7. Nora

7

NORA

“I’m hallucinating,” I whispered. “This isn’t real. My mind’s state is altered and…”

“Altered from what, exactly?”

The voice was deep and timbre, sending a chill through me as the yellow eyes blinked. I swore the moon darkened as the leaves rustled and a beast emerged forth. I was frozen still, unable to move as I watched. Both terror and intrigue made my mouth feel dry, my heart pounding.

The trees seemed to move to make way for him. In fact, the whole world around us seemed to respond to him as if he were a deity. His body was a collection of mushrooms, bark, lichen, and vines, all pulled together to create a monstrous, humanoid figure.

“I’m hallucinating,” I repeated.

I had to be. There was no logical explanation for the being before me. I pinched my palm hard, the pain a sign that this was not a dream, but reality. This couldn’t be real, even if it appeared so .

Everything the professors said must have affected me deeper than I previously believed.

“You’re impossible,” I rasped.

A low chuckle echoed from him. “Your reaction is surprising.”

“You’re not real,” I whispered as vines crept across the soft dirt road towards me.

Run, run, run.

My instincts screamed, and yet I couldn’t move. All of the terror in my system was growing, morphing into something much, much more dangerous for someone like me.

Curiosity.

I stared at him, noting every detail, committing it all to memory. I was too morbidly intrigued by my imagination and the beastly creation before me to listen to the instincts begging me to flee.

“I am very real,” he whispered.

He continued to creep forward, becoming larger and larger until he stood before me. Heavy clouds crowded the moon, but even in the darkness I could make out the shape of his face. Angular and strange, with what appeared to be oyster mushrooms growing over his head until ridged horns appeared, curling back like a ram’s. Long, sharp claws extended from his fingers, his skin rough like bark. Darkness extended from him in wispy tendrils, intertwining with the vines that grew from him.

I was splayed out before a dark forest god. At the mercy of a natural fae with eyes that bore into me with a thirst that was both frightening and fascinating.

He lowered down until his face was right before mine. I swallowed hard, my breathing unsteady. His scent reminded me of a forest path after the first rain of the season, rich petrichor that was inviting and warm. My mouth watered. He parted his lips, revealing sharp teeth.

“You cannot be real,” I whispered.

“Do you not remember me?” he asked. He let out a deep hum. “I suppose the human did a good job with the potion he gave you.”

Alarm bells rang through my mind. “What do you mean?”

He only smiled, his lips twisting sadistically. “Why aren’t you scared?”

“I’ve had nightmares more frightening than you.” That wasn’t entirely a lie. There had been patches in my life where my nightmares were plagued by monsters far more demented than this one, monsters that wished to devour me. Knowing that they weren’t real was the only thing that had kept me sane. Just like right now. “And you’re not real.”

The murders and conversations with The Hunt had manipulated my imagination and my heightened emotions had only fed into it. My mind ran wild, trying to justify what I saw before me.

He cocked his head and then slowly lifted his hand, cupping my face with his claws. The sharp tips pressed against my cheek, but never pierced my skin. “You seek evidence .”

It wasn’t a question. I nodded slowly, careful not to jerk away. “I do.”

“Is the feeling of my claws on your skin not enough?”

“The mind is clever.”

“I see,” he murmured.

“You’re a monster and yet you speak like a man.”

“But I am no man,” he countered. “And you are alone in the darkness away from the village at the mercy of a beast that could devour you. Would they even know?”

The tips of his claws pressed firmer. The needle-like pain was followed by a rush of pleasure, and I sucked in a sharp breath of confusion and surprise. Still, he was careful not to draw blood. Dark green vines continued to wrap up my body until my lips parted in shock. A tendril of a vine pressed against the apex of my thighs, stroking me.

The pleasure was unexpected. Out of everything I could have felt from a monster—fear, terror, rage even—the rush of need was the last thing I would have guessed.

I found myself arching, a soft moan leaving me. “What are you doing?”

The vine continued to rub against me. Another slipped into my blouse and cupped my breasts, sending more pleasure rushing through me.

An orgasm came out of nowhere and I screamed out into the night, seeing stars just from his touch. He waited until I melted into the grass before he released me.

“ Evidence ,” he said.

I blinked, and he was gone.

What was that?

I panted as my muscles relaxed. The release of tension was beyond glorious. No man had ever been able to leave me feeling like this. I sprawled out alongside the road for a few minutes, toying with the absurd wish that he would return.

“Hallucination,” I whispered to myself. “Not real. He wasn’t real.”

I swallowed hard and slowly sat up, picking leaves from my hair. A few minutes passed before I finally got to my feet. I was trembling, but certainly not from fear.

Whatever I had just experienced, I was foolish to not be scared. Perhaps even delusional. The rational was rearing its head, attempting to counter any of the things that my mind wanted to believe happened.

What if this had just been an erotic imagining? It wasn’t like I’d had time to take care of myself this week. Perhaps the build up of sexual frustration had mixed with the fantasy of being ravaged by a monster.

I went back to my bicycle and picked it up, straddling it and taking off down the road again. Within a few minutes, I was stepping through the heavy door to my tower and locking it behind me.

Thorn Tower suddenly felt cold and lonely. I went to my kitchen table and struck a match, lighting the candle there and then the three above the fireplace mantle, and then the fourth on a side table next to a cushioned chair. The presence of open flames spiked my anxiety, but I needed their light. Lamps would need to be purchased soon, but the candles would do for now, especially given how outdated the tower was. I thought about Harold’s townhouse enviously, and then decided it was best not to dwell.

It wasn’t like I wanted to be neighbours anyway, though the updated amenities and warmth of his home made mine feel even colder. Maybe I should get a pet to ease the feeling of being alone. Though nothing like his cat, given the scratch I'd seen on his neck. Wait...

He didn’t have a cat.

The thought struck me and I pressed my lips into a thin line. He’d claimed that the scratch on his neck, which I hadn’t noticed tonight, was from a cat.

But he had no cat.

It was such a small discrepancy but it was enough to truly make me doubt him, Louis, and Jacob. The secrets and mysteries were stacking up and I hadn’t even made it a week yet. The stress of the coming Monday was getting to me, perhaps, along with the unbelievable bullshit the three professors had tried to sell.

“Just a dream,” I whispered to myself.

A shiver worked up my spine as I imagined the vines again. But whatever had taken place in the tunnel of trees did not happen again. I was unable to create such a visual, even with focusing hard.

I plopped down at the kitchen table and cut a piece of bread, spreading butter over it as I opened my leather journal sitting there.

Now, more than ever, I felt it was best that I stayed to teach at the university regardless of how my colleagues behaved. Maybe it was the university, but there was something about this place that made me believe my best discoveries were yet to be had. The mind was far stranger than reality, and even if I became my own test subject, I was determined to contribute to the field in the way that many others had.

It would be imperative that I start recording whatever visions I was having. It wouldn’t be the first time in my life I had imagined things.

I bit into the bread as I started writing, starting with arriving at Harold’s. I reluctantly included the moment I believed Louis to have sharp teeth, the strange quickness that Jacob had shown, and their conversations leading up to my departure.

And then the monster in the trees.

My thighs pressed together as I thought about the vine that had touched me.

Ink dripped out on the page. I put the pen down and sat back, swallowing hard. I couldn’t say the last time I had been with someone, so perhaps the loneliness was getting to me as well.

The monster was some sort of manifestation of desires. He had to be.

Or maybe he was real.

The thought of that vine made my cheeks turn hot. I’d never heard of a monster such as him. I closed my eyes, imagining his face. His eyes, the mushrooms, rough skin, the deep growl that permeated all the way through my bones.

I had no books on folklore, but the library certainly did. I stared into the flickering fire of one of the candles, my heart beat quickening. Something scratched at my mind, clawing and clawing and…

I needed to be amongst the familiarity of dusty books and knowledge. It was late, but what was the point of being a professor if I didn’t take advantage of the campus?

My heart rate had just finally returned to normal, and now I was going back out there. I wasn’t going to let anything keep me from research, though, monster or not.

I tucked my journal into a satchel and swung it across my body. I lingered for a moment then decided to take the loaf of crusty bread with me. I stepped back out into the cool night and peered into the creeping shadows.

I was such a fool.

The monster wasn’t real. If he was , he would have hurt me.

Instead, I’d experienced pleasure.

My cheeks burned. The imaginary vines I’d seen strangled my logic, making me wonder just what had happened.

The bicycle ride back to the university went by fast with my mind preoccupied. By the time I made my way through the grand doors of the King Charles Library, it felt as if time had simply flown by, another phenomena I wished to study further.

How did the mind do such a thing? When I was caught up in my imagination and working through scenarios, it often felt as if I’d stepped outside of a world where a clock continuously ticked.

There were only so many hours in a day though, and my area of study was a focus on innate behaviour and how environment impacts behaviour. Was every human inherently good in the beginning and was it the world that slowly corrupted them?

The silence within the library was reverent. The scent of books and dust made me feel like I was home. Given how out of place the last few days had made me feel, that notion was welcome.

This was a type of loneliness that comforted me.

I gripped the strap of my bag and went to the desk in the entryway, lighting the oil lamp that sat there. I took it with me as I passed rows and rows of shelves, only stopping when I finally found a section dedicated to mythology and folklore. I crept down the row and set the lamp on a small desk along with my bag.

My fingertips grazed over the leather and cloth spines. I moved down the shelves, tilting my head as I read the titles. The Lost History of Beings. An Encyclopaedia of Creatures. Myths and Legends Long Forgotten. I plucked all three from their shelves, along with a book on fairy rings, the history of mythology within this area, and Scottish folklore.

I piled them up on the desk and pulled out the chair. The wood scraped against the floor and I glanced up, listening for anyone else. There were no signs of movement. I was utterly alone.

I settled in and welcomed the familiarity of being sequestered away within a library late at night. I chose the book on Scottish myths first and skimmed through the table of contents. Born and raised in London, I couldn’t imagine why the monster in my mind might have been of Scottish origin, but it was a starting place.

All of the things that had occurred in the last week spread before my mind like a map. There was the dinner party. A boring event where three colleagues had been murdered. By whom and when, I did not know.

Then there was the history of the school. Dr. Bolton definitely omitted information when he connected me with Dean Andrews. It made me wonder why he would send me here, knowing about the student deaths.

Maybe he knew I wouldn’t let them go.

Between the professors and students, I couldn’t understand the attitude of those who worked here. Even the Dean had shown little to no concern. Why?

Alec came to mind again. A man of mystery. I chewed on my bottom lip, and then decided it was best to shove him from my thoughts. He was a distraction. My dislike for him did not equate to proof that he was a killer.

I needed a book about St. Thorn’s history too. My thirst for knowledge had awakened, and now I would not be sated until I discovered more.

Meddlesome . That was a word my uncle had used for me after my father’s death.

I released a sigh and flipped through the pages of the book. I paused as I turned to a page on fae.

The folklore ran deep. Even though I equated it all to nothing more than stories, I still found it interesting how much people believed in such things. I thought about Jacob, Louis, and Harold—three men that were undoubtedly smart. And yet they believed in monsters.

Spiriting Away.

It is believed that children, even adults, can be taken back to the Otherworld. If taken, they never return. It is even thought that the fae stole away babies, replacing them with one of their own.

I snorted. A myth used to explain why a child misbehaved or looked different. It was awful, really.

I continued to read for a while until my eyes began to droop. Daemons, fae, forest spirits, bauchan, dryads, the Ghillie Dhu. Finally, I snapped the book shut. The creature seemed to match the Ghillie Dhu, or even a dryad of sorts, but only in physicality. A lonesome solitary male fairy that roamed the woods, clothed in moss and birch and… well, the myth didn’t say anything about mushrooms. But the Ghillie Dhu was beloved and helpful, and did not feel correct for the monster I’d imagined.

This hallucination made sense. The last week had been exhausting and it was a new environment. I was accustomed to city sounds and people, not dark forests and silence. My brain was simply filling in the gaps. As I seemed to be the only one even mildly disturbed by the murders, it made sense.

Satisfied that I’d deciphered my mind, I restocked the books, grabbed my bag and lamp, and continued through the library until I found the historical section. It was three rows of shelves, one of which was chained off.

I scowled. This was absurd. Surely they didn’t think chains could stop someone from slipping through. And who chained up books?

I set my bag and lamp down again and then stepped through an opening in the chains that were bolted to two shelves, stepping into a small section full of even dustier books.

The History of St. Thorn.

“You’re coming with me,” I whispered.

It wasn’t stealing if I returned it later.

I plucked it from the shelf and paused. The book next to it— The Occult and other Oddities —was surely out of place. I pulled it free as I tucked the other tome under my arm, opening it. It was full of random drawings of strange rituals: a circle of stones, how to sacrifice a human, and so forth.

I scowled and flipped to the back.

Property of Dean John Andrews I.

Well, that was lovely. Nothing like the Dean owning a book on how to make sacrifices.

Footsteps echoed through the library and I snapped the book shut, bringing the two books with me as I wriggled through the chains. I tucked them into my satchel and swung it over my shoulder, picking up my lamp. I hurried down a few rows right as a man rounded the corner.

“What are you doing in the library?” he seethed.

He was a short stout man with grey hair and a moustache.

“I’m a professor,” I said. “Nora Woulfe, psychology. I needed a book.”

“The library is closed. It is well past midnight. Get out.”

How long was I reading for?

“Very well,” I said.

I slipped past him and rushed towards the front of the room, leaving the lamp on the front desk before exiting out into the cold stone halls.

I found my bicycle outside and decided to try a shortcut back to the tower. I could see it in the distance, although this would take me past the greenhouse.

Regardless, I peddled down a small walking path that wound its way through tall needled pines, slowing as I came to the mouth of a dark maze. I went around it, but I could see a light coming from the greenhouse beyond it.

Someone else was a night owl too.

It took longer than I expected, and really I should have stuck to the known road, but I eventually made it back to my tower. My muscles ached as I stepped back inside, the exhaustion finally hitting.

I collapsed in the chair at the kitchen table and frowned.

Two oranges sat there.

But I ate one already.