It slid over them, touching them, lingering longer then it should have.
It roused the memories first, and then their minds.
They awoke crying and afraid.
Scrambling in the dark, they all reached for their lanterns and lite them.
One by one warm bubbles of light pushed back the darkness.
Once the light reached Dogdancing she shook her head sleepily. The lightening bolts in her hair glittered in the lantern light. She opened her eyes and they dilated slowly as they adjusted to the night light.
Abruptly she shot up onto her feet. "Girls! she called in alarm.
Years of conditioning surged through their veins and the girls shot out of their leaf beds and on to their feet in a seamless motion.
That is when they all saw the ground. It was scattered with dead baby birds.
Little One voiced what they were all thinking. "what is it?"
"There is a monster in the forest." whispered Dogdancing with nostrils flared and her body tensing up to take flight. "Lets go."
"Halt!" came a deep voice.
They froze...eyes darting left and right.
The bear huffed as it slowly padded into the light. "Yes there is monster in the forest. But we must stay put."
Little Two writhed in agony. "But my heart is telling me to run, that we are in danger."
"We are." Said the red fox jumping into her lantern bubble and sitting at her feet.
Dogdancing swallowed hard. So scared she was she couldn't hear her thoughts over the poundings of her heart. "we aren't safe here." she said in an echoic voice tinged with panic.
"Truth." said the tree from above. "Right now, no where is safe. We must all be trees, and stay put."
"oooohh" whined Little Three, tears slipping down her dark face. "If we stay put the man wif the flesh knife can find me. He will hurt me."
The bear nodded saddly. "we have two monsters in the forest."
"Uuugh, one killing, and the other sending more girls to the forest." said the fox.
Dogdancing's knees buckled and she crashed heavily to the forest floor. The weight of that knowledge crushing her.
Her lantern flicked and dimmed.
The bear carefully began scooping out paw fulls of earth.
The red fox began gathering the baby birds and placing them softly in the holes, and using his snout to cover them.
A few of the forest girls stood tall twisted and held out their arms and barked over to became trees.
Others, crouched down and shelled up...blending in the the boulders.
"I can't stay, HERE, I can't stay STILL." said one of the newest girls to the forest. She was so new she didn't even have a lantern yet... and before anyone could move she took her life.
This unhinged the fox.
He fell and yelped painfully next to the still body.
From way up in the forest canopy the redmother tree spoke. "The forest is ancient. Endless. The journey is long. Long enough that some of you have forgotten just how strong you are. What it took to survive the past. You still have that in you."
Dogdancing painfully stood up, and took up her lantern. "not everyone can survive this...some are not long in their healing journey, some have yet to even take one step. Healing is hard."
She walked over to the fox and scooped him up. He sobbed silently into her neck.
She looked at the bear. "Not every story has a happy ending."
"Truth" the bear said and began to push dirt over the newest forest girl's body.
"What now?" asked Little One as she hunkered down and nestled into the rocks.
"We stay. We wait." Said Dogdancing.
"Is the healing journey over?" said Little Two.
"No." Said the fox wiggling out of Dogdancing's arm.
Dogdancing placed her lantern on the grave. It's light shining bright.
"We still journey....but for now we just have to march in place and hold the line."
