The night was darker than usual when the two sisters unwittingly stepped through the portal. There were hints indicating the dangers, but they were not looking for them and wouldn’t have known what they meant even if they had found them. No one can say why they were out at night walking in the woods; it may be that even they did not know. Whatever their purpose was, they did not see it through.

The younger girl ran ahead of her older sister and passed through the stone pillars without even noticing them. A brief flash of light marked her passage, and the older sister could no longer see the younger. She began to run to catch up and passed through as well.

Portals such as this were not common, but they do exist. One may appear for just a few hours before vanishing again, so they were difficult to find if you were looking for them. A few lead to fantastic realms. The dimension the sisters stumbled into was not one of those.

They now found themselves in a denser forest that managed to be even darker than the one they had just left. The younger sister, sensing something was wrong, turned to run back the way she had come. Unfortunately, this portal, like so many others, was only one way. Running through the stone pillars had no effect.

While the older sister wanted to stay near the pillars, in case they became active again, the younger wanted to look for another way out. She would take a few steps and then look back to make sure her sister was still in sight. Several times her sister admonished her to return, each time growing more insistent. She did not listen, until finally she turned around and could no longer see her sister.

Overcome with fear, she ran back towards the pillars, but she must have gotten the directions confused because she could not find them. Nothing looked familiar. Calling to her sister produced no response. Off in the distance, she caught a glimpse of a pale light. Hoping it might represent help, she walked towards it.

As she drew nearer, she could see that the light came from a lamp at the top of a tall pole, which stood along side a wide dirt path. Underneath the light, a man was bent over, digging a hole. Hope sprung up and drove her forward. That same hope died just as quickly when she got closer and saw that the man had the head of a bull. She screamed and turned to run away from the monster, only to be picked up by a large, vaguely human looking creature whose face seemed to be melted half off.

Every being in the forest existed for one purpose, to kill anything that made its way inside. I would like to tell you, dear reader, about the uniquely kind creature who helped the girls and guided them back home. I wish I could tell you that story. Sadly that isn’t what happened. There was no such kindly creature.

Her older sister, who had been looking for her, heard the scream before it was abruptly cut off. The terror was unmistakable, and concern for her sister overrode any sense of self-preservation. By the time she made her way to where the scream had originated, it was too late; her sister was quite obviously dead.

Before she could run away, she too was grabbed by the ogre. It was about to snap her neck like it had her sister’s, when the minotaur stopped it. He explained his plan, and the ogre agreed.

The minotaur was not a monster with a good heart. Like every creature in the forest, he hated all living beings and only knew how to kill. But there was one thing that made him different: he hated his own life as much as he hated the lives of others. More than killing, he wanted to die. He had lived longer than he could remember, and he longed for oblivion. Yet the forest let nothing within its boundaries die. This was the curse that every creature in the forest suffered, and the minotaur had had enough.

Alongside the path, nearly hidden by overgrowth, was a motorized metal carriage. There were artifacts like this scattered around the forest. Like the sisters, they arrived in the forest seemingly at random and by accident. Generally, the inhabitants of the forest ignored them. Since these items were from elsewhere, the minotaur believed they might inhibit the rules of the forest.

The minotaur and the ogre climbed into the carriage, dragging the unconscious girl with them. They made sure the doors were locked from the inside so that no one could get in. Once they were secure, the minotaur lit a fire. They didn’t need to burn to death; suffocation would be an easy way to go. And if they died in here, away from the forest, they should stay dead. The girl’s death should seal their own.

The minotaur’s plan had been a good one, but the girl’s death was unnecessary and involving her undermined it all. The minotaur and ogre had stopped breathing when she woke up. She shouldn’t have. There was no oxygen left in the carriage. The pain of being on fire was somehow enough to overcome that obstacle, and she woke screaming in agony.

Truthfully, she was already dead, but her body continued to struggle to escape. Fumbling through the flames, she managed to get a door open and fell out. Her screams persisted until her body finally gave up.

Much later, the forest revived the minotaur. Climbing out of the carriage, he saw the girl’s body on the ground. In his anger at finding himself still alive, he bent down to take out his rage on what remained of her. When he turned her over, he saw that her head had been changed. It looked like the head of an octopus with tentacles where her mouth should be. Her eyes opened suddenly, and she began screaming again. This time, the sound was in human. The forest had made her one of its own.