The Forest Abides

This place was mine, and mine alone. I smiled as the leaves rustled; the air smelled of pine and damp earth. I stood on the front porch of my cabin, a monument to my own handwork and strength.

It wasn’t just a place to lay my head each night; it was a fortress, a symbol of my life’s work. I’d cut every log, hammered every nail, and it was a testament to my solitude.

I ran my hand along the newly finished wood railing; its satisfying smoothness was my best work yet. I’d honed my skill over many months building this cabin, and now I could enjoy the results.

I’d hiked for days—weeks really—to find this valley, choosing the spot with a hunter’s precision. There were no trails leading here, and the thick canopy of trees was a perfect shield from prying eyes. To my knowledge, I was the only human for miles, hell, a hundred miles, in any direction.

Inside the cabin, I was greeted by the familiar smells of fresh-split wood, a low, steady fire, and my own cooking. One of the traps I’d set yesterday had captured a squirrel, and he was going to make an easy meal. I checked the stew pot I’d put on the wood stove before I’d finished up my work. I tossed in a few herbs from the garden and stirred them into the softening vegetables. The smell of carrots and potatoes filled my nostrils.

I carved the squirrel, added it to the pot, and cleaned my knife; the worn leather handle felt like an old friend. As I went to hang it back on its hook, I noticed something was off. The fire poker was leaning against the stone hearth instead of resting in its usual spot on the rack. I paused; a small frown furrowed my brow. Hmm. A momentary lapse in concentration. Nothing more.

I scratched at the scruff of beard under my chin. It wasn’t like me to leave something out. Not put it in its spot.

I picked the poker up and returned it to its place. There. I stirred the stew for a few minutes, but my eyes kept drifting to the poker. How about some fresh air?

A cool gust of air hit me as I walked back outside, watching the sun dip below the jagged tree line as the sky began to burn away to darkness.

•••

A few days later, the first of them appeared. I’d just returned to the cabin after checking my snares, tired and with nothing to show for it, when I saw it. Resting on the flat stone that served as my doorstep was a deer skull. Sun-bleached and clean, it was a flawless piece of bone, placed deliberately with the empty eye sockets staring straight at my door.

It had to be a hunter passing through, leaving it as some kind of odd territorial marker. Hell, if I was going to accept that. This was my cabin. My valley.

I searched the ground around my porch, trying to find any disturbed earth, footprints, drag marks, hell, any indicator of where the asshole had come from or gone. But I found none. Just my own coming and going.

I picked up the skull, feeling a strange mix of curiosity and unease. Sweat formed on my brow as I turned it in my hands, looking for anything out of the ordinary. The skull was cold, a silent object that seemed to hold a secret. But what secret?

I stared into the eye sockets for a moment, wondering. With a shrug, I propped the skull up against the railing, facing it outward, commanding it to guard against further intrusions. I went inside, latched the door, but the image stayed with me.

Over the next week, the gifts—what else could I call them?—became routine. A small pile of ripe berries, the kind that only grew on the west-facing slope, appeared on my stump table. A freshly caught trout, its scales still gleaming, was left by the creek where I drew my water.

I tried to rationalize it. A clever raven, a fox with a habit of stashing things. I shook my head unconvinced. The logic felt thin and fragile. The gifts were too perfectly placed, too specific. Like a cat feeling sorry for its human, leaving food so they won’t starve.

Dammit.

The feeling of unease deepened into something else; a strange form of curiosity mixed with a growing sense of being watched. I’d begun to look for gifts each morning, half-expecting them. It was just a game. It had to be. A harmless exchange with an unknown neighbor. Someone closer than I expected. Someone who knew where I lived and had been watching me.

I decided I’d leave a small offering of my own: a roughly carved, but deliberate piece of wood in the shape of a sly fox. I’d placed it on my doorstep, like the first gift, but facing outward, away from the door.

I waited to see what would happen, a part of me hoping for a response. The sounds of the forest seemed quieter, like it was holding its breath along with me. I kept watch, peeking out the shutters, but eventually sleep had taken me. In the morning, I’d gotten a response. The little carving I’d made was gone, and in its place was a new, hand-woven snare made from sturdy strands of twine and leather.

It was perfect. An intricate piece of work, and a gift far superior to my own offering. It was then that I thought it couldn’t be just a fellow survivalist. It was something else. I pushed that thought from my head. What in hell did I mean, something else?

No, it was someone who knew exactly what I needed but wasn’t ready to show their face yet. I took the trap with me on my daily routine; figured I’d set it along with the others. Hell, it was superior to those I could make. Maybe it would snare something tasty.

•••

One morning, I opened my door, ready to start my daily routine, but there it was on the doorstep, resting precisely where the deer skull had been. It was a doll. Primitive in materials but intricately made: an unsettling effigy of twigs bound with sinew. Its head was a small, smooth stone, flesh-colored, and its body was shaped to resemble a man.

But the horror wasn’t in its craftsmanship; it was in the details. The thing had been wrapped in a tattered piece of old flannel: a piece that had torn off my favorite work shirt a week ago while I was out checking the traps. The scar above my left eye was represented by a small crack in the smoothness of the stone head.

It was a perfect, miniature representation of me; a small, disturbing mirror.

All my previous rationalizations—curious wildlife, passing hunters, neighboring survivalist—none of them seemed plausible. This wasn’t a game. This wasn’t an exchange. This was something intimate. Something was watching me.

I looked around frantically at first. But I forced myself to take slow, even breaths. I scanned the trees around the cabin, seeking the slightest movement, the flicker of eyes catching the sun, anything that might reveal what was watching me.

Nothing.

I warily tended to my usual routine, craning my neck toward even the faintest of noises. The hairs on my neck stood on end. Every twig that snapped, leaf that fluttered, bird that cawed, had me on edge.

That evening as I was tending the stove, I looked out the window and I saw them for the first time. Two unwavering points of light, a sickly yellow, glowing just beyond the firelight’s reach. Positioned in the trees, they were much too high to be a wolf, too steady to be an owl, and too calm to be a bear.

I stiffened as ice flowed through my veins. Frozen.

The eyes watched me for an age. Probably no more than a minute, but it felt like an eternity. Unblinking. Then they vanished into the darkness.

I spent the rest of the night with my rifle in my lap, peering into the blackness of the forest, and feeling the weight of an unseen presence.

The following day, while ranging wider than normal, I spotted a hunter in the distance, a man wearing a bright orange vest. He was on my side of the valley, a trespasser. What the hell was he doing here? I thought to confront him. To remind him that this was my territory; teach him about the unmarked boundaries. But as I argued with myself over it, a ripple moved through the trees behind him. Not a rustle of leaves, but a fluid, purposeful movement. I saw the hunter stop and peer into the forest with a confused expression. A moment later, his face twisted into a mask of pure terror. He didn’t scream. At least not at first. He fired a couple of shots. But then he dropped his rifle, turned, and sprinted away. I heard panicked shouts in the distance after, and those were accompanied by screams, of a sort.

I shivered, wondering what fate had befallen the hunter. I crouched in a rock outcropping to watch; I waited for a few hours. He didn’t come back.

But in the morning, when I opened my door, I found him.

His body lay on the doorstep, a grisly offering. He hadn’t been shot or stabbed, at least from my reckoning. Deep, clean gashes, wide and impossibly long, carved through his torso. His clothes were shredded but neatly folded, piled beside him. His chest had been torn open, not in a frenzied attack, but with deliberate, surgical precision.

The thought just popped into my head; how I wished it hadn’t. It was as if he’d been prepared for butchering. Like livestock ready for the knife. His organs exposed, his limbs neatly stacked, ready. Ready for me?

I felt bile rise in my throat, and I retched into the dirt. Still feeling queasy, I forced myself to move the body and hide it for now. I’d have to dig a hole for it later, once I regained my strength. It was then that I saw the glint of his rifle propped neatly against the railing of my porch, as if it had always been mine.

What in the hell was going on? Whatever had done this, couldn’t consider me a threat. It had given me another weapon, and it hadn’t helped this poor fellow. Was it protecting me? Or just thinning the herd?

My head was spinning. I plopped down on my bed, letting sleep take me.

•••

The horror of that hunter’s body stayed with me, not just the sight of it, but the chilling context. It was a gift, a promise. Something was looking after me. The forest, my cabin, it wasn’t just my home, it was a gilded cage.

And I was the well-fed canary.

The gifts that followed hammered this home with grotesque precision. A family of raccoons I’d seen playing by the creek turned up on my doorstep, skinned and gutted, their paws meticulously removed. A massive bull elk I’d watched graze for weeks was left for me, butchered with the same deep, precise gashes. His haunches stripped of meat and set aside as if for a feast.

Whatever it was out there. Whatever monster it might be. It was a provider.

My provider.

The terror of this benevolent relationship was too hard to bear. I had to leave. I packed a bag with only what I could carry, my mind racing with a desperate need to break free.

I headed in the direction of the nearest civilization. Somewhere I’d never wanted to return to, but now a beacon of sanity, of normalcy. I took a deep breath and doubled my pace.

About a mile from the cabin, right along the path I’d chosen, a massive oak had fallen, blocking my way. A fresh obstacle that hadn’t been there the day before. I tried to find my way around it, but a tangle of impenetrable brambles and newly fallen pine trees blocked every possible route leading away from the cabin. It was as if the forest itself had become a wall, blocking my progress and funneling me back into the valley.

I turned and fled. My heart a frantic drum against my ribs, back towards the place I knew was safe. Back to my cabin.

Breathless and defeated, I climbed my porch. Resting on the stone doorstep was a final offering. A new doll, this one even more refined, with my face expertly carved into a piece of polished wood. And etched into its smooth, wooden chest were three words: The Forest Abides.

I stood there, a slow cold spreading through my chest, staring at the doll—that grotesque tribute—and realized that I would never leave.

I was loved, I was well-fed, and I was here to stay.