Halloween I.F. – “Going Dark” – Day 18

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Hands up to show they were empty, Fern took a step away from the spike, and another. “Of course I’d like to show a willingness to trust you,” they said carefully. “I’d love to speak as allies and equals, like you said. Being trusting is willing to be betrayed, right? But it would be very rude to get betrayed after I helped you willingly first.”

The shadows around Aris’s face seemed to shift as if with an expression Fern couldn’t quite make out. “That would be inhospitable of me indeed.”

“And of course,” Fern added, “my being willing to come visit you isn’t a favor you’re doing me, either. If it were, we wouldn’t be meeting as equals.”

“So you’re saying,” Aris said briskly, “that by meeting alone with you in my place, I have not paid the inherent debt I am in by you saving me in the first place.”

Fern swallowed, unsure if Aris was annoyed or just in agreement. “Of course. That would be strange right?”

“O, strange indeed of any host,” Aris said. “Very well. Hedge your bets, and know I will do you no harm while you are in my place for this visit, nor will I keep you trapped there. We will meet, we will treat, you will put yourself in my hands and in the strength of my words here, and that will be that.”

Unsure if they could relax, Fern found themself smiling again anyway. Nerves really did some wild things to a person. “And I, like. I have to emphasize I’m not Bannick’s stooge,” they added. “I’m open to an alliance with him—like, of course I am, I’m a soft little human who’s trying to survive here, I’m not going to turn my nose up at any possible help! But I’m also really aware he’s been messing with me. He’s told me he’s cut off communication, and even talked to my brother pretending to be me?? And he’s messing with the number stations on the radio.”

Aris let out a little tittering laugh that sent a chill down Fern’s spine, like a cold breeze that they just weren’t dressed for. “In regards to the radio,” Aris said, “nothing you’ve been hearing is an actual station. For someone who can play with communications and who wants to communicate, anything that can enable communication is their toy. He built an intrigue for you, a mystery for you to want to dig into, and then you tuned in. Well, he’s been broadcasting for some time in the hopes some other sensitives would be able to pick up on it, though most cannot hear it at all. And here you are! But it’s not for you. He’s run his little shows before you and if you die, he’ll run it after. It’s how he and I have been able to talk while both locked away, so that we have not lived in full isolation. Even no longer trapped, we are bound, and so he’ll continue to speak and play music in the hopes of strangling some of the pitiful loneliness out of his life.” They sniffed. “Pathetic.”

Intriguing. Fern wasn’t entirely sure what to make of that. That the radio show wasn’t really for Fern, but that by coming here and picking up the radio, it sounded like maybe Bannick had immediately begun using it to… to tune Fern somehow…?

“And of course he is trying to mess with you, and of course he cut off communication,” Aris said airily. “I would do the same if I’d had the chance. It’s just that you’d given Bannick greater freedom before you gave it to me. He has to hedge his bets for his ongoing safety, just as you do, and just as I do. Neither of us want to face that man’s wrath.”

“That man?” Fern echoed.

A shift in the shadows, those bright eyes moving: Aris had shaken their head. “Well, then, if you’re willing, empty your pockets of salt and come with me.”

A beautiful hand extended from the tree branches, smooth and soft-looking, brown, almost glimmering under the sun. 

In for a penny, in for a pound. Fern turned their pockets inside out and brushed them a few times to shake out the salt, then walked closer. It was still hard to make Aris out even while right next to them. All Fern could really see was the extended hand.

They reached out and put their hand in Aris’s. It felt… nearly human. Not quite. The temperature was wrong, and it was too smooth. But nearly.

Aris’s eyes glittered. Their fingers wrapped around Fern’s, and then they tugged Fern into the tree.

For a moment, there was a sensation of falling without falling; Fern didn’t feel their feet really leave the forest ground, but their entire being shifted, like the worst hypnagogic jerk they’d ever felt. They staggered briefly, but Aris was leading them on through the woods.

The woods were different, and so was Aris.

Gone were the cottage country woods with its expected vegetation, dirt paths, roots crossing underfoot. Instead, the trees that clustered around glittered and gleamed, sending a million reflections off their silver and gold leaves, their branches laden with diamond fruits. It reminded Fern of some childhood fairy tale they’d read; they wished they could remember what happened in it. The whole thing felt like it should be teeming with life: insects, and animals, and other creatures like Aris, but besides the trees, it was empty, nothing but Fern and…

And Aris.

Aris, the creature holding Fern’s hand as they walked, was no longer hidden in shadows. They were fairly small, slightly shorter than Fern, and moved languidly, as if through a dream, walking too smoothly compared to Fern’s own awkward, jerky, human gait. Their hair was a million hair-thin tiny pine needles all rolling down in locks made of individual branches, but the needles were also emerald, glittering and gleaming as they rolled across Aris’s shoulders, down to the ground to puddle at their feet and drag softly behind them like a train, chiming softly as each brushed the other. Fern couldn’t tell if Aris was naked or not; the glittering reflections off the trees and off Aris’s hair made glowing reflections that covered their body like diaphanous robes. Walking behind Aris as they were, Fern couldn’t see their face, only the pointed ears that emerged from their hair, the silk-soft arm and shoulder in front of them.

The trees opened up into a clearing. There were various tree stumps around, not cut but fallen and then polished smooth, the ground still littered with silver and gold foil that crunched underfoot as Fern walked, but simply chimed as Aris did. Ahead was a full tree in the form of a chair, a seat, a simple throne…? It was simply the wood, no branches. It hadn’t been carved, but rather shaped while still alive.

Aris jumped up onto that and perched there, crouching, all odd knees and dangling arms, their chin resting on their knees. Their face was so perfect, so beautiful, that Fern had difficulty remembering it even as they looked at it. Soft bow lips, an upturned nose, heavy emerald lashes covering glowing green eyes—

“Now, then,” Aris said. “What you and I want from an alliance, I’m not sure we know, either of us. But let me not put words in your mouth; put them there yourself. Do you know what you want?”

Fern had to clear their throat before they spoke. They felt out of place, a scar on the world, a discordance that shuddered through their body. “I’m not sure,” they admitted, wondering if it was foolish to admit even that much. “I didn’t want to see a tree harmed the way yours was, and I don’t want to see this free beauty you are, trapped the way you have been. But I… I deeply don’t understand what’s going on here, so I don’t know what to suggest.”

A little sharp giggle from Aris at that, who barely now resembled the feral, odd thing that Fern had seen in the world outside, being now rather more royal and less wild. Fern thought it would be good for them to remember that Aris was both things.

“Well,” Aris said. “I remember that Bannick offered you three questions or pieces of advice. I’m not Bannick, and I will not advise anyone, no, but I will answer three questions as well, if you have it and you will it. Then I can give you time to think on what you want the alliance to be, and we can touch base later—though it’s also possible we can simply plan to help each other as we are best able, and not make a specific plan at all.”

“Ah…” Fern swallowed. “Right, that’s true. It might be hard to plan for what’s going on here. So … I can ask you three questions? Please don’t count that as one of them.”

“I’ll do you a kindness by not doing so. Yes, three questions, ask away and I will answer as I am permitted,” Aris said, with a little snort that didn’t match their jewel-laden appearance. They stuck their hand through the air as if tearing it, and pulled the can of beer back in from where Fern had left it at the base of the tree, then popped the tab. The sound was loud and bizarrely mundane, and for some reason made Fern want to cry. “Refreshments?” Aris offered, apparently not wanting to drink without offering Fern something in return.

Should they accept the refreshments? 

And what questions should Fern ask?

[Comment below with a suggestion for Fern.]

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