Dio - Mold (1)

The forest rushed past Dio, the trees nothing but streaks of brown and green that barely reached his awareness. His lungs burned, his legs ached, yet he kept running as fast as he could, always forward.

Always towards her.

He barely felt the ground anymore, only the drive that filled his chest, urging him onward, driving Dio towards his best friend.

When Brela’s warmth had flickered days ago, as if it were about to vanish, he had sprinted into the forest without hesitation, without a second thought. Des soon darted ahead, always in the direction where Dio could still faintly feel Brela’s presence.

A presence, however, that was growing weaker with every moment...

Each fading pulse felt like a voice calling from behind a closing door. Calling for help. Calling for him and Des, calling for Daw.

Yorm ran beside him, others behind: Ogan and Ha, even Wes, who still clutched a soup ladle in his hand, his stained apron flapping at his sides. Dio barely noticed them. It was enough to feel how the stars their warmth were within him, those that usually stayed near but not too close, now illuminated the world around him. He had only ever felt them this vividly during their shared meals and feasts. Their nearness now was a blanket of unity that carried him forward through the murky, dark ocean of the forest.

Something vast seemed to stir between them all, a shared pulse that turned exhaustion into movement. He knew what it was, of course. The urge to save Brela.

Dio had no sense of how long he’d been running. The others likely didn’t either; he had no time for any thought except reaching Brela. Her warmth had begun to flicker soon, and dread was growing in him, the fear that one terrible moment might come when she no longer shone inside him. When her Light in the firmament of his soul would fade, leaving only a dim afterimage.

He had known fear before, especially when his blindness crept too close, but never one that lived so deeply inside his mind that it drove away all other thoughts.

He couldn’t think about the others, whether they were still running or had fallen behind. He couldn’t even think about time. Sometimes he saw the forest blur past him; other times the darkness was so thick it was a miracle he didn’t fall. His instincts drove him on, and even when he couldn’t see his own hand before his face, his intuition and alertness carried him.

Still, Dio somehow knew exacly where to go and tread. He felt it. He felt everything around him, was a part of it: The forest breathed around him. Buried in the soil, roots stirred and tightened. Thorned stems trembled at his passing, and the air quivered with the flight of frightened creatures. All through the woods, things moved that should have been still, the branches being swept away by hasty hands and bodies, the undergrowth rippling with hidden panic of trmbling steps. The sounds and shapes converged into one living rhythm that drew Dio onward, guiding him where no path existed. He did not see or think about where to go anymore; the world itself told him where to step, and his body obeyed. Somewhere deep beneath awareness, a pattern older than any of his experiences unfolded around him, carrying him through the dark.

All those impressions that never fully reached Dios mind made the foreign part of the forest feel almost familiar. He dimly noticed that the blindness was receding, little by little, until he barely felt it anymore. It was another reason to keep going, though of course its importance paled compared to the mission at hand.

Dio surged ahead, his senses continuing to absorb the world around him in fragments. He leapt over brooks and stones, always moving toward Brela's trembling warmth, closer and closer. The only one faster than him was Des, whom he sometimes glimpsed ahead yet could never quite reach.

Des and the others seemed to move with impossible certainty as well, guided by something more precise than instinct.

Dio himself pushed harder, afraid that if he slowed even once, the sound within him would go silent forever. He had no idea where they were when Des suddenly stopped in front of him and his presence mingled with Brela’s. Pushing off the ground, Dio leapt through a final hedge and landed, drenched in sweat, at the edge of a line of trees growing along a small slope. Beyond the rise stretched a little meadow, and on its far side the forest thickened once more.

A lone willow's remains stood there, its sickly yellow clumps the last traces of its miserable decay. Dio swallowed hard as recognition struck him. The place looked different, yet unmistakable: The feeling, the atmosphere...

It was the same spot he, Wes, Oli, and Ha had seen during their first journey to Daw. The stone formations had become the willow now, and still the scene felt lifeless, even though stone had turned to plant and now rotten away. The air itself was thinner here, stripped of sound.

Then he saw her. Down below, halfway between the meadow’s edge and the willow, Des stood staring at something on the ground, then turned back to Dio. His face was ghostly pale, and even his beard seemed to lose the last of its color. Dio hurried down to him. As he reached his friend’s side, a shiver ran through him and pain throbbed in his head.

Before them, barely ten feet away, the grass had lost its vibrant green and bright orange glow beneath the rising Sun. It was wilting, turning brown, and the stench of rot rose from the dying patch, burning his eyes.

And there, no more than a few arm lengths beyond, lay Brela, barely visible, wrapped in black, stone-like thorns that pierced her flesh and held her fast. Blood darkened her skin where the plants had dug in deep. Des looked at him again, about to speak, but no words came.

Dio could hardly blame him. Just as he had felt the trees, bushes, and animals while sprinting through the forest moments ago, now a wave of sickness crawled to the edge of his awareness. It was like a warning from within, telling him not to move closer. Even the stars within him had gone still, as though watching in dread.

Danger was near.

And deep inside him, as he took in the sight of the decaying grass and flowers, the foul vapors thick in his lungs, he felt the blindness within him stir once more. Trying to calm down, he looked around for the others that had been behind him.

“What is that? What… it’s coming from the willow,” Yorm gasped as he caught up, stepping hesitantly beside him.

He was right. The black, thorned vines were growing from the base of the dead tree, and it looked as though they had chased Brela down.

As if something didn't want her to leave.

The willow’s bark quivered faintly, a motion so slow it could have been mistaken for breathing.

“Her skin…” Des whispered.

Dio’s gaze drifted back to Brela’s body, and he barely stopped himself from stepping away. Nausea surged through him at the sight. Only fragments of her skin were visible, yet the once smooth, dark-brown tone was now torn open by veiny gray and greenish webs. Furry mold spread across her shredded dress, her arms and even her hair. The stench, growing stronger by the second, was horribly tangled with the familiar scent of flowers that had always surrounded her. He could not tell where the decay ended and her body began.

At first, there was no sign of life and his fear grew until it threatened to consume ghim, but then... Then she twitched, and her warmth flared within him.

A faint tremor ran through the ground beneath them.

Behind Dio, murmurs rose. He turned carefully once more and finally saw dozens of people emerging from the forest, most of them weary and staggering, yet all staring ahead. When they saw Brela, doubt crept into their whispers, and many hesitated to come as close as Des, Dio, and Yorm had.

Dio drew in a slow breath, forcing his mind to steady. He realized the disgust he felt wasn’t for Brela herself but for the thorns... and for the fact that something was making her suffer.

Something close by.

He tried to take in the scene with a clear mind: Brela lay bound by the rotting, mold-covered vines that clung to her like chains, tying her to the rotten willow. Around her stretched a space—five or six feet wide—where everything looked as withered as the tree and smelled as foul as the thorns. The corruption encircled not only Brela but also her connection to the willow, whose gray, gnarled branches drooped lifelessly toward the ground.

Even the sunlight avoided that circle, fading before it reached her.

“It’s coming from the willow. Some kind of decay,” Dio finally said, keeping his tone deliberately calm.

“I think it won’t let us near her, will it?” Yorm asked, shifting uneasily from one foot to the other.