5. Kira

5

KIRA

I wake to the first tentative brushstrokes of dawn painting the sky outside my window a delicate shade of shell pink. For a moment I simply lie there, watching the light slowly suffuse the room, listening to the gentle susurrus of the breeze in the treetops. It's peaceful, almost eerily so after the tempestuous events of the previous day.

Carefully, I sit up, half-expecting to feel the drag of chains at my wrists, the weight of the collar around my throat. But there's nothing. Malachar must have removed them while I slept. The thought sends a conflicted shiver down my spine - gratitude tangled up with unease at the idea of him touching me in my unconscious state.

I slide out of bed, my bare feet sinking into the plush carpet. Someone - Malachar, I assume - has laid out a dress for me, a froth of emerald silk and gossamer. It's beautiful, and no doubt hideously expensive, but I ignore it in favor of my own jeans and T-shirt, cleaned and folded and ready for me every morning.

I dress quickly and make my way to the window, drawn by the lambent glow of the rising sun. As I watch, the sky transforms, cycling through a palette of pastel hues before finally settling into a brilliant, cloudless blue. It's going to be a beautiful day.

The thought sparks a sudden, desperate yearning in my chest. After the claustrophobic darkness of the castle, the idea of feeling the sun on my face, the wind in my hair, is almost painfully tempting. I know I shouldn't - Malachar warned me of the dangers that lurk beyond the walls. But surely a few minutes couldn't hurt?

Just a quick walk to clear my head, to feel like myself again...

Moving quickly, before I can second-guess myself, I slip out of my room and make my way through the echoing halls. It's early enough that the castle is still slumbering, the silence broken only by the occasional creak of ancient timbers. Even the ever-present aura of power feels muted, drowsy.

I'm halfway across the great hall when I spot the doors – their handles glinting invitingly in the muted light. My heart kicks into a gallop as I approach, half-expecting them to be locked, or warded, or simply immovable. But when I lay my hand on the weathered wood, they swing open soundlessly, as if eager to aid in my escape.

I step out into a courtyard drenched in dew and dawn-light, the chill air stinging my cheeks. The sky arches overhead, the color of a robin's egg. For a moment I simply stand there, breathing deep, savoring the tang of pine and wilderness. Then, before my resolve can waver, I strike out across the frost-limned grass, making for the treeline on the far side of the lawn.

The forest seems to lean in as I approach, branches straining towards me like grasping fingers. A part of me is apprehensive at the sight, remembering Malachar's dire warnings about the dangers that lurk in this place.

But the need for space, for autonomy, overrides my fear.

Squaring my shoulders, I pass beneath the dense canopy and into the glaucous gloom beyond.

At first, it's not so bad. The woods are hushed and still, the only sound the soft crunch of my footfalls on the carpet of pine needles. Slanting bars of sunlight pierce the interwoven branches, dappling the forest floor in gold. It's actually quite beautiful, in a strange, shadowed way.

But as I press on, the atmosphere begins to change. The trees press closer, their trunks bent and twisted like arthritic spines. The air grows thick with the scent of loam and decay, cloying in my throat. And beneath it all, a tingling sense of watchfulness, as if the very woods are aware of my intrusion.

I'm just about to turn back, unnerved, when I hear it - a voice, high and sweet, raised in a wordless song. The melody is unlike anything I've ever heard before, haunting and ethereal, winding through the trees like a skein of silver. Without thinking, I alter course to follow it, drawn onwards by some force beyond my control.

I break into a small clearing and there, perched on a moss-covered log, is the singer. A young man, or something that very closely approximates one. He looks up as I enter and smiles, his eyes the vivid blue of a summer sky. Suddenly I notice all the flowers and the natural beauty of the mire. And of course it doesn't smell overwhelmingly of death and decay and rot, but of flowers and fresh clippings and the first day of summer.

"Well met, fair wanderer," he calls, lowering his pan flute, his voice carrying a lilting accent I can't quite place. "What brings you to my neck of the woods on such a fine morning?"

"I... I was just walking," I stammer, suddenly self-conscious. What am I doing, talking to a stranger in an enchanted forest? "I didn't mean to disturb you."

"Disturb? Nay, you've brightened my morning considerably." He hops down from his perch with a fluid grace, moving towards me. "Pray, what are you called? I am Lorias, of the Greenwood folk."

"Kira," I answer automatically, before catching myself. Should I be giving my name to this bizarre, if charming, individual? I try to search my mind, Malachar said something about this.

But what was it?

"Lady Kira." He sweeps me an elegant bow. "You seem a touch lost, if you'll forgive my saying. These woods can be treacherous for those who don't know their ways. Perhaps I could guide you? Show you the hidden delights of this place, steer you clear of its dangers?"

I hesitate, torn. The offer is tempting - more than tempting, if I'm honest. The thought of a companion, someone to talk to besides my grim-faced captor, is almost pathetically alluring. And what harm can there be, really, in letting this amiable stranger show me around for a bit?

"That would be wonderful," I say before I can think better of it. "I'd be grateful for the company."

Lorias beams, his smile as bright as the shaft of sunlight he's standing in. "Splendid! Come then, let me show you the marvels of my sylvan home."

He sets off into the trees and I follow, a giddy lightness in my chest. As we walk, he regales me with stories and anecdotes, his voice painting vivid pictures in the air. He speaks of the secret places of the forest, the glens where the wildflowers bloom in a riot of impossible colors, the caves that echo with the songs of underground rivers. Of the strange and wondrous creatures that make their homes in the shadow of the boughs - the wise old turtles with shells of precious jade, the silver-furred foxes who can speak the tongues of men, the birds whose feathers shine with all the hues of the rainbow.

I find myself relaxing, the tenseness bleeding out of my spine, my earlier fears fading to a distant memory. There's a strange magic to Lorias's voice, a cadence that lulls and beguiles. Walking beside him, listening to his tales, it's easy to forget the darkness of my predicament, easy to imagine that I'm just a girl on a woodland ramble with a new friend.

We emerge suddenly into a glade that steals the very breath from my lungs. It's a place of impossible beauty, the grass a carpet of emerald velvet starred with jewel-bright flowers. A waterfall spills down the moss-covered rock face at the far side, feeding into a pool as clear as glass. The air is alive with the dart and glimmer of hummingbirds, the chime of birdsong, the heady perfume of a thousand blooms. "Oh," I breathe, turning a slow circle. "It's magical."

"It's like something out of a dream," I whisper, my voice hushed with awe.

"It is, isn't it?" Lorias agrees, but there's an odd note in his voice that makes me glance over. There's something different about his face, a sharpness to his features that wasn't there before. His cheekbones are higher, more angular, and his skin seems to hold an inner luminescence, as if he's been carved from moonstone. When he smiles, I catch a glimpse of teeth a little too pointed to be entirely human. And there are so many teeth, crowding his mouth in glittering, pearlescent rows.

The longer I look, the more unsettling details I notice woven into the enchanting scene. The chiming melody takes on a discordant edge, the notes clashing and jangling like shards of broken glass. The colors of the flowers seem to pulse and swirl, hypnotic and dizzying. And there, in the shadowed depths of the glade, I catch a flicker of movement - sinuous and serpentine, a glimpse of something ancient and hungry.

A chill runs through me, a cold finger of dread tracing the length of my spine. "Lorias," I say slowly, taking a cautious step back. "What is this place?"

He tilts his head, the movement sudden and birdlike, and I see that his eyes have changed. The warm summer blue has been leached away, replaced by an opalescent swirl of colors - flickering gold and pulsing violet, shimmering green and glowing crimson. They're mesmerizing, those eyes, but there's a coldness to them, a predatory gleam that sends my pulse racing.

"This? This is my home, sweet Kira. My true home." His smile widens, stretching past the point of naturalness, a slash of too-bright teeth in a face that's become a mask of alien beauty. "And soon, very soon, it will be your home as well."

He takes a step towards me, his movements fluid and graceful, but there's something off about them, a sinuous wrongness that makes my skin crawl. The glade seems to darken around us, the shadows lengthening and deepening, reaching out with grasping tendrils.

I stumble back, my heart a wild drum in my chest, but there's nowhere to run. The trees have closed in around us, their branches twisting and twining into a living cage. And all the while, Lorias advances, his eyes burning with a fevered intensity, his hands outstretched in a mockery of welcome.

Terror crashes over me like a frigid wave as the veil of enchantment falls away, revealing the true nature of this place. The colors are too vivid, painful to look at. The birdsong warps and distorts, resolving into mocking, chittering laughter. The very air feels thick and cloying, clotted with a miasma of cruelty and madness. And Lorias...

Gone is the amiable young man, replaced by a thing of nightmare. His skin is bark-rough and green-tinged, his hair a writhing mass of vines and briars. Antlers sprout from his brow, wickedly sharp, and his eyes... Dear God, his eyes are black pits, fathomless and cruel, promising an eternity of torment.

I scream, high and shrill, and turn to run. But the glade is changed, the trees pressing close in an impenetrable wall of grasping branches. Lorias laughs, a sound like the cracking of rotted wood, and stalks towards me, his movements sinuous and inhuman.

"Did you really think you could escape, little field mouse?" he hisses, his voice a choking rasp. "Did you think I would simply let you fly back to your dark sorcerer, like a little bird to its cage? No, no, that will never do. You will stay with me, be one with me, forever and always."

I back away, my heart a wild drum in my chest, until my shoulders hit unyielding bark. There's nowhere to run, no way out. Lorias looms over me, a horror beyond imagining, his hands reaching for me with a terrible hunger.

I close my eyes, a sob knotting in my throat. I think of my family, my friends, all the dreams I'll never get to chase. I think of Malachar and feel a bitter stab of regret. He warned me, didn't he? Warned me of the dangers that lurked beyond the castle walls. And I, fool that I am, blundered right into their clutches.

As Lorias's grasping hands close around my arms, as his fetid breath washes over my face, I send up a desperate prayer. Not for salvation, for I know it will not come. But for forgiveness, for the chance to tell Malachar how sorry I am.

And then I am swept away into a maelstrom of agony and terror, my screams swallowed by the pitiless green gloom of the forest.