The Forest’s Secret

With a feeling of indescribable terror, I was yanked from sleep and sat bolt upright in bed. Something was wrong—oh, so wrong. I looked around the room, trying to find the source of the fear, but everything looked exactly as it had the night before: a vanity table, the bed I was in, and a bookcase full of old books. No—there was nothing here that could have woken me, and I knew I was alone in the house.

I slipped out of bed, pulled on a tank top and a pair of shorts, and stepped into the narrow hallway. On tiptoe I crept into the kitchen, only to find it just as empty as when I’d left it yesterday: an old table, a few chairs, the wood-burning stove, a small armchair, and the kitchen bench I used to sleep on as a child.

As I stood there, wondering what had woken me and where that fear had come from, something began to tug at me—an intense urge to go out into the forest. Being the rational person I am, I tried to find a logical explanation and concluded it must be the outhouse calling, even though it didn’t really feel like that. I opened the door and went outside. It didn’t take long in the dew-soaked grass before I realized I should have put something on my feet, but the tugging had grown stronger, so my feet would just have to endure. I walked across the cold grass, feeling my toes long for shelter and a warm fire.

When I reached the outhouse, a thought struck me: I would just follow the forest path a little way and enjoy the morning’s wonderful silence. Said and done. I looked at the trees and the stumps left behind after my grandfather had cut down a few trees for firewood.

I stopped dead. What was that?

I heard a strange sound—something that sounded like Aditu, spoken in a creaking, faint voice. I froze, terrified, and when I felt something land on my shoulder I thought my heart would stop. My legs were far too jelly-like for running to be an option, so I stood perfectly still, eyes shut, wishing that whatever it was would disappear.

I don’t know how long I stood like that—several minutes. When whatever was on my shoulder refused to move and time kept passing, my fear began to settle. I thought it must be a branch or something natural that had fallen. Slowly and nervously I opened my eyes and looked at my shoulder, and I exhaled.

It was just a branch—or wait. The best description I could give was a miniature shrub, with only a few twigs and tiny leaves. I was about to brush it away when I heard that creaking sound again.

“Aditu.”

Now would be an excellent time to faint, I thought wildly. The weak, creaking voice had come from the little shrub on my shoulder.

I stopped breathing. This has to be a dream, I told myself. The shrub creaked again—louder now, sharper, more irritated.

“It wasn’t that long ago you were here. Haven’t you forgotten your friends?”

Okay, I thought. Either I’ve completely snapped, or I cooked the wrong mushrooms yesterday.

Seconds ticked by. The only change I could perceive was that the little shrub on my shoulder radiated more and more anger. But my mind didn’t get any clearer, and I still didn’t wake up in my bed. When nothing else is available, you might as well accept the situation. I looked at the shrub and asked, “Do you know me? Who are you, and what are you?”

The answer was that he—apparently male—was a servant and defender of the forest, that he’d known me since childhood, and that we’d spent a great deal of time together during the summers I’d spent here as a child. I couldn’t remember anything from those summers except playing with the neighbor kids, falling in love with one of the boys, and kissing in the hay.

The shrub snorted. “Typical. When children grow up, they forget everything that doesn’t belong to everyday life—and they push away everything that makes them different.”

He introduced himself as Soulfly (which I was oddly grateful for, because it felt strange to address a shrub as “you”). Soulfly whispered something strange into my ear. I didn’t recognize the words, so I didn’t think much of it—until a few seconds later, when images of elves and little forest folk rose inside my mind.

Now I knew I’d lost my sanity. Had I, as a child, danced with fairies and played with gnome-children and argued with a troll? I snorted at myself. That’s what happens when you read too much fantasy, I thought ironically—when you finally lose your mind, you start believing the creatures in the books are real.

And yet I couldn’t shake the feeling that this was real—and that the elf standing a little way from me was real.

I gasped in pure terror.

That elf?

Two meters away from me stood something that looked like an elf. Oh, what a man, I thought. Oh God—what a man. Bronze-brown skin over an athletic body, raven-black hair falling in waves over his chest, eyes dark as a forest pool and just as unreadable, and the sharpest ears I’d ever seen.

I couldn’t stop staring. It was as if the world had paused and time had dissolved into a haze.

A hiss from Soulfly in my ear snapped me back. I heard him mutter something about silly girls and that Daft wasn’t that special.

Daft, I thought. So the gorgeous apparition had a name.

The hunk—no, sorry, Daft—said, in a voice like running water, that someone was waiting for me.

“Who?” I asked.

“Paladin,” he replied.

I followed Daft deep into the forest—so deep and so far that the only light came from him, a bluish glow that streamed from his body like a guiding star. Suddenly he stopped and bowed to an ancient tree. I couldn’t hold back the laugh that bubbled up at the mildly ridiculous sight.

Soulfly’s hard pinch—absolutely crushing my ear—cut my laughter short and brought tears to my eyes. Before I could ask what the hell he was doing, I heard an old voice come from the tree:

“No, Soulfly. She doesn’t remember. That’s just a natural reaction from someone who has lost her childhood faith.”

I stumbled backward in shock as I watched the tree change into an old man.

And by old man, I mean old. The oldest, most fragile old man you could imagine—long, matted hair and beard as white as snow, a body like a crooked, stunted oak, and the wisdom of the world in his eyes.

I shut my eyes, rubbed them, and thought, please—enough. I can’t take any more.

But when I opened them again, there I still was, in the same place, with the same three strange beings.

“It’s been a while since you were here,” Paladin said. “That’s the downside of you humans—you forget so easily as you grow up, and then you explain away anything unusual as childish fantasy. Your grandfather gave you a gift to strengthen your natural inheritance. But you’ve forgotten both the gift and the inheritance, and you’ve pushed away what you’re capable of.”

Something in his words rang a small bell in my mind. I drifted into memories—or dreams—or fantasies—whatever they were. I was a child again, though the place was the same, and beside me stood my beloved grandfather. Around us were incredible beings: fairies, gnomes, elves, sprites, trolls, tree-guardians, will-o’-wisps, and so many more.

“This is the last time you and I will meet here,” my grandfather said.

I laughed. We met here every summer.

“Life changes, and everything ends. Next time we meet, it will be under different circumstances—another way entirely,” he continued. “You have the inheritance—the one that lets you see and experience more than others. The one that makes you live more dangerously than others, because you are affected by nature, and can affect nature, in a different way.”

I knew what he meant, because no one but him could see what I saw, or understand what I was talking about. Everyone else thought I was simply imagining things.

“It’s time for me to hand the responsibility to you,” he said, sighing deeply. “If only you were older. If only I had more time.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“You’ll find out soon enough,” he answered.

He placed his hands on my shoulders and looked deep into my eyes. I felt a power flood my body, and whatever inheritance I’d had before was nothing compared to the gift he gave me now—a gift of magic, of understanding, of knowledge… and of sorrow.

It felt as if my heart would burst when the truth hit me: this was the last time he would hold me, comfort me, and be there for me. The last time we would speak like this. My beloved grandfather was dying. We would leave his childhood home that very day, and I would never see him again.

Tears streamed down my cheeks. The lump in my throat kept me from speaking. He looked at me with warm, wise eyes and said there was no reason for me to grieve, because even if his time on earth was measured, his soul was not gone. It would always be by my side—to help and protect me.

I woke as if from a trance. I was back in the forest, with Soulfly, Daft, and Paladin. I lifted my hands to my cheeks and felt tears still falling.

Paladin’s eyes held compassion as he said, “Now you remember.”

I couldn’t speak, only nod. Soulfly stroked my cheek with a leaf as if to comfort me.

And suddenly I saw something beside me—something I either hadn’t been able to see, or hadn’t dared to see.

My grandfather stood there.

Not solid like the rest of us, but like a transparent mist—yet with the same calm presence, the same unshakable sense of safety. He smiled.

“Welcome back,” he said. “It’s been a while since you and I could talk.”

A smile lit up my face. And I felt, with sudden certainty, that now I could handle whatever would be asked of me.

I understood then that reality isn’t what you think, and that there is more than ordinary people could ever imagine. Once I accepted that I wasn’t like everyone else—that I possessed knowledge most people lacked—my memories returned, and with them everything wonderful I’d experienced as a child in a world few were allowed to see.

I turned to Paladin and asked what he needed help with. Now that I remembered who I was, I understood it must be something serious to drag me out of my safe ignorance.

Paladin told me this story:

Sometime in late spring, something new had appeared in the area—something that seemed to come from the house that both existed and did not exist. Something cold and dark, frightening every living creature capable of sensing the unusual. Paladin and several others had tried to discover what it was, but failed—mostly because of the crushing sorrow and helplessness that filled their minds as they approached the place.

The closer they came, the deeper and darker their thoughts became, until by the time they arrived they no longer knew why they were there. Every creature—dead, ethereal, or alive—avoided the place like the plague. Anything that could move abandoned it and refused to come closer than two hundred meters.

Paladin couldn’t tell whether it was evil or merely sorrowful, but the extent of its effect on the world around it was undeniable. It could not be allowed to remain.

They had gathered all their strength to send me the feeling that it was time to return to the place I’d left as a child. It had taken more than they expected, because in pushing away my inheritance, I had also shut out everything connected to it.

I learned that Paladin had nearly sacrificed his life in the attempt, because he gave more than he realized was safe for him. That made me understand just how thick a wall I had built around my memories, since Paladin—if not the strongest force of nature—was at least one of the strongest.

I began to apologize, but he stopped me, saying he understood my choice. It isn’t easy to live in today’s world with gifts like mine; most who have them are locked away as insane.

I wondered whether I should go to the house that both existed and did not exist, but quickly realized I needed to relearn how to trust what I saw and what I felt first. Paladin said I would need rest after that morning’s experience before I could fully use my gifts, and that I should go home and sleep for a while.

Then he smiled and said many old friends of mine wanted to renew their acquaintance once I woke.

I turned to Daft and asked if he would be kind enough to light my way back out of the forest, but that request only made everyone laugh—and I realized I could do it myself. With a slight blush, I formed a ball of fire in my left hand, said goodbye for now, and walked home.

Home, I thought quietly. Home is where the heart is—and that means this is home to me.

I woke a few hours later with sunlight in my eyes. I didn’t get up at once, but lay there thinking through everything that had happened. I felt a deep happiness and safety knowing my grandfather was still with me, and that the strange flashes of memory I’d had over the years weren’t signs of future madness, but real memories.

I stretched and remembered I would get to see all the other little beings from my childhood summers. I leapt out of bed, threw on the first clothes I found—jeans and a gray T-shirt—and this time I actually remembered sandals. Then I walked around the house to the forest clearing, where I saw a sight that made my eyes sting with joy.

Everyone was there, it seemed—from the tiny fairy Ailsaiona and her friends to the troll Mr. A and his peculiar companions. I stopped and simply drank it in.

Suddenly the vittra Sanne called out, “She’s here!”

Before I could even prepare, they were all on me—chirping and humming in a whirlwind as everyone spoke at once and tried to catch my attention. Overwhelmed, I dropped onto the first stump I saw—an unwise choice, since the stump-creature asked if I could sit on a real stump instead.

Blushing, I stood up to apologize, but then I saw a pair of mischievous eyes in the stump. I burst out laughing. Of course—it was my old friend Miss A. The little witch had turned herself into a stump just to watch me secretly and make sure it was really me, and not some malicious creature wearing my shape.

I laughed as she transformed back, and told her some people are punished immediately. She giggled and admitted it hadn’t gone quite as planned.

Oh, how wonderful it was to reunite with everyone—to hear everything that had happened since I left this place as a child. It was beautiful to see that my friends were still here, that even if I had suppressed them, they hadn’t forgotten me. They had thought of me every day and wondered when I would return.

It felt humiliating to admit what I’d done, and when I finished telling them, I couldn’t meet anyone’s eyes. Paladin appeared during my story without me noticing. He stepped up, placed a hand under my chin, and forced me to meet his gaze.

He told me they understood, and that I should stop being ashamed of something I had done to protect myself.

We spoke for a long time, and eventually we reached the subject no one wanted to acknowledge: whatever it was that lived by the house that both existed and did not exist.

Paladin coaxed forward a delicate little fairy named Rosa and asked her to tell the story, since she had discovered it first and been affected most strongly.

This is what she said:

One evening Rosa awoke—fairies prefer sleeping during the day and dancing, rejoicing, and living at night and in the very earliest morning—and she felt uneasy. That wasn’t strange, because she lived closest to the house. She felt worry crawl into her heart. She tried to shake it off as she went down to the water to cool herself—imagine her happiness when she succeeded. She bathed for an hour, then rose on her delicate wings to dry, playing among the trees for a while before heading toward the fairies’ hall (the most beautiful hall you can imagine, filled with the most fragile things and the most glittering fabrics).

On the way, the worry returned. The closer she came, the greater it grew. And just before she reached the hall, sorrow joined it—sorrow deeper and stronger than anything she’d ever known. Even deeper than the sorrow she’d felt when her lover vanished (which is a story of its own).

With a mind dark as night, she entered the hall and discovered she wasn’t the only one affected. The fairies sat everywhere, weeping. The atmosphere was so heavy you could have cut it with a knife, and the crying was so loud it frightened the angels high among the clouds.

It didn’t take long before the angel Moln descended and asked what was wrong. Moln—like all angels—doesn’t feel emotions the way other beings do, and so she was completely immune to the sorrow that had paralyzed the fairies. Rosa tried to explain, but her words vanished in sobs, and Moln left without understanding—though she did at least realize there was nothing more she could do right then.

No one knows how long the fairies sat there grieving—days, perhaps weeks. At last the Fairy Queen Fia managed to pull herself and her subjects together enough to leave the hall. After they’d gone some distance, the sorrow weakened, and they felt like themselves again.

Rosa and a few others tried to return home to fetch the things they valued most, but had to give up; the sorrow became overwhelming. The fairies turned to Paladin to learn what had happened and how to fix it so they could return.

Paladin, who had already been contacted by animals and other forest beings, understood more than ever how dangerous this “something” was. Anything that could drive lively fairies into despair and make them abandon their homes was unlike anything he had ever encountered. The fairies had been the only ones able to resist the cruel torment of Blå, who—as a nasty little dark elf—had haunted the forest years earlier.

Paladin called a council. They decided that Soulfly and Daft, together with Paladin and a few wolves, would try to push through the sorrow and banish whatever caused it.

The next morning they set out toward the house that existed and did not exist. Before the first sunbeam appeared, they reached the edge of sorrow. They began the grueling journey through the realm of pain, but before they reached the house, none of them remembered why they had come. The sorrow overwhelmed them, and they turned back to seek comfort among their friends.

Once outside sorrow’s grip, they became themselves again—more or less cheerful. Another council was called, and this time they admitted that whatever it was, they could not overcome it even together. They decided, with combined strength, to summon me—and so here we were.

After hearing this, I couldn’t understand how I would succeed where so many had been caught in a net of despair. Paladin reminded me that I was special in one way: in my grandfather’s gift, there was also a flame of hope—a golden, warming hope that could overcome any grief.

The downside, they said, was that this flame could protect only me. I would have to go alone.

With a heavy heart and a hollow feeling of isolation, I set out. My friends walked with me until we reached what seemed to be the boundary of sorrow’s reach. I said goodbye, aware I might not return if I failed. I was human, unlike the others who had felt that deep despair before.

Before I turned my back on my friends and walked toward what felt like a cruel fate, I lit the flame of hope inside myself. I let its warmth fill my soul until it burned through every part of me.

I walked through what looked like an ordinary forest, feeling neither fear nor the sorrow everyone had described. At last I reached the road where the house that existed and did not exist was said to lie.

Only then did I realize that for the first time in my life, I would enter that house—a house that, to my knowledge, no living human had set foot in since the day it vanished from time and became a mere legend.

On the steps I paused, drew a deep breath, and braced myself before touching the handle. The door was unlocked and glided open without a sound. Inside I glimpsed a long, dark hallway.

If I’m going to do this, I have to do it now, I thought.

I stepped inside and looked around. Since the house had vanished before electricity was invented, there was no switch to press for light. Instead I shaped magic into a glowing sphere in my left hand. I studied the ancient paintings on the walls and smiled when I recognized the stream where I’d bathed as a child.

I walked down the hallway and into the first room I came to. It didn’t take long to realize I was in the kitchen. The old wood stove, black with soot, seemed to be burning. Only then did it truly sink in that I wasn’t alone in the house.

Who—or what—had found this place, and dared to enter?

I moved through the kitchen into the adjoining room. The maid’s quarters, I thought, noticing its poverty. I returned to the hallway. There was nothing else to explore there except the staircase to the upper floor.

Climbing those stairs felt unsettling. I saw a light flicker beneath one of the doors. That must be it, I thought. I crossed the floor quickly without looking too closely at the surroundings, gripped the handle, and opened the door.

Inside was an old-fashioned bed with a coverlet antique dealers would have killed for. And at the desk sat a hunched figure, crying so hard I thought my heart would break—even with the flame of hope protecting me.

I crept forward, crouched beside the figure, and gently asked what was so terrible.

The answer shocked me more than anything else could have.

The creature had once been human. Her name was Tony Clifton.

Tony had left her parents’ home after a fight with her father, and as she stormed out she uttered a curse from the deepest part of her heart. The curse was that her childhood home would remain forever in the very second she stepped out its door, and that its inhabitants would have to watch the world come and go for eternity—watch time outside continue, seasons change, neighbor children grow up and die—while they themselves could never step outside the door again, and never feel the wind of time.

Tony herself had wandered out into the wider world, unaware that her dark wish had come true, and lived life’s cheerful days—until one day she accidentally fell into an outhouse pit and drowned. Only when she died did she understand the magnitude of what she had done, because the Angel of Vengeance sentenced her to search for her parents’ home forever.

After all those years, the Angel of Vengeance had taken pity on the sad wretch named Tony and allowed her to find her home again. But once inside, Tony realized the angel could not undo Tony’s own curse. The home remained outside of time.

It was this—Tony’s certainty about what she had done, and now her own suffering under the curse—that had made her sorrow so powerful it could affect the world around her. I suspected that being trapped in her own curse was what made her grief large enough to spill outward.

I asked Tony whether she truly regretted it—in her soul—not merely because she herself was trapped, but because she had laid the curse in anger. She said yes, with such conviction that I understood she now grieved more for her parents’ fate than for her own.

I left her at the desk, where she collapsed again, crying in a way that tore at the heart.

I went down the stairs without touching anything except with my feet, and finally I was outside the house. I stood some distance away and called upon the angel Moln. I told her what I had learned and asked her to help set everything right. Together we managed to lift the curse.

The years that had been held back flowed through the house, slowly turning it to soil, until nothing remained—which was probably fortunate for the people who lived here now, because the shock of a whole new old house appearing would have been too great.

I thanked Moln, let the flame of hope go out, and returned to my friends. I told them what I had experienced, and their joy knew no bounds. Once again the forest belonged to itself, and once again the fairies could rejoice and delight in their homes.

And so began a long night of dancing and singing and happy cries. When it ended, I returned to the cottage and slept.

When I woke the next morning, I left my childhood playground and returned to my new life. I didn’t look back, so I can’t say for certain that all my friends stood at the forest’s edge to say goodbye—but I feel in my heart that they did.

Now I live like most people, with one difference: I see and experience more than they do, and I make new friends among beings my fellow humans don’t even know exist.

And when I grow old, I will buy back my grandfather’s family home and live my last days there, among the friends of my childhood.

I end this story by reminding you of a real gift I believe all people possess—yet far too few use.

What gift is that?

Imagination, of course.