Of the Trees

by E. M. Fitch

  It was suddenly clear, bad things came to those who could see these creatures.

  “How are we so far from the road?” Ryan said. She could sense the touch of panic there, his unsettled realization that something wasn’t right. “We shouldn’t have come in here.”

  Cassie agreed, but she did not speak. The light was leaching from the sky. It was already a deep purple. The moon shone brightly, a halo of mist making it seem like a beacon in the sky. She tripped, and was grateful Ryan was there to yank her back to her feet. She paused, scanning the forest around them.

  “Do you have a flashlight?” Cassie asked, squinting up at Ryan. Already his features were hard to make out. She saw him shake his head. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out his phone. A beam of light lit the forest around them, and Cassie froze. Six pairs of gleaming eyes watched her from just beyond the trees. Her throat felt dry and she twitched with the urge to run. One set slanted, the owner’s head tilting in consideration, his eyes hauntingly blue.

  She turned back to Ryan, gripped his fingers tightly, and let him lead.

  “Who’s out there?” Ryan shouted. He swept the trees with his light, elongating shadows and forcing gray bark into white brilliance. He couldn’t hear the low laugh that echoed back.

  They stepped forward together, Cassie refusing to let him go. The underbrush was thick and tangled, and Ryan cursed, unable to break through.

  “This isn’t right,” he murmured. “We didn’t pass through any of this to get here.”

  “I know,” Cassie replied, she brought her free hand to his back. “Maybe we should just call someone.”

  Terror started to eat away at her, the anticipation that something awful was about to happen to them out here in the woods. They were being watched, played with. Cat and mouse. Only the mouse was in a maze that the cat controlled. She couldn’t explain it to Ryan. There was no way to tell him that the forest was preventing them from leaving. He wouldn’t understand. She barely understood. She just knew they were watching, laughing, taunting. That they wanted her to …

  To what?

  That, she wasn’t sure. Why they wouldn’t leave her alone, she couldn’t explain. She just knew that they were there and that they wouldn’t go away.

  Ryan cut the light and Cassie blinked into the darkness. An owl hooted softly. Other than that, the night was silent. Ryan’s face could be seen in the glow of his phone screen, a bubble of light in the darkness.

  Quickly before she could scream, as though he had materialized out of thin air, a face appeared next to Ryan’s. His skin was the same soft, luminescent paleness that Laney’s new face was. He leered at Ryan, his lips twisting slowly into a scowl. His gaze locked on Cassie’s as he bent close to Ryan, his breath ghosting over his cheek. She saw an arm raise and crash back down, catching Ryan in the back of the skull, and he fell.

  “No!” she shouted, falling to her knees. She crouched over Ryan, cradling him to her chest protectively. She rocked back and forth, feeling ridiculously exposed in the dark, night air. They hovered around her. She could feel the air move as they did, sense the footsteps on the dead forest floor all around her. They watched.

  “She doesn’t see,” someone whispered.

  “Get rid of him,” Aidan hissed. Cassie clenched her arms tightly around Ryan. She could feel his breath, his heartbeat, solid and warm, but he wasn’t waking. She felt for his phone, her fingers scattering through dead leaves and dirt. She needed help. She didn’t think she could get out of this alone, not dragging Ryan. She couldn’t leave him behind.

  It happened slowly, just a low tremble at first. She thought it had come from her, a side effect of the horror, a slow shaking washing through her. But then she realized it was the ground. It was moving, churning. The stench of rot filled her nose, and she screamed.

  Not again. Not again!

  NOT AGAIN!

  She felt for Ryan’s arms, forced her hands underneath them and dragged him back. He flopped back on her, groaning.

  “Wake up, wake up,” she pleaded, pulling him away. She lost her footing, falling back, the dirt roiling under her as she fell. Her heels dug in, pushing back against the soft earth and she moved, fractionally but still moved.

  “Don’t do that!”

  Cassie nearly sobbed as Laney’s shrill voice cut through the darkness. Laney. She would make them stop. Even if Cassie refused to acknowledge them, even if she pretended she couldn’t hear them, Laney would stop it.

  “She’s not ready,” Laney insisted, her voice rising in volume. “You’ll kill her.”

  “Hush, love,” Corey whispered. The darkness covered them all like a blanket, kept them from Cassie’s sight. She could hear their soft whispers, hear the shuffling of their feet. But the ground ripping apart below her was overshadowing them, the snap of roots and the tear of mossy soil. Her legs were cold with mud, and she scrambled back, never letting Ryan go even though she knew it might mean that she went with him. Into the mud, into the earth, swallowed by the trees.

  Laney made a token protest, murmuring concerns over the wrenching soil. But they didn’t listen.

  “Get her out of here,” a voice Cassie didn’t recognize called out.

  “Help!” Cassie shrieked. She couldn’t move her legs anymore; the roots spread over them. She shifted, trying to pull one and then the other out of the stranglehold the ground had taken. “Ryan, wake up!”

  He didn’t move, a solid weight against her chest. She felt the suck of the forest, dragging her lower. Panic seized her. She clawed at Ryan, screamed for help. The stench was overpowering, the cold of the mud seeping through her. She was stuck, like quicksand that pulled her faster and faster toward the center of the earth. Immobile. Soon to be dead.

  “Laney! Please!” It was the last thing she was able to say before the soil danced up her neck and into her mouth. She spat, unable to rid herself of it. She held her breath, stars appeared behind her clenched eyelids. Roots slithered up and over her face and chest, squeezing, pinning.

  The ground tore opened beneath Cassie, and she fell, her body ripping through what remained of the clinging roots.

  The drop was fast and cold. She landed with a thud and her breath rushed out of her. She saw stars even when she opened her eyes, colored lights winking in and out of focus. A circle of dusky light was directly overhead, the tips of blackened trees visibly swaying below the darkened sky.

  Ryan lay still atop her, a heavy weight pinning her down.

  “Ryan,” she whispered, trying to shake him awake. “You okay?”

  There was no answer. Cassie felt the heat of tears, but she ignored it. She pressed her hands to his chest, cradling him against her. His heart beat fast and strong behind her palm, his breath came evenly, lifting her hands slowly and then gently lowering them. She sucked a deep breath in, and then squirmed out from beneath him. She lay him down. His head lolled to one side in the muck, plastering mud to his cheek.

  Her head ached. When she brought her fingers to her scalp, they came away sticky, wet, and warm. She was bleeding. She blinked several times, unable to rid herself of the pinpoints of light that sparked in her peripheral vision.

  She could hear voices from the forest above. Somewhere, far away, she could hear Laney crying.

  “There are others, Aidan, this is not worth the trouble.” The voice held a ring of authority but when Aidan answered, he was casual.

  “I want her,” he said, his voice echoing down into the hole he put her in. “I like her face.”

  There were soft chuckles from above. Cassie stretched her arms out. She could reach either side of their enclosure with her fingertips. She spun, keeping her hands to the walls. It was circular, like a well. Roots sprung from the wet sides, dirt crumbled as her fingers ran over it. She stepped up to the wall, running her hands up as high as she could reach. It was hard to gauge, with the light so dim above, just how deep they were, but the voices above were clear and strong. She had s
urvived the fall and so had Ryan. They couldn’t be that deep. She pushed her fingers into the soft mud of the wall, grabbing a handful and trying to pull herself up.

  Clumps of wet dirt rained down on her.

  “Tsk, tsk, my dear.” A smooth voice from above laughed down at her. “That’s not the way to play nice.”

  “She can’t hear you, imbecile,” a female, not Laney, said. She sounded bored.

  Cassie didn’t respond. She wouldn’t. This was a game, and Cassie wasn’t playing.

  “Help!” she screamed. “Can anybody hear me?”

  Laughter. Cassie grit her teeth and tried again, screaming until her eardrums hurt. She gave up with an angry cry, pacing the small confines before kneeling next to Ryan. She couldn’t see any more than his outline so she put her hands on his chest, relieved when her hands rose with his breath.

  Something soft tickled her neck, and she jerked back, scrambling against the side of her prison. She couldn’t see anything at first, though she searched through the darkness. When she looked up, the circle above framed the moonlight and the straggly trees, and through this she noticed the mist. It purled over the edge, floating in soft tendrils toward Cassie and Ryan.

  Someone above snorted, but a voice cut through that. “Remember how it was, darling?” he said. Cassie felt her eyes drift shut, an unexpected thrill shooting through her chest. “Remember how it felt?”

  Her throat was dry, and she swallowed roughly. The voice was melodic and soft, enticing. She knew what he meant, and yes, she remembered how it felt. Warm. Intense.

  He desired her. She knew that. And for a moment, in the forest, against that tree, she had desired him, too.

  She reached out, her hand finding Ryan’s inert shoulder. She tucked her hand inside his jacket and curled her fingers into his damp shirt.

  “It could be that way.” The voice drifted down on the mist, soft and warm. “Call out for me.”

  Her lips parted and she looked up, searching for Aiden among the trees that thrashed above. A flash of a head appeared silhouetted above her. She imagined him smiling. She was trembling softly, cold and wet. Except for her fingers. They were warm, almost hot, as they clung to Ryan’s shoulder. The mist was sweet but cold and suddenly, more than anything, she wanted to feel warm.

  “Call for me,” he whispered, “I will keep you warm.”

  She blinked and her mind cleared.

  No. She didn’t want him. She never wanted him.

  “Enough of this nonsense,” someone sneered. Cassie shook her head, and the mist evaporated. Gone, or never really there to begin with. A trick of the senses. Before she could think it through, over the huff of annoyance from above, the seat of her pants was saturated in cold water. She pushed her hands to the ground around her, water pooled over her fingers, then her wrist. It was rising.

  Cassie got to her knees, jerking Ryan to a seated position against the side of the well. She smacked his face. His skin was cold and wet under her hand.

  “Wake up!” she shouted. Cassie shook him, pounded on his chest, yelled for help. The water rose steadily, her knees were cold and wet. It crept up her thighs. “Ryan, please!”

  Nothing. His head lolled on his chest and the water, dark and shining, covered his lower half. She wracked her brain. Even if she called out to Aidan, acknowledged that she heard him, saw them, would that save Ryan? The soft hiss came back to her, and she gritted her teeth. No, she couldn’t save him by calling out. She thought of her mother, the ER nurse who would know exactly how to wake him. What would she say, if she saw her daughter now, stuck at the bottom of a created well in the middle of the forest? Would she know how to save them?

  Her voice floated clear through Cassie’s mind, always so direct, always focused. She could handle a crisis. Cassie couldn’t. Random snippets of CPR, of treating frostbite, it flashed in her brain, none of it useful. Then an afternoon with Laney, Cathy darting about the house in pajamas on her day off. It had been a snow day. They had been watching a movie, something dumb on television when Cathy stopped collecting laundry and stood, watching the characters on the screen.

  “Stupid,” she had muttered. “Would it have killed them to get some medical advice before filming this.” Those kinds of things had always bothered her mother when they watched anything medical play out in a movie.

  “That’s not how you set an IV.”

  “You’re giving them what for that?”

  “Now they’re not even pronouncing it right!”

  But on that particular afternoon, Cassie remembered, her mother had snorted. “A simple sternum rub would have that wuss up in a second. What a waste of time.” Laney had bugged Cassie’s mom until she showed them what that was, a hard rub of your knuckles up and down the unconscious person’s sternum. Cassie and Laney had wrestled each other to the floor and tried it. It hurt like hell, which was the point, of course.

  Cassie yanked at the zipper of Ryan’s coat. His head fell forward, and she pushed him back, making a fist and pressing her knuckles hard to the center of his chest. She rubbed vigorously, pushing into him until she felt he might bruise. He came to with a lurch, crying out in pain.

  “What’s going on?” he gasped, rubbing at his chest.

  “Get up,” Cassie said, pulling on his arm. Water drained from her jeans as they stood, making cold paths down her legs. He pulled her to him and leaned on her heavily. She didn’t mind, happy for the solid feel of his body, the warmth leaking from his jacket.

  “You should zip up,” she murmured, pressing her face into his chest. He squeezed her but didn’t pull away to fix his jacket.

  “Did we fall?” Cassie nodded into his chest. “How long was I out?”

  “A little bit,” she answered. “I was starting to get worried.”

  The water hadn’t stopped rising, but neither had realized it. They were both soaked from the waist down, and it wasn’t until the water reached dry areas, the tails of their coats and then further, creeping up onto their waistlines, that Cassie felt the fear spike again. For a moment, with Ryan awake and here, it hadn’t seemed so impossible. But once again, she was thrown into the maelstrom, waiting for the water to rise too high.

  “Have you tried to climb?” he asked, sounding breathless as he realized what was happening. She nodded again, pulling away.

  “It’s mud,” she said, “all mud. I can’t get a hold.”

  As she knew he would, Ryan turned and tried to find purchase on the soft walls. Just as it happened to her, chunks of earth fell down on him.

  “My phone?” he asked.

  “Gone.”

  The laughter from above was audible to her, but she was blocking it out. The musical tinkling as though there was a cocktail party above her was distracting, but not overwhelming. The water and Ryan took most of her concentration. The lower half of her shirt was soaked now, cold tickling her ribcage.

  How far would he push this? Would Aidan drown her and Ryan too, just to prove something? Cassie didn’t think so. He liked her face, he wanted her attention. But, surely, he didn’t want her dead.

  “She’s not responding.” Cassie’s ears perked up at his voice. She looked to Ryan, trying to make out his features in the moonlight. He didn’t appear to have heard.

  “She was before,” Aidan answered. It sounded like he was sulking. “If you hadn’t interfered.”

  “Poor Aidan.” A soft feminine voice laughed. “All you’ve got going for you is your looks. It’s been that way forever, hasn’t it?”

  The water rose slowly, but steadily; it was just under her breasts now. Cassie shivered uncontrollably, colder than she had ever been in her life. The water sliced through her, her feet already completely numb. She doubted she could climb now even if the walls didn’t fall apart.

  “Has the water been rising all this time?” Ryan asked, his voice shaky.

  “Slowly, but yes,” Cassie answered. Shivers had taken over her body, her teeth clacked togeth
er when she spoke.

  “I don’t know how high it will go,” Ryan said. He grabbed at Cassie’s arms and pulled her back into his chest. “The water table shouldn’t be too high, but it’s been raining lately. I’m just not sure.”

  He sounded helpless. It unnerved her.

  “I want you to climb up me,” he said suddenly, grabbing her low on her waist and moving to lift her. Cassie gripped his arms and stilled him. “See if you can grab anything, up higher it might be more firm. You can run for help.”

  “Ryan, I can’t.”

  “Look. I’ll swim if I have to,” he said. “But one of us needs to get out of here and get help.”

  His fingers were firm and insistent on her waist, yet she could barely feel them through the numbing cold. He bent in the water, one hand tracing down over her hip and under her bum. “C’mon,” he murmured, “up you go.”

  Water sluiced from her body, draining from her clothing and jacket. It soaked Ryan through as he lifted her. She dug her knee into his collarbone, ignoring his grunt as she climbed up to stand on his shoulders.

  “Are you okay?” Cassie asked. She was shaky. His hands came up to wrap around her ankles as he grunted an affirmative. She stretched up, reaching as high as she could. He wavered underneath her. The dirt was soft but dry. She reached up to grab something, anything she could find to hoist herself out of there.

  A dark arm appeared before her, a head silhouetted by the moonlight above. “Grab it, sweetheart,” he murmured, reaching for her outstretched arm. “Come to me.”

  Every muscle in her body locked. Above, the shadow hovered almost blocking out the moon. He was ringed in silver, his head tilted in consideration. She saw him. She heard him. A menacing force that would drown her best friend. She remembered the feel of his skin, too warm and too soft. He wanted her to touch him again, to link fingers and let him drag her from the earth and into his arms, into a future she didn’t understand and didn’t want.

  If she grabbed that hand, if she admitted that she saw them, they won.

  “Cassie,” Ryan called out from below. “Can you reach anything?”