Mid-Week Flash Challenge - Week 246

This week's picture prompt was taken by German photographer, Gordon Adler. it was taken in Chestnut avenue, Briest, Germany, and he calls it Misty Path.

A picture that is perfect for a little bit of Tricky's tale. The last time I wrote about here was Week 241.

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Path of Discovery

She stepped carefully out onto the path. She was deep into their territory now and caution was warranted. Even though there were defined parallel tracks Tricky wouldn’t call it a road, but it spoke of the passing of some form of vehicles; something had been pushed or pulled through here regularly enough to create them.

The clouds shifted, causing shafts of sunlight to cut through the canopy and light the way. But the way wasn’t clear, there was a mist and Tricky wasn’t sure if it was manmade or natural. If natural she would expect something like The Rabble to appear at any moment. It had a fae feel to it and it unsettled her. But manmade threw up more questions, although it could be smoke or steam coming up from their underground bunkers.

She took a deep breath and touched a piece of birch leaf to the peridot, feeling relief as the veil enclosed her, cutting her off from prying eyes. Then she tapped into the root energy of the trees and reached for the quartz in her other pocket, her feet lifting up as soon as she touched it. It was the only safe way to travel in these parts. She might be invisible but footsteps still made sound. And with the network clearly having harnessed the abilities of the gifted folk, she couldn’t take any chances.

She moved in and around the trees and watched from her airborne view. Nothing moved, which was in itself unnatural in a forest. She wasn’t the only one holding her breath. She moved into the mist and it thickened. It was a shield of some sort, she was sure of it, although in her invisible state she couldn’t use her senses to test it.

She moved higher up and settled on a branch of a large pine. She released the peridot and birch leaf and felt her visibility return. She sniffed the air but there was only the normal forest scent. She reached out her energy to track its source. It was definitely ground based, but it was further along the path. She cloaked herself again and continued on.

The mist grew into a fog and Tricky moved back among the trees to use them as a compass to find the origin point. They helped show the way through her mind’s eye until eventually the square in the ground it was emitting from was revealed. She wondered if they were doing this deliberately to obscure it from view. But why would they do that unless they knew someone was seeking it?

Tricky chuckled. Oh yes, her; they knew she was coming. She’d overheard Stanislav getting stressed about it. But really, this was a trick? She was way beyond this, and everyone knew it.

Something prickled at her conscience, and her gut responded with a hard dropping sensation. That’s because it was deliberate; it was a trap!

She pushed her finger down hard onto the quartz and shot up into the tree canopy. Her sudden movement broke the cloud of fog and it swirled. Men appeared out of the ground a few feet away and rushed to where she’d just been. They stood bewildered looking round, and then they separated, going into the woods on either side, clearly searching for her. She’d narrowly avoided capture.

Tricky chided herself for her naivety. She wasn’t the only player in this game. She wasn’t the only one with lots of tricks up her sleeve. They had lots too, and they were much sneakier than her – in fact they were trained in sneaky; they lived and breathed it every day in their secret underground bunkers. She had to lose her cocky attitude of thinking she was better than them. In fact she had to assume they were better than her; that they had the same knowledge as her. It was hard. She liked being queen of her particular castle. She would relent to other gifted folk, but not these double-dealing, murderous shysters who were extracting other people’s gifts to gain power. They weren’t worthy of living on the underside of her shoe!

But whether she liked it or not they’d just bested her. She had to be more than cautious, she had to be vigilant from here on out. Her life depended on it.