Whispering Woods by Emma Goodenow

First Place, 10-12 Grade Fiction

Elliot had never meant to wander so far. He had been hiking with his friends, their laughter echoing between the pines like careless birds, and yet somewhere along the winding trail, the path had vanished beneath a carpet of dead leaves. Now, the forest pressed close on all sides, the trees leaning toward him as if to whisper secrets he could not understand. Shadows pooled at the base of tangled roots, and the wind carried faint murmurs that might have been voices, or might have been nothing at all. He called out, but only the lifeless echo of his own name returned, and the sun, long swallowed by the high canopy, left him alone with the growing chill of twilight.

A flicker of movement caught his eye. Just beyond a twisted oak, something darted between the shadows. Elliot froze, heart racing in his chest, eyes straining to see. For a moment, he thought it was one of his friends playing a trick, but the forest was silent now, save for the occasional sigh of the wind through the branches. The shape paused, low to the ground, its form strange and hard to place, as if the darkness itself had taken on a life. Elliot swallowed hard, the uneasy thrill of curiosity warring with the instinct to run, and took a careful step forward.

The creature, or whatever it was, tilted its head, and for a heartbeat, Elliot thought it was studying him, not as prey, but as something… different. 

His legs felt heavy, but some part of him, reckless and curious, urged him closer. The creature didn’t move away; it simply lowered itself slightly, letting the shadows swallow the rest of its body. A low rasp, almost like a whisper, slipped from its throat. It was a sound that made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end, yet it was oddly melodic, like a half-remembered lullaby. He froze, every instinct screaming to run, and yet he could not look away. The eyes, glowing faintly in the dark, followed him, unblinking, full of an intelligence he did not understand.

Summoning a courage he did not feel, Elliot took another step forward. The creature shifted slightly, revealing more of its form: limbs impossibly long, fingers with claws that gleamed faintly like wet stone, and a head too narrow, too angular to be human. Yet its eyes… its eyes held something almost human. It cocked its head, then stepped closer, each movement deliberate and silent.

“You… you’re not like anything I’ve ever seen,” Elliot whispered. The words sounded absurd, even to him, in the vast, silent forest.

The creature tilted its head, and a thin, almost musical sigh escaped it. Then, without warning, it reached out a clawed hand and brushed a leaf from Elliot’s shoulder. The touch was cold, like moonlight, but not cruel. A strange understanding passed between them, as if the forest itself were speaking through the creature: “You are not lost… not yet.“ 

Elliot swallowed hard, realizing he had a choice. He could turn and run into the darkening woods, leaving this encounter behind, or he could follow, trusting the forest’s strange emissary. The pull of curiosity, of adventure and terror mingled, was too strong. He took a hesitant step forward.

The creature glanced back once, then moved deeper into the woods, slipping through the shadows like smoke. Elliot followed, heart hammering, senses alive with every rustle, every whisper, every glance from unseen eyes in the trees. The path was no longer a path, it was a maze of roots and fog, but he felt, somehow, that he was meant to be here, that the forest had been waiting for him.

Hours passed, or maybe minutes; time had little meaning here. At last, they reached a clearing, where moonlight spilled like silver over a still, black pond. The creature stopped at the edge, its eyes reflecting the water like twin stars. Then, as suddenly as it had appeared, it vanished into the night, leaving Elliot alone, trembling, and profoundly changed. For a moment, silence pressed in, thick and heavy. Then, faintly at first, he heard voices. “Elliot! Elliot, where are you?”

His friends, their flashlights bobbing like fireflies, were calling. Relief surged through him, tangled with something else, an ache, a longing for the strange presence that had led him here. He waved frantically, and the beams of light snapped toward him.

“There you are!” one of them gasped, rushing forward. “Dude, we thought you were gone. Like… gone gone.” Elliot let out a shaky laugh, raw from fear and disbelief. “Yeah. I… I’m okay.”

They crowded around him, fussing over how pale he looked, how cold he felt, how long he’d been missing. He barely heard them. His gaze drifted past their worried faces and back toward the clearing’s edge, where the shadows pooled thick and dark among the trees.

For a moment, he thought he saw a pair of faint, glowing eyes watching him from the underbrush. He blinked, and they were gone.

His friends guided him back toward the trail, their chatter filling the silence that had once felt endless. But Elliot walked with a new awareness, every rustle making him flinch, every whisper of wind brushing the back of his neck like a memory.

He was no longer truly lost. But part of him… some quiet, curious, half-changed part, would always remain in the whispering Woods, where the trees leaned close to listen… and the shadows remembered his name.