Children of the Forest - Sagas of Yryan - Completed #Wattys2017

Chapter 11: Cold water

A few days after their terrific ride through the nightly forest, the twins had gotten used to the place. In the rare nights when the forest shone, the plants now grew away from them as if the twins were poisonous. Therefore, the horses were calmer again and the twins decided to ride at night and sleep throughout the days when they didn't have to be scared to lie on a forest glade covered in grass.

The supplies which they'd bought held for many days and Faolan was very thankful for it. He didn't want to try any of the berries and mushrooms growing in this forest. He'd often scan the trees warily and sometimes he thought he'd seen something move, but nothing happened.

Three days after they'd entered the forest, their road turned away to the northwest. They left the road because they wanted to go southwest, only to find out why the road had taken a sudden turn. They stood in front of a loudly rushing river. It crossed their way and they couldn't see any way over it.

'Maybe the road leads to a bridge somewhere nearby,' Moira said.

'I don't think so. If it did, they'd have built the bridge right here, why make a circle first?'

They looked around and got off the horses, but it seemed to be impossible to get to the other side. Swimming wasn't an option since neither of them could swim and they didn't believe they could get the horses through the ice-cold water. The river had dug into the ground and they stumbled down the steep riverbank, dragging the unwilling horses with them. Having reached the water, they stood there not knowing how to continue.

'What a shame, if we were in the other forest, I'd only have to wish for a bridge and I'm sure one would form, one made out of roots and branches,' Faolan said after a while. To his surprise, Moira had heard him over the noise of the river.

'How come the forest listened to you anyway? And how did you do the trick with the protective sphere the other day?' she nearly shouted to be heard. Their eyes met for a moment, but Faolan looked down quickly.

'I don't know...' he mumbled.

'What?'

'I said I don't know,' he repeated more loudly.

She just looked at him as if she didn't believe him. 'Did you try it here?'

'Of course I did. I can't control it, sometimes it just happens, I don't know...'

Sunk deeply into their conversation, they didn't see what was happening behind their backs. Only the horses did. And they didn't like it. When Faolan saw the horror in the horses' eyes, he turned around quickly. What he saw took his breath away and now Moira could see it, too.

While they had been talking, about a dozen small creatures had climbed out of the river. Their skin was greenish-grey and they were walking on two webbed feet. When they came closer, Faolan felt an uncomfortable cold emanating from the small creatures, which reached up to his knees. They had long tails and no ears and, instead of arms, they had fins with long claws forming something reminding the twins of hands. But most horrific of all were their faces. They had huge round eyes as black as coal and there was no nose. Instead, there were huge mouths with uncountable tiny teeth, sharp enough to cut through flesh and bone.

'Hush!' said Moira to the horses who were about to gallop away and when she started talking to them as calmly as she could, they trusted her enough to stay for a little longer. Meanwhile, Faolan knelt down to be on the same level with the creatures, which didn't seem to want to attack him.

'My name is Faolan. Who are you?' he said shakily. The creature closest to him answered with a weird hissing and the other creatures joined in moments later. 'I don't think they can understand what we're saying...'