Chapter 3: The tale of a leafy brethren.
"No, no. I'm too young to die; I've got so much to give. I haven't finished my jazz album yet," Howard cried.
"What album?"
"Slap bass Odysey."
"Don't worry Howard, it's only a forest. We've faced worse," Vince smiled and patted Howard's shoulder like a maternal chimp.
"This is the Forest of Aruk Moon," said the knight, "We travel to the West. Our feet should march for three and thirty minutes, then we will find the tower. So says the myth, it is large and tall and green. Do not eat rice for the trees will sense you."
The look of fear on Howard's face had gone and a new expression of realisation and recollection swept into its place. Howard spoke to Vince but did not look at him, "This is the forest Aruk Moon. He was once my brother."
"What? How can a jungle be your brother?"
"It all happened a long time ago…"
(Lots of mist - enter flash back)
"What is she doing Howard?" A little boy was tugging on a taller boy's sleeve and pointing at a figure dressed in black. She was on her knees in the middle of a garden, patting the soil gently.
"She is planting a tree," the taller boy relpied, "The first tree of the new forest which she is growing."
The next day the boys returned to see the garden and they were amazed at what they saw. There, where the seed had been planted was now a strong, proud oak tree.
"Howard. Is that woman a witch? Surely only a witch could grow a tree so fast."
"I don't know," said Howard, "Maybe she is, Aruk."
And at that, the younger boy, Aruk, ran off to tell the other children of the witch and of the tree.
When night time fell so there was sufficient darkness to hide them, three boys, including Aruk but not Howard, came back to the garden and the tree. On noting the woman's witchery in rather less polite terms, they destroyed the tree and burned the remains.
The witch came into the garden at the sound of their laughter. She looked at the ash with tears in her eyes and the looked up at the boys who had killed the tree.
In anger, she raised her ten, elongated fingers and pointed them at the boys. There was a flash of light. Then there was silence.
It is not known what happened to the other two but Aruk had been transformed into a seed. And from this seed the witch grew a new tree and then a new forest. However, this forest was not of beaustiful strong oaks, but of crippled blackened tree skeletons which mirrored the hate of his heart.
No-one ever dared enter that forest as they say it was haunted with his soul.
(Lots more mist - return to present time)
"…And that, Vince, is how this forest came to be," Howard turned to look at Vince, "Vince? Oi! Did you listen to any of what I just said?"
Vince moved his queen to knight 7 then lifted his eyes from the chess board, "Sorry Howard, what was that?"
"Checkmate!"
"Oh what? Wishton you cheat! I thought I was winning!"