Please let me know what you think. I will post the second chapter in this story next week. Then I will post 2 chapters of a different story. I am letting you decide which one you would want to read first. I will finish that story first.
1
A twig snapped under Flit’s foot causing
him to recoil before Jett shot him an angry look. Flit hated having to go into the haunted
forest and his company made it even worse.
Flit knew Jett didn’t like him and would do everything to make his day
miserable.
Maybe if the forest was thick he
could stay close but out of Jett’s sight, but the tall trees grew yards
apart. Only the new growth grew tightly
together until one tree eventually dominated the spot and the others would die
off. The best cover seemed to be
wherever large bushy shrubs gathered around the base of a tree. Still they had to be careful these locations
weren’t the home of some unseen beast.
At only fourteen years of age, Flit
was small, even for a malo, at four and a half feet tall and a skinny
build. Jett stood at least a foot taller
and outweighed him by about forty pounds.
Jett had reached his full height and already had facial hair and tuffs
of hair covering his ears while Flit’s skin was smooth and golden brown. A mop of untidy black hair sat upon his head
just like all the other malos with deep blue eyes. They both wore ratted ragged attire and Flit
barely had what could be called shoes.
“If you give away our position
again, I’ll gut you and leave you for the monsters of the forest,” Jett hissed
angrily. “It’s bad enough I have to come
into this dangerous place, but I have to bring you with me.”
“I’m sorry, Jett,” Flit tried to
apologize.
“Shut up. If I want to hear from you, I’ll say so. Otherwise, keep your trap shut.” Jett left
their place of cover hurrying across the open space between one set of trees
for another in a hunched over run.
Flit waited until Jett arrived at
the new spot, looked for any sign of danger, and then bolted after Jett. Flit, like all the races, feared the haunted
forest. He hated when their leader would
move their camp next to its boarders, because that would mean he would have to
venture in to find food. Most who
stepped within its borders were never heard from again.
As dangerous as the forest was, the
malos used it for protection and food.
Being one of the smaller races made them easy targets as slaves or
prey. Camping near the forest gave them
a little peace. The need for food drove them into the woods whenever they couldn’t
steal what they needed in their nightly raids.
Flit wished life was different. He seemed to always be stuck with whoever was
assigned forest duty. It wasn’t that he
liked stealing for a living either, but there were usually more malos involved and
it felt safer. They never let him carry
a weapon and he didn’t think Jett’s short sword would protect them from any
serious danger. Instead of a knife or
his sling with some stones, Jett forced him to carry all the empty sacks.
The farther they went into the
forest, the longer they paused before moving out into the open. It had been quite some time since a malo
disappeared in the forest. Only partial
remains were found along with their shredded clothing. Everyone knew some monster had eaten them.
“There’s our target.” Jett pointed
to large patch of berries growing on a slight slope about a half mile
away.
“It’s a little out in the open?”
Flit stated, pointing out the scarcity of trees and shrubs.
“Just stay low in the berry
bushes. The sun rarely makes an
appearance.” Jett cast a look at the smoke filled sky which gave the land an
endless dim hazy light. “And what did I
say about speaking!”
They continued their darting from
one large tree to another always pausing to make sure nothing had spotted
them. Nothing moved. No small animals or birds in the sky. They crossed the distance in a matter of
minutes and then crept out into the berry patch. Flit passed a couple of sacks to Jett and
they began filling them with berries.
A gust of wind swept through the
area, causing the trees to creek and leaves to rustle. Flit and Jett froze, listening while sinking
a little lower into the bushes. A
strange cry from over head grabbed their attention and an uneasy feeling spread
through Flit.
“Stay still,” Jett whispered. “If you move, it might spot us.”
The call came again, closer this
time.
Flit’s heart started to race and he
wished he could crawl inside one of the empty sacks. Sweat started to form
along his brow and annoying biting insects initiated an assault on his
ears. The urge to swat the pests became
unbearable and he used his mouth to angle breaths of air to keep the little
devils out of his eyes and nose.
A loud slap indicated Jett gave into
the desire to rid himself of the insects.
The strange call took on a higher
pitch, volume and repetition as a massive black bird with beady red eyes landed
on a branch of the nearest tree. The
bird continued with its non-stop chatter, rotating its head to stare at them
with both eyes.
“That thing is going to give us
away,” Flit whispered.
“Shut up,” Jett hissed.
“It knows we are here. We need to get out of here before it attracts
the attention of something larger and more dangerous,” Flit warned.
“Shut…”
A hair rising roar off to their
right scared them out of the bushes.
They raced away from the roar but another closer to their left stopped
them in their tracks. The black bird
appeared to be following them yammering away, as if it was calling the beasts
to them. Before they had a chance to
head back towards their camp, a third call drove them deeper into the forest.
They ran wildly dodging trees all
the while the howls of the beasts continued to grow louder.
“There!” Flit pointed towards a
massive tree about a quarter mile a head.
“Maybe we can climb higher than these things can grab.”
They arrived at the tree only to
discover the lowest branches were just out of their reach. Flashes of black beasts appeared through the
trees rushing in their direction.
“Quick give me a boost,” Jett
ordered and Flit clasped his hands between his knees.
Flit almost buckled with Jett’s
weight but managed to hold him as he stepped from Flit’s hand to his
shoulders. Jett snagged the lowest
branches and swung himself up. Then no matter
what Flit tried he couldn’t grasp Jett’s outstretched hand.
“RUN!” Jett screamed as the beasts
roared with delight on finally spotting their prey.
The bird continued to caw
excitedly. It landed a couple of
branches above Jett.
Flit sprinted through the forest,
adrenaline and fear pushing him on. His
heart pounded in his ears and his lungs burned inside his chest. The grunts and growls of his pursuers grew
closer and closer until the thudding of their feet hitting the ground joined
the other noises.
He reached the top of a hill and
risked a peek over his shoulder. His
change of focus caused him to trip and fall down the steep slope on the other
side. He rolled at an accelerated rate,
bouncing off rocks and bushes until finally falling off a twelve foot drop into
a group of thick bushes which helped break his fall.
Flit groaned against the aches and
pains in his body. Two hideous black
hairy heads with red eyes and long sharp yellow teeth peered down at him from
on top of the cliff. They swung back and
forth as if searching for a way down.
Flit eyes jumped both ways to see
another way down wasn’t too far off. He
scrambled out of the center of the bush while broken branches and thick
structure scratched and snagged his clothes and skin, making him use a lot of
time and energy.
The beasts’ call told him they were
heading towards the path he had spotted while lying in the bush.
Ignoring the pain in his back and legs,
he started running once more. He searched for a possible place to hide when a
horrible scream momentary stopped him.
He turned back towards the hill. Jett! Oh No, They got Jett!
He exploded forward once more at full
speed but his energy started to wane fast.
The calls of the creatures began again and steadily grew closer and
closer. Fear threatened to consume him
and tears began pooling along his lower eyelids. He didn’t see any way out of the
situation. These monsters would ripe him
to pieces and devoured his flesh.
The louder their terrifying calls
sounded, the harder Flit’s heart beat inside his chest. He began blubbering in his desperate search
for a solution. Tears rolled down his
face and his legs became heavier and heavier.
Hopefully
they will kill you quick, Flit. I don’t
want a lot of pain.
Through the trees ahead a strange gray wall like structure
appeared. A building? The image
sparked in him hope at the chance to escape.
He sprinted as fast as his tired legs would work. What he thought was a wall of stone that was
part of a larger building turned out to be a wall of gray thorns about twenty
feet high. The dried bushes were knitted
so tightly together they looked impregnable.
The thudding of the monsters’ large paws
told Flit he was out of time. He dove
straight into the dense wall of spikes, which punctured his skin and
clothing. Gritting his teeth, he dug
deeper into the painful thorns. He
managed to get several feet into the thick structure when the ravenous
creatures slammed into the wall.
They whimpered and wailed after
attempting to snatch Flit in their snapping jaws as the thorns jabbed their
faces with each attempt. The thorns
seemed to drive the hideous beasts mad.
The howled with pain but would dive into the thorns again and
again. With each try, they got closer
and closer to their prey.
Flit had no choice but to continue to
endure the painful bushes and force his way deeper into the stabbing
plants. Bloor ran from every part of his
body. His fingers hurt so badly, that he
turned his back in the direction he wanted to go and pushed his way
through. Flit screamed from the
pain. For every inch of progress he
made, the beasts gained the same amount of ground.
He closed his eyes and drove his
backside into the wall until he broke through the other side and fell on his
back, driving in some of the broken off thorns.
He cried out but sprang to his feet so he could flee again, when
something odd happened.
The enraged monsters stopped their
assault all together and acted as if an even more terrifying monster had shown
up. The lowered to the ground with their
tails between their legs and acted as if they didn’t know what to do. The shot lofty looks at Flit and then at
their air all around them before yelping and darting away.
Their reaction caused the hair on the
back of Flit’s neck to stand on end. He
didn’t dare move. It felt like he was
incased in ice and the world around him grew completely silent. A cold chill brushed across his cheek like
ice had touched his face.
He cocked his head slightly to the side
and strained his ears listening for anything noise at all. A very soft sound reached his ears. He couldn’t tell if a breeze blowing through
the thorns created the noise of if it was something else. The noise was there
one moment and then gone the next.
Taking a deep breath, Flit forced his
muscles to move. The effort shot pain
all through his body as the thorns still stuck in his body made their presence
known. “Ahh,” the sharp protrusions took
his focus away from his surroundings and he began plucking the dagger-like
objects out of his skin.
He had just cleared all the objects from
his backside and was trying to reach some in the center of his back when the
sound came again. He held his breath to
hear more. A soft moan or something like
it traveled with the wind. Is that someone…crying? Or a wounded animal.
The sight that met Flit’s eyes filled
him with wonder. While the beasts and
the thorns held his attention, he failed to see the spectacular gardens in
which he now stood. There were beautiful
flowers of all colors, fruit trees and bushes, marble fountains with running
water and immaculately trimmed hedges and lawns. Bees and butterflies busied themselves about
the flowers and tree blossoms.
“Wow,” he whispered to himself. He took a step which caused more thorns to
reveal their presence in his skin. He
paused to pluck out the last of the sharp devils before returning his attention
to the beautiful gardens.
He took a couple of steps forward and
the eerie soft crying returned, stopping him.
How could this be in the middle of
the evil dark forest? Wait a minute. His eyes darted around the strange world
inside the forest and realized the sun was shining. It was moving toward sunset quickly but it was
still giving off more light than he was used to. He put a hand over his eyes to deflect the
glare and took in how blue the sky appeared inside this place.
Swallowing the lump that had pushed its
way up into his throat, he called, “Hello!”
His voice carried a little louder than
he would have liked and a colorful array of birds took flight, chattering with
fright from the disturbance. They
circled the gardens and then Flit before returning to their hidden perches
within the trees.
The moment the birds calmed back down
and their chirps died away, the crying sounded again. More prominent.
“Hello!” Flit called a little louder
with the same response from the birds and few deer materialized out of the
bushes and hoped away, deeper into the gardens.
It took a little longer for the birds to
calm down, but once more the crying started.
The sobs were deep like it was a man wailing.
Flit waited, not knowing how to
proceed. The moaning and sobbing
continued to float around on the breeze but Flit could not determine from which
direction they came. Soon the allure of
the fruits and water overpowered what fear he had felt.
He limped to the nearest tree. Without any adrenaline to drive him, his body
hurt everywhere. Blood oozed from all
the cuts created by the thorns and his back ached from the fall. When he reached the tree, he pulled a few
pieces of the lower hanging fruit and began devouring them. They were unlike anything he had ever
tasted. They were sweet and juicy. A deep calm spread through him and all his
aches and pains seemed to disappear.
He continued to eat until he was
satisfied and then went to a fountain and drank his fill. He used the water to wash of all the dried
blood from his face and hands. The
crying continued. It ate at his mind,
speaking of great pain and loss. Whoever
it was could find no comfort. A deep
sorrow started to creep into Flit’s mind as he browsed the gardens sampling
other fruits. The place seemed to go
forever. How is it now one has found this place? It is a paradise in a dangerous
world. What do I tell my people?
Flit checked for a bag to take some
fruit back with him for proof.
“You will tell no one,” a soft female
voice whispered in his ear and a white wisp-like mist passed at the edges of
his vision.
Flit felt like ice had touched his ear
and he flinched then stopped dead. His heart started pounding in his chest and
ears and his mouth turned dry once more.
Ghosts! Goose pimples spread
up his back and over his arms and it felt like he was incased in led. Fear
replaced his will to move. Ever since he
was a small malo, the elders of his camp had told horror stories about the evil
spirits who lived in the woods with powers to deceive the mind. And
lead people to their doom. What if this
is all a trick. The sun. It wasn’t
shinning on the other side of thorns.
It’s an illusion.
The image of the frightened monsters
flashed through his mind. What did they see that I didn’t? He closed his eyes tight and opened them
again in an effort to clear his vision but the garden remained. There must have
seen something to scare them off. Some
evil more terrifying then themselves. What did they see? He shut his eyes once
more and shook his head this time, but he didn’t notice anything different.
His stomach started to tie itself into
knots and an uneasy feeling crept over him.
He tried to remember how he had reached this point. It took all the effort he had to make his
muscles respond. He kept glancing in
every direction, looking for whatever lay hidden within this vision. You
need to get out of here.
He started to retrace his steps in order
to find the whole he had created to get in.
“Where are you going?” the soft voice
spoke into his other ear, freezing it with its icy touch and another white mist
danced at the corner of his sight. “You can’t leave. It is getting dark. The demon will catch you?”
This time Flit’s terror launched him
forward at full speed. He raced back the
way he had come.
“Where are you going? It is not safe outside the wall. You have eaten the fruit. You will see him and he will see you,” a
different female voice spoke and the transparent mist floated across the front
of his vision in the form of a beautiful woman.
“Leave me alone,” Flit screamed while
swatting at the mist by waving his arms wildly through the air.
“You can’t escape him. He will peel the flesh off your bones while
you still live,” a third female voice stated and another ghost zipped in front
of him.
Flit closed his eyes and raced blindly
forward with his hands extended to make sure he didn’t run into anything. He cried out as he smashed into the wall of
thorns cutting his arms and hands again.
His eyes snapped open and he searched
for his exit. He didn’t want to squeeze
back through the thorns but he had to escape before these evil spirits led him
to some horrible fate. He located the spot he had entered and started to ease
his way out.
“You cannot leave,” yet another voice
spoke as if it were right on top of him in a distressed tone. “Watch out.
He is coming!”
Heavy thuds shook the ground, dropping
loose thorns and branches down on Flit’s head. On the other side of the thorns,
a giant black demon with curved horns and fire dancing all over its muscular
body, road a giant monster with scales and spikes all over its body.
The scaly monster roared a deep guttural
sound they almost caused Flit to lose control of his bodily functions. The demon’s eyes locked with Flit’s and an
expression of rage took hold of its face.
It swung a massive double axe at Flit, who just managed to jump out of
the way before it cut a gash in the thorns.
Flit scrambled backwards in fear and
stumbled to the ground. The demon coaxed
its mount forward but the second it crossed into the thorns, the thorns
disappeared and a wall of fire took their place.
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