In the forest, Victoria shut close her locket and let it slip from her fingers, dangling from its chain between her breasts. It was warm against her chest and she gave a throaty moan on contact.
“Just the one left, now,” she said, as she strolled beside William between the trees. “The wizard will be pleased.”
William seemed less joyful at their latest progress as he said, “Now we just have to find the old bastard.”
Victoria grabbed hold of his arm, dug her nails into his flesh, and forced him against a tree. “Watch your words here, William.”
“He still slumbers, Victoria.”
“Be patient. Our time is coming.”
He pulled her closer, body heat radiating the short distance to collect on the surface of his skin. He pulled her in harder. “In the meantime...” But she turned her head as he moved his nearer.
“Such control in front of the Order.” Before he could question the meaning of her words, she added beneath her breath, “Such a dog in private.” He begrudgingly released her and followed behind as she continued through the forest, thinking to himself a worry of her and how she could surprise him. Amidst a flurry of other thoughts and objectives, he made a special note to return to this one.
2.
This was a dream.
She had gone back on her decision that this was real, opting again for an elaborate dream. It had to be, thought Cybil, as she found herself strolling beside a boy, however beautiful, still glowing with a faint blue hue in his skin. And he was the most normal thing in her presence. Two feet beneath her, a crowd of humanesque creatures with green skin and hairy chests – the males, anyway – ogled at her with necks craned as she slowly maneuvered through.
“Alright, kin,” the one leading her and the blue boy said. She had been told his name was Ix. What sort of a name is Ix? “Trust me, she’s not that special.” Ix cast a half-glance over his shoulder with a cringe-grin, checking to see if he’d offended his guest. He hadn’t, she was too caught off guard to hear him. Even if she hadn’t been, she would have been distracted by the oohs and aahs coming from the strange things around her. Wood elves. No wait, Ix had said they weren’t that either. They didn’t have a name. Without anything else to call them, she had decided then in her own mind she would stick to wood elves. Unless one of them got offended. Then she just wouldn’t call them anything. Oh, what a complicated dream.
A path cleared through the crowd, a straight line leading to the trunk of a tree near the center of the village. It was wide, six or so feet, and a rectangular section of the side facing her was carved out, hanging on hinges, and opened just slightly. It was a door, Cybil reasoned, and much too short for herself to fit through. Following behind Ix, she began to consider perhaps she would have to.
One of the wood elves to Cybil’s left reached out and grabbed the end of her dress in its small grasp. She gasped, twisted to tear the fabric out of its hand, and wore shock and disgust across her face. However, when she turned to view the one that had done it, she saw what was clearly, in spite of being so foreign, a child’s disappointed face full of excitement turned shame. She couldn’t quite tell if it was boy or girl, but nonetheless its eyes welled and a short, infant like squeak escaped its lips. The crowd around Cybil went silent. She could feel Riddle’s eyes watching for reaction. From the corner of her sight, she could see red come into Ix’s cheeks as he audibly slammed his palm into his forehead. Cybil felt her own cheeks flush and felt a great responsibility to amend the situation. She squat down on her knees, dress end collecting on the forest floor around her ankles, and stared the child eye to eye. She smiled. She raised a hand before it and slowly brought the end of her index finger to its pointy, slightly snotty nose end. She made quick and soft contact with a high-pitched, “Boop!” and a wide grin broke out on the child’s face. The child chuckled a moment, then its face returned to wonder.
“Have you come to save us?” it asked. A twinge of fear made her skin cold as she froze before the child. She felt the word What? catch in her throat and stick itself there, causing her to swallow dryly. A small, hot hand rested on her shoulder, and then Ix’s voice beside her ear spoke after a nervous laugh, “Alright, moving the freak show right along.” Riddle took her hand as she rose, following quickly behind Ix as he led them to the tree door. Riddle gave a glance over his shoulder and made brief eye contact with Cybil as if to show her it would all be okay. And she felt the better for it, but when she watched Ix swing open the door and leap in only to drop down into darkness, she felt a bit of fear swell again.
“It’s a soft landing,” Riddle said as he maneuvered his body through the trunk’s opening and sank quickly down. Alone, and surrounded by gawking wood elves, Cybil quickly forced courage into her heart and slid her body awkwardly through the hole. Her right ankle slipped and she plummeted down sideways, without the grace of Ix or Riddle as she had watched them do it. She dropped in darkness in a wooden tube just the size that would fit her for a length of time just long enough to shriek. Then she collided with something soft, her face shoved into its fuzzy texture. She slowly rolled herself to her side, focus slowly revealing the faded orange fabric of the couch cushion that broke her fall, then of the homey dwelling it sat in. It had earthen walls, smoothed and curved, arching overhead and dropping down into the floor to make an egg shaped hollow space in the ground. But the egg was far from empty. Against one side, a full dining room set, against another a bed of modest upholstery and fabrics. Opposite the dining set up, a kitchen space, complete with a wooden basin for a sink and a root for a waterline that ceased a flow of water as a woman wood elf upturned its end. The root’s end was pinched shut by her small, soft looking hand as she turned to face her guest. The entirety of the room was lit by a glowing orb resting in the center of the ceiling that cast a warm orange across the woman’s features. As the others, her face was green, but it was not gawking. Instead, it curled in a smile very welcoming to Cybil, as she turned to place her elbow against the couch and maneuver herself into a more presentable position. Still, she did not rise to her feet, feeling perhaps it would be insulting to her very short hosts, and partly fearing her head would strike the ceiling, though Riddle seemed to fit nicely against the far wall. She decided on swinging her legs over the front of the couch and placing her hands neatly in her lap.
“Well, hello there,” the elven woman spoke. It was only slightly higher in pitch to a human voice, but every bit as hospitable as a human’s could be. Cybil felt herself becoming at ease in her presence, the first moment she’d felt truly safe since discovering the Deep Forest. Ix placed his arm around her middle, puckered his lips and placed a prolonged, loving kiss against her cheek for which she closed her eyes and smiled genuinely. Ix continued past her towards the kitchen wall, where he swung open a wooden cupboard to retrieve an elegantly wrapped leaf, twirled in such a way that it contained a hallow center, a long neck, and an opening on top in which was placed a pebble. Ix gripped the pebble between his teeth and pulled back his head. He spat the pebble on the counter beside the sink and threw back a long swig while the woman elf, still smiling broadly, took a seat next to Cybil. “My name is Uli, what’s your name?”
“Cybil.” She extended her hand towards Uli, who looked down at it with curiosity. Cybil’s face began to redden and the awkward moment dragged on until Ix, finally pulling the dew drip from his lips and seeing the exchange, explained, “They shake hands, love.”
“Oh!” Uli said, trying to sound as delighted as possible. She tried taking Cybil’s hand in her own, it being three times as large, and shaking it side to side. “That’s nice,” she said. “Us folk place palms together.” She retracted her hand from Cybil’s grip and held her palm up facing the girl. Cybil met Uli’s hand with her own, dwarfing the tiny, green fingers. “Not so different,” Uli said, and smiled again. “It’s nice to meet you, Cybil.”
“It’s nice to meet you. Uli.” Cybil sat on it a moment, then added, “That’s such a lovely name. Uli. I
like that a lot.”
Uli stood from the couch and returned to Ix’s side, wrapping an arm around his shoulders. A twinge of distaste crossed her face, but she replied with grace. “Thank you,” she said. “I hope you’ll like me as much. But for now, I think it’s time for some rest. You and the boy may sleep on the couch, and I’ll cook up something special in the morning. Been a long time since we’ve had company.”
The wood elves shuffled over to their bed against the wall and disappeared beneath a pile of blankets. It seemed no sooner had they laid down that a gentle snore emanated from Ix. Cybil looked to Riddle and blushed. With hands held politely behind his back, he asked, “Is that alright? I don’t mind sleeping on the floor.”
Cybil’s words caught in her throat, collecting one behind the other until they burst forth in quick succession. “No, don’t do that. Of course, there’s plenty of room. Here. Next to me. On this couch.”
Riddle walked gingerly across the small living space of Ix and Uli’s home to meet Cybil on the couch. She laid to make room and he placed his body beside her, laying slightly curled and very close to her so they could fit. His breath was a refreshing, rhythmic breeze that played across the back of her neck, lulling her towards slumber. She sank into a deep relaxation, a calm so encompassing it was inebriating. She assumed it was what the moments before unconsciousness with laughing gas felt like. But instead of an operating table, it was a worn couch beside a boy mysterious and yet, somehow, innately connected to her. She slid herself back into him and accepted his arms around her with her own, collecting four hands at her waist.
“Mmm,” she said, a better statement of her contentment than any words that fluttered past her mind. “I think this is keeping me from losing my shit.”
Riddle softly chuckled, a short burst of air against the back of her head, then, “What is?”
“The hazy place my mind goes when I’m with you. Stranger.”
“You gave me a name, remember?”
She smiled, but it was trounced by a consideration. “Where is your home, Riddle?”
He lifted a hand to play his finger through her hair. He brushed it around her ear and tucked it beneath the lobe. He planted a very soft kiss, and only just audible to the ear he placed it upon. “In dreams,” he whispered.
“Will you join me in mine tonight?” she asked, more of a request.
“Yes,” he answered.
With his assurance, she allowed herself to drift quickly into slumber, slipping through the darkness of her mind, feeling herself retreat from her limbs, the sensation pulling back to her chest, and there the last of it disappeared in a quivering breath.
The breath was released in a puff of cloud, hovering. It glowed, illuminating the space before Cybil, who was now standing in an indefinite darkness. The glow of the cloudy orb was a radiant blue and cast its shade against the similar color of Riddle before her. It was the two of them in her dreamspace, an expanse of nothingness in her mind she had unconsciously conjured to see him in. She could feel herself asleep, and yet she could feel herself there with him. The air was still but for the gentle breeze from their breath, caressing each others’ cheeks and spinning the orb in place between them. Beneath it, their fingers met and slowly interlaced. Above it, their foreheads leaned in and connected. Cybil felt again that wondrous feeling of perfection she had felt before in her dreams. The tone, the single note of the forest emanated out from the orb as they stood, still, and slept.
3.
The morning came with a jolt, an awakening at the sound of clattering. Cybil twisted in Riddle’s arms to view over his shoulder Uli struggling with the cabinets to retrieve a proper pan. She stood with feet at the edge of the countertop and arms extended overhead in a delicate balancing act, but one that seemed to come naturally to her. Her rummaging concluded with the retrieval of a metal pan the width of which nearly equaled her height. She allowed the balls of her heels to slip over the counter’s edge and her body dropped. She recoiled with her knees, casually spun in place, and put the pan over the stove with a gentle ting of metal on metal. She pivoted again, twisting to present a wide smile to Cybil. “Good morning, love!”
Rubbing the sleep from her eyes, Cybil returned, less enthusiastically, “Good morning.”
“We’re going to put some meat on those bones today. How does a stack of mosscakes sound?”
With her host awaiting an excited response, Cybil mustered the most she could for the mysterious, and not at all attractive sounding dish. “I couldn’t be more enthused, Uli.”
From beside her, the quietly reassuring voice of Ix came, “They’re not as bad as they sound.” Cybil smiled genuinely as she sat up at the edge of the couch. Slowly rousing, Riddle followed suit, sliding his legs over the edge and placing his elbows against his knees whilst driving the sleep from his eyes with his palms.
“Terrible nightmare,” he muttered.
Offended, Cybil retorted, “I thought it was soothing.”
Riddle finished rubbing his eyes to bring his bewildered gaze upon Cybil until he understood her offense. “No, no, not our time, not the time we spent together in the darkness.” Cybil blushed then, turning her anger over into embarrassment at the end of his sentence. Uli and Ix exchanged knowing glances. “After, in the moments you awoke but I still slumbered.”
“What did you dream, Riddle?” Ix asked. He seemed suddenly enraptured in Riddle’s dreams, stepping nearer and whispering as if to relay the gravity of it all. It all being something Cybil still felt very much far from understanding. Nevertheless, she mimicked the weight with her posture and expression of reverence, donning a near scowling face and placing her hands neatly in her lap. The thought crept again into her mind that this was all very silly, but she dared not insult by undermining the terror that appeared on the wood elf’s face.
“It wasn’t certain,” Riddle replied. Ix awaited details, while Uli, tending to the searing mosscakes in the pan, turned an ear towards the conversation. However, Riddle seemed lost in the telling of his own dream.
“What wasn’t certain, kid?” Ix prodded.
“Anything.” There was a long pause again where it seemed the whole room’s frustration mounted, until he continued, choosing each word slowly, considerately, “It was the forest, yet, uncertain. With its colors, its powers, its creatures, but unhinged. It was. Chaos. All was fire.”
The room grew solemn, even Cybil feeling concern for the forest she was just getting to know. The mood was broken by the excited announcement of Uli, “Breakfast is ready!” They collected around the table, Uli last of all to sit after serving the greenish, absorbent disk on plates before the other three. Cybil prodded the mass with her finger and it oozed in a way that appeared breathing. She gave a quiet gasp, catching herself from revealing her shock. Riddle, grinning, took fork in hand and split a piece away from his mosscake. Staring into Cybil’s eyes, he raised it to his mouth and nonchalantly pulled it from the fork with his teeth. As he worked the bite over in his mouth, Cybil’s eyes questioned. He shrugged in reply, but when Uli asked with her gaze, Riddle responded with a hearty mmmm. Uli smiled and settled into her seat to carve into her mosscake. Cybil scooped out a taster bite for herself and slowly raised it to her mouth. It met with the tip of her tongue, and when it appeared it would not assault her taste buds, she popped it in her mouth. Perhaps a little bland, she thought, for her first meal in an enchanted forest. Then again, she thought, she could be eating something frightfully exotic, like unicorn. Which would be awful. Not that she was a vegetarian, but she assumed, if real, such a beast should be revered. This line of thought was cut off by the rumble in her stomach, which she sufficed with subsequent bites of the mosscake, which she was steadily growing to enjoy.
“Sorry, love, it was awful rude of me to sweep you away to my village when you’d hardly gotten used to Riddle being real without a thorough explanation of the goings on and how you fit in to all this.” Ix had finished his mosscake when he addressed Cybil, who wanted to rep
ly with grace, but found her mouth stuffed. “So, allow me to clear a few things up for you. One and two you’ve already been told, you’ve got a connection to the essence and Riddle’s an orphan of the forest. Don’t go throwing questions at points one and two, since we don’t know much more about it than you do. Neither of you are alone, but both of you are rare. Clear on those?”
“Clear as we can be,” Cybil answered.
“Excellent. Now, I’m what you might call a mayor in this village.”
“What would you call it?” Cybil interrupted.
“We don’t, really. You’ll find we’re not ones for labels. However, I make decisions and they follow me. They put trust in me and I strive not to betray it. Mostly, our lives are quaint, but the forest being what it is, life’s course winding how it does, there came the necessity for governance. So, each of the villages has a ‘mayor’ that collect into a council. We created this so that we could function as a sort of republic, if you will, when we needed to be bigger than our individual villages. Still following, love?”
“Like Alice with the white rabbit.” Ix’s face became consternated and it was clear the reference flew over his head. Cybil turned her head to Riddle, whose eyebrows arched, telling her she was alone with her allusion. Of course, she thought. Why would they know? Then again, Ix seemed to reference things in her world when explaining things in the forest. “Hold on, how come you know things about where I come from?”
Unrest in the Woods (Secrets of the Forest Book 1) Page 4