In the Clearing (Part Two)

“Dragons aren’t real, right?” Alfred said with confusion.

Will’s .22 cracked, and the small slug ripped through the air toward the red body in an unbending line. A metallic ping rang as a bell struck with a stone, and the bullet ricocheted into the grass a few yards away with a puff of dry, warm dirt. Will shot again, aiming for the swaying scarlet head. His second shot cracked the air but missed. The snake heard the shot and felt the bullet disrupt the air as it moved past in a split second. The beast twitched and reared up with its mouth open when the crack of Alfred’s .30-06 cut the noise and forced flames out of the back of the vindictive serpent’s head from a hole matching the caliber of Alfred‘s weapon.

The glowing body thrashed in the calm golden sunlight. Will and Alfred stood in the shade, breathing heavily and shaking to release the adrenaline screaming through their bodies. Deep inside, each of their souls felt like a dying star.

The snake’s breath became shallow as wisps of white smoke hovered over its head like a spent campfire. Its skin, once as red as molten steel, faded to a cool blue-gold while the boys watched its breath drift toward the top of green trees and into the clear, cerulean sky, away from them like a memory. With each slow blink of their eyelids, the scaly skin changed, and its recently hideous strength withered.

“Are you OK?” Will said.

“No,” Alfred said in a monotone response.

The boys stood motionless as time turned around them and watched the sinister shape dissolve into the soft green grass of the clearing, scorching the earth and soil where its body fell and faded.

With caution, they walked into the clearing as a red-winged blackbird piped its metallic call, and squirrels thundered through the dead leaves toward the trunks of the trees that sheltered them from the evil.

They stood near the desiccated skin and charred ground, towering above what was a poison threat long, breathless seconds ago. They both refused to speak and only watched the remains, now paper thin, shake in a stiffening breeze that swept over the trees and into the clearing. At their feet, the shape quivered, then blew away like the hair of a dandelion.

The boys cautiously turned to head back into the darkening woods. They were tired and reluctant to leave the dying danger of the sunlit clearing for the unknown risks hidden behind the silent trees. Will spoke first with a slow drawl.

“We’ve gotta go,” he said. “I want to go.”

“Yeah, me too,” Alfred replied. He scraped at the burned soil with the toe of his boot.

Alfred‘s movement nudged Will into action, and he followed a few short paces behind.

But they did not move. Held in place by the moment, stepping into the shade would be like passing through time sideways.

They both looked around the clearing and listened. Alfred pointed the .30-06 downward, turned away from Will, and stepped toward the waiting woods. The cool shade was thick and ominous now and swallowed the light that abruptly halted at the tree line.

Alfred’s movement nudged Will into action, and he followed a few short paces behind.

In the woods, they moved with lanky strides, picking their way through the narrow deer path they followed to the clearing. Holding their rifles down but still ready to use, they stepped over small branches and snapped their legs forward as brambles clawed at their feet and calves, almost clinging to them in shaking fear of what could be drifting through the growing shadows. Unintentionally, they moved as quickly and as silently as they knew how. They did not speak but glanced at each other at the quick snap of a dried branch or the flutter of a bird a few feet overhead.

Ahead through the snarl of limbs, the afternoon sun, warm and orange, spread through the thinning woods like the fingers of God. Each boy walked faster and pushed their legs hard like a swimmer, straining to break the surface of a river. They walked beyond the tree line, gasped for fresh air, and felt the breeze blow across their faces and corkscrew around their necks. Will halfheartedly spit at his feet.

“You just killed a dragon, Alfred,” Will said. “That's what that thing was.”

“Dragons aren’t real, right?” Alfred said with confusion. “They’re not. They’re only in old stories. Nothing can breathe fire, and snakes don’t have wings or claws. It's a myth.”

“Then what was it? You saw it. It was breathing smoke. I saw fire, you saw fire. We’d be dead. If you didn’t have that,” Will pointed to the rifle gripped tightly in Alfred‘s white knuckles, “and shot it in the mouth. Fire flew out of the back of his head, Alfred.”

“I saw it,” Alfred said with resignation.

The boys walked down the two tracks worn raw in the old trail that led to a gravel road.

They walked down the road, hearing the familiar rasping crunch with each step. They acted normal, but, like someone concussed with grief or the budding thrill of danger, it was theater. Birds trilled, punctuating their confusion.

“Are you going to tell anybody?” Alfred asked after a few hundred yards of walking.

“I don’t know. Everybody'd think we were crazy or lying. But I know what happened and what I saw. I can still smell it on me.” Will raised his arm and sniffed his sleeve, wrinkling his face in displeasure.

In the distance, they saw two mailboxes—one on each side of the road, marking where each boy lived. Alfred said nothing until they reached them. Then, he stopped.

“I’m not going to tell anybody. Not yet, anyway,” Alfred said.

“Okay. Me either. Let’s wait,” Will said, looking over his shoulder across the road and down the lane to his house.

As the two boys walked away from each other, the clearing in the woods quieted in the late afternoon sun. The birds stopped singing. The squirrels sat motionless on limbs deep in the woods, guarding their nests. Where the dragon had fallen and flaked away in the breeze, the ground squirmed in pain. As the sun set, the last rays of light slanted over the unholy ground and cast in high relief the long curling forms of a dozen snakes.