Innocence Lost 

Myndril Forest was nestled quietly in the foothills of the majestic Emsré Mountains. The lofty peaks towered high above the land, creating a strikingly picturesque backdrop as their gleaming crown of pure white snow stood in stark contrast to the azure sky. The afternoon sun bathed the westward-facing peaks in brilliance as if the sun itself sought to highlight the splendor of the mountains. Crystalline streams meandered down from the alpine crags and into the foothills and valleys far below, providing a constant supply of life-giving water to the lush forest that had taken up residence before time immemorial. 

It was this setting that the small community of woodland elves had chosen as the place for their remote settlement at least an age ago. But it was not only the breathtaking landscape and pure mountain streams that drew the elves’ attention; the forest below the Emsré mountains was the unique home to giant Silverwood trees. The beautiful trees were extremely large, reaching high into the heavens as if mimicking the mountains’ tall grandeur and majesty. The sturdy branches and large leaves created a dense forest canopy, and the many seasons of fallen leaves created a soft, loamy blanket upon the forest floor below. The trees were aptly named for their light-gray-colored bark that would reflect a silver color under the light of a full moon. According to legend, the first sapling was planted by the Goddess Kathele herself, and each of the Silverwood trees was considered sacred by the woodland elves. They named their settlement: Kelómé. 

The wild and untamed land made it the ideal place for the elves. Unlike the humans who mostly inhabited the hustling and bustling cities, the elves preferred to live in and with nature surrounding them, enjoying the solitude and sanctity of the forest. The remoteness of their community kept most outsiders away, providing a degree of insulation from the outside cares and troubles of the world, just as the elves intended. Many humans looked down upon the woodland elves with misguided prejudice, considering them wild and uncivilized. In reality, their communities were clean, orderly, and relatively harmonious.

Kelómé had not been completely cut off and isolated for quite some time. It had inadvertently become quite renowned for the highly sought after “Frostwine” that the elves produced, known as “Mhelekävin” in the elven tongue. As a labor of love, the first settlers had painstakingly turned an open forest glade into a vineyard of unparalleled beauty. Their affinity and steadfast passion for working with nature, coupled with the perfect location, produced bountiful harvests from the relatively small glade. The warm summer sun and the cool night air descending from the mountains created the perfect conditions for the grapes to sweeten and thrive. The dual influence resulted in a harmonious equilibrium that produced grapes of unparalleled quality. The now many-centuries-old vines would show their appreciation to the elves with every passing season.

It was about one hundred and fifty years ago when several casks of the wine had found their way into the distant human towns. A mere breath in the passing of time for the elves but several generations for humans. Once discovered, a thriving trading partnership rapidly developed between Kelómé and the remote human outpost town of Dailion, a twelve days’ ride on horseback. The journey was arduous and, at times, impossible when the spring snowmelt would turn the normally gentle mountain streams into mighty rivers that were much too dangerous to cross. There was no way to travel through the rough terrain with a wagon, and therefore the supply of Frostwine was very limited. This made it extremely rare and highly sought after throughout the realm. It became a status symbol for the richest of the human nobles to own a cask. The casks were easily recognizable as each one had a Silverwood tree, the symbol of Kelómé, lovingly emblazoned on the front. The elves were often urged to produce more and had been offered up to five hundred gold pieces per cask, more than a year’s salary for the average laborer. The elves refused, choosing to only take what the vineyard would freely give and nothing more. They had a love of nature, not a love of gold.

*   *   *   *

The sun was low on the horizon, and the fireflies were beginning to fill the forest with their yellow, otherworldly glow. Lauriel hurried to finish her chores, not because of her work ethic, but because she wanted to go play and explore. The elven children were assigned community chores based off of their age, and Lauriel had been assigned to vineyard duties because she was still a very young child. She hated it! She didn’t understand why she could not be out learning how to track and hunt like her older brother. She was instead stuck at the vine trellis, mindlessly (and begrudgingly) tending to the grapes. 

She had an uncharacteristic restlessness when it came to exploring the lands and couldn’t wait until her next adventure. She’d gotten the trait from her father. He would often take her and her brother on hikes through the forest, trying to find some new cave to explore or see how many forest animals they could encounter. Her mother would shake her head and laugh when Lauriel would come back covered from head to toe in mud or with some new “pet” that she had befriended. 

The vines were heavy with the large clusters of grapes and needed to be tied back so that the vine didn’t break or bend to the ground. It was getting late in the season and the grapes would soon be harvested. The long summer nights were beginning to get earlier, and the slightest hint of chill was in the air. The trees higher up on the mountain were just beginning to show a sprinkling of canary yellow, their first of many colors. It would not be long until the entire mountainside was ablaze in the full glory of the autumn splendor. Normally, grapes should have been harvested several weeks ago, but these grapes would stay on the vine until the first frost, making them particularly sweet and creating the appropriately named “Frostwine.”

Lauriel worked until the last rays of sun dipped below the horizon and the distant mountains faded into a deep purple. It was her favorite time of the day, a “magical time” as she called it. It was that time of the day, just after dusk, when the wind in the trees would die down and everything would become still and quiet. The silvery moon would soon rise and bathe the forest in its glow, and all would seem right with the world. She sat down beside the trellis and closed her eyes for many long moments, enjoying the quiet solitude of her own pleasant thoughts. 

Lauriel sat longer than she intended and was only brought back from her daydreams when she heard her mother’s concerned voice in the distance calling for her to come home. She peered up through the vines and saw the familiar glow of the starlight but was shocked to see that the silvery moon had already risen high in the sky above her. 

Wow! I must have been daydreaming for hours! I’m going to be in big trouble …

She stood up but was mesmerized by the sight of the bright moon glowing through the grape leaves. 

It looks so close! 

As she refocused, she suddenly realized that she was not looking at the moon—something was glowing in the vines! Her highly inquisitive nature overtook any other thoughts of returning home; she had to investigate. She crawled up on the trellis and inched closer to the illumination. As she did, she could hear a faint buzzing noise. As stealthily as she could, she moved even closer. The buzzing continued to get louder. She came within a few feet of the object and could see that it was some sort of glowing ball of light, about the size of an apple. 

If I can just get this one vine out of the way, I can grab it!

As carefully and quietly as she could, she slowly moved the large leaves out of the way. 

There it is! 

Some kind of buzzing, brightly glowing, round object floated just an arm’s length above her. 

She lunged for it, grabbing at it wildly. 

Bzzzzzzing! The glow nimbly bolted away from her grasping hands and out from under the leaves, zooming right by her head. Normally sure footed, she tumbled off of the trellis, taking multiple bunches of the valuable grapes with her. 

Bzzzzzzing!

Bzzzzzzing! 

The glow darted around her head in rapid, concentric circles, staying playfully just out of her reach.  

“A Will-o’ Wisp!” Lauriel gasped. 

She had never seen one before but had read enough about them to know that they were exceedingly rare. Suddenly, it darted deeper into the woods, and Lauriel began to give chase, giggling lightheartedly as she ran after the whimsical illumination. It continued its playful game for many minutes, drawing her deeper and deeper into the woods as she pursued it with singular focus. Suddenly, the Will-o’ Wisp brought itself to a hover high above her head. It was then that she got the strangest feeling. As she stared at it, still mesmerized by the experience, she felt as if it was doing the very same. She realized that it was not some mindless creature; it was sentient and purposeful. 

Bzzzzzzing! The Will-o’ Wisp was gone.

What was that all about? Did it just want to play? What was it doing here? 

Lauriel’s mind was so flooded with questions that she was oblivious to her present surroundings. She did not realize how far she had gone into the deep woods, and even in the elven realm, the evening woods were no place for a child. 

She was suddenly drawn away from her thoughts and back to the present by strange noises in the distance. Her keen eyes were beginning to readjust from the bright ball and onto the darker woods beyond. She did not see any immediate danger but realized that she was deep in unfamiliar territory. She held her breath and listened intently. She could hear the very faint sound of what she pictured in her mind to be many large animals clumsily crashing through the distant woods. She had an innate sense of direction, as did most of her kind, and she realized that the noises were coming from the direction of her village. 

Her father had taught her how to move through the woods unheard and unseen, and she began to quietly make her way back home. Her footfalls were sure and silent as she skillfully traversed the forest floor with amazing dexterity for her age. She quickly made her way back into familiar territory, but she could feel a growing sense that something was amiss. None of the familiar noises of the evening forest could be heard. There were no sounds of the familiar chirping crickets or hooting owls. Even the fireflies had hidden their illuminating beacons. It was as if the entire forest held its breath. 

With growing concern, she proceeded onward until she heard a noise that made her stop dead in her tracks. Screams began to echo throughout the woods. They were quickly followed by the wail of the elven warning horn. 

She began to run as fast as she could, foregoing her silent movement. “Ammé!” she called out to her mother in elvish. “Ammé!” She began to smell smoke and some other unnatural smell that she couldn’t place. 

As she neared, she could see the faint glow of a fire and could hear more and more screams. “Ammé!” she yelled frantically as tears began to stream down her face. “Fadwé! Nolthien!” she yelled for her father and brother. She quickly made her way back to the vineyard but it was almost unrecognizable. The carefully constructed trellises and well-tended vines had been torn to shreds as if a pack of wild boars had been living in them for weeks. Not a single trellis remained standing.

An icy cold chill took hold of her as she caught a brief glimpse of one of the terrible creatures that had descended upon her village. She was unable to move, paralyzed with fear from the scene that played out before her. As the creature came to a brief stop to find another prey, it was partially illuminated by the light from the numerous fires. Lauriel could see that it stood upright and was easily twice the size of the largest human. 

It had a thick white mane of hair that began on the top of its head and continued down its broad back and onto its powerful shoulders. Its body was dark gray and it had glowing red eyes that made it appear like it had just come  from the pits of hell. It had two terrifying sets of arms that rippled with powerful muscles. The top set of arms were massive and ended in giant, fingerlike appendages that resembled razor-sharp claws. The lower set of arms had very much the same features, only smaller. With the four-armed creatures, terrible dog-like monstrosities ran around like frenzied beasts. Lauriel was very young and inexperienced, but she knew that both of the creatures were not natural.

The four-armed beast that Lauriel observed suddenly found another mark as Ornthalas, a peaceful baker and grandfather-like figure to the small community, suddenly ran from his burning home. Lauriel recognized him immediately and knew that he did not see the creature lying in wait to ambush. She tried to yell out to him but could not find her voice. “Reh Ornthalas, abacas da! (Mister Ornthalas, behind you!)” she said in a dry and barely audible whisper. “Abacas da!” she whispered as more tears streamed down her face. The creature immediately chased him down with incredible speed and seized a hold of him with its smaller, lower set of arms and claws. It raised its powerful upper arms overhead and came down upon him with enough force to split open a tree. The razor-sharp claws rent his frail body nearly in two while the second strike followed almost immediately after, disemboweling him. His blood splattered violently into the air, and his lifeless body crumpled to the ground with a loud thud as the creature quickly released him and moved on to find another. 

It was then that Lauriel’s legs failed her. She crashed down into the tangled heap of vines, unable to move. She could not bring herself to look onward at the many other horrors taking place. She tried to cover herself in the vines just as a child would do with their blanket when afraid of the monsters in the night. She lay silent and unmoving for several minutes while the screams lessened. It wasn’t until she heard the distinct noise of something moving in her direction that she forced herself to peek through the twisted clump of vines covering her, and she immediately regretted it. The vile creature was one of the doglike aberrations that had come with the dark creatures moving around the village. The crash into the vines had drawn its attention away from its frenzied killing and toward the noise. It was carrying something bloody in its mouth, and Lauriel did not want to know what it was. The “dog” had no fur and was a deathly pale gray with bulging yellow eyes that stuck out much like the eyes of a dragonfly. It had leathery, bat-like ears, much bigger than normal dog ears. 

It walked like a dog but had a much bigger hunched back and huge front shoulders and legs that ended in large, bloody paws with equally large nails. It looked deformed as the back half of the creature was much smaller in size and stature. Both the top and bottom sets of fangs, also dripping with blood, were way too big for the creature’s mouth and protruded outward beyond its snarled lips. It did not have a snout like other dogs, rather, a flat nose that the fangs protruded above from the mouth below. The aberration seemed to breathe frost out of its mouth as it exhaled. 

The vile creature dropped the object in its mouth and stared straight in her direction, frost curling from its maw. A deep, hollow rumbling echoed from its unnaturally large chest cavity. It was unlike any dog growl she had ever heard; it was terrifyingly worse. The hollow sound seemed to pierce right through her soul. 

Lauriel held her breath and tried desperately to blend into the vines and shadows. Her hand had come to rest on some grapes that had not yet been destroyed. She slowly squeezed them against her leg, crushing them on herself. She prayed to the Gods to protect her from the evil incarnate. She could see the creature trying to sniff with the open hole where a nose should be. It seemed as if the creature could sense that there was a life form not far away, but had not yet picked it up with its other senses. After several moments, the creature, smelling nothing of interest other than grapes, turned and ran back toward the village. 

After what felt like an eternity, the screams finally ended and the creatures drifted back into the shadows. A deathly silence fell upon the ruined village. Lauriel had been too afraid to move from her spot, too weak and powerless to do anything. After many long hours of not hearing or seeing any movement, she pulled herself from her hiding place and walked on unsteady legs back into her village. 

She could not even begin to grasp the unspeakable evil. In an instant, the innocence of youth no longer protected her. The inner peace that comes from safety, security, and stability was suddenly shattered into a million pieces. She could not make any sense of it. The creatures did not even take anything, they only killed and destroyed. 

In a daze, she walked from house to house, trying to find someone still alive; but the vile creatures had exterminated their prey with ruthless efficiency. Scene after scene of unspeakable carnage played out with each house that she checked. Finally, she looked up and found herself standing in front of her home. 

It was a gruesome attack. The creatures had no weapons, only huge claws that sliced and ripped apart their prey. Lauriel walked quietly back out and sat down on her front porch. The beautiful trees, the silvery trees that she had come to love, now reflected a new color in the light of the moon—blood red.