Community Camp Fire Story // Whispers of the Oak // #1

Once upon a time, a traveler was walking though a dark forest. He knew it was dangerous, but he did it anyways. This forest was owned by his boyfriend, the kindhearted, noble, peaceful, yet hated, witch of the woods; 'Moss' Mossthanial Spruce Ginger. He wanted to see him, for it had been a while since they had last met. Between, the trees, the raging river; so strong and wet. He found a dark cave in the forest. He decided to stay the night there, for he had a long journey ahead. He rested before the river should calm down.

He saw a bird land next to him. The birb attempted to communicate via chirping; Which confused him to no ends. "G a na furber." Chirped the birb. He grabs the bird by the neck, and shakes them, the birb then flies away; still crying. "G a na furber. G a na furber. G a na furber." He pulls out a journal and writes down what the bird said. Then continues on his journey, still questioning it. 

He finds a large oak tree. And climbs it, after attempting four times. He see a ghost siting at the top of the tree, and the ghost calls down, "Go, go no further." Then the birb from before alights on the shoulder of the ghost, speaking. "G a na furber." The man repeats what the bord said. Then both are gone with the wind, leaving him staring at nothingness, questioning reality, and the very fabric of what he could see.

But then he sees Moss walking towards him, confused and worried. Then he stands dumbfounded, questioning if anything is real, including Moss. He blinks, he calms, and he remembers about himself; this is real; he was just very tired and very lonely. Then the memories creep back into his thoughts, he banishes them with the thought of his name. Twas a curse that once did come; fey forsaken an adventurer from dating a witch; he didn't know how to break it, but, he might know someone who could.

He starts running on fear of the memories trying to creep back into his mind. Moss holds his hand, and gives him firm a hug. "Look, I know how hard it is to deal with all... this... but we can break it; we can, okay?" He hugs Moss, and then goes back to his related thoughts, just on the verge, but not over. Moss pats his shoulder, pointing to all of the forest; there's a mountain, a river, and he's here to watch it with his boyfriend; he may be in a bad place, but better than he was last year; and the next near, he'll get better; the year after that, it'll be easy. Then the fear comes back, and such hopeful thoughts are impossible, but the comfort of Moss limits the fear slightly; but really, slightly is all he needs now, things just need to get better.

With fear still gripping at him, he tries to distract himself any way he can. "C'mon!" Moss says, as they walk into his cabin. In moss's cabin is a small little cottage with plants over taking it. Moss starts pulling books and artifacts out of a shelf; all books about fey and breaking curses, all artifacts swirling with Moss's magic.  The adventurer sees a present, with a label saying his name. He opens it, and it contains a crystal to sooth the curse; not yet able to stop it, but to hold it down until Moss finds a way. He pulls the crystals closer to himself, clinging on all the peace it is giving him. Moss pats him on the shoulder. "I know it's not a cure, but it can help keep it at bay whilst I find a cure."

He gives moss a grateful smile, and looks around the cabin. It has a small table with tea brewing over a magic flame. Moss goes over to the table and sits down, and motions for him to come sit. They sit down and talk, bonding, spending time together. The little cabin seems to feel warmer with the joy of company. It's a long time, but he hasn't seen him in a long time.

They noticed that it is starting to get dark outside, night approaches. But it is a calm dark, small balls of lights in the woods, the moon high up. The tea is ready, and moss pours some in two cups. They enjoy the tea together. Moss gestures to the couch and tells him he can sleep their for the night. And he does; just thinking about how great it is to be seeing Moss again.

The sun shines on his face threw the windows waking him up from his slumber. He wakes up, looking around to see his boyfriend cooking some bacon. Moss says "Looks like someone got some good rest." He smiles at that. He gets up to go wash his face. And washes his face, plus his hands. He heads to the kitchen to see if he can help cook. He can cook pretty well, however he hates getting grease sprayed on him by bacon, and, he also hates the burns that follow; so he helps with cooking eggs and such. With the toast as well. Soon, they are having a nice breakfast, and he smiles, as being with Moss helped greatly.

Sadly though, it's Sunday, and soon, he will have to go back to his college. However, he hates his college; but it's the only way he'll get a job in being a lawyer. He hates lawyers and following stupid rules, but at least he understood that without them, people would die; But that doesn't stop him from hating them, just from lashing out at them. He does believe that he can help as a lawyer, and lashes out due to how constrained he fears he might be as one. The fears, the fears always come back...

Moss notices he is sweating, and comes over to him and puts his hand on his shoulder. He lets out a spark of magic, one that lights the crystal. He is filled with peace, with all the negative thoughts rushing out of his head; and so after a long embrace, he heads back to collage for a week. Sighing the entire way back.

He eventually gets to the college and makes his way to the door. He is greeted by a few of his roommates, and they all do a bro hug. A stupid bro hug. What? He grips the crystal harder, and he hates life less.

Then he spends some time alone in his dorm, admiring how beautiful the crystal is. After a bit, he goes to his lectures. Most of his lecturers are quite boring, except for one of them, who taught biology. After he finishes all his work for the day, he heads out to town his roommates. His roommates urge him to buy a couple of drinks, but he refuses, because he absolutely hates things that mess with his thoughts, as his mind was always his one sanctuary. But he decides he could spend some money on drinks for his roommates, since he isn't gonna drink the drinks. So they thank him for that.

Soon, it's about 2:30, so they head back to their dorm, and then they study; they study until it is 5:30, and decide that they should go to sleep; they have a lecture in the morning.

They wake up at 9:00, and get ready as fast as they all can; they each have to use one of two showers, with four people, get themselves ready, and  then enter the 10:00 lecture quick, and this was such an uneventful day; but the next one very much makes up for it.

During his biology lecture, he noticed a glassy figure in the corner. The glassy figure just stood there, staring at them, as the professor brought one more forth. It gets closer, and be blinks, confused. It leans up to its ear and whispers, "G a na furber." He blinks again, and the crystal glows brighter, and the glass figure falls back. The glass figure turns around 4 times, and 10 more glassy figures come through the wall. One stumbles and explodes, spawning a fire; no one seemed to notice them moving, all thinking they were still, but they saw the fire. The students were all terrified of the fire, for it glowed bright purple. They all ran out, helping those who couldn't to escape.

But he stayed, he was far too afraid, and the flames did spread. And the figures started saying it again "G a na furber." He froze, still, and saw someone coming back to get him. It was Moss, wait, why was Moss here? He holds out a hand, and the glass figures all flow away, the flames repelled from the adventurer. And then he was glad, glad that Moss was here, Moss carries him away from the burning college. He asks Moss "How are you here? Why are you here?"

Moss says, " I'll explaine everything later. Let's get out of here first." When they get out, he falls unconscious due to the smoke, so Moss grabs his phone and tries to call 911. Sadly, Moss's phone has short circuited. Moss starts to panic and call for help, while he noticed glassy figures come out of the smoke. Moss then stared at the figures, dead pan stared them. The figure reachs towards moss's hand. Moss jerks back, screaming at it, to go away, and leave him alone... 

He hits the ground, and thorns rush out, destroying every glass figure. He stands shocked, Moss takes a deep breath, and sees the school phone in the mess. He goes to get it, and calls the medics and firefighters. They know not how the fire started; at least Moss has saved his boyfriend, and he was content with that. The adventurer would be unable to do anything physical, no activity at all. He would be unable to do any of that for several weeks, at least that's what Moss heard in the hospital bed.

 Not that he had ever liked physical activity anyway... then again, he was thinking about learning a few medieval weapons; but eh, he'd probably just wait, get more mentally unstable, and start hating himself for inaction but never doing anything about it. All the while stuck in a loop of self hatred...

Moss gave him the crystal back, and he stopped thinking about procrastinating. But which weapon? Eh, it doesn't matter right now; he can think about it later. First he must get home. But he has no home... he has his dorm and Moss's hut.