“Nothing. Another day of dodging studies,” Cybil answered.
“Where was that beautiful mind running off to today?”
“Oh, the usual fancies,” Cybil said with a smile as she rocked up to her tip toes and back down to her heels.
Kasey examined her face, then questioned, “You met a boy, didn’t you? You’ve got that lightness about you, like I’ll have to hold you down or the wind will take you off. What’s his name? Did you do anything?”
Cybil dropped into the couch. Her first instinct was to say Riddle. She caught herself before saying his name. She didn’t want to sound crazy. “Ethan.”
“Ethan what? It’s not Ethan Anderson, is it?”
Cybil nodded. “How do you know him?”
“Shit, everyone knows his father. They all hate him. Asshole bought out all the land from Greenville’s townsfolk to sell it out for a fortune.”
“Do you know him? Ethan, I mean.”
“I’ve seen him a few times. At parties. Hangs with frat boys.”
“But you haven’t spoken to him?”
“Not that I remember.”
“He’s nice. I think he’s a little ashamed, and a little in his shell.”
Kasey grinned at her. “He’s attractive. Blonde hair, decent build. Did you have sex?”
“No! I just met him.” Then after a pause, “We did kiss.”
Kasey shoved Cybil’s shoulder playfully. “There you go, kiddo. You’ll be caught up in no time.” Kasey had taken it upon herself to guide Cybil’s sexuality since becoming her roommate. To Cybil, this seemed mostly to be a mask for insecurity, and at its worst was just an annoyance. She brushed off the comment.
“He had a darkness in his eyes when our lips met. It wasn’t like how I thought he’d be, like how he was until that moment. It was a little frightening.”
“But also a little enticing?”
Cybil hid a smile and nodded.
“Where?”
“We ran to the forest at the edge of campus. He knows a trail there.”
“In the middle of the day? Sober? I’d have to roll to do something like that. I’d feel too stupid otherwise.” Kasey realized what she said and added, “It’s just not my style.” Cybil took no offense. She knew it was true of her.
“Well, it got me tired, so I’m going to crash for a bit. Wake me in an hour?”
“Sure thing, pretty dreamer.”
Cybil stood from the couch and walked directly forward to enter her bedroom. It was a small size, and within its four walls was the chaos of Cybil’s wardrobe, half-read books, other miscellany, and somewhere among it all, her twin mattress. She found it with ease, though the mess of laundry that hung over its sides made it appear as merely a hill of clothes amongst other piles. Before collapsing into it, she turned on a rotating lamp that displayed what she assumed were supposed to be licks of flame. It rested atop a short bedside table where she kept her rainbow-dyed wristlet, the watch from her mother she never wore, a wand shaped bowl with accompanying pouch of grass, and a handful of coins. She had found the lamp at a garage sale when she was a child, at an age she couldn’t remember. She had called it dumb, an odd looking lamp with a shade full of holes. Her father had smiled at her and bought it, much to her confusion. When he set it up in her room that night, after turning out her lights, the show of shapes that crawled across her walls immediately entranced her. Her mind created from them stories, like a child with back in the grass and eyes on the clouds. She would spend countless hours intended for sleep instead dreaming up fantasies of the red characters that explored her blank walls. She never had to beg her father to let her stay up to do so, he always passed by her doorway at night with a smile. As it creaked in its old age, turning each night still, Cybil inhaled a toke from her wand and fell back into her sheets and clothes to drift softly into slumber.
3.
Cybil came to from the sounds of her own mumbling, as her indistinct words reverberated off the wood around her to return to her and scratch at her eardrums. While her voice roused her, it was the cold that flooded into her lungs as she took a deep breath bringing her to wake. She was not still, as she most often was when waking. She was walking. Her bare feet tread over a familiar sensation to their bottoms, a moistness that sank when she stepped. She did not stop walking when she awoke, instead unconsciously she continued strides forward as her eyes blinked rapidly to shed their blurriness. When her vision finally cooperated, she took in the sight of her dreams. She was again in the deep forest, surrounded by its massive trunks and glowing mist wrapped around them. The scene was just as she remembered, but for the angelic note filling the air. Instead, it was silent, as she believed the desert might be on a windless day. In the silence, she heard her thoughts. This can’t be a dream, this must be real. I’ve sleep walked my way back. Why did I do that? How did I do that? And where is...
Riddle. His silhouette appeared before her, gradually filling with more distinct features as she approached it through the darkness. He was not alone. There was a second figure, a shorter one, much shorter. As Cybil approached them, she recognized the hairy bare chest and the greenish skin tone. It was the creature that had stalked her and caused her to run and knock herself out. She stopped immediately.
“Cybil,” came Riddle’s voice, affectionate and welcoming. He held out a hand.
“Riddle?” she asked, to be certain.
“Riddle?” questioned the short one, scratchy and deeper than Cybil expected. He coughed to clear his throat, but it did little to alter his voice. “Is that your name now?”
Riddle shrugged as he looked downward. “Matches, don’t you agree?”
The creature scoffed and stepped forward towards the stubborn Cybil, who had insisted on remaining stationary while the two exchanged words. “My name is Ix. How do you do?” He offered his hand in greeting. Cybil shook it with bottom jaw hanging. When the handshake had finished, she thought to push her bottom jaw up towards her top so as not to offend with her look of astonishment.
“Nice to meet you.”
“Don’t worry, you’ll get plenty of that look yourself where we’re going.”
“Sorry?” Cybil still held to the idea that she was dreaming, just increasingly more realistic dreams upon each visit.
Ix’s shoulders slumped. In spite of appearing the oddest of the three, he felt the most isolated by his rational thoughts. “Cybil, where do you think you are?”
“I hadn’t quite decided, actually.”
“Well, let reality decide for you, darling. You’re in the forest where few can reach. The thick of it, as it were, and it’s only going to get stranger.” Ix could see she wasn’t retaining, so he donned an exaggerated tone. “These woods be magic, miss. That’s magic, like enchantments and curses, love, aplenty.”
“This is real?” she asked. It was obviously hard to accept, as she was certain her last visit was a dream. Though it felt real, she had awoken the first time and was not entirely uncertain she would not again this time. Ix sighed, then swiftly swung his foot into the center of her shin, causing a sharp pain that told her she was present. More so than she was usually used to.
“Sorry, it was necessary,” Ix said, as he turned his back to her and walked forward. He made it back to Riddle, then turned his head over his shoulder as if to ask why she didn’t follow. Then she took control of her legs and rushed forward, catching up to walk beside them.
Riddle took her hand, smiling as he turned his head slightly to catch her in the corner of his eye. “It’s good to meet you Cybil,” he said.
“Haven’t we already met?” Cybil asked.
Riddle nodded. “But only in dreams.”
“Riddle here is an orphan of the forest, a dream whisperer, a tree child,” Ix butted in, providing Cybil with the first bit of knowledge she didn’t know her logic thirsted for. “No one knows where they come from, or how many there are. Not many. But we know they speak to people like you.”
Fascinated by the actual
and not dreamt touch of Riddle’s fingers between her own, Cybil asked half-heartedly, “What am I?”
Ix turned his face up to hers. It was human, only greener, smaller. Distressed. “Someone with a profound connection to the forest.” Cybil turned her head down to his. “We don’t have a name for you, you’re the first one.”
“And what are you?”
“A person.” Ix begrudgingly added, “But I guess wood elf would make sense to you.”
“Context, I understand. I guess that makes me a giant to you.”
Ix chuckled. “No, you’ll meet them. Ornery folks, them.”
Cybil stopped. Her arm extended forward with Riddle as he continued, until he too stopped when her arm recoiled. He turned to face her, and several paces later, so did Ix. “What’s going on?” she questioned.
Riddle stepped in closer to her, which made her feel uncomfortable for the first time in his presence, as though she were afraid of his answer. Either that it was all true or all fantasy, both seemed undesirable in their own ways. “I want you to close your eyes and take a deep breath,” he said. She obliged. She inhaled, pulling in the taste of the trees through her nose and filled her lungs. “Hold it,” he said. She paused her ballooning chest. “Do you remember how you felt, when we first met? What it was like in your dream?” Cybil did remember. She remembered it all vividly, better than any dream before it. She recalled the hum in the air, the glow in the mist, his touch, her embarrassment. Most of all, as she played it over in her mind, she remembered the feeling of perfection, like she was right where she needed to be. “Now release, and open your eyes.” Cybil slowly let her breath billow out from her lips before opening her eyes. She saw the cloud exit her mouth and collect in a floating ball before her. A light appeared in its center and extended its shine throughout the cloud. Then it expanded, stretching itself high above them, then growing arms and a head. It was an apparition before her, with its head aglow with a bright light that shined down upon the three of them in the otherwise dark forest. Cybil, with astonishment shone across her face, was locked with its eyes, two concentrated dots of light in the bulb of its head. It sang out. It played the familiar note that was omnipresent in her dream. The tone diffused into the air, filling the space around them, reverberating in the trees, and echoing out deeper. It was beautiful. With a tear in her eye, Cybil watched as the creature of fog and light spun in place like a giddy dance, then shoot off into the darkness, a ball of light followed by a cloudy tail darting between trunks and disappearing beyond her eye’s horizon. The shiver and the goose bumps across her flesh were enough to know she was not dreaming. She turned to Riddle, who was smiling. “I told you, Cybil.”
“The forest is magic,” she said. “What was that?”
“Essence of the forest, my dear,” Ix answered. He began walking again, leading them up a hill. Riddle took her hand again and followed. “The essences are where the power lies. You have the uncanny ability to summon them. For that reason, we need you.”
A bit out of breath from the moment before, and a bit from the hike up the hill, Cybil took her time saying, “How did you find me?”
“Dream whispering. Something Riddle here is capable of. He can enter the dreams of the people who have a talent such as yours, people whose minds are open to enchantment.”
“Who is threatening the forest?”
“A collection of foolish humans that call themselves the Order of the Forest.”
“Who are they?”
Just before the top of the hill, Ix stopped. He turned to face Cybil eye to eye, which was aided by the slope. “I know you have plenty of questions, and they’ll all need to be answered. But right now, I’m hungry, a little tired, and in need of a tall glass of dew drip. Let’s say we pause the inquiry for a bit and revisit in the morning, hm?”
Before Cybil could respond, likely with some concern over her studies, Ix turned his back and led them to the crest of the hill from which a full view of the valley below and the city within it struck her eyes. Filling a basin was a mass of activity, tens of creatures like Ix roaming around, traveling between large, hollowed tree trunks with doors and windows like homesteads. It was seemingly haphazard in design but for the town square which resided in the center of it all. The densest collection of them gathered here, laughing, dancing, playing instruments beneath a ball of light hovering over them. Ix descended the hill towards his home while Cybil stood holding Riddle’s hand, taking it all in.
“Come on,” Riddle said. “Let’s get you acquainted.”
*
Episode 2:
Unrest in the Woods
1.
The man watched, with palms sweating and mouth agape, as the bottom of her dress crept up her thighs, inching nearer the sight he craved, but would die before seeing. As a flame dancing atop a white candle, her hair bobbed back and forth with each heavy step she took, some five or six paces in front of him. She threw a glance over her bare shoulder, placing pouty red lips against smooth skin, lashes batting. Her lips matched her dress, a blood red number that clung to her curves tightly, covering the space from the very edge of her buttocks to the lowest point of her chest without slipping over. Besides the red dress, she wore a gold necklace, the center of which hung a golden locket that she rubbed occasionally with her fingers.
“Why do we have to come all the way out here?” he panted.
“It’s more exhilarating, don’t you think?” she replied, a tinge of rasp to her voice that drove him mad. Still, he was not entirely comfortable with the idea.
“Whose forest is this, anyway?” he asked.
Victoria stopped, a still image of a woman wrapped in red against the backdrop of twisted branches and shaded forest floor. Like a fantasy you’re afraid of having, but can’t stop yourself from chasing, thought the man. His name was Rory Olsen, and he thought fleetingly of the desk that sat empty at his bank back in Greenville while he pursued lustily this stranger. The thought was swept away by her turning figure as she faced him, smoothing the vibrant fabric of her dress down her hips as she did so.
“It’s mine,” Victoria answered.
Rory eyed her in a new way, curious. Not only was she the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen, she was wealthy. Rory knew all the free land had been picked up by William Anderson in one fowl swoop, a swift and strategic land grab for development. The forest sat on the edge of Anderson’s property, an ideal location for expansion. If she had held out against his offers, she had to be rich. While public opinion held William in low regard, Rory held a secret adoration for the man, personally taking William’s deposits at the bank and grinning to himself at the balance of the investor’s accounts. He had thought about propositioning William Anderson, that he might lend his expertise for an assistant’s pay. But William never seemed to take to Rory the way Rory took to him. The banker held his tongue. Now, it was salivating profusely as Victoria lifted the end of her dress to reveal her sheer black panties. Rory peered through the space between them for a better sight.
Victoria extended a finger towards him and slowly curled it inward, signaling him closer as she said, “Come.” Rory wasn’t sure why, but he was afraid. She was everything he thought he’d never have, and yet a chill shot up his spine watching her summon him. While his mind stewed on the reason, his legs went to rubber and moved him unsteadily forward. Victoria grinned. “That’s it, come to me.”
She had him now, she was certain. She reveled in the moment, savoring the catch before the kill. It was like watching a fish flap on deck. No, it was like watching a deer stride into the sights of your rifle, she thought. Uninterrupted by its panic. Unwittingly walking into its own slaughter. It was easy, batting eyes and sultry tone, faking interest in a credit card to sit across him at his desk. She had crossed her legs then, allowing the fluorescent light to stream down her exposed thighs and place the demon thought in her prey. From there it was nothing, a moment of innuendo, then less veiled dialogue. A promise of something sweet for a day of playing
hooky. Victoria always had control over men. Once or twice in her teen years, she felt played by boys who gamed her heart for her body. After a few days of sulking, she realized she hadn’t wanted what she thought she did. It was more the attention than the romance, and even that was worth only so much. It was the power, she later realized, the feeling that with a well-planned outfit and a pose she could make a boy do anything. From her teens to thirty-two, she had perfected the craft. But when she met William, who had a similar power lust, she’d met her match. Rory was not her match. He was six or seven tiers away, in fact. Though he was well aware of that fact, the sight of a beautiful woman with her eyed trained on him was enough to ignore it. This stopped him from coming to the conclusion that her seduction was most likely not well intentioned.
Victoria allowed her lips to curl nefariously as Rory neared. It was the satisfaction of success, the thrill of victory. “Come here, baby,” she said, lifting her locket to her lips. She kissed the golden piece as she held it between them. Rory was already lost to his own sexual charge to give a passing thought to the jewelry, but had he done so, he would have noticed its unnatural luminescence. As he closed the gap to inches, the intense light from the gold between her fingers shrank his pupils while her slender fingers opened.
From light to darkness. Rory existed for less than a minute longer in a startlingly cold and black place, empty, but for himself and the woman he now feared in greater measure than his lust. Then a third figure emerged behind her, as if in slow motion, revealing himself from the enveloping dark. A cloaked man, hood pulling back to the image of a familiar face. Rory stared on with shock as William Anderson approached Victoria from behind, placing his hand over her bare shoulder and spinning her around to meet him for a hard kiss. They pressed their faces together like they were trying to rub skulls, Rory thought. Then William led Victoria back from where he came and Rory was alone for his final ten seconds. They were filled with horror as he turned to face a collection of statuesque bodies, seven men with eyes dead and flesh blue. They formed a semi-circle behind him, drab, loose clothing hanging from their still frames. They stood perfectly straight, though their heads were hung and their arms dangled at their sides. In his final five seconds, Rory watched as the same blue tone crept up from his fingernails across his arms, stretching up his shoulders to surround his neck, and finally enshroud his head.
Unrest in the Woods (Secrets of the Forest Book 1) Page 3