Beyond The Forest

“You’re sure about this?” The necromancer asked as he maneuvered himself over a fallen log. The winter sun dripped faintly over the forest, chill and quiet.
“Why do you care if I am?” The woman in front of him said, moving with assurance through the tangled brush and sturdy evergreen trunks.
Good point, he thought to himself, and concentrated on following her towards the clearing she had chosen for the ceremony. He eyed her back, broad and sturdy. She moved fast for a fat woman.
The tree line parted to a small open clearing, being taken back inch by inch by the forest. The remains of a campfire, grey ash and blackened rocks, centered the collapsing space.
The woman stopped and turned to him. Her eyes were sunken and dark like a raccoon; grief and pain were etched in every line from her brow to her pinched mouth.
He shrugged and held out his hands. “I need the talismans.”
Her face twitched and her shoulders hunched, as though she was protecting something, then she pulled her hands out of her pockets and presented him two handfuls of grey ash. 
He held out his cupped palms and she poured them full. She did not wipe her hands clean, the layer of burnt flesh and bone like a glove over the skin.
He shook his head. “One question, then your soul is mine. That’s the deal.”
She nodded, making hard eye contact, and for the first time in many years, he flinched back from the gaze of one of this victims.
“Get on with it. Men talk too much,” she said.
Stung, he turned away from her and cast the ashes on the ground, then followed them with the vial of blood she had drawn for him and other, more esoteric components. 
The spell snapped open right away, shocking him. He’d never done this with these kinds of ashes before; he’d doubted he could.
But it caught like wildfire, faster and hotter than any calling he’d ever made. Behind him, the long dead ashes burst into life, making a pillar of light and heat up through the space between the trees.
He whipped around to see the woman looking intently into the forest. In the roaring, nearly white hot light of the flames, the edge of the clearing wavered a moment…
…and faded out into the vista of a prairie, lush and green and golden. Undulating hills spread into the distance where blue mountains guarded the flat land below. In the sudden, profound, silence he could clearly hear a river not far away, probably rushing past the first line of hills. 
A huge flock of small birds careened past in the air and cresting onto the flat plain came two herds, one of horses and one of deer. 
The wind blowing towards them carried the scent of flowers, of honey, of warm dirt and fresh grasses.
Parting the stalks, two small forms padded towards the window in reality. The woman rushed forward, stopping at the edge of the world with palbable apprehension. She dropped to her knees and held out her hands, fingers brushed up against the after world the necromancer had summoned.
The two little dogs who had emerged from the grass tried to press their noses into her hands, covered with their own ashes. The barrier separated them still.
One was small and golden, long bodied and bow legged and huge eared.
The other was a little bigger, built like a race horse with strong legs and beautiful conformation; black and white like a cow’s hide.
She was giving up her life to ask one question of two dead chihuahuas. 
He shouldn’t look gift fools in the mouth.
She was strong and intelligent, and he could get good use out of her soul for decades while he drained it dry. 
On the ground, the woman hunched right over, hands pressed against her face, which in turn pressed against the ground. It was very clear she was weeping.
Two small tails stopped wagging and the path he had opened irised closed. The pillar of fire winked out in the same moment.
For several minutes the icy darkness of the forest crept over them both, and that whole time the woman wept and rocked in the dirt.
He stepped forward. “You got your question, now I get my payment. Drink this.” He leaned down and jabbed specimen jar into her shoulder, the cap on tight to prevent her trying to spill it. He had more alchemical poison, and a knife if he had to use it.
She stood up, wiping ashes mixed with tears across her face, making it look like she was trying to improvise camouflage against her fate.
Eyeing him, she took the container peacefully enough and popped the top off. Holding it in her hand, she said softly, “Don’t you want to know what I asked?”
“No.”
She nodded and still looking him in the eye gulped down all the anti-freeze green liquid inside.
Most people screamed when the brew hit their stomach; she grunted and went down to her knees, then onto her face and died in silence.
He stepped back, impressed despite himself. Strong as hell, her soul would be. He could do terrible things with a spirt that strong.
It stood up from the cooling remains of its mortal life, looking remarkably similar: a little taller, a little stronger, but visibly the same woman he’d led into the forest.
“Come,” he ordered curtly, pulling out his phone. He wanted to get back to the car before it was too late into the night. He had protections—his new spirit guard one of them—but there were things that haunted forests who didn’t care for his kind.
Wavering as though a wind was pushing her from behind, the woman took a step…back. Away from him.
“Do you want to know what question I asked?” She breathed again, her voice a whisper through the darkness.
Behind her the Door to The Fields Beyond The Forest snapped open again, the bright warm light hurting his dark adapted eyes.
When he could see again, he watched as his newest captive spirit stepped up to the Door…and through it.
The two little dogs were there, throwing themselves at her shins and she scooped them into her arms as easily as feathers.
“Can I go with you?” She said, smiling down at their wiggling forms, the black and white one struggling to lick every part of her he could. The woman looked up at him, and her triumphant smirk enraged him.
He called his power and stomped forward, snarling. “Obey me or you will regret it! Obey me or I will take you out of there by force!”
The grass behind her swayed again and three more dogs appeared: German Shepherds, all. Two of them huge females, muscular and menacing. The third was a male, smaller, built for speed and with rage in his eyes. They moved in front of the woman and her tiny companions. 
His death was in every posture of their bodies. 
Behind them now he could see an endless sea of dogs, wolves, canines from the great ancient Dire Wolves to floppy mutt puppies. They advanced through the grass, teeth bared and eyes intent on him, flowing around her as though she was already part of the Pack That Runs Forever.
He jerked back, fear ripping up his spine for the first time, shaking his head. He had her money; he wasn’t going to risk his life against the Pack. 
She smiled, and nodded, and place the cow-marked dog on the ground at her feet. He jumped and spun, eager to be gone. The little golden one she settled into the crook of her elbow.
“The queen rides,” she murmured with such love that for a moment it made even him feel it. The portal began to close, draping him in cold and darkness again.
She kissed the tiny golden head lying against her forearm, turned…
And Ran with them Forever.
 
 
For Bambi