It's hard to want to wake with the way his head is feeling. He screws his eyes shut and almost slips back into unconsciousness, but a voice, no, two voices bring him back to the surface.
It is an argument, a man and a woman, over what he hasn't the slightest inclination to care, he just wants to think without his whole head protesting. His head moves slightly back, into the wet moss on the tree. It is heaven, but the voices reach him again, still unintelligible, but too loud to ignore. He thinks, he dares, he opens his eyes. A man, no a goat, no that's probably a man, stands there, arms moving animatedly as he argues with a woman, no, THAT woman. La Diablesse, she's here again, and for the first time he notices the sturdy bamboo cane she carries.
With a final exclamation she looks over the goat-man at him, quickly feigning sleep, and leaves in a twirl of skirts and loud curses. Immediately the atmosphere changes. He is brought back to the small room with the dog in his mind. The man emanates danger, capriciousness and cruelty. Joseph wonders if he will be worse than the dog. He wonders why he associates the two so easily, he wonders why he can see the moss and worms growing from the old man's beard, oh, he's standing right there.
"Finally awake my boy" not a question, Joseph manages to gurgle and choke out a sound, it probably sounded like "Jablesse" what the uneducated kids called the Devil-Lady.
"No need to fear, I made it very clear that you are under my protection" he says, in a tone that could be almost fond, if any of his expressions had any human comparison.
"Who are you?" The words actually come this time and of course Joseph knows the answer already, "Papa Bois, Father of the Forest?"
"And many other names besides" he smiles, his teeth as gnarled and brown as the roots of a tree.
"But isn't the Lady your wife?" Stupid question again, he really loves pissing off gods doesn't he?
"I think you are smart enough to know that it is not so simple as that"
"Then, what did she want with me, what do you want with me?" A dangerous question, but finally the right one.
"You are having troubles, are you not? A large black dog, has a taste for human blood?"
"How did you know?" Of course he knows, he's a god. A god of animals no less.
"You are a very strange human, boy. The dog is none other than Dee Baba, the Ghostly Slaver, he is trapped in his animal form by your sedating him with blood, tell me, how did you know that blood would put him to sleep?" The old man is curious, but the edge under his words unsettles him.
"I don't know"
"Do not lie to me boy!" And there it was, the anger, literal crash of thunder, Joseph could relax now, Old Papa Bois had shown his hand.
He didn't take kindly to Joseph visibly exhaling, and then he was not there at all, just a thousand different assaults from all over. A Stag butted him, the breath forced out further, spitefully, a wild boar gored his leg, cloth, flesh, fat, and muscle all parting like water. And the birds, crows, ravens, all pecking and scratching will single minded intensity.
Joseph exhaled again and Papa Bois came back, smiling again, "You are indeed a very odd little boy, but a natural Obeah I think"
No more stupid questions, Joseph decided, Obeah was the medicine man, he knew that. Just the one,
"What do you want from me?"
"I want you to be free of the Slave Dog" that wasn't all, but it was all he was going to get.
"And how do I become free of it?"
"You kill it" Dammit he was dragging out the questions longer and longer, and Joseph knew he had little consciousness left.
"And-and how do I kill it?"
"Hit it with a stick until it stops moving" and he could not hold on any longer, he was gone back to darkness.
He did not remember being moved, but the next time he awoke, the pain in his head was gone, and he was sitting in a pool of warm water, wait, no, he was sitting in the water filled coils of a giant snake.
"Hello young Obeah," hair like a silken sea breeze caressed his face, "I am Maman Dglo"
A/N: So now we have most of the main players at the table. Papa Bois is to me a fusion of the natural aspect of The Convocation, and the dark-self attributes of The Mother of Snakes. Maman Dglo on the other hand is the literal Mother Of Snakes and Water, but represents more to me healing, and duality of natures (the destructive/constructive capability of water). Finally La Diablesse will show a lot of the jealousy of The Unnamed Child. Hopefully you might start to see where I'm going with the tonal shifts, and once again, feedback would be the greatest!
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