Where the Trees Watch – Chapter 21
The Trail Back No Longer Existed
The fog thickened so heavily around the clearing that the surrounding trees slowly disappeared into pale gray walls of drifting mist. Ryan could still barely see the thing wearing his face standing farther among the pines, calmly holding his wallet while smiling with unnatural patience.
Then the figure stepped backward into the fog.
And vanished completely.
The whistles throughout Blackwood stopped at the exact same moment.
Ryan Mercer stood frozen for several seconds while his thoughts spiraled violently inside his head. The forest wasn’t simply hunting people.
It was learning them.
Copying them.
Replacing them.
Claire grabbed his arm suddenly. “We need to move.”
Ryan snapped back to the clearing around them. Pale fog drifted between the photographs scattered across the forest floor while the trees surrounding the group seemed noticeably closer now than before.
Mason already moved toward the northern trail again without hesitation.
“We head for Tower Four,” he said quickly. “If there’s any ranger equipment left, maybe we can radio out.”
Claire looked horrified. “You want to go deeper?”
“We don’t have another direction anymore.”
Ryan turned instinctively toward where the main trail should have been behind them.
Nothing there.
Only dense black trees stretching endlessly through fog.
The path they entered from had disappeared again.
Cold dread settled deeper into his chest.
The group hurried north through Blackwood while darkness slowly gathered beneath the canopy overhead. The forest floor had become uneven now, twisted heavily by massive roots and thick patches of moss swallowing sections of the trail entirely. Several times Ryan glanced behind them expecting to see the smiling copy wearing his face following silently through the trees.
Instead he noticed something worse.
Claire occasionally looked toward him with uncertainty now.
Tiny moments.
Half-seconds.
Like her brain kept trying to remember where she knew him from.
Ryan finally whispered, “Claire.”
She looked over immediately.
“You do remember me… right?”
Her expression tightened painfully.
“Of course I do.”
But even now she sounded like someone forcing herself through a fading dream.
Mason walked faster ahead of them. “Blackwood messes with memory first. That’s how it isolates people.”
Ryan stared at him. “You knew this would happen?”
The guide didn’t answer immediately.
Finally he said quietly, “Locals call it The Watching Forest.”
The trail curved sharply downhill between enormous pine trunks while fog rolled thicker across the ground around their feet. Ryan noticed more trail bells hanging from branches overhead now, dozens of them swaying gently despite the still air.
Soft metallic ringing followed them through the woods continuously.
Clang.
Clang.
Clang.
Like the forest tracking their movement.
Then Ryan saw the markings again.
Circles carved into the trees.
Only these were different.
Larger.
Hundreds overlapping each other across entire trunks until the bark looked shredded beneath endless rough carvings.
Claire slowed beside one of the trees staring at the symbols. “What are these supposed to mean?”
Mason’s voice lowered slightly.
“People used to mark paths when Blackwood started changing around them.”
Ryan frowned. “Circles?”
“They believed if they stopped moving in circles…” Mason hesitated briefly. “The forest couldn’t trap them.”
The sentence settled uneasily into the growing darkness around them.
Then the trees ahead opened suddenly.
The group stepped onto a steep hillside overlooking part of Blackwood below — and all three immediately stopped.
Hundreds of lights moved through the forest beneath them.
Small pale lantern lights drifting silently between the trees miles below across the valley floor.
Ryan stared in disbelief. “What is that?”
Claire lifted the camera automatically again.
The lights moved slowly through the woods in long winding lines beneath thick fog.
Like people walking trails through Blackwood at night.
Except there were far too many of them.
Mason looked terrified.
“No…”
Ryan turned toward him sharply. “What?”
The guide swallowed hard without taking his eyes off the lights below.
“There aren’t supposed to be any towns near this side of the forest.”