[h3]Woods[/h3][hr][center][img]http://i.imgur.com/daNUSGm.jpg[/img][/center]

[color=gray][quote=Croft]"Ah!" He exclaimed with a grin on his face. "Good morning, Kettle! I was wondering what can be expected on this journey. One can never be too careful of course!"[/quote][/color]

Kettle pulled tight the last pack on Grom's back and laid a gloved hand against the beast's neck. [color=#B2AEBC]"I honestly have no idea what to expect, Croft."[/color] She turned toward him and pushed her hood down to her shoulders; she had slept little but was brimming with energy; her expression was not quite as kind as it had been the night before -- in the back of her mind, she was concerned about the billows of fog that hung over the marsh in their path. [color=#B2AEBC]"As far as I know, no one has gone this way before. You had best keep your guard up, and stay close. It looks like visibility will be low this morning."[/color]

Movement in the corner of her eye drew her attention to Leon. For a moment, Kettle studied him as if he were a puzzle that needed to be solved. There was absolutely no way Leon was going to trek across the mud and muck with that peg leg -- he had to have realized it, himself.

Kettle's original plan had been to use Grom only as a pack animal, as evidenced by the volume of bags and boxes that had been strapped to cameldragon -- but it seemed there was one more duty her faithful steed would have to undertake.

Kettle looped Grom's reins in one hand and gestured with them to Leon. [color=#B2AEBC]"Leon, you're riding the lead,"[/color] she told him factually, with no room for argument. She didn't explain her decision, nor did she invite questions: the look on her face told him that the decision was made and he would be riding Grom into the forest.

Grom turned his head lazily, chewing, and huffed a dull sigh.

[h3]7 am[/h3][hr]
After a quick breakfast the company gathered in the weeds outside the veranda. Kettle noted without surprise that there were fewer here now than had been at dinner. She had expected at least a few to turn back after her speech the previous night; the reality of their missing faces only steeled her resolve to move forward.

Kettle draped the hood over her head again and picked up her spear. She scanned the faces of everyone who was left -- her own eyes had hardened, and she stood straighter than she had the previous night. She knew they were being watched; she could see nothing beyond the distant fog and the dark mountains behind them, but someone, somewhere was watching.

[color=#B2AEBC]"Where we're going, no one has been in centuries,"[/color] she announced to them all. [color=#B2AEBC]"I don't have a map, and I don't know what we might find past the treeline, only that we should make for the heart of the woods. I ask that you all stay close; Leon, if you will, we'll follow your lead."[/color] Atop Grom, Leon would sit far higher than the rest of them -- he would have a view of the path (or lack thereof) much farther than the rest of them, and would therefore be best equipped to direct their movements.

Frogs creaked and birds cackled all around them; the foggy morning was chill and damp, and the mud squelched under their feet. There was no road here -- the traveled paths had ended at the café door.

[h3]7:30 am[/h3][hr]
The creak and croak of crickets and toads filled the mist; puddles of murky water reflected gray skies and rippled from beneath; long-legged birds looked on in the distance; fireflies glimmered on the stalks of thick weeds. Grom squelched and splashed ahead at a leisurely pace. Mushroom-fairies lighted on the supply packs and rested there, wings shimmering.

As they drew closer to the twin hills at the northernmost edge of the marsh, the lines of trees began to take shape out of the mist. The trees that had seemed perfectly average from a distance proved to be enormous in girth and stature; like giants themselves, the moss-thick trees towered high overhead, and the company had still yet to reach them.

The sun rose higher behind the clouds, and enormous bright flowers blossomed; their huge red, yellow and orange petals -- each the length of a man's arm -- seemed to shimmer in the fog, like bursts of fire on the marsh.

[h3]8:00 am[/h3][hr]
The expedition passed between two high hills that marked the end of the wetlands. The ground was finally dry and solid under their feet -- but the fog still shifted and billowed gray around them.

Through the mist, high atop the hill to their right, something dark and misshapen stared down at them. It shifted and quivered -- and in a blink it was gone, replaced by only the moving fog.

The sunlight shifted and warmed as it filtered through the boughs of the impossibly high trees. The fiery flowers bloomed gigantic here, each monstrous enough to envelop a person in its petals. Their perfume filled the air, sweet and thick like honeyed cinnamon. Eventually the fog dissipated, and the sun trickled brightly through the breaks in the leaves, illuminating lichen-thick boulders and moss-heavy roots.

[h3]10:00 am[/h3][hr]
The way ahead remained clear and wide; the marsh had been left far behind them, and all was quiet save for the sigh of wind in the leaves high above. The flat, dry ground only offered the occasional boulder or stream to make their trek occasionally difficult, and once they were forced to change course in order to navigate the huge girth of a fallen tree, but otherwise there seemed to be no reason at all this forest could have a reputation for being anything but a pleasant walk.

[h3]Noon[/h3][hr]
Everything was just the same as it had been since they had entered the forest. They weren't walking in circles -- each tree was slightly different from the last and the angle of the sun was changing -- but the deeper they walked into the woods the less likely it seemed there would be anything here worth finding. The stench of the flowers, at first pleasant, was now sickeningly sweet. Their feet ached from their trek across hard ground. All around were still only trees, and moss, and flowers, and rocks, and no sign at all that any person -- let alone civilization -- had ever set foot in this entirely safe, bright, sleepy forest.

Leon would see it first: a white glimmer of stone between the trees in the distance to their right.

It was an enormous pillar of jagged white rock. It was twice as wide as the biggest of the monstrous trees, and its sharpened tip disappeared in the clouds high above the canopy. The pillar, as peculiar as it was, appeared to be of natural origin. Nowhere would they find any trace of toolwork, human or otherwise -- except for something weathered carved into the stone at eye-level, the size of a hand. With some examination, it could be determined to be a spiral, chiseled into the pillar centuries ago.

Grom suddenly huffed, jumped, and [i]bolted[/i] past the jagged pillar and into the woods beyond, whether or not Leon was still on his back.

[color=#B2AEBC]"[i]Grom![/i]"[/color] Kettle cried. The cameldragon lumbered and leaped with a terrified speed no one had ever thought possible, leaving a few bags of spilled supplies in his wake. His scaly orange tail disappeared between the trees, with Kettle chasing full-tilt after him, calling and whistling.

Behind them -- should one turn around to see what had spooked Grom -- the trees were entirely different from where they had been a moment ago. They were of the same type, with the same moss and flowers as all the rest, but the way back was no longer obvious, and nothing looked familiar except the pillar of stone.

A magpie bobbed on a low root. It fluffed its feathers and tipped its head. It had a dark spiral on its chest.

In the woods to the left, something bright gleamed in the sunlight. A ruby was embedded high in the bark of a tree; it flashed every time the sun peeked through the leaves.

In the woods to the right was a clearing full of little white flowers. At its center stood a dark stone statue.

In the corner of your eye, you see something dark and shifting, staring at you from behind with faceless eyes.

Blink, and it's gone.