The Embrace

It wasn't an uncommon event for me to be gone for a greater part of the night when i decided to take my night-walks, as I had grown to call them.

For longer than I can remember, I would leave my home after everyone else had retired to bed, and walk to greet the woods behind our yard. It's embrace is more full than any other, being taken into it's arms is an undescribable feeling, indeed.

I would just... just walk. I would lose myself in my thoughts for extended periods of time and I never could recall where I had gone on a given night. Only pieces of the evening would commit themselves to my memory and the rest was only a gap in time.

One particular night does clearly stand out in my mind, more than any other. The moon was but a yellow crecent blade cutting across the sky that night, and naught a cloud could be seen. Everything that night had an extra vividness to it. I felt more alive than I ever had as I stepped across that threshold from the grass into the forest.

The trees, looming over me seemed to lean inward, conciously blocking the moonlight, leaving me to rely on my other senses to navigate their traps and pitfalls. I felt alone but at the same time I felt as though hundreds of beings were accompanying me in my stroll. Their intent I could not read.

Each step seemed like a reflex. Once or twice I remember turning with the intent of going back, and each time I was greeted by a seemingly impossible wall of thistles and prickers preventing the path from which I just came. Turning forward revealed an open path, ushering me forward and into the depths of the woods that I had never seen before.

I'm unsure of how far I travelled, my mind was elsewhere for a small period of time. When finally did realize I was still walking, I forced myself to stop. Looking around, trying to get my bearings, I found myself at a dead end. My path had ended, and when I turned to go back, I was once again greeted with no path, only brush.

I pushed my way through the plants and bushes, trying desperately to regain my sense of direction or to see something that was comforting and familiar to me. I found neither.

Soon, with no path in sight, I began to run. I ran, hoping to pass through this... this being that used to be nothing but a forest. The trees had faces now, in the bark. Eyes, consisting of the red wood lying where bark was recently chipped away, watched me pass. Grinning mouths were where innocent crevices in the wood once gave home to birds and rodents. Branches reached out to prod me and stab at me as I passed, and I swear on my grave that the gentle wind was replaced by sighing laughter, as though I was some sort of entertainment for this thing that once was nothing but a grove of trees.

I've no idea how long it was that I was running, and why I stopped I can not grasp, either. However, I did stop willingly, and looking around I found myself in a small clearing, atop a hill with a single stone protruding from the dirt.

This stone seemed to call out to me, and I was drawn to it more than anything, ever. Kneeling beside it I saw that it was etched with ancient letters, which were impossible to read.

Looking to the sky for a sign of light, I saw it was now filled with clouds, and the moon was nowhere to be found. Clouds were rolling over one another as if playing a sort of game, forming shapes that soon disappeared into nothing but black masses.

Using my fingers I blindly traced over the letters, one at a time. The slow realization that these letters spelled my own name was closing in upon me. The horror was growing in me, in my chest, in my heart and in my throat. I could taste my own fear's bitter taste, and I could feel it pumping through my veins. The world began to spin around me, and an unfamiliar sheet of darkness began to move across my eyes. I sat down and soon laid on my side, waiting for this spell to pass.

Darkness.

My eyes slowly drew open, the spinning had stopped and my vision was once again clear. The horror remained.

I sat up, and carefully stood, my knees were shaking, refusing to work. My hands were dirty and my arms ached. The moon was once again overhead, staring down at me, casting it's light over the clearing. I looked to the stone once again, and saw a fresh hole was dug next to it now. A shovel laid to the side, abandoned. I silently knew what I would see when I looked into this pit, but I walked to it's edge to peer into it anyhow.

Looking down, I spied an open box, about the size of a human, laying open inside. It's blue satin sheets were cleanly pressed and looked ever so inviting. A small pillow lay at one end, seeming to call out to me. My knees were shaking worse than ever now and the darkness was beginning to close in on me once again.

I climbed into the hole, into the box, almost involuntarily. I laid myself in it, and watched as my own traitorous arm reached out to the lid, pulling it closed on top of me. I could still hear the wind's tired laughter as it swept through the trees.

I swear it was laughing.
I swear on my grave.