deity was another thing entirely.