The Black Forest

I pass a yellow streetlamp pouring out its light between dark pines, leaning so as to make an archway, menacing the butter-golden light, which passes between dimmed and anxious. The light meanders meekly on, lighting a path between the tall trees. I walk in. the forest curves over my head like a cathedral. I feel like Hansel or Gretel, peeking in between the trees set like teeth in a comb, shadows falling like matchsticks. The light fades behind me, barred with trees, and now it is almost gone, a beacon to guide me back. I look forward into the dark world. it seems almost like I have stepped into a fairy tale; not the sugary-false tales modified for children of today, but the beautifully woven, dark, and menacing tales of the Grimm brothers; the children killed and eaten by witches, carried off by faeries, raised by bears and wolves. I shiver and imagine a spiteful wing flutter behind a tree ahead of me, green and yellow eyes surrounding me as Spanish moss suddenly grows long and hangs down from every branch. Suddenly I feel the urge to turn around quickly. I force myself to walk on, a little more quickly than before. There is something about these woods, something magic and haunted, something faerie tale, dark and beautiful. I come to a little bridge across a stream. A curved little bridge, with carvings all around and through it. I almost expect to find a little girl here, lost and crying, or a troll, or an old woman (who's really a faerie) begging for food. I cross it, with the strange sensation that I am crossing into another world.
As I step down onto the ground on the other side of the little bridge, the world seems to gather and twist around me. I stumble and try to catch my balance but it's the world that is dizzy, not me. Suddenly, the universe snaps back to clarity like a giant rubber band. I rub my eyes and look around. The bridge has disappeared, and in the place of the stream is a deep gorge and white water barely covering jagged rocks at the bottom. I step back from the edge, and I see the forest transformed. Colors seem both brighter and more unreal. Small golden lights float like motes of dust in the sunlight- except no sun filters through the thick canopy. Only silky moonlight finds the forest floor. Florid flowers larger than any I have ever seen open before my eyes, pointing towards the crescent moon. The world seems deceptively pretty, danger lurking just beneath the overpowering sweet scent of the flowers. Suddenly, a fluttering, a soft pair of wings twists into my view. The moth is iridescent, glowing softly with a light of its own. It is so beautiful as to be almost breathtaking. I gasp, captured by its loveliness, and I feel a wondrous floating sensation, so soft, so beautiful. My brain protests for a moment, tries to regain control, but it's too late. I stumble after the gorgeous creature, helplessly following in its winding, seemingly aimless path. It flies faster, higher, and I am running urgently after, following the light of its wings, the sparkle of glowing dust, and it is gone, flown into the moonlight, and I am surrounded by a dark glen. Here the trees grow high and block out the moonlight. A perfectly smooth, black pond gleams, sinister in the center of the clearing. Dark roots and vines seem to twist about my feet, holding me back as I walk warily toward the water. Suddenly, a rock half in the water moves, unfolds in the darkness. I stumble back too late remembering the black vines at my feet which twist around me as I fall, oh so slowly, crash on the ground, caught by dark roots which twist inescapably around my arms and legs as I struggle they grow tighter cutting into me, and a dark form leans over me and laughs, dark and vicious. As the vines grow over my head, muffling my screams and covering my eyes, he leans close and whispers to me. "You will never escape...shall I help you?" His tone is mocking. I struggle ever more violently, and he chuckles, and draws a sword, holding it toward me, blade first. The metal drips with a dark liquid that burns my skin. The vines pull me completely underground, and I dimly hear him sheath his sword. I am dropped down onto a cold stone floor. I look around. I am in an underground room, cobbled with stones. It is empty except for a torch on the wall. I take it, and search for the small pack of kitchen matches I had taken from the hotel bar earlier that day as a keepsake. The torch flared to life, revealing a low, damp dirt ceiling, and stone walls. I see a dark patch on the opposite wall, and walk toward it. The flaring light shows a hall, leading into the dark. I follow it, for what do I have to lose? I doubt I will ever return to my own world. The tunnel leads on, twisting and turning. More tunnels branch off the sides, and I know I am in a labyrinth. The maze is so complex that I begin to doubt my own senses, and wonder which tunnel I came from. But there is no way out behind me, so I walk on ahead. The tunnel branches again, but now I see not another twisting hallway, but a room, filled with light. I walk in, wondering if I will see a way out or just another mystery. As soon as I enter the room, I know that I am not seeing daylight. The light comes from a strange globe, like a miniature blue sun floating in the center of the room. I am mesmerized, drawn in like a moth to the light. It pulses softly, and seems concentrated on an object, spinning in the center... I reach in, and the light flows around my arm like water, pricks my skin softly with a cool fire. My fingers close around the object in the center, and I pull it out. A set of panpipes, formed from the same material as the light, but hard and solid and real. They sparkle with an unearthly light, and on them words are traced in light. "A fickle friend; use me wisely and I am yours, use me wrongly and I shall become your master." The words fade even as I read them. I loop the cord around my neck, and walk back to the labyrinth. Now I have an ally, and I feel stronger already.