My heart raced as my eyes darted from tree to tree. The pines towered over me like a large and ominous audience, hindering my view and therefore my search. The sun should have been high in the sky by now, but in this forest I could not tell. There was a dark tension so thick it was palpable - not even the sun shone here. My legs continued to put one foot in front of another without my mind telling them where to go. Either they knew their own way to Sky or I simply was wandering around in the woods like a lost puppy searching for her owner desperately. In a way, Sky was my owner. He was older by a couple minutes, and of course he never let me forget it. I should have listened when he told me he was scared. He told me he felt like something was in these woods, but hindsight is always 20/20.

“No you can’t think about that now. You just have to find him.” I pushed the thoughts from my mind.

His name echoed off the trees in a voice I almost didn’t recognize as my own. I did not know I had produced the sound until I heard it reflected back at me. I paused to listen, but only heard silence in return. Eerie, creeping silence. The kind of silence that feels like a fog. Neither a cricket nor a bird could be heard, only my footsteps crunching against the pine cones and the trickling stream.

He had to be in there, somewhere. There was no other explanation. His shoe, my hand still tightly wrapped around it, had been on the bank of the creek behind our house. It was soaked throughly, so I assumed he lost it somewhere further up. What if I was wrong? What if I had spent the past hour searching for him in vain? I did not even think to call for help, did not even think to call 911. I just knew he needed me, immediately. I could feel it.

My feet picked up their pace and within an hour I had reached a cave situated in a cliff side. The creek went underground just inside, but I could tell it went in deeper. There was something ominous in the air - a smell I couldn’t quite place. I did not have a flashlight on me, but I could not let that stop me. I had only taken a few steps in when I found his other shoe, a confirmation I was on the right path. I looked up at the walls around me and could see something painted on them, but the substance and subject where unknown to me. I pressed further on, Sky being my only thought.

I could hear a faint whimpering, you could mistake it easily for the lapping of a brook. I knew it was Sky, but I dare not call out his name. Something about this place felt wrong. I should not have been there, and I hesitated for a moment. If I had to fight something in this cave, I had only my hands. They seemed so small, so incapable of harm in that very moment. The whimpering grew louder suddenly, and I followed it’s sound to a chamber lit with torches. Sky was in the middle, a circle of blood drawn around him. He was curled up, knees to his chest, rocking back and forth. He was uttering incomprehensible words, but relief washed over me still.

“Come Sky, let’s go.”

“If I leave they will come after you.” I struggled to understand him.

“Who’s they? Why me? Come on let’s go!” I tried to grab him but he pushed my hands away. He wasn’t making any sense, and we had to get out of there. I did not know why, but the urgency I felt was overwhelming.

“The demons! They’re coming!” His voice was merely a whisper but his eyes were wide with fear. I had never seen him so scared, but we did not have time for this. I punched him as hard as I could to knock him out, threw him over my shoulder, and high-tailed it back down to the house.

I did not believe him in the cave, but I wish I had. Demons certainly followed him home.