Chapter Two: The Bloody Man in the Woods

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My feet skidded to a painful halt against thorns and hard ground

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My feet skidded to a painful halt against thorns and hard ground. My hair whipped against my face, my chest heaved as I turned my head from right to left, then back and then finally forward once more.

Before me stood thick woods, the bark of the trees dry and brown, the leaves a prospering green. There was a spring nearby, I could hear it. It sounded fresh and full to the brim, something I once was. The wind cried next to my ears, a soft lullaby of heartbreak.

The air was dreaded heavy with the cries of death, a man with a voice so cracked like a mirror and hands so cold and lifeless. Three men stood above his body, three men in powerful suits and money raining down from them.

They were whispering next to my ear, telling me the rich would always prosper, the rich will always win. My heels dug into the ground as I sprinted forward, needing to get away from the voices. Needing to get out of the woods before death himself got his cold hands on me.

I gasped and wheezed, the cold air sending a shrill scream of pain down my throat. Leaves and branches whipped against my legs and arms and cheeks, yet it didn't make me falter. Rather scrapes against my face than death accompanying me to my last destination.

Whether it be hell or heaven, I didn't want to find out.

There was a clearing in front of me, the air was denser here, and I knew that this is were death was waiting for me. I tried to run in another direction, but ultimately came up to the clearing again. It was a road, one I recognized immediately as I ran down it. The gravel was harsh against my feet, and when I turned my head back, a figure look from the edge of the trees.

He stood tall and dark, with a heavy cloud of sun above his head. It was grey like the beating heart in his chest, yet when my eyes found his, they did not hold the same colour.

They were the colour of swimming pool water, cerulean blue eyes blinked slowly. The blue casted a spell on me and I stopped myself. My heaving passed as I stared into his eyes, the lifeless sheen of his body had nothing on the lively blue his eyes contained.

Yet when he tilted his head, almost in question, I noticed the deep, burning sadness behind them. They sparkled with sorrow, the pain so deep one can't help but drown in an attempt to fill your lungs with enough of it that it would disappear from his eyes.

Sad Blue Eyes blinked for a final time before I turned on my heel. There was a slight curve in the road and the trees and I took it with caution before my cold, shaking hands gripped onto a leather steering wheel, and I stepped on the gas.

Greens and brown whipped past me as I spend down the road, the car warm inside yet it felt worse than the cold outside.

I took the curve, and felt the car slow down. It wasn't my doing.

On my left side, against the trees, a figure caught my eye. I blinked a few times, and when I saw the white fabric covering his wide shoulders covered in blood, the brakes screeched as I stepped on the brake.

THE RETURN | Kirill IvanovWhere stories live. Discover now