Falling behind a bit...

I dhould have posted this yesterday, but between the con last weekend, a lot of fun holiday activities, cinema (James Bond and Dune, tonight!) and doing some marking, it was only to be expected I'd fall behind. Hey, it took me until day 19 to do so. That's better than most other Inktobers!

Here's my lineart of "Ancient Grove". The prompt (as well as for the next two pieces) take second position to the story now, but I'm still finding ways to accomodate them. 

I'm also posting the story here, in full! I've changed minor bits in previous instalments to round it all off. If anyone would like to read it, and has any feedback, I'd be glad to hear your thoughts!

(There'll be an introductory bit as well as another image to go first, later)

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ONCE UPON A HAUNTED FOREST

4: Shadowy friends

Agnes had never been in the forest before. Desperately, she looked for the bright green and yellow speck that was Peef, but couldn't see him anywhere. Even the light looked unfamiliar, as if the bright mid-day had turned to twilight in an instant.

While she hovered on a clearing, unsure of whether she dared to go deeper into the forest to go after Peef, she heard a faint, barely audible swishing sound above her head. She looked up quickly, ready to sprint for  cover, but it was only a little flock of Shadingales. Their wings hardly moved as they circled above her, their bright eyes disconcerting but curious.

Agnes gathered all her courage. "I'm looking for my little firecrest," she said. "Have you seen him? Can you help me?"

Their voices sounded almost exactly like their shadowy swishing wings, and she had to strain her ears to distinguish them. "A crest, a crest!" they said. "There was a crest! We saw him flying deeper into the Forest, towards the Grove of Faces. He was following the cry for help."

"A cry for help?" Agnes replied. "You heard a cry for help, but you didn't see what was going on? And left my poor Peef to investigate?"

"We do not leave our clearing," said the shadowy voices. "The Grove of Faces is a strange place indeed."

"Can't be any stranger than this, can it?" Agnes muttered as she leapt on, in the direction the Shadingales had indicated.

7: Faces in the Trees

As Agnes plodded deeper into the forest, the darkness deepened until she had to walk slowly to avoid stumbling over low brances and tree roots. All birdsong had ceased, and the silence was like a crushing, choking presence. Gnarled, dead trees stood on either side, overgrown with mushrooms, sinister in the gloom. While she wondered how far the Grove of Faces was and what awaited her there, she heard a squabbling sound far ahead. It did not sound like Peef, but it was a lead, and she braced herself to go towards it.

Something held her back. The hem of her cloak had caught upon a root - no, was it a low-hanging branch? As her glance followed its shape, she hunched down in fright as her eyes fell upon a nightmarish face staring at her from one of the trees, which suddenly did not look dead at all. As she glanced round in alarm, she saw similar faces all around her. The trees did not even move, but there was life and malice in their faces that made all her instincts scream to run for cover.

Then, far off came the squabbling sound again, and she gripped her collar tightly as she steeled herself. Peef needed her.

"I'm looking for my firecrest," she said. "I have no business with you. Let me go my own way, and I'll be gone immediately."

The answer came in a creaking groan, like crumbling wood and wind in leafless branches. "We cannot let you go. The forest guards its secrets. None may leave here to undo what has been for a thousand years." More branches and roots crept out towards her.

The hairs on her ears stood on end at these words. With a tremendous leap, she darted out of their reach, and did not stop running until there was grass under her feet and faint birdsong above her.

10: Dark Fae

“It was your fault!” – “No, your fault!” – “You lets it escape, you did!” – “And the crest too! Naught but shadow fowl for eatin’ for as long as I can remember, and you lets a real crest get away!” – “Is that all you thinks of? Don’t you remember the verses? When the Light is free at last – you knows what happens next?” – “Yeeeh, but he won’t appear here, now will he? These shrubs look like high-wrought halls to you?”

Bewildered and alarmed, Agnes followed the angry little voices until she reached a clearing covered in shrubs and ferns. An empty iron cage stood on a large, flat stone in its middle. All around it, little winged Fae were flitting, squabbling, biting and hitting every bit of each other they could reach.

The forest guards its secrets, she thought. But it had better guard them well, because I am going to find my Peef!

Their little claws and teeth looked very sharp, and Agnes would not have dared to do what she did next if it hadn’t been for a little, bright green feather lying before the cage on the stone.

“Where is my firecrest?” she demanded of the little creatures, stepping among them. “Where did he go?”

They had been so busy with each other that they had not seen her approach, but now they let go of each other, turning their ugly little faces towards her.

“You is friends with that crest?” they shrieked. “Then you will find him for us, and find what he stole, and then we eats you both!”

“No!” Agnes cried, fending off their sharp little claws and teeth as they swarmed around her and tried to lift her up. “Let me go! You will eat neither him nor me!”

But they were too many, and too fierce, and as much as she struggled, she could not shake them off. Then, when she thought that all was lost, there was a long, warm sound in the cold dark air, like a deep bell chiming in the forest, and courage filled her heart as the Fae shrank and quavered.

13: The Guardian

Into the clearing sprang a white stag, the most magnificent Agnes had ever seen. Glimmering cobwebs streamed from his antlers like ribbons as he came down upon the clearing, scattering the Fae, who shrieked and rushed away into the gloom.

The stag did not pursue them, but turned back to Agnes, who still sat where they had left her, trying to get her bearings and unable to make sense of what had happened. But then the stag spoke, and his voice sounded like deep but gentle bells.

“Did you set free the Light?” he asked, and his glance passed the clearing and the empty cage. “Did you set in motion the things that were foretold a thousand years ago?”

“No,” she whispered. “My crest must have done. But I don’t know what that means. The fae talked about a light, and someone in high-wrought halls, but I don’t know what they were talking about.”

The stag turned towards the dark forest as if he was listening. Then he bowed his beautiful head to Agnes and said, “What the fae spoke of is just a few of the verses foretold a long time ago:

When the Light is free at last
The Guardian comes to his high-wrought Halls
Follow the Light
To end of night
Shining Key unlocks the Gate
And Spirits roam free from earthy walls.”

16: Ghostly animals

“I was the Guardian of this forest,” the stag went on, “when it was fair and green and full of birdsong. Then the Light of the Forest was taken and imprisoned in an iron cage, and the spirits of all that lived here faded away, lingering in deep underground caverns. For long centuries, what remained of the creatures of the forest has been bound to their shadowy forms and their trees and clearings. Some endured. Others became mean and twisted, like the Fae and some of the trees. While the Light was imprisoned, I slept. Though I have been awakened, I cannot yet return to my halls in the heart of the forest, for I cannot pass the Gate.

But now the Light has been freed from her prison, and soon, the time will come for me to return. You must follow the Light, and bring to pass the events foretold a thousand years ago. I cannot go with you. But fill your heart with courage, and find your crest, and the Light that is with him, and follow where she leads! Go now!”

19: Ancient Grove

Agnes left the Guardian, but she found that the courage that had filled her when she first heard his voice was still in her heart, and she felt as though no evil could frighten her. With the stag gone, the forest felt completely dark, but after a while, she saw a faint trace of glimmering specks of light between the trees.

She had not gone far when the faint glimmer grew to a golden glow ahead in an ancient grove, and she heard voices – not the eerie voices of Shadingales or the other birds of this place, or the cackling and shrieking of the Fae, but a friendly sing-song voice in conversation with–

“Peef!” she cried, running across the roots and mushrooms towards the golden glow. There was her firecrest flitting through the grove, and next to him floated a bright little speck of light, flickering unsteadily in the ancient grove, but bright enough to light it, more than anything she had yet seen in the forest save the Guardian himself.

Peef gave a joyous little twitter as he saw her, and in her joy at being reunited with him, Agnes hardly had eyes for the speck of light. At length she tore her eyes from the firecrest to look at the little stranger, and she saw a figure within the brightness, wavering and flickering and looking at them, her expression full of joy and hope.

“Well met!” said the Light of the Forest. “I am glad indeed to have two companions now! We must be on our way. You must come with me to the High Hall, to unlock the gate so the Guardian of the Forest can return, and the forest spirits are set free!”

22: Twinkling pumpkins

“We must search for the key,” Peef said as they made their way through the dark undergrowth. The Light still shone unsteadily, but her gleam seemed to grow stronger the closer they came to the heart of the forest. Everywhere they went, they seemed to leave a trail of lingering light behind, as if the presence of the Light alone could hold the darkness at bay and bring back hope and life to the forest. At the same time, the thicket became denser and denser, until they had to clamber on their way.

“The Guardian spoke of a key,” said Agnes, remembering. “But where is it? Surely it must be well-hidden if it hasn’t been used for many centuries?”

“I know the Fae tried to find it, and destroy it, so the verses that were foretold could not come to pass,” said the Light. “I do not know where it is, though they long tried to get the secret out of me. I only know this: we are following the path that was foretold. If the key can be found, it will be found.”

25: Masquerade

With the Light weaving around them, they went on laboriously through the forest. After a while, Agnes was startled to find that the shimmering weave around her seemed to free her feet from the entangling roots, allowing all of them to pass easily through. The stifling thicket thinned, and suddenly they found themselves in a clearing that could only be described as a Hall. Trees stretched high up into the sky, their branches interwoven like carved pillars, but their living foliage creating a gentle canopy. Soft moss covered the ground. The Light had become stronger and stronger almost with each step they took, and the clearing was filled with her golden glow.

The Gate stood in the centre of the Hall. It could only be the Gate the Guardian had spoken of; it was a green mound, with slabs of stone lying on it, each carved with patterns that echoed the glow filling the clearing. As they approached, Agnes saw that the stones began to shine brighter and brighter. In the middle of the mound, the light was slightly dimmed, as if it was—

“The keyhole!” whispered the Light.

“But where is the key?” Peef asked in distress, flitting this way and that, as if he expected to find it lying in the grass somewhere.

The Light hovered before the mound, looking suddenly unsure and forlorn.

“If the Fae have tried for so long to find it, how can we hope to?” twittered Peef, despair creeping into his voice.

28: A Strange wind

Agnes stood still, the Guardian’s voice echoing in her mind, as clearly as if he was standing beside her.

When the Light is free at last
The Guardian comes to his high-wrought Halls
Follow the Light
To end of night…

“Well,” she said slowly, “they kept her locked up, didn’t they? They never followed her.”

“But you did,” said the Light.

“And you led us here,” said Peef.

Shining Key unlocks the Gate…

“It’s you,” whispered Agnes.

They turned to her.

“You are the key,” she went on, in the same low whisper. “The shining Key. It’s you.”

For a while, none of them spoke. The carved stones in the mound seemed to hum and pulsate with a golden glow like a beating heart, and the Light began to radiate with the same rhythm.

Then came Peef’s quavering voice. “So this is good-bye?”

The Light hovered close to him, and embraced him briefly. Her brightness was now so strong that it almost swallowed the little bird.

“Farewell, my friends,” she said. “May we meet again!”

As the Light slowly sank onto the mound, Agnes had to close her eyes against the brilliance that suddenly emanated from it as the lights mingled. She glanced up again when a mighty wind swept up from the mound, light or air or music or an indistinguishable mix of all three streaming out in all directions, filling every corner of the clearing, of the forest, or possibly the world, lifting her heart and soul.

31: Peculiar spirits

Still the wind rose up into the sky, and now Agnes saw that shapes came with it, rising from the mound and the caverns beneath it, shaking their heads, beating their wings, flicking their tails, twitching their ears, staring at their surroundings, then starting to dance and caper out from their long prison in expressions of pure joy.

And Spirits roam free from earthy walls, whispered Agnes as she held the crest close. She could not tear her eyes from the exuberant dance of life that continued to stream from the Gate, watching as all around them, the forest was filled with life and light as in the first spring the earth had known. Young leaves sprouted from barren trees, the air overflowed with the sweet scent of flowers, the rush of running water, and the song of nightingales. The Fae danced upon the mound. In their midst, his antlers sparkling with dewy cobwebs like jewels, stood the Guardian. He slowly inclined his proud head towards Agnes and Peef.

“It seems I’ve got you back,” she said softly to the bird. “Let’s go home, shall we?”