The Spirit of Hallahan

“By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire.” The scrawny, red-faced boy gasped.

Breaker paused for dramatic effect and took a swig of mead, amber droplets sloshing over the sides onto the wooden table. His captive audience of one was supposed to be bussing his table, but his rag hung limply from his hand, forgotten.

“Oh go on, what happened next?” he squeaked.

“Well…” he whispered, leaning forward and giving a dramatic, furtive look around before continuing. “I made sure the tribe leader wasn’t looking, and I swiped a few of the leaves.” He sat back and took another large swig.

“What? They didn’t burn a hole through your cloak?” The boy’s face grew redder and redder with excitement. It wasn’t every day that he got the chance to meet a real live adventurer. He gave a quick glance over his shoulder to make sure the innkeeper, a monstrous man with a short temper, was still in the back counting inventory.

“Oh, it certainly did. Burned right through my clothes. By the time I made it back to the village I was as naked as the day I was born. Gave the womenfolk quite a shock.” He chuckled at the look on the boy’s face. Breaker loved telling stories of his adventures to a willing audience. Even if those audiences were becoming fewer. And even if his stories involved a bit of embellishment.

“But did it work? Did the leaves of Hallanan break the curse?” The boy’s face was filled with awe and admiration, and Breaker felt a twinge of guilt. He knew this boy would go to sleep dreaming of magic, fighting, and heroism, meanwhile his inspiration was a broke phony who could not afford the very mead he was drinking, let alone a room at this inn.

Just then, the hulking figure of the innkeeper appeared behind the boy. He put a firm hand on his shoulder.

“Kitchen needs sweeping.” He glared at Breaker, suspicion apparent beneath his bushy eyebrows. So much for staying incognito.

“Sorry kid,” he chuckled. “Looks like you’ll have to hear the end of that story another day.” He watched as the boy ran back to the kitchens, clearly terrified of angering his boss.

Yes, it was true. He had hit rock bottom. He sighed, drained the last of the sweet amber mead from his tumbler, and squeezed out from the booth that was clearly built for a much smaller person. He headed past the hearth, where merry guests were still drinking mead and swapping travel stories, and up the creaking stairs to the room he could not afford.

That night, he dreamed of fire, of leaves that burned but were never consumed, of flames that licked his head, burning his eyes. He dreamed of a haunted girl whose curse was never broken, a girl whose eyes burned like leaves.

You see, Breaker used to be a renowned hero. His life consisted of one adventure after another, rescuing maidens, slaying monstrous creatures, and yes, breaking curses. His last mission seemed so simple. A young girl in a small river village had been cursed from the time she was born by a vengeful hag. This hag terrorized the village and demanded they pay taxes to her. The family was poor and unable to afford her price, so she cursed their only child. She became blind to the world, and behind her eyelids, she was forced to see only evil continually.

Breaker knew the only way to slay a hag was to burn her in eternal flame, and there is only one place to find this magical fire—the forest of Hallahan. The leaves in the forest of Hallahan only go up in flames once a year, in the deep of winter, during a New Moon. Not only that, but they are extremely well protected by the Hallahan people, a tribe of people devoted to protecting magic from the frivolous use of mortals.

None of this bothered Breaker. He was patient, charismatic, and the best fighter in all of Ghaeranian. He would infiltrate the tribe, pretend to devote himself to the protection of magic from mortal use, and then when the leaves broke out in flames, he would cast a spell of confusion amongst the tribe and swipe a few of the rare leaves.

At the time, it all seemed so simple. He successfully stole the leaves, returned to the village, and tied the hag to a stake. He burned her in eternal flame, and the villagers threw a huge banquet to thank him. When he drank his fill of mead and praise, he slumped his way over to the hut where the family lived to check on the girl he had just rescued. Surely she would want to meet her new hero.

When he was 50 feet away, he realized that the hut was on fire. He ran towards the house, casting every sort of anti-flame spell he knew, but to no avail. As he stood there, dread filling his stomach, he saw the girl standing still in an open window, surrounded by flames. Her eyes were just as dead and unseeing as before, but her gaze was directed straight at him. Somehow, he knew she would come back to haunt him. He ran away that night, and he has been running ever since. He knew that one day the repercussions of that night would find him. He didn’t know what that meant, only that it was deadly true.

Breaker woke before dawn, feeling more exhausted than he had been before he fell asleep. He stripped the bed, knotted the sheets together, and tied them to the bedpost. He slipped quietly out the window and climbed to the ground, feeling like a common thief. Then again, he admitted to himself that at this point, he was a common thief. And he was getting too old for this.

He strode towards the large stone stable to gather the horse he “borrowed” a few towns over. He was rounding the corner to the entrance when a voice called out from behind him.

“Breaker, wait!”

It was the boy from the night before. He turned, trying to look as innocent and important as possible so he would not suspect that he was slipping away without paying.

“Sorry kid,” he improvised, “but I’ve received an urgent letter and I’ve got to get going. Best of luck to y-” But he stopped, suddenly horrified.

The boy was grinning at him. And his eyes, his eyes were dead cold. He held out a hand, and Breaker felt his limbs lock in place. He tried to fight back but realized that he no longer felt a connection to magic.

“You fool.” He laughed, and Breaker’s stomach dropped. “You prideful bloated old fool.”

Breaker watched, horrified, as the boy began to transform right before his eyes. His fiery hair grew down to his shoulders and turned dark as night. His eyes burned with flames. He was now the girl from the river village.

“You? But, but…”

“Yes,” she whispered, and her voice was pounding inside his head. “It is I. Yet you do not know who I am.”

Breaker, who could wax on for hours without breath, was at a loss for words. He stood mute and literally paralyzed.

“I am the spirit of the forest of Hallahan. I was sent to test you, to see whether you were good, or whether your ambition would drive you to justify your actions by the end result.” She lifted her hand higher in the air, and he began to float skyward, his limbs still glued together. The spirit of Hallahan floated beside him as they sailed south, back towards the forest.

“You stole from the good forest of Hallahan. Now you shall burn in their eternal flames.”

So it is, he thought. Finally. He had met his match, and he would spend eternity figuring out how to defeat the spirit of Hallahan. He smiled.