Imago Ch29: Into the Dark

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It took an hour by road to reach their destination, and by the time Lyra told them to stop the car, it was well past midnight. 

The path leading to the fairy circle wasn’t far from the country road, just past a sign announcing Hedgerow Farms.  Even so, Lyra had to direct them to it. Some unforeseen ward, something like the one at the Spectral Suites, had kept it from Lloyd’s perception; he felt disoriented as they crossed into the wood, and only then could he make sense of the path ahead.

Now he drinks in the night air, damp and crisp; perfectly suited to the crunch of their footsteps. He can feel them all, even if he’s outpacing them by at least a dozen steps. His parents and Ian lighting their way with their torches. Neith keeping to the far side, idly playing with her jacket. And then there’s Lyra, at the group's centre, buried in the enormous blue hoodie. He can feel her most of all.

Lloyd keeps his distance, refusing to look back. He doesn’t want them to see the look on his face. He can’t let them see his thoughts on the road ahead. All it will take is one good look, he fears, and then they’ll hear the anxious voice whispering in his heart, singing that this might be their last goodbye.

Footsteps quicken behind him, threatening to overtake him. Even without his antennae he knows who it is. Lyra slips silently alongside him without a word of greeting. Simply matching his pace, his silence. Lloyd glances at her from the corner of his eye. It’s unsettlingly familiar. He can remember so many of her mannerisms. The little bob in her step. The barely-audible rustle beneath her clothes, and the stray hint of grey poking from beneath the hoodie. Lloyd reaches down and tugs the fabric, covering the tip of her wings.

“Just how Mum used to do it.” Lyra murmurs, her antennae swiveling.  He offers her a halfhearted smile.  

“Penny for your thoughts?”

“I am… not sure it is a useful thought.”

“Not all thoughts have to be useful.”

She hesitates, then nods to the woods ahead.  “Do you still feel the Call?"

Lloyd shivers. It’s not the thought he had been expecting. He considers for a moment, seeking that deep restlessness, somewhere in the dark place behind his eyes.

There’s nothing. He squares his shoulders. 

 "...no. Not in the way you mean.”

“Oh.”  She says. Her antennae turn away. Lloyd can hear the soft disappointment in her voice. 

“Maybe I’ll feel differently after we cross over?"

“Humans don’t feel the Call. I don’t expect that to change. I was simply…curious."

 “Lyra, I might not feel it, but I still remember it.”

Something in his voice catches her attention. She fixes him with huge, liquid eyes, then walks a step closer, close enough that their shoulders almost touch. “You mean from when we were…”  She makes a complicated gesture with her hands.

“Yes. From then.” Lloyd smiles, seeing how her face relaxes. "What about you? It’s been over twenty years since you weren’t…” 

He copies the gesture. Lyra huffs out something that might have been a laugh and tilts her head back, studying the sky. 

“I remember what you remember, and more. I remember my cache."  She stretches her arms wide. "I remember what it was to soar. The way the leaves brushed my face when I scrambled through the branches. How it felt to have warm blood on my hands.”  

Lyra looks down at her talons, her pupils sharpening as she admires the curve and the gleam. 

“I miss those things. Those were good things. But the cold…” 

“The cold?”

“Astraea thought it was the light that drew me to Xylia. But it wasn’t.” The sharpness in her eyes vanishes, dulling as she flits away to some distant place in her mind. Lloyd hesitates, then puts his hand on Lyra's shoulder. Her wings stir beneath her hoodie. “It  gets so cold in the darkwood. So cold you can't feel your feet. So cold you can't count your fingers." 

Lyra turns her head, staring at him in the dark. "You know this cold, too. We shared it. That day with the boy, when Mum yelled at us…"

Lloyd slows and looks away, unable to hold her gaze.  "Yes. I remember." 

“What was his name?”

"Marcus, I think."

“Maaar-cuss.”  Lyra repeats, savoring the syllables.

The two walk together in silence for a bit. Lyra hops over some roots, barefoot, landing soundlessly on the far side.  “Mum really took care of us, didn’t she?”  

"She did. Her and dad both." Lloyd puts his hands in his pockets, fighting the urge to look back. "Did you… have that before?"

"Parents?”  She asks.  Lloyd nods. Lyra tilts her head up in thought.  “I had a mother. And a brood. But that was fleeting. It was not like how Mum and Dad are. Our nature is to slip away into the dark, once we are able. To drift."  

Lloyd thinks back to his own nights working shifts at Cromart. His own days spent hiding alone in his flat.

"I'm glad you got to try it. The, ah, ‘human parent’ experience."

"I intruded.” Just like that, she’s gone again.  “I wasn't thinking. I didn't know."

"Well, I'm glad you intruded." Lloyd mutters, giving her a nudge with his elbow. She twitches, then nudges back, grinning wolfishly. 

"It was… interesting! Do you remember when Dad made us the…the ant… structure? We asked and asked and asked.”  

Lloyd laughs. "The ant farm? Yeah. Mum was so convinced they’d get out, but we talked her into it. And after all that worry, I think she watched them more than the rest of us." 

"We... tricked her." 

"Well, I’d say persuaded."

"Like we persuaded her into buying us those romances. For a ‘friend’."

Lloyd's cheeks light up.  "Ah, n-no. That was a trick."

Lyra snickers. Someone coughs.

"You really thought that worked?"  

The pair of them jolt to a stop, turning to see Mrs. Morgan smirking in the pale light of her torch.  "'Buying it for a friend’? That wouldn’t fool your gran. It certainly didn’t fool me.” 

"Mum." Lloyd sputters. Daniel chuckles.

"She'd read the back covers for me when you were out. She had this voice - "

"DAD!"

Sarah starts laughing. "N-no! It was… it was all just very interesting!"

Lyra narrows her eyes.  "Lloyd, I think we are being ‘persuaded’ right now." 

"Allow it, mate." Ian calls out, catching up. "Honestly, I think we all find it pretty cute. Especially your face when someone brings it up - “  

Lyra's cheeks go red, her antennae flaring, and spins on her heel to start walking again. Ian grins. "Yeah! Just like that!"

"It’s a conspiracy. I can’t believe you’re all poking fun at us now, of all times." Lloyd groans, hurrying after her.

"I'm not." Neith mutters. Daniel raises an eyebrow at her, and she snorts. "What? If I tell my lolly story, you'll just hit me with the bloody torch."

Sarah gives her a frosty smile.  "No, please.  Don't hold back on account of - "

Neith hurries past. 

"What's the rush, Neith?" Ian calls after her, keeping his voice low enough  

"I'm not interested in starting this job with a concussion, thanks. Lollies One and Two have those covered nicely."

"Oh, now hold on - " Lloyd starts indignantly.

Lyra's hand darts out and grabs Lloyd by the arm, pulling him to an abrupt stop.  

"We're here."  She announces.

It’s the clearing he'd seen back in the Glade, the one from Lyra’s memory. Where the trees reach a little too high, and the ground is all but hidden under drifts of dead leaves. Here and there, the moonlight breaks through the scraps of foliage, glinting from a ring of pale, close-set mushrooms. 

"Guess it's time."  Ian says, dropping his canvas bag with a heavy thump. Neith settles against a tree, cool and composed. Lloyd can see her eyes flickering anxiously to the circle when she thinks no one is watching. He can’t blame her. There’s something ominously enticing about it, an air that speaks of the edge of cliffs or deep, murky water.

Lloyd starts. He's moved just a little bit closer, without quite realizing it. He clears his throat, drawing back.  "So we just...step through?"

Lyra nods.  "It is not a stable portal, like what Astraea opened. We will enter the Wilds, but as to where…”  She shrugs.

“Encouraging, love. Thanks much.” Neith says. Ian tosses her a bronze bracer, and she catches it without looking. Lyra frowns. 

“You don’t need to follow if you don’t wish to. None of you do."

Lloyd shakes his head, fighting back a stab of nausea. "I'm not going anywhere except through that gate.  We'll make it work. Whatever's on the other side of that."

"We know you will."  Daniel Morgan steps closer, dry twigs snapping underfoot as he approaches. Up close, it's easier to see the cracks in his manner. He looks more rumpled than casual, more bewildered than open. Nevertheless, he puts a hand on Lloyd's shoulder.  "You might not believe me, kiddo, but your life's been a little unusual."

"...Dad..." Lloyd starts. Daniel squeezes gently. 

"You've been planning your world around something people don't even believe exists since you could talk. And...look, I know it's not going to be a picnic in there. We've seen enough and you've seen more. But...that's your world too. It’s as much your world as this one is. There's no one better suited to walk in there and right back out again."

His other hand settles on Lyra's arm.  

"We’re proud of you, of both of you. We couldn't be more proud of who you've become."

"... you know you can't stop us from following you."  Sarah says, a glimmer of iron in her voice. It fades away, and she shakes her head, her eyes going glassy.  "We tried. We really tried to prepare you for life, it just kept…surprising us. Not everyone gets a fairy for a child."

"I can't think of anything more you could have done." Lyra says, her voice trembling.

 Lloyd coughs, trying to control his voice. "Self defense...? Maybe international politics."

"It's not too late for that uni degree." She says, her voice breaking as she finally smiles. 

"Maybe when we get back.”

Sarah lets out a tight little laugh, taking both their hands in her own.

"Your whole life, I've said to think of your safety above all else. To consider the odds and the circumstances and to make the careful choice. I've tried to protect you from what I could, and to help you get around what I can't. But now…now I want you to be brave. Now be big. Be loud. Even if they don't listen, sing. Even if they tell you to stop, move forward.  It's YOUR life."

She pulls them both into a tight hug, whispering fiercely.

"Live it."

Lyra shivers, tears falling onto the leaf litter as she nods into Sarah's shoulder. "Y-yes, Mum."

Lloyd shudders, trying to keep himself together. "We will. I promise."

"G-good."  Mrs. Morgan says, pulling away, straightening their hair. "We love you.  No matter what.  Remember that we love you."

Daniel moves next to Sarah, gently wiping away the tears she missed.

"Always. We..."  Lloyd starts.

"...we will always remember that."  Lyra finishes. 

“Not to interrupt.”  Ian clears his throat, holding out his phone to Mr. Morgan. He’s fully clad in bronze armour now, moving awkwardly with the new weight. Behind him, Neith is settling a helmet onto her head. "But… just in case.  My mum's number… it's that top one." 

Daniel claps Ian on the shoulder. "You ought to shrug off being run over by a train in all that metal. But don’t worry.”  He gives him a bracing shake. “We’ll be sure to look in on her for you.  You just focus on protecting each other."

Ian nods, then turns and walks right through the -

In a whisper of leaves and a remnant of the winter's chill, Ian Evans is gone.

"Well, it's been lovely." Neith pulls her jacket over her armour, darkening its moonlit gleam. "I'd stay for a longer chat, but I'd rather go wander around a forest full of bone-crunching ogres. Oh, look - "

The shadows of the wood close around her as if she’d never been. 

Lloyd takes a deep breath. He offers his parents one last smile and slips a hand into Lyra's.

"Ready?"

Lyra sheds her hoodie, leaving it to puddle on the forest floor. Beneath it, she’s clad in a green dress, altered and belted with a satchel of supplies. She stretches out her wings, letting moonlight gleam off the patterns. 

“Let's save her." 

Hand in hand, they step over the mushrooms. There’s just the faintest hint of resistance, something gossamer-light and invisible yielding before their passage. Lloyd’s eyes cloud, and then - 

He doesn't realise, not at first. The shapes of the forest around them don't change so much as complete, as if what they had been before was a pale reflection of what they truly were. The close-knit trees swell into gnarled shadows, older than old, extending to the sky. 

Lloyd's standing up to his ankles in dead leaves and tangled grass. Vines and brambles snarl over a dry streambed where the path had been. The ground where his parents stood remains, but instead of their familiar faces, there’s nothing more than  a heap of moss-covered boulders.

A silhouette flows out from beneath a branch, extending into a long-limbed figure, a light igniting in its fist. Lloyd freezes. Neith's fangs glint as she shoves the lantern into his face.

"Welcome to the Ebony Wilds, lolly. So glad you could join us.” 

Lyra releases Lloyd's hand, her pupils contracting as she studies Neith. "You are Annwyn-born, aren't you?"

Neith stiffens, her lantern wobbling as she steps back. "I - that doesn't matter - "

"Hang on." Lloyd says. "Have I spent more time in the Wilds than Neith?"

Neith darts him a murderous glare. He stifles a laugh. The trees smother the sound, little veins of aether shooting through their leaves. The light plays off of Ian’s armour as he emerges from the dark, shadows scampering across his face.

"Neith just wants to keep playing at being top predator." He says, patting her heartily on the shoulder. She swivels, turning her glare on him.    

"I just want to make sure lolly doesn't go around crashing into trees. I'm not ending up in the stewpot because you didn't take this seriously." 

“So flashing the lantern around is taking it seriously, then?” Ian grins. Neith lowers the light and draws herself up, but before she can respond, Lyra chitters sharply. She snaps a finger to her lips, silencing them both. Lloyd looks around uneasily, watching her antennae taste the air. 

"Hide." She hisses, crouching low and scuttling beneath a half-fallen trunk. Neith pinches out the lantern-flame and slides into a thicket as Ian ducks behind the snarled roots of a massive tree. Lloyd dithers for a moment, his feet whispering back and forth in the grass, then drops down behind the boulders.

A shape emerges from the woods behind them, following along the dry riverbed. It’s a corpse-pale woman lit by the aether stirred by her own sinuous movements, each step setting off a ripple of light. She stands nearly three metres tall, from her cloven hooves to her tangled black hair. It drips from her head in great knotted mats. She is otherwise completely naked.

From his hiding place, Lloyd can see Neith’s arm drifting to her pocket. Her armour jingles, the sound so soft that it barely sparks the leaves around her. 

Black eyes, like two pools of ink, snap to the light. Neith freezes. 

The woman moves languidly toward Neith, her legs almost flowing, until she’s close enough to touch. She stoops and spreads her arms, webbed flesh pulling taut along her joints. The woman tilts her head. She’s looking right at the unseelie, but there’s no recognition in her eyes, no acknowledgement that there’s anything there at all. She snorts, the sound harsh and bestial in the dark. 

Neith holds perfectly still. Waiting. 

The corpse-woman straightens up again, blinking blearily in confusion. Her mouth yawns open, rows of inward-curving teeth glistening. Moving as slowly as he dares, Lloyd reaches down, his fingers closing around a stone. The woman snorts again, then tilts her head back and begins to sing. 

It sounds like Lyra, and yet unlike her. The notes blur and flow, smooth and soft and honey-sweet, rolling through the air. It’s…intoxicating. Lloyd feels half-drunk just listening to it. He can’t tear his eyes away from the woman. Something in him wants to rise, to approach. Behind her, someone’s doing just that. A shape in the dark, taking a halting step closer.

Ian. 

The recognition is a shock of cold water, snapping him out of the spell. Lloyd hurls the stone as hard as he can. It bounces off of a trunk and into the underbrush. The woman jolts upright and stops her song. Ian does the same, his eyes widening as the creature turns to stare him squarely in the face. 

She ignores him completely, gliding past and darting into the thicket with a birdlike lunge. Her hands curl suddenly, closing around the stone. She lifts it to her face, close to her mouth. Her tongue flicks out, giving the surface a quick taste. 

Her expression twists into a furious grimace. The corpse-woman’s jaw unhinges and she lets out a primal shriek of frustration. Her flesh bubbles, boils, and spills over into something vast and horselike, bent forward on all fours. The creature screams again and tears off along the course of the riverbed, aether echoing her hoofbeats. 

No one moves until the darkness and silence have returned. Finally, Lyra stirs from beneath the log, carefully testing the air.

“The kelpie has gone. We are safe.” She announces softly. 

Ian’s legs give out in a rattle of bronze, sending him thumping into the dirt. 

"I- "  He starts, his hands shaking violently.  "I couldn’t stop - "

Lloyd scrambles over the rocks, hurrying over. "She’s gone, it’s okay! A-are you alright?"

Ian shrugs, his face hollow and disbelieving.  "It was like… I was looking at my body from the outside. If you hadn't - "

"Still think you've got the guts for this?" Neith asks, getting to her feet. Her own hand shakes as she pops a mint.

"It's not his fault." Lloyd growls. Ian reaches over and grips his hand. His touch is cold as ice. 

"Th-thanks, mate."  He says, smiling queasily 

"There will be scavengers in her wake. We must move quickly."  Lyra interjects, her voice and movements clipped. "I can find the way."

"We're in your hands." Lloyd looks up into the trees, straining to pick out even the smallest branches. "And in your home. Just tell us what to do."

She nods. "I’ll perform a sounding. Watch the aether. Don't speak."

Lyra darts across the riverbed, leaves crackling under each step. She stops when she reaches the centre, closing her eyes and letting the forest settle. When the last light has died away, the nymph opens her mouth and lets out a sonorous, sustained note, like the sound of striking a bell.

The forest floor lights up in a wave, flowing away from her for as long as she holds the note. It moves along the earth and up into the trees, glittering in the leaves like fireflies on a summer's night. Shadows fracture and come apart, shattered into jagged shapes by lines of golden light. Lloyd watches in awe as the aether travels up the trunk beside him, blazing into the dark.

It's moving. For a moment, he thinks it's just following the echo, but Lyra's still holding her note. The aether is running off to his left, drawn by something as surely as water flowing downhill. It shimmers through the tree trunks and into the ground, racing along hidden root networks like glowing veins, sparking and shining through the leaves. Lining their path. Lloyd catches his breath. At last, Lyra lets the note fall away, then looks with the others to take in the direction of the aether's flow. 

"It's a powerful current. More than usual."  She points. "Xylia is this way. My call will have been noted. We must not linger.” 

"Don’t have to tell me twice."  Ian says, then plunges after the fading aether. 

Lyra glances at Lloyd and Neith.  "Move as quickly and as silently as you can. It is not an impossible distance, but it is still a distance.”

Then she’s off, fluttering between the trees to take the lead. Lloyd hurries to keep up, slipping and scrambling after them. Neith casts one look back over her shoulder, then kicks the discarded lantern into the undergrowth, stalking off in their wake.

There's a trail, of sorts.

Not the streambed, of course, they leave that as soon as they can. It's nothing even so formal as a deer path, but after a while, Lloyd starts to make it out. The bracken is a little less thick, and though brambles still catch his clothes and stones shift under his feet, they always seem to nudge him in the same direction. An enchantment? Or maybe even Xylia, extending her pull into the wood.

He'd ask Lyra, but her demand for silence has settled like a blanket. The only sound they make is the faint crunch of their steps, whispering branches of their movement, and even that seems too loud. How easy would it be for something like the kelpie to prick up its ears and catch that? How many denizens of the Wilds would be so clumsy? Lloyd shivers. He might as well be wearing a bell for them to follow.

Lyra turns left, smooth as smoke, drifting between a pair of tree trunks. She doesn't bother looking back, although he sees the pale blur of her antennae twitch to track their movement. Yes. They can be heard.

And the only way out is to keep moving.

They slide down into a stony gulley, following it for a while before climbing back out and into a thicket overgrown by slimy moss. It's hard going, and by the time they break free, Lloyd's sweating in spite of the chill. He can hear Ian breathing hard next to him, and even Neith seems unsteady. Only Lyra's still moving with confidence, using her talons to catch herself on the tree trunks, occasionally humming softly to check her course with another pulse of light. 

They go on and on, over fallen logs and splashing through shallow streams, down hills and up slopes and through thorns that clutch like hands. No one speaks. No one mentions the distance. There are no complaints over aches in their legs, or the curious way they always seem just on the verge of catching their breath. No mention of how the wood seems to wall them in and yet expand endlessly on every side. 

Even the idea of words fades away. Swallowed by the dark. 

"M-mate..."  Ian whispers, finally.  "I can't... I need to talk.  This silence...it's starting to get to me."

"It's...probably fine." Lloyd whispers back, casting his eyes around. The words send up little sparks in the leaves of a nearby bush, but nothing else. "You alright?"

"Right as right…”  Ian forces a little grin, then his expression falls. “Actually... I want to ask something.”

Lloyd risks a glance back. “What is it?”

“Well…”  Ian’s voice drifts, a hint of guilt in it.  “Is this what it's like to be you? Is this how it is to - you know?"

Lloyd ducks under a branch hanging low enough to scrape the top of his head.  "It’s a lot of it.”  He shifts, moving closer.  "But it’s not everything.”

Ian reaches over and grips his hand. Lloyd can feel the strength behind it, slowly returning as they walk through the dark together.

"So what is our plan? Do we even have one?"

Lloyd gives a dark little chuckle. "Do we need one? Between the hostile dryads, the army of spriggans, and the great big walking statues, I figure it can’t be all that hard."

Ian smiles queasily.  "Appreciate the gallows humour, mate, but I'm being serious.”  He points ahead. “And beyond all that, Trystan’s out there somewhere.  Er... Alastor."  

There’s nothing Lloyd can say to that. Not even a joke to deflect with. The gloom seems to grow around them, creeping back in from all sides. Ian shakes his head.  

"I'm still reeling. I shared so much with him. He was just…so easy to talk to. He taught me how to navigate the market, you know?"

"Yeah." Lloyd answers in a low whisper. "But that’s exactly how he did it.  He caught you off-guard. He did it to Lyra even without the glamour."

“Right. Right.” Ian nods.  “Still, we should have some idea of what we’re going to do when we get there. Should we talk it out, or - ”

"We'll approach from the city outskirts."  Lyra says, dropping back in line to let Neith take the lead. “Learn what we can. Fili may have been victorious, but I doubt it.” 

“What about the Bookkeeper? Maybe…maybe something got him?” Lloyd asks. She shakes her head.

“He may be one person, but the Grove has not seen his like. And now he has use of the King’s eyes."

"Well - well, he hasn't seen the Wilds, either, has he?" Lloyd offers weakly. "You nearly took his throat out, remember?"

"I did take his throat out." Lyra corrects. "And he survived."

Ian lowers his head.  “...they won’t know what they’re dealing with. Not ‘till it’s too late.”

Lloyd looks away, trying to hide his anxiety.  "So the plan is 'it's too early to have a plan', then."

"The plan is to observe."  Lyra says. Her hand slips into Ian's. "All we are after is Astraea. We do not need to defeat them. We are not conquerors. All we need is to find her and escape."

Lloyd smiles faintly.  "...I can work with that."

"And if Astraea is - "  Ian starts hesitantly. "Well. You know."

"She's not."

"Lloyd..."  Lyra's voice trails away. Ian tightens his grip on both of them. 

"No. No, he’s right. She's definitely waiting for us to come rescue 'er."

"She's waiting for you to come rescue her." Lloyd grins, and pokes Lyra.  "So think of something dramatic you can say. Like in the books we used to read."

A small smile tugs at the corner of Lyra’s mouth. "We'll read them again, someday."

"Excuse me."  Neith hisses, cutting through the conversation. She trudges into the middle of the group, pointing. "Is that meant to be there?"

The forest peters out ahead of them, not falling away so much as sinking. It crumbles into still, murky water, shallow enough to be choked with reeds and grass along the edges. A thin layer of mist clings to the surface, billowing and twisting like a living thing. The shoreline stretches out into the dark, drowning the Wilds on all sides. The air smells of rotten wood and clings to their skin.

"Can we get around it?" Lloyd asks uneasily. There's something about the water's surface that he doesn't like. Lyra's antennae raise, and she takes a step back, careful to make as little noise as possible.  

"Yes. We should go around. This is a bad place."

"Always nice to have an expert opinion." Neith mutters. Without waiting, she stalks off to the left. Lloyd lingers for a moment to see if Lyra objects, then follows along behind her, one eye on the swamp's surface.

It's difficult to keep to a straight line; the shore curves and twists, sending their feet into unexpected patches of sucking mud. The forest seems to cluster as well, making knots of impassable thickets at the water's edge. They have to detour again and again, always returning to keep the swamp on their right.

“Where are the mosquitoes?”  Lloyd wipes his brow, the back of his neck prickling. "We should be getting eaten alive. Midges, flies, anything. But instead it's just..."

He glances out over the water, and a cold feeling runs up his spine.

"Lyra." He starts, very carefully. "That crooked tree over there, the one with its branches in the water. Have we seen that before?"

"... seven times."  Lyra says.

"What? What does that mean?" Neith snaps, shading her eyes.

"It means we have to go through." Lloyd looks squarely at Lyra. "Doesn't it."

“Something dwells here.”  Lyra turns to the shoreline. “We’ve wandered into a domain.”

“So we’re stuck.”  Neith says.

Lyra shakes her head. “We can get through if we do what it wants."

Ian puts a foot in the water, wincing as he sinks up to his ankle in the ooze.  "What if what it wants from us is 'drown in the mud'?"

No one answers. Lloyd’s eyes tighten, and he splashes into the water. "Only one way to - "

"Wait." Lyra barks, a ring of aetherlight rippling away from her. Lloyd pulls up sharply. She pauses, looking around the group. 

"I am not strong enough to carry Neith or Ian, but I can fly Lloyd across. With him safe, it will improve our odds of survival."

"No." Lloyd snaps. "We're not splitting up. Not in the nightmare swamp. Out of the question."

Ian frowns, looking at the way the water ripples around his foot. "Mate, Lyra might have a point. One less of us to get snagged by whatever’s out there."

"Volunteering to be the bait, Ian?" Neith snorts.

"No one’s going to be bait." Lloyd growls.

Ian smiles wryly, darting a glance at Lyra. "No talking you out of it, then?"

Lloyd shakes his head, then levels a threatening finger at Lyra.  "Don't you dare pick me up halfway there, either."

She twitches, and Ian looks away just a little too quickly. 

"I mean it." Lloyd grumbles, then turns away and wades into the swamp. One by one, the others follow. 

Lyra has the easiest time of it. She's able to flit between dead trees, trusting her weight to the sturdiest branches. She snaps off the first one she comes to, passing it down to Lloyd as a walking stick. It's harder for Ian and Neith, weighed down by their armor. Each step takes careful planning, and more than once they have to steady each other to keep from slipping into deeper water. It seems reluctant to rise higher than their knees, but even that makes the going difficult. They do their best to move between tufts and islands of grass.

Lloyd doesn't have to worry about sinking as much as Neith or Ian, so he leads the way, probing the depths ahead with his branch. The uneasy feeling lingers with him, though, never quite departing. Each splash magnifies into a threatening call, each ripple tricking his eye into seeing sinuous bodies writhing toward the group. He shudders and forces himself to focus on a cluster of bare islands in the distance to the right. They’re a good point to navigate by, at least.

"I wonder how long this has been - ah!"

He recoils as something long and lithe twists toward him, curling on the surface of the water. 

"What? What is it?" Neith hisses. Lloyd laughs sheepishly.  

"Just a bit of pondweed. Gave me a start." He breathes out, probing with the branch. It disappears into the water without any resistance, all the way up to his hand. Lloyd frowns. More shapes waver in and out of view. He’s almost certain he can see trees on the far shore. 

"Careful. It’s a little deeper, but I think we’re nearly through - “

"F-FUCK!!"  

Ian topples backwards with a startled yell, submerges a second, then splashes upright again a moment later. 

"Ian?" Lyra calls with soft urgency. 

Ian points at a low, indistinct shape in the water in front of him. “Have a look at this…” He whispers. Lloyd splashes over, then claps his hands over his mouth, cutting off a gasp. 

It's the top half of a rotted corpse, sunk into the muck just beneath the water's surface. Ian grimaces. “Almost stepped on the bloody thing.”

"More of them." Neith says, straightening up and scanning their surroundings. The mist curls in on itself, shrouded objects fading in and out of visibility. Something that could have been a branch juts from the water, skeletal fingers dangling limply. Desiccated cracked-glass dragonfly wings hang snared in a tree, with no sign of the nymph they must have carried. Lloyd draws backward, his eyes wide with horror.

"W-were they trapped here?"

"Perhaps."  Lyra says. A cool wind picks up, sending the fog drifting this way and that. The rotting, fetid odour it carries with it sets Neith gagging and drives the humans back a pace. As the mist peels away, it unshrouds a steep, crumbling mound, spilling over the shore and into the water. 

It’s made of bones. 

Grasping hands frozen in place. Skulls and ribs and torsos, some still sticky with blood and entrails, many stripped clean or gnawed to yellowed splinters.  Fluorescent orange mushrooms sprout from the remains, bulging ghoulishly among the heap. And between them, the bodies of scavengers writhe and skitter about.

"What does this?" Neith gasps, struggling to regain some semblance of composure. Something between awe and horror flickers over her expression. 

Lloyd backs away, clutching the branch hard enough for the bark to dig into his skin.  "I don't...I-I don't..."  His leg brushes against the strand of pondweed.

It twitches.

A thin spark of aether ignites at the tip, snaking up the length of it. Lloyd watches, paralysed, as it travels all the way to the cluster of islands he'd seen earlier. The golden light pulses once, illuminating the fog, and it clears.

They aren’t islands at all. 

Patches of ground resolve into a jutting chin, a pair of glassy, fish-like eyes, and a gnarled weedy brow. Its mouth hangs open, water slopping past jagged, mossy fangs as long as his arm. Lank strands of pondweed-hair trail from its scalp, threading through the swamp. It doesn’t breathe. It doesn’t move. 

The spark of aether lingers in its blindly staring eyes, flickering on and off fitfully. Slowly, the swamp begins to stir, lines of pondweed drifting curiously back and forth. 

Lyra clutches to her perch, her wings spread in terror. “Get away from her hair!” 

"W-what is - " Lloyd stammers. 

“Greenteeth!” The nymph chitters. She scrambles farther up the tree, as if she could climb her way to safety. “Jenny Greenteeth! Drowns all! Eats all!”

Lloyd stumbles backward against Ian, breathing hard. Something curls lazily through the water, right where he had been standing.  He can hear Neith breathing hoarsely behind him. She sounds on the verge of panic. Lloyd doesn't feel much better himself.

"Stay close, yeah? Less space we take, better our odds."  Ian says, pulling him closer. Lyra flutters overhead, moving back and forth in anxious little darts as she scans the water. She jabs at the air with a talon. 

"There are fewer this way!"  She directs. Lloyd puts a foot forward, flinching back as he brushes against a strand. Another little thread of golden light ripples back towards that gaping maw.

"Fewer?" He glances over his shoulder. The light in Jenny’s eyes is growing brighter.

"F-fewer." Lyra answers.

He uses the branch to propel himself, faster by the moment, pushing through the swamp. Lyra flits overhead, a pale ghost in the night. Silence descends again, save for Neith's hoarse breathing and the splash of their footsteps - but now there's another sound underneath that. A rhythmic whisper of moving water, an audible ripple. Something moving, deep beneath the surface. 

Lloyd tries to shut it out. The water they're wading through is growing murkier, more foul. They're almost past Jenny's bone heap. The shoreline of the swamp is nearly within reach.

"...I can...hear her."

Lloyd stops and looks back. There's a tightness in Neith's voice, a disquieting strain he's never heard before.  "Neith, we're almost there. The shore's just up ahead, just - "

The leannan sidhe’s standing still as a statue in the water. Her pupils have dilated, swallowing up her irises.  "She's calling me." She whispers. "She knows what I am."

Thin strands of pondweed slither toward Neith, brushing against her legs. They shiver and twine, igniting with a soft glow. 

"Neith - " Lloyd starts. Neith smiles.

"She says I'm home."

Pondweed yanks Neith backwards so fast she doesn’t have time to scream.

"NO!" Ian yells, charging through the water. Strands light up all around him, flashing and flickering. Three separate vines lash around his chest, dragging him below as well. 

Lyra cuts a sharp circle, beats once to gain elevation, then rockets towards the surface like a thunderbolt. She breaks beneath the waves, bursting above a moment later, dragging Ian on sheer momentum. The tendrils still cling to his body, stretching along behind until they reach their full length and-

- snap!

The jolt is too much, and Lyra loses her grip. They both go skipping and crashing through the shallows until they strike the sandy shore. Ian rises, coughing and choking, pulling Lyra upright with him. Her wings are waterlogged, dragging her down like a billowing cloak. 

Lloyd dashes as quickly as he can, closing the distance on the trail of lights as Neith’s dragged away. If she reaches the gaping mouth -

Without giving himself time to think, he dives in after her. 

The water is brown and silty, roiling with wriggling strands of illuminated plants. He grabs her wrist and digs his heels in, bracing. More and more pondweed ignites, converging on them. A line of bubbles escapes from Neith's mouth. She's already drowning. Lloyd jams his forearm against her mouth, plunging her fangs into his flesh. His blood mixes with the murky water, only a thin trickle passing her open lips.  

It’s enough. Neith convulses, her eyes flashing back to awareness. She kicks free, twisting against the weeds, pulling them both back to the surface. Lloyd spits out what feels like half the swamp, gasping.

"S-sorry, I didn’t know what else t -"

Neith wheezes, laughing incredulously.  "Lolly, it’s - "

A dozen tendrils burst from the water, blazing with light. They wrap around Lloyd's limbs, his neck, his waist, dragging him into the air. He tries to scream, but all he can manage is a choked garble.

Jenny Greenteeth is awake.

The swamp surges and swells with her movement, sluicing past crooked teeth and rotten gums as she lifts her head from the mire. Her tremendous torso follows, skeins of flesh and woody vines inextricably entwined. Water pours off her bulk in a wave that knocks Neith from her feet. Jenny's lips peel back in a hungry smile. A great hand bursts from the sucking mud, jagged bark-like nails plucking Lloyd out of her hair.  

"LLOYD!!!" Lyra shrieks, as she tries to take to the air. Her drenched wings flap twice, unable to lift her from the ground. 

The fog roils, swallowing her echoes. Atop the corpse pile, bones stir. They shift, rattling, tumbling down the heap. Discarded rot and cartilage moves. 

Surges. 

Lifts.

A titanic figure rises, something equal to Jenny in mass and stature. Glowing orange eyes glitter like constellations, coiling bodies wrapped around each other to form ropelike muscles using the bones of innumerable dead as scaffolding.  A grisly conglomeration, a shambling creature. 

An alp-luachra. 

It cascades into the swamp, extending its body to crash down on Jenny's arm in a seething tide. She bellows, trees splitting around the edge of the swamp with the force of her outrage. Her hair writhes and flashes, and Lloyd tumbles from the coils, forgotten.

He has time to see Jenny's neck snap out, her fangs sinking into the roiling mass of bone and worm, before crashing back into the swamp. Lloyd scrabbles at the water, turning this way and that, unable to see which way is up.

Something seizes the back of his shirt. He kicks as it drags him to the surface, striking out blindly.

“Stop it, lolly, it’s ME!”

Lloyd coughs, desperately wiping away the muck from his eyes.

"Neith - ?"

"Shut up and move!" She screams.  

There's another horrible, tree-cracking screech from above, and a chunk of something wet and glowing splashes into the swamp, writhing as it sinks. It's all the encouragement Lloyd needs. He hurtles through the water, hacking and coughing, trying to shut out the carnage happening overhead.

Neith helps him along, looping his arm over her shoulder and dragging him the rest of the way to shore. The moment his foot hits solid ground, he stalls, desperately looking for the others.

"Ian - Lyra - !"

"Keep going!" Neith cries. "They're fine, just run!"

Her grip brooks no argument. They dash over the stony shoreline and crash through the underbrush of the wood. Flee until the fog of the swamp has dissipated, and the cold sky of the Wilds winks overhead. Until at last, the stench of death dissipates, and Lloyd can see the glimmering waves of aether with each step. Lloyd steadies himself enough on Neith's arm, taking a moment to make sure he can stand on his own again.

"Neith," Lloyd starts. "You - alright?"

“Be more worried - about yourself, lolly. I can only imagine what was in - that water.”

Lloyd looks at the puncture marks on his arm.   “... no worse than whatever you swallowed.”

Neith smiles weakly. In the distance, they can hear a low, chiming note. It’s a call Lloyd would recognize anywhere. Here, it seems at home. He takes a step, only for Neith to put her arm out, blocking his way.

“... Lolly… er…” She shifts uncomfortably.  “Lloyd. What you did back there. It... I don’t like being in debt to anyone, and a life debt is - “

Lloyd holds up a hand, cutting her off.  She watches him suspiciously. 

“All I want is one absolutely sincere, bottom of your heart, thank you. Good enough?”

Neith blinks owlishly at him. “Are you serious?”

“Deadly.”

She breathes out a laugh, then extends her hand. Lloyd clasps it.  “Then… thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.”  

Her eyes gleam. “Trust me. Not one word.”

Lloyd laughs, and hangs back a pace to let Neith take the lead. He watches her as they make their way through the trees, following the chiming voice. It’s such a small thing, a thank you.  Easy words, easily said. But a sincere one, from someone he once considered an enemy, on a journey like this…maybe it’s things like that that make a name or a memory so powerful. The warmth in those little human moments…

… carrying through the frigid, endless dark.


continue reading ->




Writing is about a lot of things. It can be about sharing concepts and thoughts and feelings you find meaningful or powerful. It can be about eliciting a particular emotion, or inviting someone to see things from a new perspective. 

Sometimes it’s also about describing a  c r e a t u r e, and that’s one of the great joys of the art form. 

And sometimes you even get two, or three, or…

Thanks as always for coming on this journey with us! Please join us on Friday, April 4th to see what else the Wilds has in store for our little band of heroes!