The Hunt

F O U R

Seeing my parents as a ghost brought forth a memory in my mind that explained why I was in the Woods, in the first place. I had killed the governor on the Royal Council because he was the man to order the death sentence of my parents. An eye for an eye, isn't that the saying?

If I had had more time then I would have taken out his eyes and used them as a token to remind people of his death, but alas the guards had came too quickly. 

My mother still had her long hair, removed of any color, but the shape of its braid was still made clear. My father had gruff lines on his chin, marking his beard, as well as clothes that were well loosely transparent as well white. 

Despite their warm appearance and the fact that they were my parents did not reassure me or give me any trust. Any one of the Faces was known to have been reborn as a ghost so they could haunt the souls of the living world.

I spoke, my voice unsure and shaky, " Your...your a ghost. Your one of The Faces?"

It almost sounded if I had poised a question, but the truth was clear that they were indeed ghosts. My parents didn't even answer but instead both walked forward. I retreated backwards but as I turned my head I knew it was of no use as there were more Faces behind me. My parents vanished, like a mist, and reappeared...inside me.

I didn't know how to explain it but I could feel their spirit and existence inside me. I immediately knew both of their thoughts as if they had cojoined their mind with mine. Maybe they had. The Faces were known for being able to posses. There was nothing I could do but writhe under the presence. They were trying to showing something, they were trying show memories. 

At first I knew what I was seeing. Their death and the axe chopping off their heads, but then everything turned to confusion. All I saw was a blackened land, made of ash and coal, and blazing fires everywhere. Then, I saw it, I saw him.

The Devil. His face completely red and eyes a luminous black, his hands had long fingernails and he sat on a throne made of ashen white skulls. 

I assumed I was seeing the past of my parents, what had happened to them in the afterlife. All of a sudden The Devil reached out his hand, a blackened thing, and pointed it towards me. I knew that it wasn't really me this had happened to rather my parents, but I still felt it. 

Hot flames on human flesh. I screamed as the red hot pain coursed through my body like the venom of a snake. I could feel what my parents had felt, the torture they had faced.

Tears streamed down my cheeks as I felt the sensation of burning, and I could barely breathe when finally the visions dissipated.

I buckled to my knees, hitting the dirt ground of The Woods with pain, but nothing compared to the feel of fire on skin. My parents flew out of my body, a weird thing to happen, and stood in front of me. Ghostly creatures with powers beyond human understanding. They stood above me, watching me recoil from the pain and I spoke once more, my voice an iron blade.

" Why did you do that to me? And that man, that creature, did  he torture you more."

My parents wore a grim expression and I knew what it meant. The Devil, a creature of myths and tales, was as cruel as they say. 

The Faces looked upon parents with a sense of respect, and I knew that somehow my mother and father had earned the name. What they had done to earn it, still sat uneasy with me? But something about their expression was something I knew. They were hiding something from me.

I pried at their walls by saying, " What? What is it? What do you want from me?"

Every one of The Faces turned their expressions to stone and watched with heavy gazes as my father spoke carefully as if I was something fragile they didn't want to tip over. 

He said, " We are not going to kill or harm you. But we need a favor. We need you to free us, to let us roam the world. We need you to free us from The Woods."

( New chapter out on Thursday.)