Forest of Fear

By Yaasha Moriah

No one entered the Forest unless they were unwilling, arrogant, suicidal, or mad, but desperation would make a mother do many things.

At the edge of the moisture-net field, Ever crouched with her infant son, Spear, wrapped in her cloak.

Behind her lay the base where the Taa and Marzr warred. Smoke hung like a battle-shroud over the lake basin, tainted with the bitter, sharp after-smell of blasters. The discharges flared like dying stars in the half-light of midday; on Gen, day was a watercolor painting and night a theater of monochrome without true light or true dark.

Ever stared, mesmerized by the strange shadow-puppet theater where blasters licked light into the world silently and life winked out just as silently. The Marzr had sworn to destroy the Taa dynasty, and this infant in her arms would reap the blood of that vow.

Turning, she rose and dashed across the shifting sands. Men shouted behind her. Something flashed and sparkled to her right—a missed blast. Her foot slid in her haste toward the scarlet-laced edge of the corrosive lake, but she recovered her footing, darting amongst the moisture-nets that collected the mist breathed from the waters. Another harsh light exploded at her feet.

All ways were death to Ever and her son: the Marzr behind, the chilling damp of the night or the shriveling dryness of the day, the toxic lake.

The Forest was her only hope.

In three more desperate strides, she ducked into the shadows of her chosen refuge.

The Forest was so named because of its density, but by Terran standards, it was little more than an overgrowth of exotic grasses and ferns the height of several men. Some of the vegetation looked like feathers, others like serrated blades, and still others like papery scrolls—all of which blocked out the wavering light and trapped moisture in the ground at Ever’s feet.

The first Taa colonists had walked beneath the shadows of these striped leaves, and had disappeared entirely, as though swallowed alive. The later colonists armed themselves, but panicked transmissions were the last anyone heard of the explorers and, since then, no one had dared enter the Forest, even to recover their bodies.

Fear. Ever tasted its bitter metallic flavor on her tongue. Was it wise to flee from a known death to an unknown one? She glanced back. But already the grasses had swallowed her path, erasing all sense of direction, and Gen’s smoky sky offered no navigational points.

Survival in the Forest was no longer a choice. It had enclosed her, and she and her son must live.

Her heart beat like frantic wings, flinging fear out from her chest, where it returned to her triple-fold.

I’m going to die. He’s going to die.

Die, die, die, alone on a planet light-years away from her birthplace. The voice of panic cut off all reason, mounting to greater heights.

Something was wrong. This was beyond natural fear. Was this what the dead explorers encountered—fear that they could not control? Fear so intense that their hearts died within them? Where did it come from? An airborne toxin? Some alien virus?

Ever fell to her knees, throat dry and limbs quivering.

There was no time. The Marzr had won, after all.

There will be no Taa survivors.

Ever’s son stirred and whimpered in her arms, writhing against her tightening grip. Then he opened his glass-bright eyes and looked up at her.

A sliver of wonder cut through the chaos in Ever’s mind. It was not the first time that she had fallen in love with her child’s face, but the interaction anchored her.

I love you, Spear Alefto Junior.

The nightmare melted. It seemed the Forest glimmered with a warm light that she had missed before. Why had she thought the Forest horrific? Why had she feared death? The very leaves in this place echoed back her love for her son, chanting his name.

Ever lifted her face to the broken pieces of sky visible through the thick leaves and laughed. Now she knew the Forest’s secret.

“An amplifier,” she said aloud.

The first man had walked into the Forest, wary of its strangeness and of whatever dangers he might find. His invisible thoughts had spread like a contagion amongst his companions, and to every degree that their fear increased, the Forest magnified it back to them until, looping and increasing, their own reaction became their death.

The explorers had brought fear, found fear, and died by fear.

But Ever had brought a child and found only love, wonder, possibility.

Ever closed her eyes. The future unraveled before her, as clearly as a memory.

They would survive the Forest, she and the boy who bore his slain father’s name. They would eat of the plants and drink the moisture that collected in the hollows of the leaves. They would sleep upon the high ground where the earth remained dry, and they would carry only strength and hope with them.

If enemies came to seek her and her son, those enemies would fall by the same evil intention they brought into the Forest.

Her son would live, and he would walk the Forest unharmed until he could come into his birthright. The Marzr would be conquerors for a short time, but her son would be lord of Gen.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Yaasha Moriah writes YA/adult speculative fiction that burns through the darkest realities with truth and redemption. She is the wife of a book-hoarding Dragon and a lover of all things purple. When she is not writing, she is updating her bullet journal, exploring the outdoors, serving women, and bringing awareness to chronic illness (she currently lives with a neurological disorder). Born and raised in Vermont, Yaasha now lives in Virginia with her Dragon.

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