Chapter 2 Run
RUN
NOW
Considering I’m half-naked in this slip of a dress, I don’t mind the cloak so much.
Without it, I’m exposed, and I don’t just mean how my nipples are playing peekaboo through the flimsy fabric.
It drapes over the top half off my body, curving right below my ass cheeks, almost like I’m wearing shadows for as much covering it gives me.
It doesn’t help that it’s all I have on.
Sandy meant it when she told me that I couldn’t bring anything else into the forest. I figured underwear and sneakers were a no-brainer, but she took one look at my panty lines, my socks, my shoes, and escorted me back to the hostel to get rid of them.
Only the reminder that Emily was still in her room, waiting for me to have second thoughts and pass the opportunity over to her had me kicking off my sneakers and shimmying out of my bikini-cut underwear.
If I returned in three days’ time, the village council members would return them to me along with my backpack.
If…
I’m feeling the weight of that ‘if’ right now as I step carefully through the forest, tugging the cloak closed around me for some kind of protection. As warm as it was in the village of Blackmoor, the forest itself has an undeniable chill to the air that isn’t doing my nipples any favors.
The three council members were there at the crack of dawn this morning to see me off.
One of the men reminded me that, to earn my wish, I needed to make it the full three days in the woods—my debt to the monsters, I guess—before walking through the same entryway on the morning of the fourth day.
Only then would I complete the contract that I signed.
Sandy reminded me not to remove the cloak.
I’d secretly been planning to do just that because, hello, it’s August and I figured I would be sweating before long.
Within the first fifteen steps past the opening to the woods, the chill had hit me and I realized that keeping the cloak on wouldn’t be a problem.
That might be the only thing that isn’t…
The first thing I noticed about the forest besides the unusual chill is how…
normal it feels. You’d think that would be comforting.
I’ve been in the woods before, making out with guys, lighting up where my foster parents wouldn’t see, or even cutting through the trees to get from one neighborhood to another.
But this… after all of the warnings that the council members had given me, I expected something more.
The tall, dark trees stretch high over my head, thick with late summer leaves that shield a lot of the sunlight from reaching the forest floor. It smells like earth and pine and something musky, with the mud packed and a scattering of old leaves covering the ground.
The grass is slick under my sensitive toes.
I’ve been poked and jabbed with countless rocks and sticks already, and I’ve moved from walking flat-footed to carrying my weight on the balls of my feet to limit the damage.
It’s slow-going, the trip through the woods even more delayed because I’m searching every nook and cranny I can find for somewhere I can bunker down and hide out for the next three days.
Just because there’s no sign of any monsters yet doesn’t mean they’re not there. If I were a monster straight out of a children’s story, I’d lurk when it was dark, and definitely not on the edge of the forest, so close to the village.
I’d like to think that I’m a fairy tale aficionado. When they were the only happy endings I figured I’d ever get, I clung to them for most of my childhood, and I’m holding onto the hope that magic is real—that wishes are real—as tightly as I can.
Maybe that’s why, when the sun starts to dim and I still have no idea where I’m going, where I’m sleeping, what I’m eating, and how I’m going to relieve myself that doesn’t involve squatting behind a bush and getting piss all over my slip of a dress…
again… I begin to have second thoughts after all.
Sure, fairy tales come with happy endings for the heroes and heroines, but there are lessons in there for the children, too.
“Hey, kiddies,” I mumble to myself as I stub my toe for the countless time, “you know the moral of this story? Don’t throw away your life savings because JOSIE521 online says that there’s a mythical forest that promises you magic and money and a wish if you’re brave enough to face the beasts.”
Brave? Me? You can call me reckless. Determined for sure. A hopeless romantic… yeah, that’s me. But I’m not all that brave. I just hate to be proven wrong, and I wanted to believe so badly that I could do this.
Can I do this?
I shift the red cloak on my shoulders, kind of regretting that I agreed to spend three nights in the foreboding forest at all.
The fabric is heavier than it looks, trapping body heat against my skin, though the black nightdress underneath is barely there.
Somewhere along the way I’ve started to sweat, beads of moisture welling up under the twist of hair that I’ve tucked under the hood.
I’m hungry. Sandy assured me that any of the fruit I come across in the woods is safe enough to eat.
Same with the running water so long as it looks clear and not murky.
Halfway through the day, I was thirsty enough to cup some of the water up to my mouth and take a sip.
I haven’t gotten the runs yet—knock on wood—so I think it was okay.
Unfortunately, I haven’t found any of that fruit she mentioned.
With breakfast a distant memory, that’s just one more regret to add to the list.
But, despite the regrets, my sore feet, my empty belly, I keep on moving.
For some reason, staying still in one spot sounds like a worse idea, and I’m holding out hope that—as though this really is a fairy tale—I could be lucky enough to stumble upon an empty cottage and borrow a bed and a roof and, hopefully, a toilet for the night.
As I do, I try to fall back on instinct, on the same survival logic that’s gotten me through worse places than this.
You got this, Char. Find some more water.
Locate any kind of shelter, whether I crash somewhere or borrow, like, a cave or a lean-to.
Figure out what’s useful, and what’s not. Keep moving until something changes.
Only nothing does.
Hours pass—or, at least, I think they do.
The sun continues to shift overhead, but not in a way that makes sense to a girl from the suburbs.
It feels too fast and too slow all at once, like time is playing tricks on me.
I haven’t found another stream after the earlier one.
No berries, no apples, no broken branches that suggest a trail, no sign that anything lives here at all.
It’s just trees, trees, trees everywhere I look.
I stop, turning slowly in a circle, my eyes tracking the same trunks, the same shadows, the same empty stretch of forest in every direction.
“Okay,” I say under my breath. “Not ideal, but it could be worse. Hell, it could be raining.”
I spend so much time on my own that it’s a long-time habit of mine to talk to myself. Out here, though? My voice sounds wrong. It’s too small, too quiet, like the forest swallows it the instant the words leave my mouth.
Shielding my eyes, I peer up through the trees, searching for clouds through the growing darkness. With my luck, I just put that out into the world and rain will start falling any second now.
When it doesn’t—and I heave a small sigh of relief—I shrug, pick a direction, and start walking again, as fast as I’m able.
The longer I walk, the quieter the forest grows. Which, when you’ve been told again and again about the monsters that lurk among the trees, you start to think that someone really is fucking with you.
At first, it’s subtle. The few birds I heard chirping and squawking fade out one by one, their birdsong replaced with nothing at all.
The breeze dies down until the leaves above me stop rustling, hanging still and heavy in the air.
Even the soft crunch of my steps feels too loud against the silence pressing in around me.
Shit. If I’m the only one making any noise in here, anyone—anything—listening will be able to track me by sound.
I slow my steps, dragging the long cloak behind me before I come to a sudden stop.
You know what? The quiet in here… it isn’t peaceful. It’s waiting.
It’s watching.
Oh, no…
A prickle of sudden fear crawls up the back of my neck. That instinct—the one that’s kept me alive in places that were supposed to be safe and weren’t—suddenly flares to life, and I have to swallow a soft moan.
Yeah. No denying it now.
I’m being watched.
I turn sharply, scanning the trees behind me, my gaze flicking from shadow to shadow, searching for movement, for anything out of place, and finding nothing.
Only the trees. Just the forest.
And yet—
“Hello?” I call out before I can stop myself.
Hello.
‘Ello.
‘Llo…
As the echo dies, I let out a slow breath, forcing my shoulders to relax even though the tension is still coiled tight in my gut. “You’re fine, Char,” I mutter. “You’re just in your own head.”
Right?
I fucking hope so.
I start walking again, faster now, my steps more deliberate, my focus narrowing to one simple goal: keep moving. Get somewhere. Anywhere but here where I can feel the weight of a pair of unwelcome eyes on me even heavier than the red cloak with the hood shadowing my face and hiding my hair...
And that’s when the first howl cuts through the silence so suddenly, my entire body locks up. Every muscle in my body goes rigid, my breath catching in my throat as I strain to listen, to figure out where it came from, what it is, how close the monster can be to me.
Monster… maybe it’s a dog. Dogs howl, right? Or it could be—
Fuck!
There’s something in that howl that feels wrong. Like it wasn’t a simple animalistic sound, but a ‘gotcha’ moment. Whatever made it is out there, and they’re looking for me.
Holy shit.
Holy shit.
Holyshit.
My quickened pace becomes a jog as I start to weave my way through the trees, doing my best not to stumble. Come on, Char. Don’t be the stereotypical chick in a horror flick. Run away from the monster, not toward it, and you better not fall because there’s no promise you’re getting back up again.
A second howl has me yelping, then pouring on the speed. Branches snap beneath my feet as I bolt through them, the red cloak making my tear obvious for any pursuer. It’s a struggle, but I push on, even when I nearly fall, even when I’m sure that something is chasing me.
“Oh my God, oh my God, ohmyGod—”
Don’t stop.
Don’t look back.
Don’t—
Something moves behind me. I stop, stare, and curse under my breath before spinning around and going in the opposite direction of where I sense that thing.
Dog.
Wolf.
Monster.
“Nope. Nope, nope, nope. Not today, Fido.”
I push harder, weaving between trees, ducking low branches that scrape across my arms and shoulders. The sting barely registers over the rush of adrenaline flooding my system. The forest blurs around me, dark shapes and shifting shadows that don’t stay still long enough to make sense of.
Go, Char. Go.
The ground shifts under my feet and I go down hard, a root catching my toes and sending me sprawling, the breath knocked from my lungs as I hit the dirt. Pain flares through my palms, my knees, but it doesn’t matter.
Get up.
Get up—
Just when I get to my knees, the creature leaps for me. I don’t even realize that that’s what happened until it lands at my side and, in a fit of pure stupidity, I snap my head toward it, taking in the… the…
Wolf.
Yeah. That’s a fucking wolf.
It’s too much. I went from wandering around the woods, trying to find somewhere to rest, secretly convinced that Sandy was full of shit when she said the woods were full of monsters, but now I’m eye to eye with one and I…
oh, no. Black spots dance at the edge of my vision, my head goes woozy, and I fold in on myself before toppling over to the side that doesn’t currently house a massive fucking wolf.
As unconsciousness drags me under, I remember the sensation of a hot breath washing over my face. The wolf lowers its head, dragging its damp snout along my throat, my jaw, my cheek as it inhales my scent.
No.
Stop.
Don’t…
But I’m too far gone to do anything to stop the beast, the panic, the exhaustion, the sheer weight of everything crashing over me all at once as my eyelids flutter and everything goes dark.