Beauty and the Beasts

  Consolation: the stranger who never knocked on her door. Through out the years, her only constant friend was isolation - hiding in the forest until someone came to find her. However, this time, no one came. And this time she went deeper than before, to where there were no paths to show the way home. Driven by every unshed tear, she wandered deeper, and deeper into the black heart of the woods, where no wind stirred, and there were only shadows and darker shadows.
  Shadows, not seen, but felt, followed her every move, weaving a spell all round her to capture and quell. The incantation was already strong, when she turned to . She tried desperately not to show fear or recognition, but only to get away. It was too late, they had already wrapped her in their web, and now they pulled the the threads all tight. She could not move, could not breath, and could not think. Only fear what would come next...
~
  The forest enveloped him, and the air grew thicker with each grudging step. Sticks and stones and fallen leaves – all crushed under his feet, racing an unseen foe, to a place he did not know. The air tried to drag him down, like the back fall of the surf, but he only pushed harder, faster. The fact that he could not see his own hand in front of his face did not slow him down. If anything, he ran faster. The overwhelming oppression could only mean one thing: he was getting close…
~
  Fear; it can play on the mind, but in the end it can do no real harm to you. What you choose to do with fear is what has the potential to harm. You can choose to ignore it, embrace it, or just let it have its way. In any case, it is still all in your head.
  Wraiths: the cause of unprecedented fear, and unbearable damage to the heart. Wraiths, so often mistaken for shadows, are darkness incarnate. The wraiths that lurked around her defenseless body had waited so long for this moment. The first day she had run crying into the woods, their labors had begun. Working away at her defenses, convincing her they were her only safe haven. She had swallowed it all, hook, line and sinker. They could not but laugh at how easy it had been…
~
  She heard a shrill echoing in the wind, a rustling in the leaves. Wind? How had any wind managed to come so deep in the forest? No, not wind…breath - something breathing. Her imagination was playing tricks on her - she thought she saw something just beyond the closest bole, from the direction the breath was coming from. She thought it looked like an old man, too old to be alive, and that it was moving towards her, with an expression that on anyone else’s face might have been a grin. She was only wrong about one thing…it was not her imagination…
~
  The wraith stepped forward, closer and closer…
  Dougal saw it all in an instant, and instantly reacted…
  She trembled as the old man reached out toward her, and then she screamed as his head left his shoulders and came flying toward her…
  In one swift leap and swing, he had beheaded the wraith. Now he stood paralyzed, looking into the tearful eyes of the most beautiful maiden he’d ever seen. She looked as if she’d just seen a ghost…of course, she had, and he knew beheading it's host would only buy them minimal time. It would now be angry now, go looking for another host - and in such places very likely it'd be a wolf.


She was lost within a dense
part of the forest, full of shadow,
and creatures of the night gathered
to slake their hunger and their thirst
with the human's blood and marrow.
Oh, she was not without defense
but, felling one with an arrow,
nocked on another feathered
shaft. Then fled, searching for the meadow.