Doors, Part 9 - Bear

Suddenly all lights go out and I trip. Without thinking, I reach out with my arms to prevent me from hitting the ground. But I don't feel the ground. And I don't feel my arms. Or toes, or anything.

I just keep falling in the dark. What's happening?

No, it doesn't feel like falling, but floating in complete silence and darkness. Like I'm completely alone in Nothingness. It's unnerving. I try to scrub my cheek to feel something but hit my nose instead. My hand is numb and slack, and then it touches my lip.

A flutter starts to fill my head, and increase. No, not in my head, I hear flutter from outside myself. The nothingness fades, and again I'm surrounded by something. I hear flutter, I feel snow under my mitten, and the pale morning light -- ouch! -- something poked my eye!

I open my eyes and push myself up to sit. I look around and see the fluttering thing, it is-- a faerie? I found it! Or did I?

"Are you a faerie?" I ask. My head still feels a bit dizzy from all the floating and silence and darkness and numbness. I had no idea that to meet a faerie you would go through such a strange experience.

"You can see me?" it says. A strange thing to ask. But maybe even when faeries want to be found, not all people can see them, so it is good to check.

"Yeah, I can see you?"

The faerie mumbles something I cannot quite hear, but I don't want to miss my opportunity and go straight to the point.

"Are you the one that opened the door?" I ask. I hope it is the right one so that I might get some answers.

"Yes," it says.

Great! Now this is finally going somewhere. It was a long shot to begin with, but I did find the very faerie that made the door and it came to me when I was calling out to learn about my uncle. It must know the answers I desperately want to hear, and then I can go and tell Mom and Dad the news -- I hope that they are good news.

"Thank you faerie, I am so honoured that you came to me," I say. I don't really know how to talk to faeries but I bet extra politeness makes no harm. And I am honoured that it came, because Garandeol told that faeries very rarely expose themselves to people.

"Er, you're welcome," it says. Nothing else. A pause. Strange, I was expecting some kind of words of wisdom, or acknowledgement of my quest for my uncle.

"I am honoured that you wanted to give me answers," I repeat because I'm not quite sure how to go on. "May I ask my questions now?" That sounds stupid, so I hastily add: "Or do you wish proceed with some other protocol?" That sounds even stupider but I can't think of anything to add to that to make it less stupid, so I just keep silent.

The faerie seems to think hard about how to put its words. Finally, it says simply: "What did you have in mind?"

I jump at the opportunity to explain my situation. "Long time ago, when my parents were still young, a foreigner came to our house through a door from the Faerie Realm. The next day he was gone, and so was my uncle. You surely know this story well. I think he took him to the Faerie Realm. Am I correct and is my uncle still there?"

The faerie looks at me carefully. It does not say anything for a while, but from its eyes I can see that it heard and understood well and is now considering. I suppose that's how the faeries are, wise and thoughtful and not acting prematurely.

"Yes, your uncle went to the Faerie Realm back then, but he went alone. And I think he is still there."

"You think? So you don't know? I mean, is there some ambiguity about his whereabouts?"

"I've not been-- er... seen him for a long time. But humans rarely leave the place, so I'm quite sure that he is still there, safe and sound. That's what you wanted to know, right?"

I'm a bit disappointed that it doesn't give me any recent information. But I don't want to upset it, so I try a different topic.

"So you are able to open doors to go there." It nods slowly. "Can you open a door to let my uncle come back?" Again, a long silence.

"I'm sorry, but that is not for me to decide. You should go to the forest. Yes, you should go to the forest right now."  The faerie says the last sentence with surprising eagerness. What is going on?

"But I am in the forest," I snap impatiently. "Er, sorry... I don't quite understand. Do you want me to leave?"

"Oh, no no, please don't leave," it says quickly. It flits a bit closer and then backs up again. "You should go to speak with the forest. The forest can give you the right advice. They will help you."

Now I am even more confused. Should I wander in the forest to calm my mind and then find what I really want, like the Fullminder once told in our village? Jeez, nobody took that man seriously. And strangely enough, it talks about a forest as if it were a person.

"Yes, we should go to see the forest," the faerie says again, nodding to itself. "Let's go right away."

It starts flying into the woods, and waves its hand to show that I should follow it. I rise up and take a hesitant step off the path toward the deep forest. It must be okay, right? Yes, it is. This faerie knows what it's doing and I will trust it to lead me into the pathless forest.

~x~

We walk in silence. Or I walk and it flies, anyway. It seems very eager to get to "the forest", whatever that means to it. Our forest is large but it has a lot of paths and I know them very well. So even if this exact route is new to me, I know where we are and it is comforting. It is already light out, and the rising sun makes the treetops in the west bright as if they were on fire. The snow from yesterday's blizzard is sitting on the branches like bright white pillows. This is the kind of winter weather I like, it is just the opposite of the mythical morning from when I visited Garandeol.

"Sorry, where are we going exactly?" I finally ask.

"To the Grand Oak," the Faerie replies.

I know what it means. There's a small clearing in the forest, and beside it there's a huge oak. I'm sure it's more than 400 years old, and its branches could easily cover our home and the barn. It's one of its kind. I'm about to ask why there, when it suddenly stops and waves its hand as warning.

"Hide! There is a bear coming."

I feel a shiver and get goosebumps. They should be hibernating already, what is it doing here? I lean behind a bush that is covered with a thick snow blanket and hold my breath.

A long minute goes by. I hear soft sounds when something is walking in the snow and approaching this way. I try to keep my head down so that it would not see me. Luckily the wind is coming to its direction.

Then I see it. It's a tall man, wearing a fur coat and skiing our way.

"Haha, it's not a bear, it's a forester," I say to the faerie, relieved.

"Shush, it's a bear. Let it go by."

Then I remember. Indeed, foresters were called bears long time ago but nobody uses that word anymore.

But I get annoyed, having been scared for no reason. Why should we hide from a forester? They aren't dangerous even if they look like beasts in their clothes.

"Come on, there is no point in hiding. He is a hunter and he will see our tracks anyway and -- aahhhhh!"

The man is so close that he must have heard me yell. But I'm not looking at him. I'm looking at my own tracks.  There are none.

I have just walked across this powder snow and I have left no marks on the smooth surface. None. I look at the fairy, then at the man. The man is just a few meters from us now, and he pays no mind to us. Didn't he hear? Didn't he see? He crosses my non-existing tracks without any sign of observing something. And he is a tracker, he would notice if even a shrew walked on the snow.

"Hello! Excuse me! Can you help me?" I shout. The man just goes on and skis away. I fall silent. What is going on?

Then I turn again to the faerie. All of the sudden it looks very nervous. This must be a trick. An awful trick.

"What have you done?" I shout. "Why didn't he hear me? Because I am no longer in my forest, that's why? You have brought me into the Faerie Realm, haven't you? Ooh, I can see it all now. You tricked me here and lured me through some hidden door."

"No, Charlie, it is not that at all. Please listen..."

"I did not tell you my name," I snap. "You have been spying on me. So this was the plan all along? You opened the door to trap me, and when it failed you saw another chance when I came to search for you."

"No, please, I want to help you. You need to..."

"How could I have trusted a faerie? Mom was right, and I should have kept away from doors and faeries."

Then I think of Mom. I start running toward home. Stupid snow is really hard to run in, and yet the extra work leaves no marks. Behind me the shouting slowly fades to silence.

"Charlie, come back. Please...!" 

~x~

I'm all exhausted and sweaty when I come to our house. Fortunately, it looks just the same, old home. I run to the door and pull the handle.

Nothing happens. It's stuck.

"Mom! Dad! Jack!"

I shout so loud that it hurts my ears. I pull the handle again but in vain. I grab the broom from beside the door to get some lever for pulling. The broom does not move. I grab again and pull and kick and shout and kick. I hear a small voice in my head but I don't pay attention, just go on pulling and shouting. The voice becomes louder and louder and finally I can't not hear what it says.

Charlie, you are no longer in this world. You are non-existent, just like uncle Aidan.

I fall to my knees and start sobbing.

____________________________

The next topic is The Grand Oak.