~*~:~*#H#*~:~*~
From the time Hevani entered the forbidden forest, all she'd known was uncertainty and confusion. Sarielle was so brave and resolute in ways Hevani wished she could be, so she followed her into the unknown, based solely on faith in her and the desire to escape.
The first day was horrible. The tree of hexes polluted the air she breathed, tainting it with sinful poison that made her body sweat and burn. She clung to her cousin, desperately trying to direct her thoughts to purer fantasies. And when they lost Kerensa, Hevani's fear for her was swallowed by the intrusive and very demanding yearnings. Her mind was in a place where she could barely acknowledge, Ellowyn. Thankfully, Kerensa returned to them safe, bringing with her another dryad creature, both beautiful and frightening.
On their path deeper into the forest, Ellowyn showed them a peculiar looking tree. It was bizarre to think that there was a nymph in there. Sarielle had shown them a dead tree sprite, but this was different. It had an aura, a presence. Rozenwild, ran her hand up the tree's bark and whispered to it. Hevani didn't like the sly grin that spread across her face. She didn't trust her.
Everyone was much more relaxed once the tree was destroyed. Hevani started to believe the nymphs' assurances that the forest was impassable to the likes of her father. No person who was a threat to the mystical creatures within would ever be able to find one.
With this security, Hevani's confidence grew. She even summoned the courage to stray a little ways from the grove. In her wanderings, she happened upon the nymph who was stuck as a tree. It was such a curious thing and Hevani couldn't help wanting a closer look. As she approached, the reddish-pink flowers on the branches fluttered. They were the most unusual flowers she'd ever seen. Three petals like that of a lily, interspaced with three long skinny ones that curled into spirals.
"You don't mind if I rest here a moment?" she asked, sitting under the curve of the tree's trunk.
The largest flower blinked once.
~
~*~:~*#A#*~:~*~
Amaranth thought it was a dream at first. Her beloved Ellowyn in nymph form, running up to her, falling at her trunk sobbing. With her, an elven creature offering to rescue her too. Ellowyn gave Amaranth some of her vitality while she waited for Sarielle. Neither of them knew if they would see her again.
But Sarielle did return, bringing more elhuvens and an old friend. Amaranth took in their new additions. Three shadows and a column of flame. She kept coming back to the tall girl at the back who stared at her with haunting yellow eyes. Most of the elhuvens were looking at her like she was a tree, but that one was staring at her like she could see
her.
When the hex tree was destroyed it was like a storm cloud lifting. Within hours, the oppressive presence that had plagued them for a century was gone. The forest sang with release, rejoicing in its freedom. Amaranth felt amazing. Life was flowing into her again instead of out. The fading seed of hope blossomed into excitement. She'd be a nymph again someday, even if it took another century.
Her sisters brought Dendelyn to see her. It was wonderful, but the forest was so quiet once they left and Amaranth came to understand that her life now revolved around the surprise visits of others.
On the day that Hevani first came to her, the elhuven was timid and restless. She sat by her trunk and tried to get comfortable. Her eyes wandered to Amaranth's flower, so the nymph tilted it in her direction.
Hevani sniffed the air around her and looked offended. "Are you doing that pollen thing?" She shrank away. "To make me a whore?"
'No, no, no, no.'
Amaranth blinked her flower once.
'My flowers have a naturally strong scent.'
The rest of her flowers wilted. She hadn't even done anything and this girl was scared of her.
Hevani inhaled. "You're not, are you?" She saw Amaranth's flower wink and relaxed. "Sorry. I don't trust people easily and I heard Rozenwild telling you to do it. I also saw what she did to Kerensa with her flower and I don't want that to happen to me."
Amaranth had seen the size of Rozenwild's flower and she knew well the kind of mischief the girl could cause.
"It's a nice smell. Sort of like violets and honey."
Amaranth fluttered her flowers at the compliment.
Hevani sat quietly in the leaves for a long time, just staring out at the woods. When she got up, she brushed herself off and said a shy goodbye as she went back the way she'd come. She didn't see Amaranth wave her flowers in farewell.
***
The next time she saw Hevani it was early morning. Amaranth was cheerful, bursting with joy from the day before. Ellowyn had given Sarielle her seed, and she'd made sure Amaranth was the first to know.
She was unable to keep her elation from the elhuven. Several extra flowers bloomed in greeting.
"Hello." Hevani slunk out of the trees and came to sit by her base again.
'Hello, leaflet. I thought I'd scared you off.'
She sighed. "Everyone's bathing together in the stream. I didn't want to join in. They stare." She picked up a twig and fiddled with it. It took her several minutes to speak again. "You must be bored out here by yourself. I don't know what to talk about that would be entertaining. I'm quite dull and not worth mentioning."
'Oh, flower, what a horrible thing to think of yourself.'
"I could tell you the story of Selrilve. There's nothing else for you to do, so I guess you won't mind if I repeat anything you might have heard. Why don't I start from the beginning?"
It started nice, but the tale got darker and the closer to the present the more twisted it became. Something had gone very wrong in that village. Maybe it was the tree's influence, but the people had passed beyond parochial customs into sheer derangement. Amaranth's emotions were so overwhelmed they became blank and a cold, empty feeling settled over her.
"I can show you if you want?"
'That is the last thing I want to see. I want for none of this to have ever happened.
But as hard as it was to hear, Hevani needed to have someone listen. Amaranth could see expelling all the horrors she kept within was her first step to moving on.
Hevani lifted the skirt of her cute yellow dress and shimmied out of the tiny bloomers she had underneath. She parted her legs tentatively. Her finger skimmed the length of her slit, over the silver metal creeping through her groin. Pieces of it tunnelled right through her flesh. A small shield hid her clitoris, held in place with chains connected to a belt around her waist and the top bar. Another chain ran between her buttocks, attaching a toothed circle around her hole. Amaranth felt ill at the sight.
"Father thought I had a little bit too much access and would be tempted to touch myself so he added the front piece. And then Kerensa got caught with that boy, so that meant another piece added to the back. And a slap on the face because he'd had to go to so much trouble."
Hevani continued on the topic of her father. She was quite engrossed in her stories and seemed to forget Amaranth was there. Years' worth of horrors spilled from her lips, sometimes accompanied by tears, other times by gritted teeth and spat words. Amaranth was sure she hadn't intended to get so deep or divulge in such detail. Perhaps there was so much held inside her that once she started it was impossible to stop. It made sense now, why Hevani wasn't like her cousin.
"Hevani?" yelled a voice in the distance.
That made her pause. "Apparently my absence has been noticed." She stood up on wobbly legs, looking embarrassed. "I'm sorry I didn't mean to dump all that on you. You don't even know me. Of course you didn't want to hear all of that horrible stuff." She lifted her head, finally noticing Amaranth's drooping flowers and the moist lines coming from the knots that were her eyes. "Are you...crying?" She reached her hand as if to wipe away her tears, but the voice called again and it spooked her. "I have to go."
