Goddess

The trees were gathered together as though hiding something, something important. Mirna reached to one, hesitant. Its bark was cool and smooth.

"I hope you don't mind," she whispered. "I feel there is something I must find here, something I must do." Nothing would happen, she knew. It was just a feeling. She continued anyway. "If you do not wish that I pass, though, then I don't belong here and will leave immediately."

But it seemed that the trees sensed her honesty, and with a slight breeze, the tangled branches loosened up, just enough to let her through.

Crystalline water trickled down from a pile of small boulders, tripping over rocks and pebbles until it reached a clear, deep pool. The rippled surface was striped with caught sunlight, filtering through the small opening in the canopy of leaves above. The trees gathered at the pool's edge, their roots drowning, alive.

Mirna stood, letting her eyes soak in all the surrounding beauty. A gentle wind washed over her, brushing her matted hair back from her neck.

She stepped into the pool and gasped -- the water was freezing, freezing her toes, freezing her bones -- but then, it was fine. She waded deeper, the biting cold quickly consuming her legs, then fading as she grew accustomed to the temperature. Or perhaps the cold had numbed her -- she wasn't sure which.

The stones were shifty and hard under her bare feet, and it wasn't long before the water had wrapped and tightened around her chest, nature's very own corset.

Mirna peered at her feet and the pebbled floor below, then at the darkness ahead, where the water was too deep to see.

She took a deep breath, and---

The trees screamed.

A dark figure lowered his bow to his side. He could not enter the clearing, but he had gotten close enough to get a clear shot.

They had let down their guard for too long. Now the trees reached for each other, tangling together tighter than before.

But he had done all that was needed. He stepped back and vanished.

Little black bees swam before her eyes. The memory of a scream still lingered in her ears. It couldn't have been her, but -- but! --

The pain. It ripped her open, tore her apart, a great beast trying to devour her soul. The only relief was in the freezing, numbing water.

Dark red mingled with black, and she let herself fall . . . fall . . . .

Gold.

Light.

It tinted the water, flooded the air.

It burned and brightened, gold to white to blinding brilliance.

The trees contained its radiance, cracking and swaying but holding on. For eternity it shone. Then, finally, the intensity faded, leaving the clearing illuminated with a soft golden glow.

She stood on the water and opened her eyes.

She knew everything now. She knew how the forest suffered; she knew how its people cried. She knew of the assassins that roamed the land, just as she knew she had died by their hand. But the assassin had chosen the wrong place, the wrong time, for he had made her a goddess.

She would guard against the assassins. None would hurt the land again.