Where the Forest Remembers Ch5

The laughter lingered long after the wind had died.

It echoed through the trees like the memory of a sound, fading just enough that Aditi couldn't tell where it came from.

She picked up the newspaper clipping again.

The paper felt brittle in her hands.

The photograph was unmistakable.

Her face.

Her backpack.

Even the tiny crack on the lens hood of her camera.

Every detail was hers.

But the date...

17 August, 1998.

She wasn't even born. "This isn't real."

The words escaped her lips automatically.

---

She shoved the clipping into her backpack and climbed down from the tower.

She had made up her mind.

No more chasing answers.

No more photographs.

She would walk.

Straight.

Without stopping.

Without looking back.

The old forest guard's warning echoed in her mind.

"If you feel lost... stop walking."

She frowned.

Why had he said that?

Shouldn't she keep moving?

For the first time since entering the forest, she couldn't remember the man's face.

She remembered his voice.

His warning.

But his features had vanished, as though someone had erased them from her memory.

A chill crawled down her spine.

---

The path stretched ahead, narrow and damp.

She focused only on the ground before her boots.

One step.

Then another.

No turning.

After what felt like an hour, the trees began to thin.

Relief surged through her.

Beyond the trunks, she could see sunlight.

An opening.

The forest edge.

She broke into a run.

The clearing was only a few metres away.

She crossed the last line of trees—

—and stopped so abruptly she nearly fell.

She was standing exactly where she had started.

The rusted gate.

The leaning warning sign.

The abandoned watchtower behind her.

She turned slowly.

The path she had just followed no longer existed.

Only dense forest.

No footprints.

No trail.

Nothing.

It was as if the forest had folded in on itself.

---

A sound drifted through the air.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

Not knocking.

A walking stick.

Someone approached from the trees.

An old woman emerged from the mist.

Her silver hair was braided neatly down her back.

She wore a faded saree stained with mud at the hem.

Her bare feet left no footprints.

She looked impossibly old.

Yet her eyes were painfully alive.

"You've been here before," the old woman said.

Aditi took a step back.

"I've never seen you."

The woman smiled sadly.

"No."

"You don't remember."

Aditi's pulse quickened.

"Who are you?"

"I keep the names."

"What does that mean?"

Instead of answering, the woman turned and began walking into the forest.

After a few steps, she spoke without looking back.

"If you want to know why the forest chose you..."

"...follow me."

---

Every instinct screamed at Aditi not to move.

Yet something stronger pulled her forward.

She followed.

The old woman walked slowly, her stick tapping against the earth with perfect rhythm.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

Eventually they reached a clearing unlike any Aditi had seen before.

In its centre stood the largest banyan tree she had ever imagined.

Its roots twisted across the ground like giant serpents.

Its trunk was wider than a house.

Thousands...

No.

Tens of thousands of names were carved into its bark.

Some fresh.

Some almost swallowed by the tree.

Every name had been written by a different hand.

Some neat.

Some hurried.

Some scratched so deeply they bled sap.

The old woman rested her palm against the trunk.

"They're all still here."

Aditi stared.

"What are these?"

"People."

"No... these are names."

The old woman looked at her with quiet pity.

"In this forest..."

"There is no difference."

---

Aditi stepped closer.

Her fingers brushed the rough bark.

Instantly, voices flooded her mind.

A little boy crying for his mother.

A man shouting for help.

Someone praying.

Someone laughing.

Someone singing a lullaby.

Thousands of voices.

She jerked her hand away, gasping.

"What... what was that?"

"Memories."

"They belong to the tree now."

"No..."

"This is impossible."

The old woman nodded.

"It should be."

---

"Why does it do this?" Aditi whispered.

The old woman closed her eyes.

"Long before roads..."

"Long before villages..."

"People entered this forest and never returned."

"They believed something lived here."

"They were wrong."

Aditi looked up.

"There isn't a ghost?"

The old woman opened her eyes.

"There are ghosts."

She looked toward the endless trees.

"But they are not the ones hunting."

A long silence followed.

Then she whispered the words Aditi would never forget.

"The forest is alive."

"It feeds."

"Not on flesh."

"Not on blood."

"It feeds on memory."

"When every memory is gone..."

"...there is no one left to leave."

---

Aditi's knees weakened.

"So the woman in red..."

"...was someone the forest took?"

The old woman's expression darkened.

"No."

"Then who is she?"

For the first time, fear flickered across the old woman's face.

"The woman in red..."

"...is the first one who forgot."

A gust of icy wind swept through the clearing.

The branches above groaned.

The old woman stepped away from the tree.

"We don't speak her name."

Aditi frowned.

"Why?"

The old woman looked over Aditi's shoulder.

Her eyes widened in terror.

She whispered, barely audibly—

"...because she is standing behind you."

Aditi's blood turned to ice.

Slowly...

Very slowly...

She felt warm breath against the back of her neck.

A strand of long black hair slid across her shoulder.

And a woman's voice, no more than a whisper, spoke into her ear.

"You remembered me."

The old woman was gone.

The clearing was empty.

Only the ancient banyan tree remained.

And somewhere behind Aditi...

Someone smiled.