Unease

The nothingness of the forest beckoned. The trees had grown tall, but in nonhealth, urged by some blackened sap into spindles and thorns. Full though it was of creatures, it seemed only empty of life, restless and without warmth to the scouts, now venturing beneath it's shade.1

Thirty-some of them had been sent out, and were now split into troops, one to go east and one to go west, and then to reach the mountains in twenty days' time. To pinpoint even such a vague direction and a large mound of land proved near impossible. Behind dreams, they found their sense of direction stolen, and soon enough  after departure, the arms of the trees grew numerous enough to block out the sun. Worse, it was often obscured in such a bizarre way that East was West, and South was North, as if the spiderwebs in the canopies mirrored all light and perception.2

In hopes to find the sun, there was naught to do but climb. And though the mens' race was of nimble feet and deft hands, to climb the towers of some perverted nature was to walk on the crest of snow, to run beneath water, to drown in sky. Coming down was harder. Remembering where the sun lay, shrouded and sequestered, was hardest. And yet, they pressed on.3

Days upon days behind schedule, the two troops gazed upon the foothills of the Mnrewv mountains, and found themselves less plentiful in all but unease. The darkness the mounts cast upon them they  found only haunting, and neither could they bear to stand idle, tired as their ever-walking legs were. They and their shadows continued south warily, though the shadows soon departed them to their own kind, chasing clandestinely about. They left embroidered in their footsteps what comfort they had had, wholly aware that their tale had scarcely opened.4

More and more now, it became evident that some magic was at work. The men were not unfamiliar to magic, but this was altogether unearthly to them. Counting scouts became more difficult. Some days the numbers were too low, but no one seemed missing, and on other days, the numbers seemed too high, though no one seemed extra. Of all things, that seemed the most unnerving. Their heads didn't seem to fit their pillows right. Their feet didn't fit their boots. Their voices didn't fit their mouths, and the words between them grew less and less. Eyes flickered and extinguished behind the path, scuttling all about the outskirts of their vision, sparking in and out of boots like dying stars.5

And at last, the destination revealed itself. A ruin of a once merry stronghold huddled itself against the cold. Rooves had been peeled off like wet leaves, walls toppled like sticks in the wind. Most unusual of all was the garden. The blades of reeds were now but blades of knives, embedded in the frozen flowerbeds, and the grapevines but chains.6

Not a bone of a bird lay to hint at life, however distant. Not a sliver of sunlight danced in the wells. Not an oak whispered.7