A Short Story.

John had always enjoyed running in the woods. He enjoyed the birds chasing him, he enjoyed the wind on his face, and the leaves he kicked up from his raw hyde boots. He enjoyed the bears that would run away out of sheer confusion to see a human running in the woods in such a way. Just free. No weapons, no armor. Just running alone in the woods the way his great grandfather had in the days before the mountain went to war with the people for Yorn.

John kept running. He was looking for his favorite spot. The mountain was a strange, magical place though, and it would constantly change. Not the location of the thing, but the feelings of the places that you ran to to get there. You would constantly doubt yourself, and you could feel the ravens staring down at you from the branches, almost shaking their heads at your attemps to find something on the mountain, especially as a human. John knew how to traverse it though. He had been there a thousand times before, and he had never let the unsureness get to him. He was concerned this time, though. The mountain seemed different. IT wasn't just this one spell this time. It wasn't just the spell held by the animals of the mountain, glued to every tree branch like a gian spider web. It was more. The pull of the spell was greater this time. John Could feel it. As though whoever the unknown caster was he was redoubling his efforts. Was he doing it just for John? or was this place somewhere he had never been to before, and the spell was stronger here? was he truly lost? John had no idea.

The spell John knew so well was only wispered about in Yore. Nobdoy in town knew where it had come from, or when the mountain had become to cursed by what seemed to be the animals themselves. John can remember his father telling him about the dangers of the woods, and the stories of a great spider that controlled the spell. His father had reassured him they were only stories though, and that there was no great entity controlling the mountain. It was simply that people had forgotten how to talk to the forest, and how to befriend it. As such the mountain had cast a great spell on itself to protect it from the men who would always tear away at its trees, hunt its animals, and fish its streams to ruin. They would burn the forest floors into fertilizer for their crops, and move forward, ever closer o the peak of the mountain with reckless abandon. Then one day people started to get lost.

First it was the hunters. The strongest dissappeared first. They would leave on a many days hunting trip, expected to return with enough meat to feed their families for the long, cold winter that the shores of the Muriel Sea were so famous for. They would be gone for days. Then weeks. And only a handful would return, shaken, and without any kills to show for it. Many of the strongest, and bravest men never returned. When the men were asked what happened, their eyes would go blank as if they had seen a ghost, and no memory of what happened on the mountain could be sopken, as if they were sworn to secrecy by a force grater than themselves. Even grater than the mountain.

Years passed, and a town which has become a famous fur trading town slowly fell into ruin as its town people learned the ways of fishing the frigid, barren waters. The Muriel Sea was a salty, black sea, which was known to have little sea life, if any at all. For a full century the People of Yore scratched their life out of that Sea, creating a hardened group of folk that were just as able to survive the harsh climate in the shadow of the mountain as they were afraid of the scret magic the mountain seemed to hold.


Tourists or travelers would come from time to time, and they would stare in disbelief at the beautiful mountain behind the town. Overlush, with no trails leading to its base. Seemingly overteeming with flora and fauna, ready to be harvested, hunted, and enjoyed. These travelers would often not heed the townsfolks warnings "There is no trail for good reason" was the statement that many would say from Yore. They would be ignored. The stronger the traveler, the less forgiving the mountain would be. John has been the only one to understand the mountain. Understand its magic.

Magic is a strange thing. It isn't as you read about in the story books: a thing that bursts with great energy from a wand, or a staff. Magic here is much slower, more deliberate, and more subtle. You can't quite find it, or see it, or smell it. But you can feel it. You can feel it seep into your bones. The People of Yore knew of the magic on the mountain. As their population grew less from famine or cold or pilgrimage to more fertile lands farther north, the people of Yore could feel the magic. They could feel the invisible spiderwebs clutching at the edges of their slanted thatched roofs at the edge of the mountain, slowly moving through their streets, making their night lamps less bright as they once were. John Seemed to dispel this just with his presence. Nobody understood it.

John was born very slight, and grew into boyhood with constant illness. He always had a love of the forest, though. He would often play too close to the mountain, and many thought he was cursed. He would venture ever farther into the forest each day in the summers, springs, and autumns as he grew into manhood. Then has his 13th year passed, and his grandfather's bow as passed down to him, he began to venture deeper into the woods. Sometimes for a day, other times for weeks. Unlike the men before him for the past age, John would return with more energy and vitality.

Today was different. The Mountain was testing him. It wanted to know his true mettle. John could feel the trees lean in around him as the invisible cobwebs seemed to tug a little bit at each branch, or was is just the breeze? He walked forward, feeling more tired than he had  in many years. He continued to follow his path that he knew, ignoring the unsureness in his mind. Ignoring his desire to turn back He knew if he gave into it he would be lost. The mountain would send him home like so many before.

Then he was upon it. The hut beneath a great waterfall, which seemed taller than the tallest tree in the forest. Even though the waterfall was so great, at least 500 feet tall and 100 feet wide, it emptied into a small, serene lake. at the far side of the lake,  next to the path that John had made was a small hut. It was hewn from softwood in some great haste, to create shelter from the great storm some years before. It had a moss roof, and a steel pipe where the woodstove let its smoke into the air. The strangest thing about this place, was that even for the great size of the waterfall, it was not noticeable from the town, nor from the opposite mountain ranges. The waterfall was also oddly quiet, as if it was miles and miles away.

John Heaved a sigh of relief. He had made it.  He pulled his pack up closer to his back, checked to make sure his bow and quiver were still about his person, and trucked toward the small shed. he knocked on the door three times. As he knocked, he could see the shed quiver and shake,  and it seemed as though at any moment the small shack would shatter and fall to ruin right before him. The sounds of the shaking didnt reverberate, though. It was as if they were only noises and sights inside Of John's head. Creating no sound except for him, for the knocker. The door creaked open just a crack.

"Ah, John" Said a small feeble voice "I'm glad you've made it"

John Stepped inside the small shack. it smelled of rotten meat and a poorly drafted wood fire. The Old Man sitting on the other side of the shack offered him a seat, the same seat John Had taken many times before.

"Tell your grandfather how my spell is holding"

John swallowed, but refused to break his gaze with his grandfather. He was untimely old as this point, and the spell he had cast had obviously given him unnatural long life. With each passing year he seemed less and less man like and more like some twisted figure that wa simply alive due to the hatred he felt for the People Of Yore.

"Grandda, its time to let it go"

"You know I can't do that" said The Old Man, and as he finished the sentence, it seemed as though the mountain would finally engulf John. He felt the spiderwebs in his mind enclose around him, and the complete fear of the mountain start to take hold of his mind. Just as quickly, his grandfather removed the spell, and let him rest.

"does my spell still hold, John?"

"Yes, Grandfather"