I should’ve known something was wrong when we found the clearing. The rest of the forest - the sheer jungle - that we’d just spent the better part of three hours tracking through was overgrown. It stank of the earth - unsurprisingly - of things growing and rotting in perfect harmony with each other. But its colours were muted, faded greens and browns that had mushed together over time. When Marcus stepped on a twig, it didn’t snap. It squelched.

“What I wouldn’t give for a desert assignment right now,” Marcus moaned, rubbing feet that were equal parts wet and blistered.

“Keep yourself together, Private,” I replied, but not unkindly. Marcus was my best friend, after all.

“Wait, what’s that?” Marcus’ gaze was razor sharp, locked in something beyond the thicket of trees facing us.

“A clearing?” I guessed, my vision not being as good as his, evident in the spectacles that dangles from a chain around my neck.

Not giving a moment’s pause, Marcus stalked through the underbrush, mindless of the foliage he was destroying.

“Damn it,” I muttered, taking off after him with a heavy sigh.

When I eventually staggered through the wall of trees, cursing when thorns prickled my palms, it was the sound that hit me first. A delicate, dreamlike melody that softened the hard line of my shoulders.

Laughter.

“Marcus?” I call out, but my voice sounds distant, even to my own ears.

Smoke wafts through the clearing in iridescent plumes, softening my vision. I shake my head once. Twice, trying to clear it, but it clings to me, steadfast.

I see Marcus ahead of me, in deep conversation with a hooded figure.

Strange, I think, I don’t remember seeing them before. Then they throw back their hood and a tumble of grey curls fall out.

“Do you agree?” the witch wonders. For of course she’s a witch, with her gnarled nose and sunken cheeks.

Marcus nods blithely, extending a hand for her to shake and it’s only when their palms connect that I realise what a terrible idea this hiking trip was.