I am so tired of berries and figs and moss soup. The corn and beets I’d planted had such a low yield that year and nothing else took. It had been the worst year yet.

The bears who’d run me out of their cottage had since forgiven me, only after I’d helped Ebar recuperate from an illness that looked so much like what took mother and father. In the years since she’d left my magic had gotten stronger.

Unfortunately, whatever curse had befallen the forest and my people had moved on to the other living creatures. Ebar’s parents, Growler and Matra, were given the same ceremony as mother. I couldn’t talk to him, but I felt Ebar’s sadness and tried to comfort him as he mourned.

It had been seven years and the forest was still filled with death. I couldn’t save them all and I couldn’t join them. In the first two years, I’d tried everything I could think of with no success. After my twelfth attempt to sever my ties to the dying forest, I finally gave up, accepting my cursed state as an immortal. If I ever wanted to see my family again, getting to Dameldun was the only way. There was no way to get to Dameldun without leaving Sorseluna, and leaving the forest meant breaking the promise.

The land wouldn’t yield anything I could use. The trees were becoming brown and every day while foraging, I found life removed. Birds would lay without breath on the ground. The once bountiful woodland creatures, curled up in burrows and hollow tree holes, all lifeless. Death was all around, but it continued to elude me.

Soon, I would be all alone. Even the fairies were slowly beginning to die. I feared staying any longer would mean I’d lose Sparrow and Rose too.

If I’d marked the days right, I was now sixteen. Sparrow was getting old and if she got sick again, even my magic might not save her. But I made a promise. “Never leave Sorseluna, Amarilla,” my mother had said - and I’d agreed. Even if I was only nine then, I’d promised. I had been barely old enough to understand what was happening. So much had changed since then.

The last seven years of my existence had been just that – existing. I was trying to survive in a dying forest that was losing its magic day by day. Staying would mean eventually starving. Perhaps then I would join them in the new Sorseluna. I would often allow myself to fantasize about being there.

Then my eyes would focus again as if seeing him, Dameldun, arrogant and proud. It was as if he were mocking me and everyone I loved. He’d done this. He’d taken away every bit of happiness I’d ever known, and for what? Because he wanted to practice dark magic?

For seven years I’d thought about him, wondering where he might be. The past three years I’d taken it further than that, letting my imagination run free. I’d gone from wondering where he was and on to visualizing how I might exact my revenge.

I could no longer count the nights I’d denied myself sleep in the cottage by the lake. Nights I’d stare out the window and play out the various scenes of finding him, killing him, and bringing back the forest. Bringing back all the Sorseluna people while he went to a lonely place of his own creation.

My reflection smirked back at me from the lake. I wasn’t very big. I wasn’t very strong or tall. But I had magic and being alone for seven years in a forest that relied on your magic, one gets a lot of practice. I was grateful for what my mother had taught me and that Rose had also been a willing teacher.

Rose. I’d never discussed my ideas with her. I wondered if she would understand. What was happening was undeniable. One look around at the brittle dirt colored leaves in the middle of summer and the evidence was unmistakable. The fullness of death lay at our door.

__________

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