The winter winds still managed to find their way into the forest like ghost of the past. They didn’t bluster about as they would across the open plains, but creeped between the tree trunks as if looking for prey. Perhaps they were truly hunters out to torture their next victim… I for one didn’t appreciate their tactics and knew that I was the last of many who would fall to the season’s cruel embrace. Fuck dying from hypothermia. Fuck the cold.

In the time I’d spent mourning an idea that went just as swiftly as it came, I’d succeeded in losing myself to the shadows that made up this dull and vacant land. With only the trees and the spattering of moonlight to keep my company I felt somehow invisible or just suspended in time until the day itself returned to light the way. There appeared no point of entry and no path toward certain departure which obviously meant that I was lost. However, I was content with the idea of having no road ahead and no road behind… I was comfortable with my wandering.

Even as I weaved between the thick trunks of the pines, some mottled and misshapen by the past, I was compelled by the evident beauty of such a place. A man could become nothing in this empty wood if he tried hard enough… and the only frightening thing I’d learned of the Deep Forest thus far was that this was most certainly a way for a man to disappear.

My musings had provided the perfect distraction for a fellow wanderer to sneak up behind me when I least expected. But, he wasn’t the deadly monster I’d been expecting and more of a jolly ole fool who clearly didn’t care what I was capable of. What if I’d been anyone else? What if I’d been looking for someone to kill? This idiot wouldn’t know and he would have approached me in the dead of night just asking to be murdered. It was also sad to say that my spirits were instantly lifted by the sight of him (and my humor consequently restored). It was a good thing that he’d stumbled upon me instead of some bear or wolf or whatever lurked in the dead wood. Surely he’d be dead by now after trying to start a conversation with them, but he was just as lost as I was and I guess I could forgive him his stupidity.

“Or a bad thing depending on who you ask,” I replied with a faint shadow of a smile. This one wasn’t a pretty lady I could lure to my bed in the middle of the night, but he was company enough for me. He also happened to be the very first stallion I’d met since arriving in Helovia. No wonder I’d encountered so many fascinated females, I thought. Perhaps they admired my skepticism or just me in general. Either way, it was of no interest to me just as long as I wasn’t rivalled.

"Are you lost, too?"

Well of course I was. Did I look like some regular Tom, Dick, or Harry just frolicking about in these creepy-ass woods waiting to be killed myself? Of course not. “I wouldn’t call it lost anymore. You’re never really found here in Helovia if you want to know the truth,” I replied casually, as if I hadn’t been wallowing in my own self-pity only moments before. I couldn’t make out the boy’s features as well as I would’ve liked, but I could see the soft traces of white in his coat and the knotted horn upon his brow. That would have to suffice for a time.

Or until it didn’t.

Just when I thought I’d happened upon some brotherly company, it was quickly interrupted by this wispy female greeting that grated my nerves and piqued my interest simultaneously. Again I was confused by their jovial introduction… I mean were we not in a forest that could probably swallow us whole, never to be seen again? Or was I simply too wary? I’d like to think it was the latter, but I was also rather new to Helovia so that may have played a role in my utter confusion about it inhabitants. “Yes, hello?” I countered cautiously. The mare was also concealed by the robes of night, but I could clearly see, or rather hear, the clinking of some kind of trinket or another. Perhaps she was adorned in jewels or what have you, but I assumed that she too didn’t care what kind of creatures lurked in the wood waiting to taste a bit of her-

Well now, that took a turn for the worst. “And I’m flattered,” I hedged smoothly. At least they were the kind of folk that one could tolerate for a time. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if we were all lost together if only because my weakness in solitude made me somewhat manic.