She stepped into the clearing without making a sound. The air was practically vibrating with energy, filling everything with a vibrance of life. She crouched to unlace her boots then stood kicking them off one by one, removing the socks and tucking them into the boots. The forest floor was cool but soft on the hot flesh of the soles of her feet. It was a welcome relief after the walking to get here, she could almost feel her feet sigh as she wiggled her toes in the moss and pine needles. This had to be the place. It resonated with a welcoming warmth she hadn’t felt in the rest of the forest. Not that the rest of the forest had been unwelcoming, but this… this was different. Focused and something that couldn’t be ignored.

She breathed deeply, ingesting the scent of the pine trees and the damp soil, letting it fill her lungs before holding it and slowly exhaling. Slowing down her internal systems and opening her senses through breathing, she sat down cross legged in the center of the clearing shedding her bag and jacket. Eyes closed she listened to the breeze play the trees like custom instruments, creaking and groaning among the birdsong that sounded wondrously like the babble of flowing water.

She used to come to these woods often with her family. Three generations of her family had walked these paths each spring, and she had only encountered this clearing once before. That time she was unfamiliar with the space and the energy and as a child, was leading her family half by intuition and half by deer trails. That day the forest had a red hue to it, the bark of the trees, the ground, everything. She started to notice large stones that seemed out of place, since this plot of land was on the edge of a swamp. They were long and flat like they had once been used for a foundation of some kind. But the lines were so inconsistent. Then she climbed onto a rock that was almost half her height and stood there looking at the widest, most sprawling tree she had ever seen. The only thing more striking than the massive tree was the fact that the color had shifted and that this space was lined with stones similar in shape and size to the one she stood on. She jumped down into the clearing feeling the coolness of the air and marveling at how green everything was. It wasn’t really a clearing, but it was a close as you could get with such a massive tree in the middle. She called her family over excitedly pointing out all of her observations, her father and sister nodding non-committaly. Thinking back, she wondered if they had any idea what she was talking about it.

The following spring they followed a more well worn path on their arbitrary search for recently active ant hills that her father told stories about finding when he was a kid. They came across a hill that looked promising, but it had no visible ant activity. Her father kicked at the mound that was bigger than a soccer ball but smaller than a yoga ball. The earth was primarily clay and kind of crumbly… not the type of medium that ants typically make homes in. As they dug into the mound with gloved hands, she caught a flash of something blue in-between the crumbles of clay. The excavation took a delicate approach after that, being careful to not damage whatever she had seen. Eventually she uncovered an entire nest of blue newts. Primarily black with blue splotches all over their backs.

The following year they found the newts again, and continued on further out on to what was like a hill of a peninsula in the swamp. They stood there for a while peering into the woods at what they thought looked like a house. The ground was still frozen so they could have crossed over to investigate, but decided that it was probably private property. The day was fading as was their energy so her dad started to lead them back the way they had come but she stopped, looking at the way they had come from and then to a path to the left and back again. “We should go this way” she stated confidently “It will be shorter.” She explained with an air not of someone who is 14 and speaking to their elder. She must have sounded like she knew what she was talking about, because her father and sister let her take the lead, and as she went she explained that they would pass through a tunnel of trees which would lead them to the path out, and that the mound where they found those newts would be just to the right. They encountered the tunnel of trees, except it was like trees lining a quaint street… minus the street. They passed through and came out on the path right next to the mound, just like she had described.

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Strange things continued to happen around her, potential haunting experiences, an experience that felt like a car accident even though there wasn’t a mark on the car, feeling the electrical charge in the air of an airplane moments before witnessing a bolt of lightning in an adjacent cloud, standing on the shore of a calm lake only for it to suddenly start lapping at her feet. After a lot of pondering, she had a feeling that all of these experiences were somehow linked to her connection to this forest, but she couldn’t figure out what it was, and she had no idea what to expect as she sat there meditating.

As she was concluding her meditation, she felt a change in the air pressure. No wind could be felt this close to the forest floor, but the change had happened. She opened her eyes, slowly surveying the clearing with the massive tree. Nothing else was there, but she became aware of something in her hand. A small braided ring-like object made of thyme and lavender. She fondled it in between her fingers, smelling the fragrant herbs as she lightly bruised them, before slipping it almost absentmindedly onto her thumb. Suddenly she began becoming aware of the fact that she was not alone. She couldn’t see them, but she knew they were there… creatures, so many creatures. She felt a welcoming energy radiating from the air and the ground as things were explained to her. Not through thought or speech, but through emotion.

All those years ago, when she had hopped off that rock into this clearing, she had entered their grove, unexpected, uninvited, but not entirely unwelcome. She arrived with curiosity and the ability to see more anyone they had encountered, so greeted her even though she hadn’t realized it then. They marked her as one of their own when she had returned to the forest the following year, and the year after that. All of the things she could discern about this forest was thanks to their influence. All of the strange things she experienced out in the world was a combination of protection and acknowledgement of other similar creatures that resided throughout the world. Their presence felt like magic mixed with static electricity, floating unanchored through the air, tickling her senses.

She had entered this clearing hoping for answers, but not really expecting them. She REALLY wasn’t expecting to discover that she had been touched by fae folk, and she struggled to figure out how this knowledge would impact her life going forward.

But that was pondering for another day.