[ P ] A Series of Unfortunate Events

Datura was beside herself, distraught and ridden with an intense guilt. She had only wanted to help, to show Sumac that bit of kindness no others had. She moved forward, closer to him, but stopped when he questioned: ”What have you done to me Datura? What’s gonna happen to me?” He was beginning to lose touch already. ”I’m so soddy, Sumac.” The girl didn’t even notice she had messed up, her speech impediment slipping out, but for once, it was not at the forefront of her anxious mind.

In truth, she didn’t know enough about her namesake flower except the worst parts: the horrible visions. A terrible sickness. Come to think of it… was there any part of datura that wasn’t harmful? This realization inspired a frown. This was what Mother Rhiannon had chosen as her name? Why…? Worst of all, she found, was a pervasive fear: Would Sumac think she did it on purpose? Would he even know who she was — who he was? What if his nightmare lasted forever?

It was her duty now to be the levelheaded one, since his fearsome journey has only just begun. Datura’s tongue was itchy and mouth parched, amber sights struggling to focus as the world around her swayed and swirled slightly. But she had only held the petals briefly in her maw. Sumac had eaten her entire prized collection. She questioned why she even had it, and why it had been such a source of pride her, now that she was beginning to understand the true terror it could create in the frantic mind of its unwitting victim.

”We have to go. We have to go, we have to…” The syllables repeated on loop, and Datura looked around warily. ”I’ll stay hew, Sumac,” she said, practically yelling while struggling over her words. ”I pomise, I’ll stay hew with you till it’s ovah.” No matter how bad it would get… She wanted to ease his suffering, the agony she had caused. But she couldn’t. There was nothing she could do now, and nothing for him but to see where the night would take him. To hell and back, Datura would stay by his side until the end..


@Sumac

coding: gutz

She promised she’d stay until it was over. That had to mean that whatever was happening would end, but the problem was, Sumac was having trouble remembering just what that was. He’d eaten something. Looking around, spotted he rabbit and thought that was okay, it was just a rabbit. As he stared at the discarded meat, he became fixated on the reddened snow beneath… blood. Blood. His blood, his blood dripping on stone flooring as a monster ripped into him. He couldn’t move, could barely breath, he was pinned to the ground and there was no way out. No one to save him. Alone. So alone. Helpless and alone.

The boy crouched low to the ground, flattened against snow he couldn’t feel, locked in a memory from months before. His wide dilated eyes moved back to Datura and it was a minute or two before he returned to the present. Realising it was just a memory, yet, he could not recall how he’d survived that attack, but it hadn’t been the only one had it? His gaze flicked to his shoulder and then back to her, ”Why does this keep happening to me?” Did he have a sign on his back that said bite me? Pulling himself out of the crouch, Sumac paced back and forth, back and forth, making a channel through the snow with each pass. His erratic thoughts bounced from one thing to the next and back again with increasing speed as he chewed the inside of his cheek raw.

”She left… she walked away… abandoned… they know… I know they know… didn’t tell me… hates me… should hate me… forget it! Don’t need her! Don’t need anyone… better on my own”, he muttered under his breath, staring at his paws. His paws. The one with its missing claw, the monster took it. It was funny, how this small detail grounded him a little, reminding him that something was wrong. ”I’m not right am I Datura?” he whispered, pausing in his movements as he turned back to her, his fear plainly evident in his shaking voice.

@Datura

”Why does this keep happening to me?” The boy’s question lingered in the air like mist as he started to pace, increasingly frantic, erratic. Datura’s eyes never left him. She tried to understand what he meant… Had he been poisoned before? It wouldn’t surprise her if one of her sisters had used him as an experiment. But she realized it was something deeper than that, a rawness she had not anticipated from the stoic lad.

Sumac began to speak haltingly to himself in a mumbling voice, eyes fixed upon his oversized paws. It was difficult to make out all of his rambling. Twin ears pricked forward in an attempt to decipher his confusion: Abandoned. Hate. It was enough to bring even a cold hearted wolf to tears, that in his life, Sumac had only experienced distance and rejection. The girl knew these thoughts must haunt his days and nights, even without the impact of a drug currently coursing through his veins. Datura would offer, just in case he could hear her, make sense of her words: ”I don’t hate you, Sumac.” She couldn’t speak for the rest of them, only for herself. At the very least, he had one wolf on his side… Even if that wolf had poisoned his body and mind.

His voice was barely audible as he whispered, his mismatched eyes filled with a terror that caused Datura’s heart to ache. ”I’m not right am I Datura?” ”W-well, no...” As she spoke, she realized her meaning could be easily misconstrued. ”I mean, not wight now. Not afto – afto what I’ve done.” Eyes welled with tears, but she willed herself not to cry at the sight of his distress. ”But you’ll be good as new soon. Just stay calm, welax..” A forced smile accompanied her words. How could she get him to believe something that she herself had no certainty in? She no longer noticed nor cared that her speech impediment was now on full display, not in a state of mind to hide her usual shame.

But it was growing more difficult to be present, not when it felt like someone – or something – was watching them from the darkness of the trees. She swore she could see flickers of iridescence in the forest around them, glittering like so many pairs of eyes. Datura was careful to keep her mounting paranoia to herself, but amber orbs watched the treeline warily. She moved closer to Sumac, silently determined to protect him from the unseen that frightened her so.



@Sumac

coding: gutz