The mountains of the Root People were a labyrinth of twisted trunks and vines as thick as ropes. Sunlight rarely filtered through: air currents pushed black clouds over the peaks, shrouding the mountains in perpetual darkness. Every step was a rustle of dry leaves and unearthed roots, and the air was dense, heavy with the scent of resin and wet earth.
Sha’ra moved slowly, her bones hardened by time but her eyes still sharp as blades. For decades she had traveled these paths, every curve and every root etched into her memory. She was the shaman of the Root People, the keeper of signs and premonitions, the one who listened to the breath of the forest and spoke with fire to protect her people.
She often spent entire weeks alone, far from the village, eating whatever she could: sometimes hunting small animals, other times subsisting on roots and insects, just to maintain her connection to the land and the spirits of the forest. Solitude did not frighten her; on the contrary, it had made her patient and attentive, ready to read the subtlest signs.
The people were changing. New generations were seduced by the comforts and novelties brought by merchants and travelers from the plains, forgetting the ancient ways and the rituals that kept the forest spirits and their ancestors united. But Sha’ra was among those who resisted. She kept the traditions alive, continuing the mission of the Root People: a mission that had lasted for hundreds of years, one that no wealth or novelty could extinguish.
She walked with a gnarled staff in her hands, carved with ancient symbols and blackened by the smoke of centuries of rituals. Every now and then she stopped, tilted her head, and listened: the wind through the branches, the distant murmur of a stream, the whisper of some hidden animal. Everything spoke, and she knew how to interpret it.
There was no hurry in her pace. Time flowed differently for Sha’ra: every step was an echo of life, every breath a bridge to what could come. The forest was never silent, yet only those who truly knew its voices could understand the secrets it held.
Upon reaching a hidden clearing, she carefully lit a small fire, surrounding it with black stones. She sat down, closed her eyes, and focused on the crackle of the flames, as she had done every day of her long life.
For a moment, she closed her eyes and surrendered to silence. She wondered, with the fatigue of one who has lived too long, whether everything she had done had truly meant anything. All those years spent in the solitude of the mountains, the sacrifices, the chastity, the life devoted to traditions… all to maintain a bond with the ancestors and the forest spirits. Perhaps it was too late to ask such questions, yet she could not help herself.
“What am I still doing here?” Sha’ra thought bitterly. “My people… my people… the mission we have carried for ages… does it still make sense? Watching over these mountains, looking for signs among the branches and smoke… does it really serve a purpose, or am I just chasing shadows?”
The wind hissed through the trees, carrying the smell of burnt resin and wet earth, almost as if answering her.
“And all this… for what?” she whispered, her voice a silent echo in the clearing. “The sacrifices, the chastity, the vigils, the days and nights spent watching the sky and the flames… did it really mean anything?”
The Root People were no longer what she had known in her youth. The younger ones looked to the future with skeptical eyes, drawn to trade, technology, and the routes beyond the mountains. Only some still followed the ancient rules, listening to the call of the air currents that generated black clouds, keeping the sun from ruling the peaks. Sha’ra knew she was part of that minority.
“But the mission… does it still make sense?” she kept asking herself. “Watching over these mountains, interpreting signs, protecting the people from unseen threats… does it still matter in a world that is changing so quickly? Do the signs I seek… still matter to anyone, or are they just old superstitions?”
Her eyes fell on her gnarled hands, veined and worn with time, hands that had traced symbols in sacred fires, held herbs, offered prayers and words to the spirits. Every gesture had a purpose: to guide, warn, protect. Yet the feeling of futility gripped her like a slow, relentless vise.
“And the people?” she whispered. “What am I still doing here if their hearts are already elsewhere? If my premonitions, my warnings, are likely to fall on deaf ears? I have spent my whole life teaching, watching, bearing the weight of responsibility… and now perhaps it’s too late for me. Too late for them.”
Something brought her back to reality. A noise, barely perceptible over the crackling of the fire. Sha’ra strained her ears, holding her breath. The silence of the clearing was deep, broken only by that slithering, subtle sound, like a foot dragging through leaves.
Instinctively, she grabbed the dagger she always carried. An ancient iron blade, sharpened many times, worn by age. She clutched it, knowing it would be useless if someone truly attacked her. “Incredible…” she thought bitterly. “A lifetime among these mountains, and I’ve been caught like this?”
She slowly rose, scanning the darkness beyond the flames. Her pupils, accustomed to the mountain shadows, searched for figures, for any movement. But the more she looked, the more she realized that the sound was not coming from behind the fire… it was coming from the fire itself.
A shiver ran down her spine. The crackle of the flames changed tone, transforming into a sound that did not belong to wood or air. It was something else. Something that should not exist.
“What… is this?” she murmured, lips barely moving, as her hand holding the dagger began to tremble.
Never in all her years of visions had she heard anything like it. Among the signs she had read, the whispers in the wind and the echoes of fire, none had delivered such horror. It sounded like a laugh… but it was not human. It was cavernous, distorted, deep, as if coming from the very belly of the earth.
Sha’ra felt her skin crawl. “No… no…” she whispered, stepping back.
The laughter grew louder. The flames flickered and then began to darken, blackening like pitch. Liquid shadows twisted among the embers, and the laughter now filled the entire clearing, bouncing off the trunks like a thousand voices speaking with the same mouth.
“The prince… I must warn everyone!” Sha’ra thought, the voice inside her head more urgent than any scream. With trembling hands, she began hastily gathering the few items she always carried: bone amulets, dried herbs, her vision scroll, the dagger.
But as she moved, something changed. The flames no longer stayed still; they seemed to stretch and crawl toward her as if alive. The black embers licked her feet, slid among the fallen branches, and the crackle that had once been comforting now pursued her.
The laughter continued, louder, cavernous, closer. Every step, every movement seemed to feed it. Sha’ra felt her heart hammering in her chest, her mind swinging between fear and determination.
“I can’t stop… I have to warn the people!” she told herself, clutching the dagger as her only anchor to reality. The fire twisted and writhed around her.
The forest seemed to breathe with the flames. The mountain wind bent the branches and lifted the dry leaves, amplifying the echo of the laughter that now rolled through the clearing like a hellish drum.
Sha’ra took a deep breath, trying to master her panic. “The prince is back… I must hurry… I must warn them all!”
The fire struck without warning. First, a flame licked her ankle, burning her skin and making her scream—a scream lost among the crackle and the cavernous laughter. Sha’ra felt the heat devour her legs, smoke fill her lungs, but between panic and pain she found clarity. With her free hand, she etched a rune on her arm screaming a single message: “THE PRINCE IS BACK!”.
The fire continued to climb, consuming everything it touched. Her skin sizzled under the flames, and the pain was so sharp that the world seemed to shatter into sparks and screams. There was no time: she had to jump.
She leapt from the cliff, screaming as the flames chased her. The fall through the trees was torture: bark tore at her flesh, deep scratches burned even more in contact with the ashes. Every branch lacerated her arms and face, leaving red gouges on her already devastated body. The laughter followed every movement, insinuating itself into her mind, twisting her thoughts, nearly driving her mad.
Finally, she reached the river below. The impact with the icy water was brutal: her bones trembled, her lungs burned, water filling her eyes and mouth, nearly drowning her. She dragged herself to the shore, barely alive, her body battered, her face swollen and covered with ash. The dagger was still clutched in her hand, and the message on her arm, now bleeding and half-erased, remained the only witness to her warning.
When Sha’ra emerged from the icy river, the black fire was gone. The cavernous laughter that had terrorized her, insinuating itself into her mind, was no more. In its place remained only the normal crackle of small embers among the trees, remnants of the flames that had licked the cliff.
The forest still smelled of burnt wood, ash, and dry leaves, but all had returned to apparent calm. Sha’ra, exhausted and in pain, fainted. She floated on the surface of the water, her body battered by branches and burns. The message etched with the dagger on her arm, bleeding and smudged, remained the only testimony.