They walked for what felt like hours, or days, or years.
Time had unraveled, slipping between their fingers like water, thick and sluggish and ungraspable, but the forest did not change.
No matter how far they walked, the trees loomed overhead, eternal and unmoving, except for the leaves in the canopy, dancing lazily with the breeze. There were no trails, no birds chirping.
Only the low hum of a place that had been forgotten by time.
"It doesn't end." Sarissa was the first to break the silence, letting out a heavy sigh.
Miles didn't answer. He was scanning the trees, looking for something, anything, that could have hinted at direction. Moss, sun, the curve of the roots, anything.
But nothing behaved the way it should. The moss grew in spirals, light filtered in from angles that didn't match their internal clock, and the trees had no bark. They were just long, woven layers of something like silk and bone.
