Talking Trees

This is the first chapter of the story about Ahl who starts discovering that he may not be who he thought he was.

Chapter 1

He lied awake, listening to nothing but the persisting ticking noise from the alarm clock. It was the third night in a row that he was unable to sleep. Tick, tock. A never ending taunting. It continued to consume him until his world was surrounded of that sound of the mechanism that made the small clock legs move. As he stared at the roof, eyelids weary, reality blended into dreams, the ticking noise becoming more and more distant from his conscious mind as he drifted off to a long awaited sleep.

Two hands, so incredibly large compared to his own was holding him. Protecting him. He could feel her warm breath against the top of his hair and a happy giggle burst from his lips. The pages from the book in front of him was a large mystery to him with the text and its hidden meaning by the combination of letters. His young eyes settled on the pictures as her voice spoke up from behind him. "Long ago, in the woods of this land, lived creatures no man can see with his eye today. At least, no one would believe any man who told stories of such wonder as the one narrated here. For there was a time, when man was able to see. It is said that the creatures were as various as they were many. There were beings of cruelty. There were beings of anger. There were creatures as beautiful as the sunset, as fair as the sea. There were fairies and trolls living alongside each other, but none were as beautiful, none were as wise, none were as fierce nor as old as the elves. Then one day, mankind was born. None of the creatures had ever seen such cruelty as was laid before them, men slaughtered and plundered, they burned the forest, they chopped the wood and made settlements for themselves with dead trees whose magic they did not understand, as their homes. Mankind turned a deaf ear and a blind eye to the suffering of the creatures who had previously lived in harmony with the land. After a time, the beings of the forest learned to hide themselves from man, and he does not know, but he is never safe on the roads he travels alone. For they can all see the rotten core of all mankind's heart, even if he can not see it himself." The woman closed the book and laid him down into his bed. She tucked him in and kissed his cheek. The last thing he saw was a pair of steel grey eyes and then he only knew darkness.

He searched wildly for the source of the noise. As he finally found it, he grabbed it, still half asleep and threw it away, desperately trying to get rid of the sound. A loud smash like something broke finally made him jolt awake. With a sinking feeling to his stomach, he looked towards the window and had his fears confirmed. His mother was going to kill him for sure when she saw the broken glass in the window frame. He slowly slipped out of his covers, drew slippers over his feet to protect them and went over to the window. There didn’t seem to be much glass on the floor, but as he peeked out, he could see the ground below had a patch covered in fragments of broken glass. He lifted the window, grabbed a thick branch from the tree outside his window and swung himself to the ground. As he landed, a voice spoke up from behind him: “That wasn’t really necessary, was it?”. He spun around to try and determine where the voice came from. Nothing was moving in the shadows. As he stared out into the darkness, a laughter started forming nearby. It sounded like it came from somewhere in the tree. Was someone sitting on the branches? An uneasy feeling started to form in his gut. What if it was someone who wanted to do him harm? Slowly, he started retreating away from the tree. “Where are you going, boy, surely you’re not afraid of me?”, he still could not pin where exactly the voice came from. He started running blindly as panic started forming in him while the voice was mocking him from behind. “What’s wrong, you’re one of my own, you need not fear me!” He could have sworn he heard the unallocated source of the voice mention something about being lonely with a sigh and then he was letting his feet take full control. They steered him towards the forest, although, he didn’t notice that until the forest had engulfed him. He ran and ran, stricken by the fearful thought that someone, no something might be following him. All of a sudden he tripped and fell. He looked behind him to see what he had tripped over, just in time to see the root of a tree slink back into the ground. Slowly, the youngster got to his feet while he glared at the root. That was definitely not normal behaviour for a tree. He glared at it, all thoughts of fear and pursuit forgotten.

He did not know where he was. He had lost both of his slippers, and could feel cold moss in between his toes.Trees could be seen everywhere around him, even in the pale moonlight. The gentle brush from the wind could be heard, caressing the treetops. But it was void of all sounds of daytime activities like the birds’ happy twitter or rabbits digging in the ground, making home for their families. As he stood there, scowling at the tree that had tripped him, a laughter startled him. This time, a feeling of curiosity overpowered his common sense, and instead of running wildly, he started to move towards the sound. "I'm sorry, my dear boy, I couldn't resist myself when I saw you running around like a headless chicken!" Again, the heartfelt laughter rung in his ears. He was struck with wonder as he realised the voice came from the tree. It was like the sound of the earth had manifested and brought to his ears by the tree simply talking. "Anyway, what are you making all that noise for?" the oak raised an eyebrow, he didn't quite know if trees could do such a thing, but then again, a talking tree was also quite a new experience to him. He looked at the great oak tree in wonder. "noise?" "yes, noise, you were trotting away like a giant through these woods, I could hear you coming when you were several miles away from here!" The blonde boy bent his head and stared at his naked feet while he mumbled an apology to the grand tree. The bizarreness of the situation struck him for a moment and he mentally slapped himself, of course! He was still dreaming. The alarm clock probably never went off, and he was still comfortably tucked in to his duvet in bed, waiting for his mother to come dragging him off and kicking him out the door, ready for school with a slice of bread in one hand, a cheese in the other, backpack on his shoulders and a hat on his head. "I never realised I shouldn't make noise, Mr. Oak, sir." He started explaining. There were a set of hmm's and grumps from the tree before he did something strange; he bent down and looked at the youth. "What's your name, boy?" The adolescent boy blinked a couple of times, as if the question confused him. You must understand, that in a situation like this, anyone would be put out by the simplest question if brought to them by a tree, so it took a while before he remembered his manners and opened his mouth: "Me? I am Ahl" at the same time, he was pointing a thumb at himself and straightened his back, as his father had taught him. He'd shake hands with the tree if he could, but he didn't quite know where to reach out his palm to. "Ahl" the grand oak tasted his name. "You're not from around here, are you?" "No, sir, tree, sir, I am not. I grew up in the city. The capital, actually, not really as grand a place as they say it is, you know". "Not a grand place, you say? I've never heard of the city as a grand place, anyway. Everyone I know thinks this is the grand place and I've never heard anyone say otherwise, but if you don't mind me asking, what on earth were you doing in the city? So far away from the trees and your own, it must've made you slightly mad." "Well, I suppose it must have. I am standing in the middle of a forest, barefoot after running away from what, I have no idea, and on top of that, I am having a conversation with a tree -no offence, in the middle of the night." The tree smiled at him before he nodded. It was strange looking at, the branches bending forward with the tree and a thoughtful expression on its bark. "You're probably right, it is quite late and I'd best be allowing you to head home". Ahl turned away from the tree, ready to start walking, when he turned back to face the tree again. "Uhm, you wouldn't happen to know where exactly home would be?" "Oh, my lad, my roots are long and deep, but even they don't go that far, but I know someone who might be able to help ye. Where is it that you live?". "The small stone cottage by the end of the forest" the blonde boy answered. The old oak brought two of his leaves to his perched lips and made a whistling sound, like a cold wind blowing through a loft on an especially cold and windy day. After a few seconds, a plethora of moss-like creatures began to appear, seemingly from nowhere. One of the small creatures, no bigger than a thumb, was climbing up his trouser leg. He reached down with one of his hands, and scooped the little moss-like thing into his hand. He brought the little one up to his eyes, and could see that it was like grass and moss had taken a human shape and minimized it. The hair on top of her head was green and looked like it had never seen a brush.  "what's your name, then, fella?" she smiled up at him with big, brown eyes and made a series of sounds that he could only assume was their way of communicating. "I'm afraid I don't understand you. Is it OK if I call you Mjun?" The creature nodded with a jingling that was caused with small mick-macks attached to her hair and raced up his arm before she placed herself, quite content I might add, at his shoulder. "Now, these nice little chaps will show you safely home, good bye, Ahl, and I wish that the Caulis guardians bring you safely home" the grand oak said with a rumble and took a bow before he seemed to retreat into his own trunk. The mini people that reminded him of small moss-inspired elves, were already tugging at his clothes, trying to make him move in the direction they were leading him. Moving one foot in front of the other, he let himself be led by the little people of the forest. They were making excited sounds while they were hurrying through the forest. Ahl walked in amazement, looking around to see where they were leading him. All of a sudden, a soft sneeze came from somewhere around his left ear before he caught a glimpse of something falling down in front of him. His reflexes acted for him and he was able to catch the little green object before it hit the ground. As he held his hand up to inspect its contents, he had to smile when he saw Mjun sitting in the midst of his palm with a moonstruck expression. He had completely forgotten that he had a passenger. "Whoa, easy there. You all right?" he asked the little one as he put his hand at eye level to have a closer look at her. The mick macs in her hair made jingling noises once again as she nodded her head happily before reaching her arms around his thumb to give it a hug. This time, Ahl kept her in his palm instead of placing her on his shoulder again, as he was a tad bit nervous she might fall down again and then kept following the trail of small creatures about as organised as a flock of sheep.

The creatures came to a halt and he nearly tripped and fell from the sudden stop. When he looked around, his senses told him that he was on familiar ground. As he glimpsed out through the trees in front of him, he could see the small cottage where his parents lived. Then a question came to mind. What if whatever had been there before was still there? The voice that had made him run and meet these strange creatures in the first place. And the talking tree, he told himself, he couldn't forget the talking tree. And he started briefly to wonder whether all the trees of these woods were talking trees. But never mind that. He bravely puffed up his chest and started walking towards his home. After a few steps, he turned back towards the Caulis Guardians, gave them a small wave and mouthed "thank you, guardians of the woods, here I shall return to my home, I wish you all the luck until I see you again" After that, he brought his hand to the ground, where Mjun was still located and let her crawl unto the ground. "Have a safe journey, little one. It was nice meeting you, my home is welcome if you want to take the time sometime. That way, I'll know this wasn't all just a dream." Mjun smiled happily from ear to ear, showing all three teeth before waving at him as he turned his back once more and started trotting towards the cottage. As he drew nearer, his steps grew wearier and his look more suspicious. He walked over to the tree and started climbing up it to get back into his room. He didn't want to wake up his parents by using the front door. As he was about to close his window, the voice from earlier spoke up. "You should watch your feet more when you climb someone, you know." Ahl almost fell backwards from surprise. "I'm sorry, I didn't know...uhm...". As he stared down from the window, he could see a face forming in the trunk of his tree. "It's quite all right, my boy. I am sorry I frightened you earlier. I shall let you go back to sleep, I hear it's been an eventful night, but first I'll give you an advise; don't close the window sill until she's jumped through, will you" "huh?" Ahl looked dumbstruck down at the window sill, only to find Mjun sitting there, still smiling goofily at him, shaking her head from one side to the other, making merry jingling noises with the trinkets in her hair. A hearty laughter was the last thing he heard from the tree that evening, before it went still and looked like any other tree again. "I see you took me up on my offer to come by any time, little one, well, let me find you something to sleep in, I bet it's quite late for you as well." With those words, Ahl took a box of matches, emptied the box onto his desk, found a clean sock from his drawer and improvised a little-person bed with the objects. When the bed was done, he looked quite pleased with himself, put the tiny bed beside his own on a night stand. "Now, this is all I can make for you at the moment, tomorrow I can go and collect some moss for you to sleep on, if you decide to stay, but now I'd rather -" he interrupted himself when he notice Mjun already lying in her sleeping place and smiled before going to bed. "Night, night, little one" and he fell soundly asleep, still with the smile on his lips and the events of the evening fresh in memory, and he did not wake again until the next morning came when the alarm clock sounded like hell's bells (as it is for young boys who have to get up early for school). And good is it that his sleep was uninterrupted, for the next day would turn out to be quite an adventure, if nothing more than what this day had brought, then at least nothing less.

Author's Note

Please bear in mind that this story is for a Teen-audience.
Other than that, please do point out grammatical errors and any thoughts you might have that could give the story more flow to it.