We were trapped. The realization hit me with the coldness of the icy river water in front of us. To the right, the dancing torches of the enraged mob, led by a bloodthirsty innkeeper. Behind us, the cold, methodical lanterns of wolves dressed as priests. Beside us, a forest that had already tried to kill us.
"This is it," Bastien muttered, and in his tone there was no more cynicism, only a resignation as gray as ash.
Margot drew her stilettos without saying a word, but her posture was a promise: she would die fighting.
I looked at the forest. Its silence no longer seemed just threatening. It was the silence of a sleeping, wounded giant. I remembered the ritual in the cave, the sensation of the medallion connecting to something ancient. I remembered Anje's words: "The forest has a fever... its pain is a barrier."
And a crazy, desperate, and maybe slightly suicidal idea bloomed in my mind.
We didn't need to enter the forest—we needed to unleash it on our pursuers.
"Bastien, Margot, trust me," I said, my voice a tense whisper. I pulled the medallion from its pouch.
"Boy, what are you doing?" Bastien croaked, stepping back, his shrewd eyes wide with a mixture of fear and disbelief. "What are you planning to do with a good luck charm?"
I ignored the panic in their eyes. "When I tell you to run, run. Along the river, heading west. Don't stop for any reason."
"Victor, what are you going to do?" Margot asked, her voice an irritated hiss.
"What I should have done from the beginning," I replied. "Ask for help."
Ignoring their confused protests, I closed my eyes. I gripped the medallion, feeling its familiar warmth flood my hand. I focused on the pain. The forest's pain. And I projected my own into it. The fear, the guilt over Guillaume, the desperation of being hunted.
I didn't know what formula to use, so I decided to simply plead.
They're hunting us. They are the poison. They are the fire that wounded you. Help us.
At first, nothing happened. I heard the voices of our pursuers getting closer. Then, an icy wind rose from the forest.
An abnormal wind, cold and heavy with the smell of disturbed earth and ozone. The pursuers' torches began to flicker, struggling against increasingly strong unnatural gusts. The shielded lanterns trembled. I heard their footsteps stop, a confused hesitation spreading through their ranks.
And then, I heard the murmur. A low, deep sound that didn't come from the trees, but from the earth itself beneath my feet. The lament of a giant awakening.
From the edge of the forest, shadows lengthened. They defied the torchlight, writhing, merging, taking on spectral forms. I saw the silhouette of a wolf made of darkness, jaws open in a silent snarl. I saw the mass of a shadow boar pawing the ground. And for an instant, I saw the enormous figure of the bear, a memory of pain and gratitude.
They weren't real. They were nightmares. Manifestations of the forest's rage.
"What... what the hell is happening?" Bastien stammered.
The earth trembled. A dull roar, and roots erupted from the muddy ground on the riverbank. Thick and serpent-like, they interwove, creating a chaotic barrier of living wood between us and our pursuers.
"NOW!" I shouted, my voice almost drowned out by the din.
Margot and Bastien didn't need to be told twice. They bolted, running along the riverbank, protected by that incredible diversion.
I stayed behind for a moment, the channel for that immense power. The forest's energy flowed through me, a raging river threatening to sweep me away. I felt a stabbing pain explode behind my eyes. A warm wetness began to trickle from my nose. Blood.
I was asking for too much! I was taking too much!
I staggered, my vision darkening at the edges. The forest's shadows clashed with the men, screams of panic mixing with the wail of the wind. It was chaos. It had worked. But the price...
I heard a voice in my head. It was older, deeper than any I had heard before. It was the forest itself speaking to me. And it whispered a single, terrible word.
Enough!
Unfortunately, it wasn't just a warning, but an action.
As I staggered, gasping, one of the brambles I had created lashed out like a snake, wrapping around my ankle with unnatural strength, dragging me to the ground.
"Victor!" I heard Margot's terrified scream in the distance.
I tried to get up, but more roots and brambles emerged from the ground, wrapping around my arms, my chest, dragging me down. They were taking me. I saw Margot and Bastien stop on the bank, two helpless figures distant in the night.
"Victor, where are you?!" The echo of her voice reached me, desperate, as the forest floor literally opened beneath me, swallowing me.
The last thing I saw was a bramble twisting across my face, before the darkness and the cold claimed me completely.
I thought it was over, but incredibly I wasn't suffocating. I was in a tunnel of interwoven roots moving around me, pulsing with a faint phosphorescent green light. They were transporting me, on a surreal journey through the belly of the earth. I could feel the forest's murmur around me, no longer a voice, but a presence, an ancient intelligence examining me.
The journey ended abruptly. The tunnel opened, and the roots deposited me on a floor of soft moss with a dull thud.
I was in an immense cavern—I saw no stone or rock, but something alive. At the center, an ancient, gigantic tree, perhaps a thousand-year-old oak, grew underground. Its immense roots formed the cavern's walls and ceiling, interweaving into Gothic arches. Its branches, covered with leaves that glowed with a silvery light, disappeared into the darkness above, like imprisoned stars.
I was alone. Weak. Scared. At the feet of a forest god.
Then, I heard the voice. It resonated from the roots, from the trunk, from the leaves. It was the same ancient voice I had heard shortly before, a sound like a thousand dry leaves rustled by wind.
"You asked for my help, little fire!" the voice said. "And we answered. But every gift demands a price. Now... settle your debt!"