Beneath the whispers

Chapter 18

Love is beautiful they say, but it stings and hurts yet it illuminates and soothes. It gives the sense of longing so intense with a touch of desire. But this is different. This stings harder and burrows deeper. Breaks free the darkness lurking within the glimmer of light in our souls, desire encroaching on our common sense and a deep sense of longing, a distraction to the dark tunnel that could barely let us stand.

The broken rays of light from the sun interrupt our echoing giggles through the other side of the tunnel covered with a long-leafed plant. I stride towards it and rip the plant from the mouth of the tunnel taking time to inhale the cool moist air with a bright grin, I hold my head still as the calm wind slam on my face, pushing my stubborn strands away from my face – come to think of it, my hair is getting worse, I need to start packing it away

I break free from the tunnel landing on the moist forest soil with hardly a leap, the trees piercing through the sky and their roots breaking from the soil like the veins on that cab man's hands and birds chirping from high up on the tree branches – Speaking of which, all this explain why the cab man was so reckless about getting a good review from me. He just didn’t need it

“Tony, you have to see this?” my voice trail in the moist air and I stretch my hand into the tunnel wiggling them to touch his “come out already” this time my voice echo into the tunnel and the silence after wards sends chills down my spine – in hardly a minute I was wrapped in his arms and just like that he is nowhere? Is he playing some game with me?

“Tony?” I slowly step back from the tunnel to let the light into the tunnel peering my gaze at the lighted part “Tony?!” my voice echoes longer rippling with panic from my throat and breaking from the tears that have begin to form, the crusty skin of the inner tunnels daggling green slim ropes I could swear might be a living plant swinging slowly and they are the only thing that move

“no no no no no…” I step back further trying to figure out what exactly I should do. Then I look round the now freaky forest and back at the tunnel, my eyes already wet with tears “Tony?” what kind of stupid trick are this gamers pulling up with me? Was Tony even real? What the hell is happening?

“Boom!” Tony's head breaks out of the tunnel making me fall and throwing him in a bout of laughter.

“Are you ok? Didn't mean to make you fall” he finally says while I still lay there wondering how all this is even funny – but I cannot deny my relief that this is actually a prank because what the hell was that? He leaps out of the tunnel, dusting his body with his shirt, and then ties it around his waist with ease

“Don’t you ever - do that again” my voice almost shouting but the humid air makes stupid of the vibration I hoped he felt. I accepts his stretched palm and drag myself to my feet

“What is this place?” He asks. Our gaze shifts to the forest trees lingering at the branches high up

“This is a path” I gesture to the untarred pathway of moist soil and roots. Only that more soil was on that lane compared to inside the forest. With trees on both sides, we stroll down the path side by side.

“What if we are heading to the Den of the shadows?” His voice is deeper than usual with a funny expression on his face

“Not gonna work Tony” I say through a heave

“oh, not so jumpy now are you?” he raise his brow

I brush him off with a tired eye roll “I have been in the midst of dark clouds twice and your deep sexy voice is supposed to push me over? Go try it on Rose” I finally say when he keeps looking at me

Our cackles grow in the atmosphere as we close in on what look like a hill. Distinct whispers grew in our ears bugging at us and causing our ears to itch then it goes silent when we try to listen. It's the whispers! - panicked, we scan through the forest as the whispering grew. The noise was all over our head that we cannot pin point the direction it is from so we climb a slight hill and our weary gaze rests on the measly glimpse of what look like a mansion.

I gasp at the size of the building “what did you see?” Anthony asks, still struggling with the branches and roots that blocked his path. He moves some branches from the tiny trees covering us

“dark clouds are parading the mansion, I saw one pass the window on the extreme left” I say, squinting my eyes and crashing my brows together.

There is a dark smoke-like aura on the building border and inside was grey with dim light. The front door lays open just enough to let a thin tree branch in and the exotic veranda upstairs stained with thick dust and spider webs.

“The den of the shadows” Tony declared more astonished than afraid. There is something about the way he said it that made me quiver and more so was the green eyes that peered through the dusty window in our direction – shit shit shit… that maniac is looking right at us and I don’t know if its just me reacting from fear but I think he might have done the shadowy-can’t- see-your-teeth grin at me… define dead meat again. Gasping I stare back at it, dark clouds like structure of a six feet tall man. The eyes gleamed even brighter pushing Tony to his feet as he drags me along and we break out into a sprint

“What was that?” I yell after him. Struggling to meet up with his pace, I am panting already barely seeing the roots that could trip me, my hand disappeared in his as he pulled me along towards the tunnel we came with

“you were the one staring” he responds after some long minutes of running through the forest. He had slowed down now, panting and he drops on a high root on his butt with his hands under his forehead

“we need to get out of here, why are we stopping now?” I ask barely keeping my legs still

“the tunnel is dark, we need to remain under the light to avoid them from getting to us” Normally, that would never have crossed my mind probably until the shadows have me in their tight cold grip, luckily for me, I have Tony to do the thinking while I worry about stilling my restless leg and stop pacing too much

“what should be do? The sun won't be on for long” I finally say ignoring the calm-down look on his face

“we should cut their access to the tunnel somehow - maybe we cut them off also” he suggests with a shrug. He is right, they will only get to the tunnel through the shade from the trees and that explains why we stopped, there is not much tree branches above us – clever

The trees provided a shade just by the tunnel and anything blocking the sun was going to provide a pathway for them to attack us in it. Heavy wind swings the forest trees away from the building and towards us with the sky getting dimmer by the minute from the clouds that struggle to cut the sunlight ray from reaching us – we don’t have a minute to spare

“Where are you going?” Tony calls after me, I had hurried to a rope that laid by the floor under the tunnel. Whoever left it there must have used it for the exact same purpose as I will

“We need to drag the branches down to allow sunlight around the tunnel. We don't have time” I explain already swinging the rope round like I have ever done this before. He hurries towards me and snatch the rope from me – rather softer than I care to admit. He throws the rope at the branches and catch a handful of branches after many throws, I join him to drag the branches down crashing them on the floor or just making them fall to the sides of the tree trunk

Wiping breakout of sweat on my fore head with the back of my hands after a few long minutes of hard labor for survival, I could barely pause my panting for a deep breath. With what seems like my last strength I drag my head up to look at the trees

“this is not helping - the sun is going down” I say with my voice breaking from the tears that is choking on my throat – believe me, I don’t know where this tears do come from and how they form so quickly but I am not letting them break out in an emotional display

Tony looks up at the trees panting, he lets out a ragged breath with a look that I could relate to – for something we had been working on for however long, there shouldn't be a branch on those trees.

“this will do, give me your hand” he finally says and we both plunged into the tunnel hoping we were right about the light.