The Whispering Woods

Dawn mist clung to the edges of the Silva Umbra as the hunting party assembled in the manor's courtyard. Cassius checked his bow's string tension while trying to ignore Servius's nervous energy beside him.

"First time in the deep woods?" Cassius asked, though he knew the answer. The stablehand's son rarely ventured beyond the estate's borders.

"First time this far." Servius adjusted his borrowed leather jerkin for the third time. "My da says the Shadowwood changes men. Says some who go in come out different, if they come out at all."

"Your da also says the horses can predict weather by how they sneeze." Cassius grinned, but he understood the apprehension. The Silva Umbra commanded respect even from those who'd lived in its shadow all their lives.

"Mount up, lads!" Gallio's voice cut through the morning air. The grizzled veteran sat his horse like he was born to it, his keen eyes surveying the assembled group. "We're burning daylight, and silver stags don't hunt themselves."

The party consisted of six riders: Gallio leading, Cassius and Servius, two household guards named Brennus and Corth, and old Hamon, the estate's master huntsman. They rode out through the manor gates as the sun crested the eastern hills, painting the landscape in shades of gold and shadow.

"Remember," Gallio addressed them as they approached the forest edge, "we stay within voice range. No heroics. The silver stag's a prize, but not worth a life."

The Silva Umbra swallowed them gradually. First came the outlying groves of oak and ash, familiar and welcoming. Birds sang morning songs, and shafts of sunlight pierced the canopy. But as they rode deeper, the character of the forest shifted. The trees grew older, more twisted. The underbrush thickened, forcing them to follow game trails barely wide enough for horses.

"There," Hamon whispered, raising a weathered hand.

Fresh tracks marked the soft earth—the distinctive split-hoof pattern of their quarry, larger than common deer. Cassius dismounted, studying the impressions with practiced eyes.

"Four hours old, maybe five." He traced the depth of the print. "Moving northeast, toward the Thornwall Ridge. Big male by the spread."

Hamon nodded approval. "Good eye, young master. Your woodcraft improves."

They followed the trail for another hour, the forest growing ever denser. Cassius found himself at point more often than not, his younger eyes catching signs the others missed. It was during one such moment, as he guided his mount around a massive fallen oak, that he saw it.

The silver stag stood in a shaft of light fifty paces ahead, its coat gleaming like quicksilver. Magnificent antlers crowned its head, each point perfect. For a heartbeat, hunter and prey regarded each other.

Then the stag bolted.

"The stag!" Cassius called back, already urging his horse forward. "This way!"

"Cassius, wait for—" Gallio's shout faded as Cassius plunged through a curtain of hanging vines. The trail was clear, the stag's passage marked by broken branches and scattered leaves. His blood sang with the thrill of the chase.

The pursuit led him through a twisting ravine, over a shallow stream, and into a part of the forest he'd never explored. The trees here were giants, their trunks so vast that six men holding hands couldn't circle them. Moss hung like funeral shrouds, and the air tasted... wrong somehow. Thick. Old.

His horse balked, whinnying nervously. Cassius dismounted, bow in hand, and proceeded on foot. The stag's trail was still fresh, but something else caught his attention. Boot prints. Human. Several sets, crossing the deer path at angles.

Cassius froze, suddenly aware of how quiet the forest had become. No birdsong. No insect hum. Even the ever-present whisper of wind through leaves had stilled. He'd lost the stag, but found something potentially far more dangerous.

Moving with deliberate care, he followed the boot prints. They led to a small clearing where the remains of a camp sprawled in hasty abandonment. A fire pit held cold ashes. Bedrolls lay scattered. Dark stains marked the ground near an overturned pot.

Blood. Days old, but unmistakable.

Cassius crouched, reading the scene. The camp had held five, maybe six men. They'd left quickly—gear abandoned, food left to spoil. But what had driven them off? He found no signs of battle, no arrows in trees or sword marks. Just that sense of wrongness that permeated the air.

A crow's harsh cry made him flinch. Time to leave. He memorised the location and began picking his way back toward where he'd left his horse. But the forest had other plans.

The path he'd taken seemed to twist back on itself. Trees he didn't remember blocked his way. Twice he found himself circling back to the abandoned camp. Panic tried to claw its way up his throat, but he forced it down. Think. Observe. Adapt.

He climbed a sturdy oak, seeking higher ground to orient himself. From twenty feet up, he could see farther, but what he saw made no sense. The forest stretched endlessly in all directions, no sign of the ridge or stream he'd crossed. It was as if the Silva Umbra had rearranged itself while his back was turned.

Then he felt it.

The sensation started as a tingle at the base of his skull, like the air before a lightning strike. But instead of building to a crescendo, it... hollowed out. The world seemed to drain of something essential, leaving a void that made his skin crawl. He looked down and saw it—a patch of forest floor perhaps thirty feet across where the very air seemed dead.

No, not dead. Absent. As if something had carved a piece out of reality itself.

The leaves within that circle didn't move, despite the breeze that stirred the surrounding forest. A butterfly had frozen mid-flight at the boundary, wings locked in an impossible stillness. Most disturbing of all, Cassius felt a pull toward it. Not physical, but something deeper. A whisper in his bones that spoke of rest, of ending, of silence.

He scrambled down from the tree so fast he scraped his palms raw. Whatever that thing was, every instinct screamed at him to flee. He ran, no longer caring about stealth or dignity. Behind him, he swore he could feel that dead zone expanding, reaching out with fingers of nothingness.

The forest blurred past. Branches whipped at his face. His lungs burned. Then, blessed relief—the sound of horses and men's voices.

"Cassius!" Gallio's roar cut through his panic. "Boy, where in the seven hells—"

Cassius burst from the underbrush, nearly spooking Brennus's mount. He bent double, gasping for air, aware of how wild he must look.

"Easy, lad." Gallio dismounted, steadying him with a firm hand. "What happened? You look like you've seen a ghost."

"Poachers," Cassius managed between breaths. "Or bandits. Abandoned camp. Fresh enough to be concern."

It wasn't a lie, but it wasn't the whole truth either. How could he explain that dead spot? How could he describe the wrongness of it without sounding mad?

"Show me," Gallio commanded, all business now.

Cassius led them back, though it took longer than it should have. The forest seemed reluctant to reveal the camp again, but eventually they found it. Gallio examined the scene with professional interest, noting the same details Cassius had observed.

"Bandits, most like," the veteran concluded. "The drought's driven desperate men into the woods. We'll need to increase patrols." He shot Cassius a measured look. "Good instincts, getting out when you did. But next time, don't go haring off alone. The stag's not worth your life."

"Yes, Decanus."

They made their way back to the manor as the sun touched the western horizon. Cassius rode in silence, mind churning. He'd made no mention of the dead zone, that impossible absence in the forest's heart. Somehow, he knew it was important to keep that knowledge to himself, at least for now.

"You're quiet," Servius observed as they unsaddled their horses. "The woods change you after all?"

Cassius forced a smile. "Just tired. And disappointed about losing the stag."

But that night, as he lay in bed, he couldn't shake the memory of that pull toward nothingness. The Silva Umbra held secrets darker than poachers or bandits. Something was wrong in the deep woods, something that defied explanation.

He flexed his fingers in the darkness, remembering the scrape of bark against his palms as he'd fled. The pain grounded him, reminded him he was real, solid, present. Not like that frozen butterfly, caught between one moment and the next.

Tomorrow, he decided, he would search the family library. Surely somewhere in those dusty tomes was mention of Aetheric dead zones, of places where the very fabric of the world grew thin. Knowledge was power, and power was what he needed if he ever encountered such wrongness again.

The forest had shown him a glimpse of something beyond his understanding. But Cassius Virellius had never met a mystery he couldn't eventually solve. This would be no different.

He hoped.