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Language:
English
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Published:
2025-06-07
Words:
474
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1/1
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1
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4

The Forest

Summary:

In the Ubrijan Peninsular, on the border of Cafrus and Stuog Shua lies the unexplored, uncharted and mysterious Forest, Aaric Glindle sets out to be the first to chart it's leafy depths.

Notes:

(See the end of the work for notes.)

Work Text:

Aaric Glindle stood on the edge of The Forest. A large expanse of twisted oak, hazel, birch, and lime and so definitive an example of its kind that no other expanse of woodland can truly be called a forest, let alone The Forest, in Stuog Shua. An empty piece of cartography paper in one hand and a compass orienting him East in the other, Glindle prepares to be the first person to enter, and leave, The Forest in all recorded history.

He breathes, in, then out, then in as he takes a step past the first moss laden trees of The Forest. Since his youth Aaric Glindle had been captivated by stories of The Forest, the deep dark Forest, that enigmatic world of dappled shade, of mysterious and dangerous depths that formed the basis of so many of the fairy stories of his youth, stories meant to instil a fear of The Forest into wayward children, yet they served to intensify his fascination of The Forest, here he is, finally taking his first steps into its wooded embrace.

Walking on Aaric becomes aware of two things, he has been holding his breathe since his first steps into The Forest, secondly, as he finally exhales and resumes breathing, he is surrounded by the sounds of life: of bird song and insect trills, of wind through leaves and the creaking of boughs, surrounded by the orchestra of life he feels calmer and more alive than he has ever felt.

After progressing through The Forest for days he reaches a clearing, inside the chorus is silent, silence that is all the more deafening after living within nature’s cacophony for countless days. In the centre of the clearing, a tree, an old tree, an ancient tree, gnarled and wizened the clearing exists as if the other trees had stepped back out of reverence for this single, solitary but dead tree. “The mother tree” a voice, as if formed from wind and leaves and only audible due to the utter silence around Aaric “The heart, and start, of our forest. Without her we would be naught but a copse”
“It’s dead, is The Forest dying too?”
“Forests around the world are dying, to the gluttonous hands of civilisation and consumption without thought or feeling. For accumulation for accumulation’s sake, but not this forest. This forest endures, The Forest endures. It is protected.”
“By this tree? It’s dead.”
“She is not our protector but our progenitor, it was her life that began us and her death which sustains us, it is the same for all trees, all life, within this forest. While we live death sustains us, the contradiction of life.” Aaric turns back towards the treeline where animated wooden creatures stand, swaying slightly, gazing softly at him. He walks to them, back into The Forest, and isn’t seen again.

Notes:

My favourite parts of the LoTR is the Rohirrim chapters, followed closely by Fangorn Forest which (along with The Edge Chronicles) are big inspirations for this story. The world this is set in is one I've been slowly building over the past few months but I've had the idea for something like this forest for a few years, initially it was a forest that had somehting akin to an immune response that worked through a mycelial root network, when a tree was cut down and removed from the network other trees would be magically animated to fight off the invaders, thereby cutting themselves off form the network causing something of a cascade, I really liked the idea that this forest could communicate with itself but to defend itself trees would have to permanently sever themselves from that community but I couldn't figure out how that cascade could naturally end while keeping the forest intact and also communicate the inner workings to a reader or player in a TTRPG, I also realised that I prefer things like this to be more ambigiuous and unexplainable, it works this way because that's the way it works, rather than having a cold sciency reason. Anyway, I've rambled on enough, just two more things; this story also contains some of my own thoughts on life/death (they aren't precisley what I personally believe but they are close) and it is the first short story I've written since I did my GCSEs nearly 8 years ago! so, be kind, this is also the first thing I've posted to the internet (except the odd comment here or there). Thank you for reading the story (and this note) I genuinely hope you enjoyed it, I enjoyed writing it!