Sweet Dark Tale

One |Overridge|

It was a fortnight of slick darkness for Ress.

After all, it isn't every day your sister goes missing.

It was a sudden thing, indeed. Someone that you had known for years of your own life, suddenly gone, just like that.

When he found out, he scoured the town for her. Not a single clue or sighting. He almost beat up the butcher when he wanted payment for telling Ress whether or not he knew anything.

It had been exactly seven days since Charlotte disappeared, not a glimpse of her since. At first, Ress had his suspicions about Richard, his father. When he was drunk, he'd do anything. Including kill his own step-daughter.

Anger flew through him every time he even thought about Richard. Ress was sitting outside, charcoal scratching fiercely on paper. As he drew, what took residence upon his paper was a picture of his father.

Ress's lip curled up, and he hurried to scratch out the eyes, erasing any tiny shred of soul from existence.

He angrily slammed his paper on the ground, unable to stomach looking at that sick bastard any more than was necessary. Ress glanced up, eyes wandering across the field he sat in. It was a cool evening, the sun just beginning to tilt downward to the horizon. Ress enjoyed sitting here—it calmed him down, usually.

But not today. He was too wound up and worried about his little half-sister. If she was dead...

She couldn't be. It simply wasn't possible. Ress had sworn an oath to always protect his family. His real family, not simply his blood.

His real family was Charlotte, his mom, and Andela. Only two of them were kin, but Andela might as well have been. She'd been with Ress from the very beginning---and had never done anything to hurt Charlotte.

Ress wasn't going to give up until he found Charlotte.

He stood, gathering the thick parchment he used to sketch with. His charcoals had been worn down to little nubs. He would have to pick some new ones up from the market, so he could make missing posters for Char.

As his physical form wandered out of the field, so did his mind. In this world, Char was fine. In this world, Richard was the one who'd gone missing. Andela would have brought some fine bread over to celebrate, as the main baker in town owed her a favor (or two.) His mother would have sat down with them, and Char would have teased him more about wanting to court Andela. Then his mom would have asked questions, and Ress would be embarrassed and annoyed, but it would be so much better than this sick reality.

Before he even realized it, Ress had arrived in town. He frowned, taking note of this. He felt as though he had been losing so much time lately. It had started weeks before Charlotte disappearing, and while at this point he wasn't worried, it bothered him. Sort of like an itch he couldn't scratch, or . . . or holding in a cough. Yes, that was it. It was a strange feeling.

Ress hurried to Andela's house to give her an update on his plans. She lived on the corner of main street and Oak, so it didn't take long for Ress to get there. After all, Overridge was a tiny town---best called a village, actually.

He hurried up toward the heavy, red-blonde door (cherry wood?)  and into it. It was a nice day, and he wasn't all that concerned for his personal wellbeing from being outdoors, but he'd never had to knock before. He was practically part of the family---but he hadn't been here since Charlotte went missing.

Entering the fairly large house, Ress padded softly to Andela's room, where she liked to practice her own sketching, and where he liked to try to teach her. It was a work in progress.

He knocked softly on the wall outside of the curtain hung up. There wasn't actually a door, but it was fair, because Ress's room at his own house was shared with his sister---that is, before she went missing.

"Come in," Andela's normally sharp and brisk voice sounded, oddly subdued.

Ress pushed back the curtain and entered her tiny room.

Andela sat in the middle of her floor, the straw mattress she slept on pushed to the corner. Surrounding her were newspapers upon newspapers, ink drawings, and the sketched out missing posters for Charlotte that Ress had dedicated his time to. There was yarn splayed out in every direction as well, connecting each poster or clipping to one main sketch---one that Ress immediately recognized as one that wasn't his own.

"What . . . are you doing?" Ress sat down beside Andela, almost without conscious decision. Andela tapped the quill she was using against the scratched wooden floor.

"I think I've got it," she murmured, brown eyes roving quickly across the room. "But I still feel like I'm missing something!"

"You're missing . . . what, exactly? What are you even doing?" Ress squinted at his best friend, wondering if she had gone wandering with the faeries since last time he'd seen her.

"What if I just . . ." Andela carefully picked up one end of yarn from where it was situated on a poster, carefully switching it with what looked like a map piece.

"Aha!" Andela exclaimed. "Yes, that is where they must have come from! Obviously they couldn't have just wandered straight to Overridge from Vien! You'd have to go through all sorts of rough terrain---"

Ress cut Andela off in an attempt to get some sort of explanation from her. "You still haven't told me what you're doing."

Andela calmed a bit, but her excitement didn't fade. "So, I was thinking a few weeks ago about Charlotte, right? And where she could have gone? I did some research, and along with a bit of inference on my part, figured that she'd gone into the Nixh."

Ress stared at her, waiting for her to continue. If he didn't know her, he might have interrupted, but thankfully, he'd already learned his lesson about that years ago.

"And there are only a few people who can navigate the Nixh, because of how dangerous it is, as well as the rumors," she pointed out. Ah, yes. The rumors of dark beasts and dangerous humanoids definitely made people wary to wander past the trails in the Nixh.

"I was reading newspapers, articles, books, even. There were plenty of people who claim to have gone in, but most were clearly fake. And then I found them—a group of people who call themselves the Hunters."

Ress snorted. "The Hunters? What a dumb name."

"This is serious," Andela snapped. Ress flinched guiltily. He knew that it wasn't a joking matter, but sarcasm or humor or some type of offensive joke always seemed to find its way into any conversation. Not a single person could be satisfied by anything—good or bad, blessed or cursed. It was just the way the world was; filled with selfish people who couldn't care less.

"I'm sorry, An. Keep going. Let's hear more about these Hunters."

Andela seemed to sit up straighter, getting almost excited now. "I think they've really survived the Nixh, Ress. I think that they can help us find your sister."