I glanced left and right, trying to figure out what I'd missed but I couldn't see it anywhere. I retrieved my cellphone from my pocket once more and used it to illuminate the undergrowth. Everywhere I looked, small shrubs grew tall and wild, no sign of a trail between them anywhere. “I don't understand…”
“The track we followed to get here is gone too!” Chloe shouted from the far side of the fire.
I flinched at the loudness of her voice but hurried after Spencer to see if she was right.
We had walked in a straight line which led right up to the oak tree and yet somehow, the path was gone. Reese leant down and pushed a few shrubs aside with a frown.
“It's still here,” he said slowly. “The plants are just kinda hanging over it.”
“Like they fell across it?” I asked.
“More like they… grew.” Reese looked up at us with a frown, clearly understanding how crazy he sounded.
“We can't have been here for more than three hours,” Jason said. “How could they have grown over the path that quickly?”
“I'm just saying what I see - no argument from me that it doesn't sound insane,” Reese replied.
Several of the others started to inspect the ground where the trail should have been and I headed back to the tree to see if the path onwards was still there somewhere.
I followed the curve of the oak tree to where I felt like I remembered the trail heading and knelt down to push the foliage aside. Sure enough, the leaves of the plants either side of the path had somehow moved to cover it. I could still see the hard packed dirt which had been trampled down over so many years that it was impossible to miss. Across it though, there were a few tiny shoots appearing, starting their journey towards the sun.
“What the hell is going on?” Spencer muttered. “How are we supposed to follow it now?”
“Let's just get moving,” Demi said irritably. “If we don't manage to follow that trail then we're gunna end up stuck in these crappy woods until someone saves us.”
“No one even knows we’re in here,” Shilo replied. “So I don't actually think anyone is going to be sending out a rescue party for us if we get lost.” I shuddered as the truth of his words settled over me. We had to get ourselves out of this.
“Plants don't grow this fast,” Chloe objected. “There must be some other explanation. Are you sure they haven't just blown across the path in the wind?”
“It doesn't matter. We just need to get out of here while the path is still there at all,” I said, siding with Demi for once. The mystery of the plants didn't matter at that second; we just needed to get the hell out of the forest.
I illuminated my cellphone
again and shone it onto the ground where the path should have been. I could just about make out the faint trail where none of the bigger plants grew directly up. Stepping into the overgrown fauna I just hoped that I was right. Either way we needed to move and no one else seemed willing to chose a route. If it all went to hell, on my head be it.
Hours ticked by steadily and our progress was laboriously slow. It was getting harder and harder to see where the path lay hidden beneath the shrubs. It seemed like the plants were growing larger right before our eyes. I didn't want to believe it was true but the further we went, the higher the trees seemed to tower above us.
“It’s impossible,” Tara muttered behind me for the hundredth time. I was beginning to wonder if she'd suffered some kind of mental break. As far as I knew, no one had gotten any real sense out of her since Bryony had been killed.
The air around us seemed to be growing colder the further we travelled. My breath rose in tiny clouds which swirled around me as I stomped through them.
Creatures moved in the darkness beyond my cellphone light too. Some scurried and scampered by whilst others stared as we passed them. Their eyes illuminated as pinpricks of light in the shadows. I didn't dare raise my light to see them clearer. I only hoped that if we carried on by they'd let us be on our way. So far it appeared to be working.
Jason and Demi seemed to have recovered after our rest at the oak tree. I was glad that they could keep up the pace; the idea of lingering within the trees for any longer than we had to didn't appeal to me.
A strong wind kicked up around us, sending the plants swaying ferociously around our ankles. I paused, unable to make out the path anymore as the shrubs continued to shudder. The noise they made sounded too harsh. Almost like the clattering of a wooden wind chime that had been caught in a storm.
As the wind gusted again, something caught the side of my knee and I flinched as pain lanced up my leg.
I twisted my cellphone, aiming the light from it at my knee and finding a small tear in the leg of my pants. A thin line of blood oozed from a wound like a long paper cut beneath the material.
“Ow!” Lacey gasped from somewhere behind me.
“What was that?” Jason asked angrily.
I turned and raised my cellphone above my head to look back at my friends. We were in a large clearing thick with shrubs which reached up over our ankles towards our knees. The starry sky peeked down at us from above, watching us with sparkling disdain.
As the wind howled again, the shrubs rustled angrily and my light illuminated several brown shapes as they sped past us. Before I could see what they were, they disappeared between the leaves at our feet but it seemed like they'd jumped.