the Forest of Emmitaenu

Unexpected Company

[art by Valeria Bogado]

Inside the tree, Lara was caught off guard by the dreamy feeling that captured her. It would be so easy to fall asleep if she weren't frightened. The gargoyles roared overhead in masses of hundreds. It seemed as though they would never stop coming. 

She felt Jades hands on her arms, rubbing up and down in an attempt to be soothing. Lara appreciated the gesture. Scrunched together on the inside of the tree with them Zeftx was staring hard beyond what she could see. He seemed concerned as much as he was scared. She hugged Jades thin shoulders. All she had wanted was to go home. 

The gargoyles lessened their howling and bellowing and landed in the nearby trees. Something was happening. She tried to look out or at least up into the tree they were in to see what had landed on it, but it was far too dark and her mortal eyes didn't agree with dematerialization it seemed. It wasn't a problem for Zeftx though. He could see exactly what had stalled them.

"What is it?" Jade asked apprehensively. Zeftx shook his head disbelievingly.

"What are they doing here? Are they mad?" He asked, mystified.

"Zeftx, who?" Lara whispered.

"Oh my!" Jade gasp, sensing what Zeftx was seeing.

"What is it?" Lara's anxiety carried in her voice. She strained to see something, anything, but could see absolutely nothing and it frustrated and worried her. Lienkin! She screamed in her mind, nervous for him. He didn't reply. "We have to go back," she decided.

"No Lara dear, the gargoyles have all landed outside. It wouldn't be safe. But don't worry, the witches are fine." Lara shed layers of tension in that one sentence till Jade added, "It's the other two we must wonder about." What other two?

"There are others?" Lara asked. Zeftx nodded.

"A man lean and tall, very tense, with hair like yours...but darker." Zeftx examined him, describing what he saw out loud for Lara and Jade's benefit. "The woman beside him looks very fair of skin with short... choppy blonde hair, and her eyes...so green I can see them from here." Lara's own pair of bright green eyes widened and she gasped.

"Mortals?" She wanted to know. Zeftx looked at Jade, who bit her lip uncertain.

"I thought at first...at least one of them could be, but then again the other one seems..."

"Jade you're supposed to know these things!" Lara shrieked. Without taking a second to think it through, Lara leapt from the safety of the tree. She froze in place as a gust of wind pressed down on her and she saw the first gargoyle descend on the vulnerable pair Zeftx had described. 

"Mom! Dad!" She screamed over the roar of the beast. She knew it was them but her mind still struggled to accept what her eyes could see. In that same instant, her mother stepped forward to challenge the beast and Lara felt her heart slam against her rib cage. It was coming in too fast and there was nothing Lara could do to help. 

Lara's father snatched her mother's arm and pulled her behind him. The undeterred gargoyle slammed into her father instead, clutching him in its grasp, crunching his glasses and lifting back up into the canopy with its prize. 

"No!" Lara cried out and her voice pierced the darkness in every direction. On cue, the hundreds of birds massed above took flight and chased after her father. Amazed, Lara watched the parade of fowl crusading for her dad like a cluster of bats speeding in the dark back towards their cave. Why? Was all she could think, the rest of her brain was too tense to grasp anything else but her fathers fleeting silhouette.

They caught up with and attacked the gargoyle until it released her father. Lara could just make out the shape of his body as he was free falling back toward the ground. She yelped in horror but muffled her own cries with the back of her fist as he was caught in midair by another of the beasts.

Now all the gargoyles leapt into the air scavenging the forest floor for more victims. The birds continued to battle to free her dad only to chase after him yet again. It seemed an endless endeavor. With her eyes glued on her father's silhouette, she didn't notice the attack from behind. Lara! She heard Lienkin in her mind.

"Lara!" Zeftx yelled simultaneously, jumping out of the tree and tackling the creature. Jade too was standing out in the open, shouting look up as one more beast swooped in from above. Lara dropped to the ground as it flew narrowly past her head. They were overwhelmed by gargoyles flying everywhere and everyone was vulnerable.

With her hands over her head and her chest pinned to the ground, she peered up to see her mother in the center as a circle of gargoyles formed around her. Triauve raised her hands high while her eyes blazed with emerald fire, threatening the first foolish creature to step any nearer.

"My mother's insane," Lara whispered to her self, disbelievingly. "Oof!" Lara was suddenly airborne. She could hardly breathe; the grasp about her waist was too tight and had squeezed all the air out of her.

Let go of me! She thought frantically. Below she witnessed her father hit the ground with a sickening thud. For seconds she thought she would vomit. As she lifted higher into the air she watched her father grow smaller before the swarm of winged creatures hid him from view. The roar of the beast clutching her brought her back to her current state. She seemed to be flying miles above the ground. Panic filled her mind and she began to scream.