Auntie's Hotel

Chapter 16 The Feast of Light

The night had been calmed. The rain and wind did not simply stop. It was hushed to a silent calm. It could not be stopped. It was supposed to be there. Weather... nature... trees... air. The rain still fell, but it no longer stabbed through the sky with needle point force. It was no longer a threat trying to break through the roof. It had also been calmed. The wind still blew, but just gently enough to barely push a blade of grass.

The door to the cabin slowly creaked open on its own and this did not startle Brian Jensen. Hope was with him and in him. She did not have control of him, but was able to calm the screaming child within that wanted to run and hide because it should. It feared the darkness. It feared what it had seen. It fear this place. It feared... because it should.

Knowing he had seen the darkness and the darkness was coming for him, she knew the task ahead would be difficult. The night was still alive and although morning would soon come, she had to protect her spark until the daylight came.

Brian Jensen looked beyond the frame and into the surreal night. Little bulbs of light blinked as they lazily bobbed in the air.

"Lightning bugs?" he asked himself, puzzled by their presence. "It's raining." he had never seen them in the rain. He would've never believed they would fly in the rain. Seeing them now, in this moment, he couldn't recall the last time he had seen a single lightning bulb.

"Follow them," hope said. "They'll be our guides in the night.

Once grass, the ground was now dirt and it crumbled beneath his feet as he walked. The dry dirt cracked and crumbled with each step. He was lost with the dry ground beneath his feet. Had it not been raining? Shouldn't it be wet?

The tiny bugs blinked on and slowly faded to dark. Then they blinked again, just a little higher, or lower, or further away from him. The tree line lit up and the little messengers moved away from the trees and to his right. Their number became more and more until their were far too many to keep count.

He followed the thousands of tiny blinking flashlights. They led him back across the clearing to a path much wider than the one he was on when he had discovered the shack. The crumbling earth turned to solid ground with grooves once created by a vehicle long ago. Although the grooves of these tracks no longer grew any vegetation, the hump between was so overgrown that his legs kept getting wrapped up in it. This caused him to nearly fall several times.

The path wove through the woods, slanting down toward an unknown destination. The branches of the trees, hanging above him, swooped low over his head. He could touch them, if he wanted to. He could pull them down and look at the leaves a bit closer and determine which kind of tree it was. Yet, he did no such thing. What would it help to disrupt the trees?

What would be the point?

Howling echoed in the night. The fluttering of wings darted through the trees. Jensen noticed his breathing was heavier and louder than normal. He could not believe how out of shape he was.

Every few steps, he stopped to listen. He waited for footsteps. He wasn't afraid, but he felt like something was following.

"What are you worried about?" Hope asked even though she knew.

Jensen shook his thoughts away and responded with, "I thought I heard something."

"Everything is okay," she would assure him. "You are safe with me."

He could hear nothing and see nothing that she did not want him to witness. As the only light in the darkness, she could control what he could see and who could or what could see him. Although the hounds could smell him and the night creatures could sense him, nothing would ever find him until she wanted it to happen.