Aster and Dante in the Woods

Aster’s stomach was growling.  For that matter, Dante’s was too, but he tried to hide that fact with well-timed coughs and grunts, while the princess made no such efforts.  Neither of them said anything about being hungry, though.  It probably would have been better if somebody had, because two hungry and tired people who are pretending not to be hungry and tired can only come to one unavoidable end – they must certainly start quarreling.
This is exactly what happened when Dante casually said something about hoping the princess was enjoying her ride, and she asked if he supposed that all this was her fault and with a distinct lack of his former careful formality, which had started to wear very thin over the course of the afternoon, he said that well, after all, it hadn’t been his idea to go out riding.  This was all the princess needed and with a rush of very mean gladness, they fell to quarreling with each other heatedly over such issues as whose fault this all was, who hated not knowing where they were the most, whose fault it was that somebody disliked one or the other of them, who was being the biggest child and whether or not one or both of them should just shut up.
A curious thing occurred over the course of these topics.  In some way, this was the most relieving experience either of the two had enjoyed all day.  In a strange way, there is some great emotional relief to be found in finding yourself in a bad situation and then fussing about the most insignificant things with somebody who you know isn’t to blame for anything.  At the very least, being pettily angry is far superior to being truly and deeply scared, which seemed like the only other option at this point.
Finally, after they had both sworn bitterly that they would never stoop to exchanging another word with one another again, Dante broke his oath long enough to declare that they might as well stop where they were for the night, and Aster replied archly that she didn’t much care where they stopped, or if they stopped at all, for it wasn’t as if they would need to stop for her to rest as she wasn’t remotely tired.  Who was the biggest burden had, incidentally, also come up in their discussions, with his argument focusing on the inherent weakness of very small women, and hers centering on the tendency of overly tall males to move too slowly and get hit in the face by tree branches, and tire horses by being too heavy, et cetera.  
Whatever the case, they did stop.  Dante sat down with a very unpleasant expression on his face and set about making a fire.  Butter settled himself down with a happy sigh and tucked his legs against his plump body – he did not care whether the others were arguing or not, so long as he got to rest.  He was not quite used to such extensive periods of exercise, and although he wasn’t exactly tired, he wasn’t quite sure that he entirely approved of this business of riding all day long, either.
Aster pretended not to watch Dante try to get the fire started for a few minutes, and then made a very innocent, off the cuff sort of comment about the type of people who can’t even do easy things like starting fires.  This led into another brief squabble, which was just what she wished, but which left her feeling unsatisfied and cranky.  It was getting cold, after all.  She watched him start to work on the fire again, and tried to think of another thing to argue about, but somehow, she didn’t much feel like it anymore.  The trouble with starting arguments for entertainment is that when you’re ready to stop, everybody’s in a bad temper, which makes it difficult to start a conversation on any other kind of topic.  After a few moments of uncomfortable silence, the princess stood, brushing herself off, and announced that she was going to walk off behind a tree – because – and he’d better not follow her or anything.  Dante replied that there was nothing he would like to do less, and with an exchange of unpleasant looks, she wandered off.  Dante set himself to getting this fire started once and for all, and he had just got a decent flame going in the center of his little pile of dead leaves when he heard a sound, and paused, listening.  There was a rustling coming from somewhere nearby.  He squinted at the trees, but could see nothing – it was starting to get quite dark by this time.
He supposed to himself that it must be the princess returning and turned back to the fire, blowing gently on the flames in an attempt to nurse them into a healthy blaze – preferably, before the princess got back.  He picked up a stick to feed into the fire.
There was a scream.  “Dante!  Dante, where are you?!”  
Even if they had not been alone in an unpopulated wilderness, there could have been no possibility that it was not the princess’s frightened voice.  Dante dropped the stick as if it had caught fire already, nearly putting the entire fire out in the mad scramble of leaping to his feet.  
“Aster!  I’m coming!  Where are you?” he shouted back, already taking off through the trees towards where he thought the voice had come from.  When she didn’t answer right away, he shouted again.  “Aster!  Answer me!”
“Here – I’m here.”  The voice was coming from somewhere to his left.  He corrected his path and shot through the trees, swatting aside branches until he caught sight of her.  Her pale dress and long hair stood out against the semi-darkness, making her look ghostly.  She was standing with her back against a large tree, arms splayed out behind against its trunk.  She turned in his direction as she heard him approach, shaking her head emphatically.  He stopped.  Aster grit her teeth and spoke through them.
“Help... it won’t let me move.”  He narrowed his eyes, not comprehending.  In the pause that followed, he noticed several things simultaneously.  First, he realized that the princess looked a little disheveled; there was a dark smudge of dirt on the princess’s cheek and that one of her elbows was skinned a bit.  She seemed to be breathing harder than usual.
What he noticed next was the dark form that stood panting a few feet in front of the princess.  He recoiled slightly.  At first he thought it was some sort of dog, but as his eyes adjusted to the moonlight streaming through the trees, he realized that the creature was actually a very large, tusked warthog.  Its hair rose on its back in rough bristles, and it looked very displeased to see him.
Dante felt angry, then.  Angry at himself for feeling so panicked and angry at the warthog for making him feel that way.  What a stupid sort of animal.  Dante jumped out at it, yelling.  The creature leapt back, startled.  Aster took the opportunity to move away from the tree and run to a safer position behind the boy.  This made the pig angry and without warning it took a run at Dante, growling and showing sharp, ugly brown teeth.  Startled, he barely managed to dodge in time, thrusting the princess away from him and out of the pig’s path.  They both fell to the forest floor, sending up puffs of dead leaves.  Aster pushed herself up on her arms.
“You see,” she cried, “that’s just what it did to me!”  She gave a little shriek then as the pig whirled on her.  Dante didn’t let it get very far, making a scrambling leap at it, knocking it aside.  His sword was laying in the leaves nearby – he lunged for it, but the pig headbutted him in the ribs and he fell, winded, with a soft ‘oof’ of pain.  He tried to roll away from the creature, but it lunged after him, jaws opening to bite him with those sharp teeth.  The warthog gave a squeal of pain, though, pulling up short as there was a flash of pale colour and Aster, appearing over him like a wild-eyed specter, wound up and kicked the pig as hard as she could.  This was moderately successful, but she lost her balance in the effort and fell to the ground once more with a little ‘eek!”
“Little creep,” Dante exclaimed, now rising to his feet and taking his sword as the warthog recovered and made a slash at him with its tusks.  “You’ve only got yourself to blame for this!”  A couple of slashes with the sword were all that was needed now, and he made quick work of the warthog, who may have regretted his actions as he lay quickly expiring, but probably did not.  Dante sighed, wiped his forehead, shook his head.
Suddenly remembering the princess, he turned, looking for her.  She was still laying where she had fallen, twisted into her own skirts, half risen on her elbows.  Dante went to her, stooped and took her hands, lifted her to her feet.
“Are you okay?”
“Yes, I’m fine.  He knocked me down, is all.  I didn’t hear him coming – I mean, I thought it was just you or something.”  She looked up at him.  “Did he bite you?”
Dante shook his head.  “He didn’t get the chance.”
Aster nodded.  “That’s good.”  She paused a moment, unsure whether to thank him or not.  Before she made up her mind, Dante, who had also been hesitating, said,
“Uh ... you’ve got...” he raised a hand to her face and started scrubbing at the dirty smudge with a thumb.  
She let him.  And, after a moment, she started to brush leaves and moss off of his shoulders.  They stood that way for several moments, silently, solemnly making each other presentable.  When they were both satisfied with their work, Dante bent to clean his sword while Aster smoothed her hair and adjusted her skirts and then they both turned back towards their campsite.  After a few steps, however, Aster slowed, then stopped.  Dante didn’t notice at first, but realizing she was no longer at his arm, he turned as well.  The princess was standing, looking back, with a finger raised to her lips thoughtfully.  Dante furrowed his brow.
“What is it?”
“Well, I was thinking... a warthog’s basically like a pig, isn’t it?”
“Uh... more or less.  Why?”
Aster turned to grin at him, a gleam in her eyes that he couldn’t quite recognize.  “Well, you’re hungry and I’m hungry, right?”
Dante’s lips moved into a silent “oh”.  “You mean...”
The gleam was pronounced now.  Aster nodded, obviously pleased with herself for such a brilliant idea.  “Let’s eat him.”
---
In the end, it turned out that cooking the pig was a decidedly messy business.  Invigorated by having a distinct purpose in life, they had scouted about until they had stumbled upon a small stream.  Getting the water back to the campsite was something else of a chore, and they ended up making quite a few trips using their hands and then Aster’s gold cap as bowls.  Getting the warthog ready to be cooked was another problem, even after Dante had gotten it skinned, a process that involved no little amount of blood and periodic outbursts from Aster of squeals interspersed with giggling.  In the end, though, they managed it, and not so long later they were sitting warmly in the glow of their crackling fire, with the pig trussed and spitted up above the flame – what was left of him, anyway.  Aster had had the reasonable idea of cutting him up in pieces so that he would cook faster.  She also insisted, for some inscrutable reason, on referring to the pig as “he” throughout the entire process, which seemed to amuse her, but was somewhat unappetizing to Dante.
At any rate, right now the little princess was crouched near the fire, slowly – carefully, so as not to burn herself - turning the spit.  Dante was laying on his back with one leg crossed over the other, slowly bobbing the raised foot up and down.  His hands were clasped over his chest and his head was turned in the direction of the fire, watching the meat – he would not refer to it as a ‘him’ – cooking.  This was not particularly interesting, so he looked up at the sky instead.  Even the stars looked alien and foreign.  He didn’t recognize any of the constellations – not that he was a particularly good navigator in the best of times, but he could usually find something or other to point him in the right direction.  Here, he could have been in a different world entirely, and he wouldn’t have known it.  The thought was hardly comforting and he groaned, draping an arm over his face.
Aster glanced over at him, but either she guessed at what he was thinking, or else simply had the good judgment not to inquire, because she didn’t say anything right away.  Instead she simply kept turning the pig on the spit and thinking.  After a little while, she cleared her throat.
“Um... Dante?”
He didn’t respond for a moment, but then he lifted his arm and laid it down behind his head instead.  “Yes?”
She looked thoughtful.  “I...I’m sorry for what I said before.  I didn’t mean any of it.  That is ... well, I mean, I know this isn’t your fault.  Whatever the reason was... we both know it must have been because of me.”  She looked down at the ground, pulled a few blades of grass out of the dirt and twirled them between her fingers.  “I’m sorry you had to get involved, but ... I’m glad you’re here.”  She looked up at him.
Dante, who had been watching her face throughout all of this quickly grew embarrassed when she looked at him and averted his gaze, unsure of how to respond.  After a few moments, he settled on, “Yeah.”  After that they both fell silent again, but it wasn’t quite so uncomfortable.  
After a while, Aster declared the pig ready to eat, and Dante poked at him – it – with a stick and disagreed and they both took turns poking it and disagreeing about its state of doneness for some time.  By the time they finally did take it off the spit to cool it was undeniably overcooked and they blamed one another for this occurrence, matter-of-factly and without malice.
They ate him anyway, of course.