Harsel, my horse, and I walked on the riverbank. All the way to where the water streams from.

As I ignored horrifying whispers and noises in my ears, we stumbled on a beautiful, enchanted forest.

We walked through colorful leaves and flowers, with butterflies fluttering around. Little animals that peek behind different kinds of plants. And within huge old trees that surround, entrapping echoes of the hum.

I tethered my horse to a tree. I laid down with the river by my feet and gazed at the canopy as I breathe.

Then I closed my eyes to sleep to grab a dream sphere. To lucid dream. To dream the very first dream I had. In a dream where a demon didn't appear this time.

I tried to close my eyes to wake up, but it didn't work. Instead, I flew straight to the dream barrier and struck it. Then I woke up. Back to when I was born. When I first woke up from a dream. And hearing my parents talking about what name I should have until I uncontrollably fell asleep again.

To a dream where I was fully subconscious and existed as a kid. In a strange place where the river appeared behind me. There was a horse running around, and a cat appeared bunting my legs, meowing. Then I bent my knees to caress its head.

"Narra," my mother's voice echoed from beyond, "Narra!"

And my father's, "Narra."

Then somebody called me from behind me. "Narra!"

As soon as I saw him standing across the river when I turned around, I was suddenly conscious of him. A teenage guy that I thought I knew, so I stopped him from walking away, saying "Wait, stop!"

He turned to me unexpectedly, and I said, "You're him, aren't you?"

He just smiled, and my heart palpitated, which woke me up by the river. Back to the enchanted forest.

I sat up immediately, facing the river, and looked around. I could still hear and feel my heartbeat. I looked at my body and my arms.

Then I just suddenly felt like crying, so I did, like a newborn baby.

As I can't stop crying, the forest was enlightened by sparkling fairies, sized as my fingers, fluttering around and humming like crickets.

Even the elf children appeared from the back of the trees, vocalizing like a choir. They appeared just like humans but taller and slim, white-skinned with long sparkling white hair.

One of the elves, who was silent, crossed the river with her lower body in the water. She was walking towards me as she was spreading luminescence in the water with sparkling dust coming from her.

An increased silence as she faced me closer.

Her black eyes paralleled mine as she gently spoke to me, "You can stop crying now." And after her mouth closed with a smile, I magically stopped crying.

She wiped the tears off my face with her rough fingers.

I looked around, and they were all smiling at me.

"You can come with us," she said. "We can play like children." Then she came up from the river and stood beside me as she continued, "We can be your friends."

I didn't respond as I gazed at the sparkling water.

I just listened to the wind, trying not to eye any of them, as I waited for them to vanish, but they didn't. So, I went where Harsel was to untether her. Then I mounted my horse.

"Wait! We know your mother." The same elf said.

I looked at her and she said, "We were her friends. We know what happened. We know who you are."

"Friends? She never talked about you. She never talked about elves and fairies."

"That's... that is so sad to hear. But you can get to know me. Us. All of us."

As she came closer to me, I looked at them, and one of them waved at me.

"Don't you want friends?" She asked. "We're not humans, but we're good. Do you believe me?"

"No, I won't until you..." Then I suddenly remembered the Elfland from her face. "You were stealing emotions from innocent souls trapped in your world?"

"We do not. How...? It's nothing like that."

"Yeah, I'm not friending you."

"Okay. You must already know about us. And yes. We still do it. But we can stop it."

"Really?"

"Yes!"

"How, really?"

She asked with a singing tone, "Will you be our friend?"

And the rest of elves repeated after her with a descending tone, "Will you be our friend?"

"This isn't funny..." I said.

Then they sang a choral "Please, please, please!" 

"No, stop singing!"

And they really stopped as I said.

Then I had a moment thinking as I faced them all, waiting for my answer.

She raised her arm perpendicular in front of her, and her hand's skin flaked off, revealing dry ice skin.

"What's that for?" I asked her.

With her hand, she cracked and flaked off an invisible barrier in the air, enough for my height to fit and get into a world composed and formed by ice. The Elfland. Then her hand was human-skinned again.

They faced me.

I was confused enough that I asked her, "Is that how you draw in... humans now? Physically?" I felt nervous surrounded by their eyes, "'Cause you're supposed to..."

"What else do you know? Tell me how we lure humans."

"Through a tree?" And I pointed out a huge tree near my side. We looked at it as I continued, "Aren't we going in there spiritually? Across that trunk?"

She gazed into my eyes back at me. "Look at my eyes." And I did as she came closer to me. "You're a friend we only trust. Trusted ones must trust us. You. We trust you to play with us."

"No... I'm not coming," and I quickly galloped off.

But on my way, by their icy hands, the forest was gradually concealed by an elven dimension, space by space, chasing me, until I was swallowed into a freezing world. Frosting me.

Harsel and I were quickly frozen, which halted us and took our last breath. I fell off my frozen horse as they ran to me and carried me away.

Bits of my consciousness started to disperse.

I can't lose this human body, so I tried to pull and keep every particle of this body unified and alive through gravity.

I just found I was capable of doing it as I kept myself warm enough that I could still feel my heartbeat.

They carried me to a glacial cell as my body started to heat up. Slowly melting my frosted body.

When I was about to be thrown in, they were scorched by my body, melting their skins that they immediately dropped me down.

The same elf walked in through them to see me. I was still frozen on the ground.

"She's fire!" They said to her. "We can not touch her."

She tried to touch my arm, and it scorched her with visible smoke. Then she looked at her melted hand before uttering an elvish phrase that made them, and their world, vanish into snowfall over the enchanted forest. Leaving me alone.

As my frosted body melted and cooled down quickly, I stared into a blue tulip far from me before I had my first deep breath.