Forest Secrets

The bus stopped across the street from the forest and Josh practically ran off the bus, I followed after him hoping to figure out what the hell he was up to.

We reached the forest entrance and Josh took the cap off the blue liquid he was given; he poured some on his hand and grabbed mine.

“With this, you will see some strange things in here; it won’t make any sense but it will keep you safe. They won’t bother you as long as we have this.” He let go of my hand and started trailing off into the forest, I followed behind him keeping a steady stride. It got darker and darker, and I didn’t feel sick at all like I did last time.

We reached a pond and Josh sat down on some rocks letting his feet slightly touch the water. I looked around and saw a man staring at us behind a tree; he had glowing red eyes and dark wings tethered behind his back.

“Josh, what’s that?” I whispered slightly pointing at the strange creature from off in the distance. He looked up and made eyes with the individual and it wandered slowly over to us.

“A vamp-fairy.” He expressed to me ignoring its presence. “Remember, it can’t hurt you.”

He got up off the rock and kicked a pebble into the water, it sank to the bottom and shot straight up and resurfaced on the water. I tilted my head confused at what just happened, Josh smirked and did it again.

“What the…” He just laughed.

“You know, you’re very adorable when you’re confused.” He laughed making me blush slightly; I punched him in the shoulder and started walking deeper into the woods. “I know nothing makes sense here; that’s why I like it so much. As you’re here more; you’ll get to understand these woods and little things like that will seem normal to you.”

“I really don’t know how a pebble floating back up to the surface of the water will ever seem normal.” I muttered noticing something far off into the woods. “Hey, what’s that over there?”

“That? I’ve only ever been there once, it’s an old cabin; I really don’t think it’s safe if you go there…” Josh said trying to word what he was saying carefully.

“Oh.”

“Maybe some other time, but wait I still need to show you something.” He took my hand and led me into a different part of the forest; there were no trees in this area but a strange door.

Everything around me started to become familiar and reminded me of the dream I had just a few nights ago, I had a bad feeling about this entire thing.

“Do I want to know what is behind that door?” I asked curiously.

“You may or you may not, it’s a different universe from what I heard. I’ve never been in it; there are three in this forest and each one lead to different universes.”

I nodded my head, unsure what he was getting at.

“I want to go in one of them, but each one has consequences.” He said after a few moments of silence between us.

Suddenly a strange purple fog began circling around us, Josh looked stunned like he never seen anything like this before; we both ran and hid behind a large rock waiting for the mist to pass.

“What on earth was that?” I asked him concerned.

“The vampire clan is coming, they are angry that you are here.” He said, and suddenly I felt a hard thud over my head and everything around me buzzed into a black cape.

********************

“She’s waking up.” I heard a voice hiss over my head.

I opened my eyes slowly and saw that I was in a dimly lit room surrounded by strange men with shaved heads and angry expressions on their faces. My arms where tied up onto a chair, I looked around and didn’t see Josh anywhere in the room.

“What’s going on, where am I?” I shouted at the men, who didn’t seem to understand what I was saying. They spoke among themselves in a strange language I had never heard before. “Where is my friend?”

Only the one man had spoken English and he just laughed at my confusion. Suddenly I heard a bunch of shuffling and a scream; Josh was being brought in by two of the strange men. He had his mouth taped and he too had his hands tied behind his back. He looked frightened and worried about what was to happen next.

“Silence, you know very well why you are here!” He seemed to be the leader among the other men; he had a cape tied around his shoulders and long fangs. “You disobeyed the warnings sent to you, and for that you will be punished.”

The men threw Josh roughly on the floor and kicked him hard, I tried to get up to help him but I was tied tight to the chair and couldn’t move for the life of me. It killed me to see him being tortured this way, and I was so afraid for him. I tried to break loose from the rope that kept me from him but it was no use, they kept kicking him and soon he was passed out unconscious on the floor.

“Why are you beating him? Aren’t I the one being punished?” I screamed at the men who laughed at my remark.

“Oh darling.” The leader laughed getting close up to my face. “This is your punishment.”

“Please stop, I will never enter here again if you just stop!”

“You foolish child, you know by now that it is far too late. It’s bad enough HE knew the secrets, but now you!” He paced back and forth like he was afraid of me knowing. “Everything we worked so hard to keep quiet has been ruined by you two MONSTERS.”

“Me, a monster? Look at yourself, you’re the monster.” I snapped back at him immediately regretting saying that, it had made him very angry and he walked toward me and slapped me hard across the face. I winced at the pain and felt my cheek burning where I had been struck.

“You two are the most powerful humans to enter here, what you two can do could wipe us all out.” He screamed striking me in the face again.

I looked down and saw that Josh was starting to wake up, he had bruises all over his face and his nose was pouring blood; his right eye had been swollen shut from the trauma. Two of the men saw and began speaking to each other in the strange language. One took out a sword and took Joshes arm and cut into it, he screamed loudly as the blood poured out of the open wound into a bowl.

“Please…don’t.” He muttered like he knew exactly what they were about to do.

One of them took his own arm and cut into it, his own blood pouring into the bowl. He mixed it with his finger and squeezed the mixture inside a syringe. He gave it to the leader of the group who made his way over to me; I shook my head scared as he placed it at my arm about to shove the needle inside of me.

Just then a binding white flash escaped from the front of the room and all the strange men fell unconscious to the ground. Andrea stood there with Christopher at her side; she held a glowing ball in her hand and ran up to where I was tied up.

“I’ll get you out of here fast; they’re going to wake up soon.” She untied the rope that had binded me to the chair, and I broke free. I ran up to Josh; he was awake but in a lot of pain. I slid my arm over him and helped him out of the room; Christopher trailed behind us being on the lookout for those things that had captured us moments ago.

We ran for quite a bit and finally made our way out of the forest and I set Josh down on a rock to catch his breath. He was still in a lot of pain but looked more concerned about me.

“Did they hurt you?” He asked placing his cold hands on my face looking right at me.

“The one man, who seemed to be the leader, slapped me several times; but are you okay? You’re the one who gotten a real beating in there.”

“I’m fine, they’ve done worse.” He replied wincing at the pain he was in, and then glanced over at Christopher and Andrea who finally caught up to us. “How did you guys know we would be in there?”

“Christopher told me the spell he gave you guys had worn off, and he advised me you guys were in danger so we quickly came up with that spell to knock them out so we could get you guys out of there.” Andrea explained brushing dirt off of her arm.

“How did you know it had worn off?” I asked him.

“When I make these spells, and they have been used the pot I stir them in turns a certain color; and when they wear off they go back to normal.” He explained.

“Oh no, save the explanations for later; they’re coming.” I told everyone turning around noticing an army of the strange men had starting following us.

We ran down the block and must have looked very silly, but eventually it seemed like we had lost them. It was growing very late in the day, we had been in the forest for hours.

“I’m hungry, how about pizza?” Josh asked pointing at a pizza restaurant; he was acting like nothing had happened to him like he hadn’t almost just been beaten to death by weird vampire guys.

“I second that.” Chris said opening the door to the restaurant.

We grabbed a booth at the back and sat down waiting for our order to be taken, I looked through the menu realizing after everything that had just happened I was not very hungry.

“Are you okay Jewel?” Josh asked me concerned reaching a hand out; I pulled away and looked out the window sighing to myself. “I’m sorry I put you through that danger, I didn’t know the spell was going to wear off so quickly.”

“What was that he was going to inject into me, it was his blood and your blood.” I asked almost angry.

He took a deep breath and pulled out his phone and searched on it for a second pulling up a photo of one of the creatures.

“They were going to turn going to turn you.” He replied as I glanced over the photo. “They know about us, and what we can do. They are trying to secure they’re identity. If they turn you, you won’t have those powers anymore and their kind will remain safe.

Suddenly the pizza we all agreed to share appeared in front of us; Josh took about three pieces and started quickly digging in. Something seemed off about him, or maybe it was just my imagination.

***

I had a hard time falling asleep that night. I had nightmares about the men and what they were doing to us and how they tortured Josh. It was around 2 am when I finally looked at my phone again and decided to text Josh to see if he was still awake.

‘Are you up? I can’t sleep… everything that happened today, was terrifying.’

Two seconds later I got a reply, ‘Don’t worry, I won’t let them hurt you. I’m at Christopher’s in the dorm down the hall from you, can you meet me I know it’s late but I need to talk to you about something.’

I got up out of bed and quietly made my way to the door slipping on my shoes ignoring the fact that I was going to meet Josh in my pajamas.

I opened the door and I saw him standing there, he seemed tired like he hadn’t slept in days. He was wearing a grey t-shirt and sweatpants and didn’t have any shoes on only his socks.

“I got this letter; I thought you should read it.” I closed the door behind me and leaned up against the wall and started reading the letter.

‘Upon your arrival to the forest, you and your friend have been called forth to attend a hearing based on your actions this evening. Come alone tomorrow at dawn and bring no spells, only one of you will come out human and free from this and the other … will be turned.’

I looked up at Josh and we both gulped in terror about what was to come.