the Forest of Emmitaenu

Insane Jade

[Cover art by Illiyana Omareva]

"The spirits, apparitions, ghosts, whatever you want to call them, they're so very lofty. They know everything but it's like catching unicorns to get them to tell a teardrop's worth," whispered the nomad. She had been the first person to find Lara and had been rambling nonsense ever since.

The last thing Lara remembered, she was searching through her garage before taking a nasty dive off a shaky stack of boxes. Now, she was wandering around an unknown tropic jungle, led by a rambling elderly nomad woman. Lara would think it was all a dream, but the scrapes on her knees from the fall were real and painful. Looking down again, Lara re-registered for the hundredth time the torn holes in her jeans at the knees.

"I knew the moment I saw you, and nomad's, darling can sense these things," the woman continued, "You are something else! You are too pretty to be a witch, you're certainly no fairy-you're far too big, and angels glow...you don't my dear, at least not in the literal sense." She began absentmindedly ticking off the possibilities on her fingers. "You're two legs short of being a centaur, genies wither into smoke, immortal women don't wear trousers, wouldn't even consider a mermaid out of water, no vampire fangs when you speak, werewolves are hairy, and let's face it," she said as she turned pinning Lara with a serious stare. "Gnomes...are just plain ugly."

Lara was tempted to laugh at the insanity, but she was feeling lost and confused and growing more irritated with each step onward. "Please tell me, ah-Ms. Nomad, what it is you're trying to say." Lara hardly felt like encouraging the woman, especially considering she seemed more and more batty by the moment, but she didn't know what else to say.

She was only fifteen years old, stuck with a woman who looked to be in her fifties with long black hair streaked grey throughout, wearing a blouse tucked into a long and wide airy black cotton skirt and enough silver necklaces to open her own accessory store in the mall. They were lost in the forest and all they had was each other. The nomad looked taken back.

"Dear me, I should have introduced myself. I am called Jade. It's obvious to me what you are, though anymore very few would believe me." Jade glanced around before continuing in a low voice, "Lara... you are a mortal."

"Yes. I knew that," Lara said with reinforced calm. "What else would I be?" She was feeling fidgety on the inside, uncertainty eating away at her. She didn't like being lost with an insane person. It was starting to really scare her, civilization was nowhere in sight, and she was getting tired of the nonsense. The nomad started to dance a jig in the middle of the dirt and pebble path. At this point, Lara rolled her eyes and walked on alone.

When Jade noticed Lara had already left, she scampered to catch up. Sighing, Lara whirled to face the elder woman. "Listen lady, I don't mean to be rude, but if you really want to help me then tell me something useful. Forget about where the unicorns live or when gargoyles do their kidnapping and just tell me how to get back home. Otherwise," she huffed, "you're no help at all." She crossed her arms below her chest and waited impatiently for a serious response.

Jade didn't answer, instead she just skipped ahead and waved Lara on saying she knew someone who could help. Lara threw back her head in resignation and followed. For the most part, they didn't deviated from the path except in the beginning when they came to a fork leading in two separate directions. After Jade finally decided which side they wanted to be on, it was a one way road from there. The path wasn't paved. It was more of a dirt trail that weaved through and around the forest like a corkscrew with no beginning, middle, or end.

They had walked for at least an hour when they came upon a tiny hut along the wayside. Lara's first impression of the hut was in comparison to a settler's cabin in the old American west. It was a wonder to her that such a dated dwelling was still around, unscathed by modern industrialization.

It had the feel of a log cabin with a simple but sturdy roof supported by beams thick as tree trunks. The side they were facing when they approached the dwelling didn't feature any windows, but in the very center of the flat faced wall was a heavy wooden door which looked as thick as a drawbridge in the Middle Ages. Effectively it was one intimidating, heavy duty, how in the world to push it open kind of front door.

Lara stood a few paces behind Jade as she mused under her breath. Jade shushed Lara's murmurs so she could hum a mellow little tune in front of the front door. Lara didn't understand at first why the nomad was singing to the hut, but then again there wasn't much that Lara did understand when it came to insane Jade. Nothing all afternoon had made any sense at all. Though on the optimistic side of things, this was a man-made dwelling and that meant they were getting closer to society after all. So, at least the nomad had been right about one thing.

With renewed patience and trust in Jade, Lara quietly stared ahead, waiting for the door to be heaved ajar to let them in. Next thing Lara saw, to her utter shock and disbelief, was a man coming through the wall... like a ghost! He was tall with sandy blonde hair and a complexion as pale as the moon. Lara's eyes grew wide as she watched him walk up to Jade, who was completely unperturbed, and hug her familiarly. G- G- G- G- Ghost! Her mind went reeling out of control, and unable to understand what she had just seen she fainted.