The Desederium Forest
---Katherine---
The dark woods of the Desederium Forest loomed ahead as we galloped as fast as we could towards them. Even with the Evils hot on our tails, we paused before we entered, our horses pacing on the trail.
"Do we have to enter?" Rachel asked. "Can't we just go around it?"
"Yeah," I agreed. "It would be best if we didn't go in."
"It's just a forest, what's the big deal about it?" Lucian asked impatiently.
"You just don't know what's in it." Rachel shot him a glare. "People have died in there, Lucian."
"Yeah, well, we're all going to die if we don't move soon." Lucian pointed at the approaching Evils. I could hear their roars now. "So, are we going in or not?"
Everyone looked at Indigo. "I really hoped that there would be another way, but going around the forest would take too long," she said slowly. "We'd also be out in the open. The best way for us, I think, would be to go in for a little while—just until we lose the Evils—and then we'll find a way out and travel in daylight. How does that sound?"
"Um…" Before we could make our decision, an arrow whizzed past Indigo and buried itself in the ground beside her. The stallion that she and Aaron were riding on reared back, startled, and took off into the forest. More arrows soon followed. We glanced at each other and followed Indigo and Aaron deep into the Desederium Forest.
Inside, tall trees towered over us, their vast branches blocking out the sunlight. As we made our way along the winding trail, I noticed that even though not all of the trees were evergreens, they seemed to remain green and forever young. A magical charge was in the air, surrounding the trees in a hazy light.
The deeper we went, the darker it got, until the trees reached impossible heights and blocked out the sunlight altogether. Even though it should be completely dark in the forest, the area was illuminated by a mysterious source that gave it a bluish-green tint. The light seemed to be coming from everything: the trees, the air, the little firefly-like creatures that danced in the air...everything seemed so magical.
We followed the twisting path deep into the heart of the forest, often galloping down side trails, until we longer heard our pursuers. Gradually our pace slowed, and we halted in a small clearing. Around us were the sounds of various forest creatures, from the chirping of birds to the rustling of small critters. Fireflies fluttered around and gave off a throbbing luminescent light.
"It's so beautiful," Aaron murmured. "How could a place as beautiful as this kill people?"
He had a point. The Desederium Forest was beautiful. Imagine a normal forest, with tall pines and oaks reaching high into the sky, blocking out all the sunlight. Now imagine that swarms of fireflies illuminated the darkness, and that everything glowed with a soft teal color, as if under the ocean. There were varying shades of blue glows as we progressed into the forest, with the farthest hues being a midnight blue and the colors closest to us almost green. Everything was light up, yet it wasn't. I could practically see ripples in the air and feel the pulse of magic.
"What's that?" Lucian peered into a thicket. As we turned our heads to look, he reared back with shock. A glowing, wispy orb of light the color of cobalt slowly rose from behind the bushes, its tendrils soft as clouds. Before our very eyes, it seemed to transform into a shapeless blob, elongating and hanging in midair. While we looked at each other in puzzlement, unsure of what it was supposed to resemble, Lucian's eyes were fixed on something within the blob. He was completely enchanted.
"Snap him out of it! Get Lucian away from the orb!" Indigo shouted in alarm.
Rachel snapped to attention and shook Lucian's shoulders from behind. "Lucian, snap out of it! Lucian, look at me!"
Lucian shrugged out of Rachel's grasp, his eyes never leaving the blue orb. It seemed to glow brighter, shining its light upon all of us. Lucian seemed pale and sickly in the iridescent light. "I need to go…I need to follow it…" he murmured softly, urging his stallion forward. The blue orb appeared gleeful, and began to drift away, leading Lucian into the dark depths of the forest.
"Atramento!" Ashley's voice sounded. A splotch of darkness shot out into the air, covering the blue glow with an inky blackness. It was like how a squid would squirt out ink to throw its predator momentarily into darkness and escape, only here, the darkness surrounded the blue orb and spread in all directions, wiping out the light.
When the inkiness dissipated, there was no sign of the wispy blue orb. Lucian blinked a few times, looking around wildly. "There wasn't—you guys didn't see—?" He tried to form a sentence but couldn't.
"What did you see?" Indigo asked. "What did you see in the blue orb that none of us saw?"
Relief crossed Lucian's face when he heard that none of us saw what he did. "It was like an image," he stated hesitantly. "It seemed so real—"
"But what was it?" Indigo prodded. Lucian paused.
"I'd rather not talk about it," he said darkly. "It was nothing."
"Nothing?!" Rachel's voice was shrill. "You were about to follow that thing into god-knows-where! You were in a trance, and none of us could snap you out of it!"
"I said, I don't want to talk about it." Lucian shook his head firmly and turned around, closing his eyes with a sigh.
"The Desederium Forest. The Forest of Desires," I said softly. "It shows you your innermost desires and enchants you, luring you into the unknown depths and your ultimate death. It magnifies your desires and twists them to control you. The few who survived their encounters here all went crazy, yearning for something that seemed so real at the time but could never get in real life. They faded away, day by day, as if their life force had been sucked out of them. Eventually, they all…" My voice trailed off.
"They all what?" Aaron asked hesistantly. I met Indigo's eyes.
"They all committed suicide and died shortly after." I finished. We were all silent for a few moments.
"You were lucky Ashley saved you from that orb before it did any real damage," Jason finally said to Lucian. "If she hadn't, who knows would've happened."
"Guys, do you hear anything?" Rachel said suddenly. I cocked my head and listened.
"No," we all chorused.
"Exactly. It's too quiet. Not even the crickets are chirping anymore."
"And the fireflies are gone," Lucian noted. "All the animals seem to have disappeared." Again, all of us looked at each other.
"Run." At Indigo's single command, all of us took off, thundering down the path. As we sped along, the glow seemed to change, from a warm light blue to an eerie ultramarine color, with shadows looming everywhere we looked. My heart sped up. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong.