Over the centuries, Oriana had changed her appearance, slightly altering the people’s perception and memories of who she was. They thought her to be the daughter of deceased town’s folk, and she would continue to change these glamours and perceptions of herself every twenty or so years, just when she began to get comments about how good she looked for her age. She had changed her features just enough to make herself look as if she could be related to the townspeople everyone remembered. Her current enchanted glamour was closer to her actual facial features than she had ever used, only really changing the shape of her face and the tilt of her eyes.
“The night I found Garren in the forest, he had somehow stumbled onto the barley farm, falling right through from darkness into light. I was in my natural state. Do you think…” Oriana placed her chin atop her knees. “What I mean to say is…this is the closest I’ve ever been to my natural facial features. Do you think he remembers?”
“You are letting your mind wander, dear one,” Haldis assured her as she slowly pushed up from her seat. “Go get some rest. I’m sure he was just over-tired.”
Haldis was right. She was letting her thoughts take hold of her, drawing conclusions and assumptions from thin air. There was no way Garren could connect her with the woman he had seen in the forest, even if he did remember her from that night in her natural state.
She shook away the thoughts, sighing wistfully. “You’re probably right. Do you mind if I rest in your spare room?”
Haldis smiled. “You are always welcome in my home, dearest. You know that.”
Oriana chuckled at that. “I know. Thank you, Haldis.”
6th Day of the Eleventh Month, 1774
Oriana had slept well into the afternoon of the previous day and woke just in time to help Haldis make her early morning rounds to the houses, delivering the week’s supply of medicines and ointments to the ill and elderly of Sardorf. By the time they were finished, it was dark and near time for supper. Garren had still been asleep when they started their rounds, but upon returning to Haldis’s home, he was nowhere to be found. Oriana waited up for him, but finally gave up as sleep claimed her once again, electing to stay one more night at Haldis’s.
She rarely stayed at Haldis’s home, much preferring the blissful solitude of her wooded oasis. But she had been so inexplicably exhausted from the past few days that she couldn’t seem to muster up the energy to go back to the place she called home. Part of her was also worried that Garren might spy her heading into the wood, and she most definitely couldn’t allow that.
So now here she was, two days after her soul-shattering kiss with Garren, and they hadn’t even seen one another, let alone spoken even one word after the event.
The next day, the full light of the morning shone in through the window, illuminating the room in an inviting warmth and waking Oriana from her slumber. She rose, collected herself, donning her favorite sapphire gown, and wandered out into the hall in the hopes of finding Garren still in his room, but his door was ajar and there was no sign of him. Oriana began to wonder if he had even come back to sleep the previous evening.
She descended the steps to find Haldis in her usual spot by the fire, scanning through one of her books on herbs and remedies. “Good morning. Did you see Garren leave this morning?”
“I did,” Haldis acknowledged.
“Did he say where he was going?”
“He mentioned something about exploring the forest I believe.” Haldis’s eyes didn’t even rise from her book. She simply flipped a page as Oriana stared at her, jaw hanging open.
“What!” Oriana yelled. “And you let him?”
“Well, why not? It’s not as if you are there lurking in the bushes to rip out his throat. The full moon is many evenings away and something tells me he won’t find himself lost within its maze as others seem to.”
“Yes, but that is exactly why I don’t want him going into the forest! You said so yourself that he is different. He found his way onto the farm, which should have been impossible. He somehow pushed his way through my enchantment, and he’s obsessed with discovering more about the forest. About me! The demon!” Oriana threw her arms up, seething.
“Well, he isn’t going to figure out it’s you from a casual traipse through the forest, is he? Besides, he went in the opposite direction of the farm. I watched him go. Now calm yourself, dear and come have a cup of tea by the fire.” Haldis reached out a hand, beckoning Oriana to join her.
“Haldis!” she groaned, shooting the elderly woman a withering stare. “I don’t wish for him to explore the forest at all. He’s clever and I won’t chance him discovering anything, no matter how small those chances are. I’m going to find him.” Without giving Haldis a chance to argue, she quickly donned her cloak and rushed out the front door, slamming it behind her.
She still didn’t understand how he had made it so far through the forest, especially mere moments before the full moon, or how he had pushed his way into her paradise at the barley farm, but she knew she didn’t want him to find it again. She had journals at the farm. Much like Garren’s book of monsters, only she wrote down victims of the bloodlust. Their names, if she knew them, and if not, the details of their features and everything she remembered of them. She would never forget them. Could never forget them.
Oriana stomped into the forest, pushing the fog aside like a curtain so that she could see far into its depths. He was nowhere in sight. She sprinted through the trees to the barley farm. Looking across the stream, over the flower beds and inside her cottage. He wasn’t there, thank the gods.
Where is he? Oriana closed her eyes, took a breath, and reached out through the Phantom Wood; her enchanted forest allowed her to see what was happening within. But the night he had stumbled upon her–half dead–she hadn’t felt his presence at all. She hadn’t even known he was in her forest.
She continued to reach out nonetheless, searching for the insufferable man. She not only wanted to prevent him from learning more about the forest, and her demon, but she wished to speak with him about their kiss.
Sleep had not come easy to her the previous two nights, her mind unable to settle from thoughts of the way his lips had felt upon hers. The warmth of his touch, the thrill of his body pressed against hers, and the tangible connection that tugged at her constantly. She couldn’t push it away; it poked and prodded at every moment, almost as if it were pushing her toward him, and would only be satiated once they were together.
She shook the thoughts away.
Garren was not in the forest. She saw nothing.
Grumbling to herself, she chose a direction at random and headed out on her search.
Two steps and Oriana froze in place. “No,” she breathed. The air around her suddenly grew uncomfortably hot, sucking the crisp winter breeze from the wood.
