Darling, There Are Wolves in the Woods

by Lydia Russell

  It was not as beautiful as I remembered it. Though the waterfalls still crashed down into the perfect blue, and the light still bounced from the ripples caused by the breeze, there was a darkness to it that hadn't been there before. The trees that danced at the edges were bare and stark, the trunks a bleached white as if all the summer sun had faded away. Shadows swam beneath the waters, which had frozen near the banks away from the falls. Ice gathered over the grasses and ferns, bending them low and creeping up over the bank, forcing winter deeper and deeper into the forest.

  It was a sinister place, dark and lonely, where the willows seemed to listen to sounds I could not hear. There was a sudden stillness, a bated breath and I tensed.

  I saw her standing at the side of the lake gazing into its depths, eyes reflecting the water so for the first time, it seemed they were something other than black. She didn't move but tilted her head to look at me. She smiled, and from where I stood, I could see the glint of her pointed teeth. I stood frozen as Lily stared back, her twisted smile still slashed across her face.

  “I've been waiting for you.”

  Instinctively I stepped back, the sharp branches of the forest behind me stabbing into my skin. There was no way they were letting me back through.

  “What do you want?” I called, hearing my trembling echo bound over the crashing waters. Lily's smile widened.

  “You...” she replied, her voice soft. Deadly. In an instant she was at my side, caressing my cheek with her bone like fingers. It was so sudden; I didn't even have time to flinch. “Him...”

  I tried to wrench my face from her hands, but she held tight, pushing her nails into my skin. She stretched her fingers over my cheeks, so they came horribly close to my eyes. Lily leaned closer to me so she could dart her tongue over my skin, to lap at the droplets of blood she had broken free.

  “I never wanted him,” I said, knowing how untrue that was.

  “Liar.” Lily smiled, backing up onto her haunches, her silvery hair gliding over her naked body. “Lying, filthy whore.”

  “Leave me alone!” I shouted. “Why can't you all just leave me alone? Don’t you understand that I don't want him? Why else would I be running around the forest in the freezing bloody rain?”

  Lily tilted her head, blinking as if she was only just seeing me. She reached out to run her fingers over the sleeve of the shirt I was wearing. I tensed, hearing the low growl that rumbled in her throat as she fingered the buttons, lingering for a moment with her hand over my heart.

  “He loved you?”

  I shook my head, barely able to utter the single syllable word without my voice breaking.

  “And you do not love him?”

  “No.”

  Lily stared, unblinking as the same twisted smile stretched at her lips. She moved her hands over my shoulders as if to hug me, and I flinched away from her. She grinned and trailed her fingers down my arms, her touch cold.

  “I think you are lying to me,” she murmured softly, allowing a wicked laugh to swim past her lips. “Oh, how well you lie.”

  I couldn't move quickly enough before she grabbed my hand and bent it back, so it was pressed against my heart. From under my palm, I could hear its quick and terrified thumps.

  “I can hear it singing,” Lily breathed, twisting my hand further as she bent down to listen. “Can you, Teya?”

  “That's fear, you monster” I snapped. “Not love...”

  “Oh, but don't they sound so beautiful? A wonderful erratic dance, I could listen to it forever. I could sing to its tune as it begins to break. Can you feel it breaking, little whore?”

  “Go to hell.”

  She pulled back her lips to reveal a mouthful of needles, her eyes an empty oblivion as she laughed at me. Then she lunged, snake-quick and sank her teeth deep into my neck, sucking deep as I screamed.

  “You see,” she began, pulling away with red lips. “Fear and love sound so familiar that it's terribly easy to mistake one for the other. But when they both play together...” Her fingers began to drum out the song of my heartbeat, her mouth dripping onto my shirt. “Can't you hear it?”

  “Please.”

  “I hear it,” Lily hissed, spitting blood. “Though not quite love, is it? There's longing and lust and betrayal. A kiss? More than one? So much more than a kiss? A touch, a sigh, a groan... another…bliss, drops of blood on torn garments.”

  “He doesn't love me!” I cried, scrabbling away from her, but she just snatched my hand back, baring bloodied teeth. “He never once told me he loved me!”

  Lily tilted her head to the left, eyes wide. “Why you?”

  “I don't know.”

  Her voice softened, became tinged with sorrow and despair. It made my head ache and the clouds above us weep. Her hold on my arm slackened. “I would have given him everything.”

  “He never wanted you,” I blurted, as I pulled my fingers from her hand just a fraction too late.

  She snapped her hand shut, trapping my fingers inside. With a sickening crack, she twisted my wrist until I felt the bones break. I screamed as hot pain shot up my arm, and I swallowed down the sudden acidic taste in my mouth as black spots danced in front of my eyes.

  “Are you going to kill me?”

  With a silent grace, Lily knelt beside me and cupped my face in her too cold hands, her fingers brushing lightly over my skin. “Yes.”

  I was shaking, my voice trembling with both pain and fear. “What makes you think he'll want you after I'm gone?”

  “He won't want me, Teya,” she said sadly, blinking her black eyes and smiling at me with more than a hint of madness. “But it will be of some comfort to know he cannot have you.”

  She grabbed me before I could move, wrenching my head back as she dragged me towards the lake by my hair. I cried out as I jarred my hand against the cold ground, desperately trying to fight. She wouldn't let go, keeping her grip on my scalp until her nails broke the skin. I struggled against her as the water's edge grew closer, scrabbling and bucking as she forced my head under water and held me there until I thought my lungs would burst.

  I gasped as I surfaced, swallowing icy water as she forced my head under again. It was so cold I couldn't fight back, the shock of the water erasing everything else except for the pain of drowning.

  I surfaced again, choking and shivering, my heart screaming in my chest as my mind went blank. With a sharp yank, Lily forced my head back so I was looking at her. I couldn't speak...I hauled in a breath, feeling it tear down my throat in an angry burn.

  “You should have stayed away,” Lily mused lazily, and I wanted to tell her that I wished so too, but all that came from my mouth was a terrible gurgling.

  She pushed me down a final time, but before my face touched the water, I heard the faint sound of singing, and something black burst from the water. It coiled around Lily, great fins powering up to the side of the lake where Lily had begun to scrabble away. I watched in horror as another slick hand crashed out of the water and snatched at her legs, before slowly dragging her into the water.

  I crawled away, feeling the bones in my wrist grind as I began to heave myself up the bank. I felt the chill of their fingers on my ankle before they touched me.

  “Come swim with us,” they sang. “Come drown with us.”

  I scratched at the ground as they pulled me back. The cold water closed over ankles, my knees, my chest, until with a last hopeless breath, I went under. I caught a glimpse of Lily as I was pulled down; webbed hands had coiled deeply into her silver hair as they used it as a rope to drag her lifeless body deeper into the waters.

  I fought and I struggled. I refused to die quietly. Until the last breath bubbled past my lips, I kept on fighting. The feeling of failure crashed over me before the fear of death. My mother had lost both her daughters and hadn’t buried either of them.

  Red mist descended, blackness followed.

  There was nothing but the soft whisper of my name...

  Chapter Nineteen

&
nbsp; The blackness was meant to be absolute; that was what I expected...a void that was free of pain, worry and fear. I never really stopped to think what lay beyond that, but I wasn't expecting pain.

  Something crushed against my chest, sending my body into a spasm that felt nothing like death. Heat brushed against my lips, again and again and again. I heard my name, a whisper. A curse, then the pain of something crushing me once more.

  “Teya?”

  Warmth at my lips.

  Pain and darkness.

  Nothing.

  “Damn you!”

  More.

  Again,

  And again...

  “Teya, please.”

  Another breath, another whisper, then more pain as my lungs suddenly constricted and forced black water from my mouth and nose. I couldn't see and I couldn't move, but I felt the cold like a swift bite, and the cool touch of fingers to my neck as someone sought a pulse with a shaky hand.

  I heard the soft intake of breath, and opened my eyes, panting for air like a hungry junkie. I met his eyes, and forced my head away, choking on a sob that scratched at my throat as if it had claws.

  I began to shake, my body juddering against his as he wrapped me in a warm dry cloak. He brushed against my hand, and I hissed in pain.

  “Why won't you leave me alone?” I asked, my voice a trembling whisper.

  “I heard you scream,” Laphaniel answered, raking a hand through his sodden hair. “I thought I was too late.”

  His warm breath was against my ear, the wicked certainty gone from his voice, leaving it raw. I turned away and caught sight of the bobbing body of Lily abandoned near the water's edge, her black eyes huge and unseeing, blue lips bleached white in a permanent twist of horror.

  “Oh god,” I spluttered, covering my mouth as I vomited up more dark water. Laphaniel rubbed my back until I finished, tightening the cloak around me when I began to shudder, my muscles tensing as they went into spasm.

  “I need to get you back.”

  “No!” I panicked, my throat protesting as I shouted, “No, leave me alone. Please...just go away.”

  I pushed him away, staggering to my feet, forgetting my broken wrist until Laphaniel used it to pull me back. I screamed, and he dropped my hand as if it had burned him.

  “How far do you think you'll get with that?” Laphaniel said, impatience chilling his tone.

  “I don't care.”

  “You're freezing, Teya. You stopped breathing.”

  I closed my eyes, bracing myself against a lone sapling, whose leaves had left its branches to wither and die beneath it. “I'm not going back with you.”

  “Teya...”

  “You'll keep me there forever,” I said, choking on the words, before my legs gave way and I slumped to the floor. I held my hands over my face and sobbed on the frigid ground, the ache in my chest breaking me into tiny unfixable pieces.

  I flinched when he touched me, but still buried my head into his shoulder as he pulled me close. Laphaniel held me while I cried, his hands cold and his clothes wet, but didn’t let go until I had finished hiccupping, and could breathe without gasping.

  “I'll take you to Luthien.”

  I looked up at him, searching his face for any deception behind his words, a trap so neatly tucked away that I wouldn't see it until it was far too late. I would find myself in his arms again, unknowingly watching as hundreds of years passed us by.

  “If you let me help you, I promise I’ll take you to her.”

  “No.” The word dropped from my lips with more conviction than I felt. “Get away from me.”

  I took a step back, my fingers numb as I tightened his cloak around my shoulders, wishing I didn’t need the warmth, but I wasn’t stupid enough to hand it back to him. Cradling my hand to my chest, I cringed at the jolt of pain it sent through my arm every time I trembled. With heavy limbs, I stumbled away from the lake and made my way to a little hollow where the wind seemed to have a little less bite. I heard him follow me, so turned to him, gesturing to the ground.

  “If you want to help me, light a fire,” I said, anger replacing the desolate emptiness within me, surging through me with a furious warmth. I clung to it, needing it.

  “If we just go back…”

  “Ha! No,” I snorted, scrubbing a hand over my face. “I’m cold, just do it.”

  I managed to help gather some wood, piling it up as Laphaniel struggled to get it lit, the flames refusing to engulf the kindling.

  “The wood is damp,” Laphaniel said, while I watched on with folded arms.

  “Maybe this would have been easier in the summer?” I bit back, sitting down on the cold earth, thankful when at last the flames took hold and began to spit against the wood. Laphaniel glared at me, but said nothing, his eyes as black as his dripping hair.

  The flames spat and crackled, licking at the damp sticks as if finding them wanting. I huddled closer in his cloak, hating the way his scent enveloped me, shrouding me in an illusion of safety. The fire was just enough to ward off the deep chill that bit at me, that had seeped so far down into my bones I wondered if I’d ever feel truly warm again. So slowly it dried the water from my clothes, melted the ice from my hair…soothed me towards sleep.

  “Stay awake!” Laphaniel nudged me and I slapped him away. “Open your eyes.”

  “Stop telling me what to do,” I said, blinking my eyes open anyway, because I really didn’t want to die of hypothermia. “And don’t touch me, stay over there.”

  “I want to help.”

  “I think you’ve done enough.”

  “At least let me bind your hand?” he said, nodding to my wrist as I cradled it against me, the pain a shooting ache that was driving me crazy.

  “Fine.”

  With cold fingers he managed to fashion a splint out of a piece of wood and the sleeve from my shirt, tying it so tight I bit through my lip. It held better than I thought it would, the pain easing slightly, but not enough.

  “That will need looking at sooner rather than later, else it’ll mend wrong.”

  “Do you have a local A and E department around here?” I muttered, backing away again, not liking the way my body had responded to his touch. His eyes flicked to mine, hearing the way my heartbeat quickened. “You backhanded me across the face.”

  A reminder to myself, not just him.

  “You hit me first,” he answered. “You drew blood.”

  I shook my head. “Are we keeping score?”

  “No…”

  “Because I think I may be winning.” I paused. “Or is it losing?”

  “What do you really want, Teya?”

  I bristled. “Just leave me alone!”

  He rose to his feet, hesitating, looking like he wanted to say something before he gritted his teeth and settled on an angry, “Fine!”

  Without another word, he turned on his heel and walked away.

  I seethed alone by the fire, the hollow emptiness within me replaced by a rage that made me want to scream into the darkness. I wanted to throw things…I wanted to punch him in the face…I wanted to hate him as much as he deserved to be hated.

  I settled instead for launching a crumbling, rotting log into the fire, watching as it disintegrated into a burst of embers. I clung to my anger like a safety blanket, not daring to let it ebb away for fear of what would be left behind.

  I shivered again, my wrist throbbing with the movement. I ran my fingers over the splint, at the little knots binding my hand to the wood, and the soft cushion he had made so I didn’t rub my skin raw. My throat ached, my thoughts nothing but chaos.

  I thought he would come back. Something deep within me simply assumed he would return, because he always did. Not for a moment did I start to fear the darkness, believing he was nearby, keeping his distance. I ignored the wandering shadows, because I didn’t believe I was alone. I hadn’t been alone for a very long time. Not really.

  But I was.

  I sensed it then…on some primal level, perhaps
awoken by the time I had spent among monsters.

  I knew.

  Fear swamped me in a sudden wave, a suffocating terror that wiped out everything else.

  “Laphaniel?” I called out, my voice echoing too loudly. “Laphaniel, are you there? Because this isn’t funny.”

  I hated calling for him…needing him, but nothing answered save for the sound of my own voice bouncing off the looming trees. A cold, horrible realization hit me, gutting me. He’d left.

  I stood, hovering close to the fire as I peered into the shadows. I took a breath… another, swallowing down the dread that threatened to overwhelm me.

  I took a step into the darkness, the way barely lit by the moonlight, trickling down through the striped branches. Venturing out of the hollow I had found, I pulled myself up over the rocks, gritting my teeth against the cold.

  My fingers found and slid over something wet and sticky, and as I pulled my hand up to the feeble moonlight, my hands were coated with blood.

  “Laphaniel?” I hissed his name, unable to tear my gaze away from the crimson streaking down the stone.

  There was a trail of red, splatters of blood leading through the trees. I knew it was his, and that something terrible had happened. Every nerve in my body was alight as I crept through the shadows and I froze at every sound, every crunch of leaves, every distant cry that filled the woods with the sound of something else dying.

  I fought against the urge to turn and run, at the fear that threatened to engulf me…I fought against the basic human nature to save my own skin. If something had managed to sneak up on Laphaniel, what chance did I have?