The weeds were too high and they clung to my legs like grabby, intrusive little hands. I wandered twisting faux paths that ended in moss and roots, and jumped between stones older than the hills. The air was warm and sweet and full of fleeting, frantic songs, the shedding life of falling leaves. The sun was high, the sky was periwinkle with only elusive, scudding clouds playing chase and whirl between the gusts like kittens. I was lost but I didn’t mind, I would find my way back eventually.

A river chuckled happily to itself at the edge of my hearing and I wandered in its direction. Between the fronds and branches and trunks I discovered it’s winding body as it skipped and roiled over the friendly smooth stones beneath. Some more arrogant rocks offered themselves as a dry path above the liquid turmoil and I hopped across them gratefully, following their guidance to the other bank carefully for they lied about their grounding. I paused on a particularly wide boulder above the glittering surface and settled my knees into the squelchy moss to trail my fingers through the icy silk of the river, it grabbed and pulled at my hand with its greedy relentless rush and I enjoyed the gentle tug of war, careful to not give too much of myself lest they pull too hard, laughing and angry. The spray in the air settles along my skin, chilling and rippling, misting occasionally across my vision and through my hair. I sit quiet amongst the chaos and let it overrule me, its mindless chattering quieting the chattering of my mind. Time was endless here, everything but I, Immortal. I could not hear the birds over the churning of the water, no bugs shared my stony island, no fish flashed by me. I closed my eyes and breathed it in, soaking my insides with the wet, cool air, the glitter of sun sneaking glances between the arch of leaves tripped frenetically across the darkness of my eyelids, light and shadow playing tricks on my vision. The wet moss has soaked the shins and knees of my pants and the cold is burrowing into my bones, trying to claim me for the river.

This place is immortal, everything but I.

The twisting spots of flickered pictures dancing brief and esoteric across my vision give me dreamy nightmare ideas that fade and forget as I try to catch the shape of the next.

I cannot feel the cold.

I dance my thoughts across the water, it laughs until the bank throws it back upon itself, feet in the mud.

Are my eyes open?

There’s feet in the mud and in the speckled shade and sun I see a glitter of a woman

Skin? Bark. Sunlight on dappled bark and shifting shades of leaves.

A woman approaches. Are my eyes open?

She’s beautiful. Feet in the mud, sunlight across her dappled skin.

Smooth skin, dappled light?

Sun and leaves and bark and the water throwing refracted light in my eyes.

She’s in the water, coming closer. A woman, then

Her hair in the water? Streaming running dark and fast and moving with the currents in tangles of silk.

Just shadows.

Everything is immortal here but I,

I can’t hear the birds

Woman in the water, hands on my hands.

Blue eyes, blue with green, face like porcelain

Are my eyes open?

Hands are so cold on my hands, tugging me with insistent currents, rippling sweet fingers between my fingers, so soft and cold

Tugging, just lightly

So cold, like ice up my arm, her hands on my face are so cold.

A kiss, she kisses me, her lips and hands and breath like ice,

My heart. It thuds. It fights. It screams.

I cannot breathe, her kiss is like ice,

Pull away

I’m so cold, the air in my lungs has claws and rips my throat as I pant.

Her hands slip from mine and her big eyes peer at me from beneath the surface

Is that my face? A reflection?

Are my eyes open?

I’m so cold, my arms and hair and shoulders are wet with icy water. I stand. I see movement beneath the surface of the glittering water like a school of fish in panic and then just the sun on the happy ripples. I’m shaking. I make it the rest of the way across the river and out of the shade into a clearing so the sun can warm me.

I can’t stop shaking even as the chill creeps from my bones to my fingertips, I still can’t hear the birds.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

The wind buffets at my back gently, there was no wind amongst the trees.

I allow it to prompt me forwards, suddenly enchanted by the rippling gold of the field, the stalks shining in the sun.

I touch the stalks as I pass them, papery and supple. So bright they reflect upon my eyes and dazzle me as much as the sun struck river. They release a gentle golden puff of dazzling dust as they bend pliantly with my pulling fingers and spring gleefully back to their proud standing, the sifting softness of the glimmering powder coats my hands and settles in my hair, gritting in my eyes, making me sneeze and laugh. The air above me is suddenly almost twilight with sepia dust that swirls hypnotically, I reach up my hands and twirl with the whirls and currents, disrupting and dancing with the patterns. The sound of my hands brushing the long shoots sounds like excited whispering, overlapping and hushing and hissing. I stop to watch the golden flowers of swirling dust and the whispers continue. I stand still to listen and they get louder.

I cannot understand them.

The words are quiet and hostile, the voices overlapping in singsong layers that seem to come from everywhere and from inside, the dust is making me dizzy, I run.

There’s eyes in the grass. I stop hard and there’s silence. I can’t hear the birds, I can’t hear the whispers. But I can see eyes before me, big and dark and hungry. They draw closer so slowly, I cannot see them step, I cannot see the face around the hypnotic, giant dark eyes. I hear a whisper from my left and when my eyes anxiously seek through the stalks there I see eyes again, big and dark and watching me in silence, drawing closer.

I sprint.

I cannot scream because my body fights through the thick golden dust to give me air to run. I can hear them behind me, no footsteps, but their bodies whispering through the golden blades like sharks through water. I cannot stop and if my eyes seek to the sides I see eyes, keeping pace, watching me. Dark. Angry. Tears drip golden from my cheeks as they carve tracks through the layers of glitter, I spit gold to the floor as it accumulates in and dries out my desperately panting mouth. It gathers in the corners of my eyes and coats my eyelashes so densely my vision is ringed in gold. Something grabs my shoulder, momentarily pulling me back. I wrench myself free and sprawl forwards, flinging myself headfirst into open space where the golden grass finally ended. My legs still lost in the thick gold I feel something grab at my ankles and I frantically pull myself free and away, scrambling to my feet and towards the comforting bark of a very old tree, sitting alone.

I cry the dust from my eyes, scrape it from my mouth with my fingernails. I wipe it from my nose and shake it from my hair and brush it from my clothes as best I can until the floor and part of the trees trunk are coated in shimmering gold and I am mostly free of it. It’s embedded beneath my nails and in my scalp and I still glitter in the sun with every turn, but it’s as good as it can be without going back to the river.

It occurs to me I don’t know how to get home without going back through that golden terror.

I lean against a clean part of the old tree, then settle down amongst his roots. They sit high on either side of me in welcome, and the ceiling of branches and leaves offer me protection and peace. I cough puffs of gold into the air and catch my breath, feeling gentled as though by a lullaby whenever the wind moved the branches and made the leaves dance. A glittery beetle shared a moment with me on the root by my foot, sparkling flirtatiously before moving on with his day. The golden grass was back to being beautiful and silent and beguiling, rippling elegantly in the playful wind that moved my friend’s heavy limbs. Eventually I look away, and around the wide trunk and find myself shocked to see a cottage, white and pink stones with grey trimming, covered in flowering vines and surrounded by a low stone fence, and tall protective trees. The garden is a riot of flowers and herbs. There are bees and butterflies decorating the air, and almost lost amongst the ivy is a well, a tin bucket hanging above it. I have not seen any sign that people live out here, no paths, no sounds of a nearby road, no people have crossed my amblings.

The smell of honeysuckle and jasmine and roses and lavender and mint waft on gentle puffs of air from the garden and I move away from the tree, planning to just walk by the lovely cottage, just to peep over the little fence and enjoy the tumultuous blossoms. But as I draw close I see an old woman, small and slight and sweet of face, tending to her blooms. I make to pass without bothering her but she stands and sees me, a smile warming her wise face.

Hello, I greet her, and she greets me back. I tell her that her garden is beautiful, and she thanks me. She asks me if I hunger, and I politely tell her no, I don’t wish to intrude. She bids me to follow, her hand gesturing me towards the little gate, the pebbled path between the bushes. On her windowsill, cooling, so quaint and soft, muffins, freshly made. She plies me with one, insisting, her little old hands so cold and insistent. Her bright grey eyes too big and shiny, like stars, so greedy suddenly as I bite.

Delicious.

The warm cinnamon and banana and butter and love fill my mouth with magic. I eat it all with gusto and gratitude, and thank the happy woman. Insisting now in turn I give her some peppermint tea from my thermos and she accepts, but her face is sour, perhaps she does not like peppermint tea.

Her eyes brighten, she puts out a hand for mine, a take it, her skin is so cold, so soft. You haven’t given me your name yet, she tells me, and so I do.

She smiles.

Fetch me some water from the well. She tells me.

And so I do.

I cannot remember something, there was something else I was doing.

She takes the water inside, I follow.

Stoke the fire for me, she tells me. And so I do.

Where was I before this?

Was there somewhere I was meant to be?

Go find more firewood, she tells me.

And so I do…