“My name’s Mahon.”

Mahon took in the four weirdly dressed people in front of him. The forest wasn’t that chilly, and yet, they were dressed from head to toes with thick outfits. They even used hats and scarves to cover their faces, as if a single breeze could freeze them to death.

If they hadn’t found the trail with Jorik a couple of days ago, he would’ve been much more surprised at spotting humans inside the eerie, beautiful forest. Neither of them were good at reading animal footprints, but human shoes were among the few they could easily recognize.

Finding new hopes in their desperate situation had been so rejuvenating they had almost jogged along the trail without stopping. Until they met this strange group that had stopped dead in their tracks as soon as they saw them. Mahon couldn’t blame them given their poor accouterments after running away from Amentiae for days and then wandering aimlessly for a whole week within the forest.

Though he didn’t expect his fellow humans to wear even worse outfits than he did.

The biggest man of the group suddenly pointed his strange tool at him and propelled a scrap of wood at Mahon’s face. Mahon caught the piece mid-flight and studied it with a curious look.

Is it some kind of offering? A ritual?

Mahon touched the pointy part of the stick. On second thought, it could have probably pierced his skin if it hadn’t been so slow.

Some kind of weapon, then?

He returned his attention to the silent group, still debating if they were hostile or not. It couldn’t really be an attack. The attempt had just been too weak to be called a real attack. Mahon then saw the shaking legs of the burly man who shot at him.

He is afraid?

“Wait! Stop!” The man who had spoken previously forced the other man to lower his crude weapon and raised his hand in what seemed to be a peaceful gesture. He seemed to be the leader of this group, or at least the more experienced if Mahon could judge correctly his advanced age from the only visible part of his body, his eyes.

Mahon put on his best gentle smile as he concluded the people in front of him were clearly afraid of him for some unknown reason. He planted his spear in the ground and took a step towards the group while raising his hands in the same gesture.

“There is no need to be afr…”

“Stop right there! Please!” The old man spoke again, quite urgently this time, and Mahon stopped.

He threw a look behind him, but Jorik simply shrugged back. Mahon saw in his eyes that he was also curious about the situation and wanted more than ever to ask important questions, but understood that the people in front of them were not acting normally.

“We didn’t mean to attack you.” The man, who seemed to be the leader of the group of four people, spoke again. Far from his initial outburst, it seemed he had calmed a bit, although fear and incomprehension were still very visible in his eyes.

“It’s not a problem. We don’t plan on attacking you, either.” Mahon answered. “See, we got a bit lost in this gigantic forest and we found the trail only recently. We’ll actually very much like to talk to you about this… place.” Mahon spoke in the same soothing way he used to comfort his soldiers with.

“You’re… lost?”

“Yeah, it’s been almost a week now that we’re stuck inside this never ending forest.”

“A week??! But… what did you eat?”

“Mainly fruits and plants.” Mahon shrugged at the weird question, but decided to answer nonetheless if it could help ease them. “Once an animal went close enough that we could grab it. We grilled it and made a delicious stew, but afterwards the others got wary of us, and lacking anything to lay traps, we went back to fruits.” Mahon explained in a joking voice in an attempt to lighten the mood.

Except his sentence had the complete opposite effect. The whole group took a step back, and it was only because of the old man that they didn’t all run away.

“I’m sorry if I offended you.” Mahon said immediately, his palm raised in front of him in a peaceful gesture. “We’re not from around here. Did we do something… uh… forbidden?”

“Something forbidden??! You should be long dead by now!” The old man suddenly exploded. “How are you even standing and talking like nothing happened? You’re inside the forbidden forest. Everything here is poisonous! Don’t you realize how foolish you are?”

Mahon couldn’t be more confused. Forbidden forest? Poisonous? What is he even talking about? Holding back a sigh, he tried to make do with what he knew.

“Like I said, we’re not from around here. We just escaped the clutch of Amentiae and ended up there. If you could be so kind as to enlighten us about our current location, that would help us a lot. Are you living alone in this forest? Do you know any other humans?”

“Amentiae? Living in the forest?! What are you talking about?” This time, it was the old man’s turn to be confused.

“Maybe they got lucky and only ate delirious poison?” The sole woman of the group spoke, but Mahon couldn’t make any sense of his sentence.

By the Fada, where did we land?

“By the Fada, that’s the most fucked-up situation I ever encountered.” One of the strangers echoed his thoughts.

“Oh, so you know the Fada!” Jorik interrupted.

“Of course, boy, who doesn’t know the Fada?” The man retorted harshly.

“Then you should know about the Amentiae!”

The group exchanged weird looks between themselves before they glanced back at the duo.

“Yes, I can’t see anything else than what Meriel said. They’re completely high. Probably got drugged by a rabbit and forgot everything. Maybe it made them immune to the other poisons while it’s in their system.” The thin man at the front spoke for the first time.

“We ain’t drugged!” Mahon protested, but the old man looked at him skeptically.

“That’s exactly what a drugged person would say.”

Mahon sighed loudly.

“It’s a waste of time.” Jorik interrupted. “Let’s just follow the trail until we find something else. Look at their equipment. They can’t have made it inside the forest. There must be other humans surviving somewhere.”

Mahon nodded and started to move away from the trail, planning to circle around the group, when they all pointed their ranged weapons towards him.

“Stop right there!”

He stopped and looked at them, reigning in his exasperation. “What are you trying to do with these things?”

“What?” The old man said.

“What what?” Mahon repeated.

“They’ve really lost their head, Tharn. What should we do?” The thin man spoke.

“It has not happened in a long time, but the rules are still the rules. No one can walk inside the forbidden forest. We’ll bring them back to the village and…”

“The village?” Mahon immediately interrupted while scratching an itch on his back with the wooden stick he was still holding in his hand. “You’re taking us to a village? Outside of the forest?”

“Uh… Yes?” The old man answered with hesitation.

“You should have said that right at the beginning! Lead the way, then!” Jorik chimed in.

Mahon walked out of the trail to move alongside them, but the old man immediately released his weapon’s string, and another wooden stick made his way to Mahon. This one, however, wasn’t aimed directly at him, and thus Mahon didn’t move. It stuck into the ground harmlessly, just in front of his feet, and Mahon raised his head in an interrogative gesture.

“What is that for?”

“Don’t walk away from the trail, or the next one will be aimed right at your heart.”

“I don’t think you can hurt me with th…” Mahon started, but the old man’s look was so intense that Mahon simply gave up. “Yeah, ok, I’ll walk on the trail.” In three strides, he was back on it. “See? I’m here. It’s all fine.”

“It’ll be such a long journey...”

“Shut up, Tomas.” The old man interrupted before he looked back at Mahon and Jorik. “You want to go back to the village, right?”

“Yeah.”

“We can guide you there, but only if you agree to the condition that you have to walk only on the trail and touch absolutely nothing. That also involves us. Never come closer than five steps to us. If you agree to this, then we’ll lead you back to the village. If not, then…”

“We promise not to destroy your sacred forest nor get too close to you.” Jorik agreed before the man tried to frighten them with futile threats.

It seemed they shared the same goal of moving back to the village, so Mahon and Jorik easily agreed to whatever these lunatics wanted. The faster they talked with sane people, the faster they would know about their situation. And this weird group of forest priests or whatever didn’t seem in any way sane enough for that conversation.

“Poisonous forest, not sacred forest.” The thin man mumbled behind his beard before he turned back and went the other way.

I don’t even know what that means. Mahon sighed, but walked behind the group, nonetheless. They would guide Jorik and him out of the forest and to other humans, and just for that, it was worth it. Mahon stopped shortly after, however, and threw a weird look at the people in front of him.

“We’re following right behind you.” He said.

“I can see.” The thin man answered.

“You don’t need to wait for us.”

“I know.”

“Then why are you walking so slow?” Mahon asked.

“Because the whole forest is fucking poisonous, you dumbass!!!”

“Artur! Stay focus!” The old man at the front of the group ordered.

“What does poisonous even mean?” Jorik asked from the back.

“... I’m done.” The man named Artur took his head in his hands. “Please, don’t ask any questions. Just follow.”

Mahon stayed silent for another couple of excruciatingly slow steps before he sighed loudly.

“How far away is the village?”

“It’s just a day and a half away.”

“At this pace?”

“Yes, at this pace. Now, please, just stay silent.”

Mahon felt the man barely contained his frustration, and he decided not to probe him further. They would have plenty of time to discuss with more open-minded people once they reached the village, given they were not all from the same forest cult.

They walked slowly, but at least they didn’t pause before the night was almost on them. The trail conveniently got large enough they could set up a tent, and the group didn’t waste a single minute before they prepared their installation for the night.

Somehow, it seemed all their motions were extra slow and cautious, as if afraid they would lure the ire of the forest if they moved too quickly or disturbed it.

“What do we do with them?” Artur asked the leading man, who had presented himself as Tharn along the way.

Mahon watched the two men with attention as they looked back at him and Jorik.

“They can’t enter the tent, that’s for sure.” Tharn started.

“We can just sleep outside.” Mahon chimed in. “I mean, we just did it for the whole last week. It’s not one more night that will deter us. There happens to be really soft moss under certain types of trees, and it’s really comforta…”

He stopped himself as the two men eyed him dangerously.

“Yeah, yeah, I get it. No getting away from the trail. I guess we’ll set up our tents as well, then.”

Mahon opened his bag and reached for his scout tent, but Tharn stopped him.

“Please don’t. We have a spare tent for you to use.” He then turned to Mariel. “Give them tomorrow’s tent.” He ordered. “We’ll be back at the village by then, anyway.”

“They will contaminate everything.” She protested, but a look from Tharn dissuaded her to pursue and she simply reached in one of the bags for a spare tent and threw it at Mahon.

“Thanks, I guess.” Mahon gave up making any sense of their conversation, and used the tent they gave them.

It was perfectly identical to the one they had set up and spacious enough to accommodate both Jorik and him. They set it up easily, and as with the thick outfits of their owner, the tent seemed to be out of place in such a warm forest. They didn’t complain much, however, and soon Tharn threw two sandwiches for them, since they couldn’t go and eat the forest fruits.

Mahon didn’t mind the change. As good as the fruits were, a week-long diet of only fruits wasn’t something Mahon was looking for again. The sandwiches were far better. The presence of smoked ham and a tasty cheese gave him hope about what to expect of the village.

At the very least, he now hoped for a real civilization and not some lost hole in the ground with twenty crazy men. Now, on why there were so many humans still living around there and yet seemed unaware of Amentiae, it was a completely different matter altogether.

Mahon and Jorik hadn’t dared to speak about it in front of the others, but the frequent glances they exchanged couldn’t be more telling about their urge to discuss it. As the night fell, and the other group locked itself in their tent, they finally had the perfect opportunity.

And since Jorik’s stock of no-dream pills had long been used up, they also had the perfect place to discuss it in full discretion, since the group seemed to be unaware of Amentiae and their magic.