The Enchantress

"I'll see you guys back in Town" Lucia said flatly. She quietly sucked her lip and turned back. The urge to shuffle her feet was irresistible. Her urges were aggressively building into frustrated energy. It desperately whined to go somewhere. Through her feet was the safe option; public eyes were watching. But the foliage would cloth her.

She headed deeper into the forest. Purposeful strides cut the soft earth deep, imprinting the harsh wood of crude slippers. Rare beams of evening light lit the way. Her keen azure eyes were peeled for intruders, but only the wind kept pace. It howled angrily; the tree’s rattled in equal fury. The dim spears wavered through the woods. They put Lucia on edge. Were they furious at being soiled?

It wasn’t the first time. It wouldn’t be the last. No, something felt different. A darkness had fallen over the forest, and it had enraged them. The voices around her were extinguished. No birds chirped their evening blues; the squirrels held their chewing. A silence suffocated everything but the fury of the forest.

Lucia started to run. Cruel tendrils for roots grabbed at her ankles hungrily. Thorns scraped her tan skin as she dove between branches to get away. Rocks, Twigs, and dead leaves wrapped up her toes and held her feet to the ground. She fell. Soft green grass caught her. She rolled free of the bed and an explosion of light blinded her eyes.

They adjusted to the brightness slowly. There was a figure in the clearing. Once masked in the dusk of haze, it started to become clear...