Dedicated to a circle of friends who has been together for a long time. Perhaps what I write about is something that had happened. Perhaps not.

The circle has no end, just as this group of friends.

Helen, Laura and T’Nell Sisters Forever.

"Kisha! Wait up!"

Kisha grinned at her friends as she waited impatiently at the top of the trail that would lead them to the beach of the lake. She ran impatient fingers through her black hair that she insists is just very dark brown hair. Her gaze went back to the lake that they were at, wanting to much to walk by the water’s edge.

"Be kind to you mommy!" admonished one of the blondes. Kisha grinned at the gasping Laura.

"Why should I?" Kisha laughed and hugged her before she could say anything. "Besides, we’re at the top now."

Instead of going to the normal place Helen, Kisha and Laura visited, they had decided to go to a lake Kisha knew of. Their friends T’Nell, David and Tom had been invited to come along as well.

"Welcome to Hanging Lake!" Kisha grinned. Kisha remembered this place from when her family used to go on road trips with family friends. The lake was situated in the mountains and you had to take a trail to it. Her eyes took in the dark pine forest around them and the lake it framed.

They stopped by a picnic table by the edge of the lake before a couple of them hurried to the edge of the lake. Kisha took her shoes off and tested the wter with her toes. "Cold!"

Laura laughed. "You who is never cold is saying the lake is cold?!" She looked at her mocking surprise. "Are you feeling alright?"

Kisha grinned and splashed her with the water. Laura yelped stepping back before the both of them broke into laughter. Soon Helen and T’Nell joined them at the edge, David and Tom deciding to let them have a little time to themselves before they joined them.



High above them, yellow eyes watches the four friends. Once in a while it would glance at the two males at the picnic table, but always the eyes came back to the four. Not yet. It would need to get them soon before the Earth finished their Circle. That was not allowed to happen. Not in this lifetime as it has in previous ones.

Once again it looks at the two males. There was something bout those two that it should know about. It dismissed it and looked back at the four. It grinned a mouth full of teeth. Soon. There were still things that needs to be done. The fact that two of them already have dreamt what was, it was going to be dangerous footing from here on out.



Air. Fire. Spirit. Water.

Earth has not entered the equation yet.

The Circle was about to come full round. To once more begin yet another cycle. Never able to break out of what was fated for them to do.



Everyone was relaxing somewhere near the picnic table with a plate of food. Laura’s blue green eyes were studing every one of her friends smiling and joking back with them. T’Nell and David were sitting next to each other at the picnic table. T’Nell was laughing at something David said. Her brown hair was pulled up into a braid and tucked under a red kerchief. The ends of her jeans were soaking wet, just like her own. David himself was splotched with water spots. He had joined in at the end of a water fight they were having.

Her eyes roamed over to where Helen was snuggling with Tom. Her long dirty blond hair was on the verge of brown from being soaked in the lake. Of them all, she was the only one drenched because Tom had picked her up and dumped her in the lake. Looking at Tom, he didn’t look any better. The two of them looked content in as they talked between themselves. Helen was snuggling closer to him, claiming that she was cold thanks to him. To her it kind of looked like Helen was trying to get Tom wet.

"Comfortable aren’t they." Kisha commented. Laura nodded munching on her sandwich. When Laura looked over at Kisha, unconsiously putting away the details of her wet friend, she couldn’t help but notice how distracted she looked.

"Are you okay?" Laura asked. Kisha answered her with a faint grin.

"Bad feeling is all."

That reminded her of the dream she had a couple of nights ago. Unconciously, her hand reached up and held her cross comfortingly. Now she couldn’t shake the eerie feeling that Kisha’s comment gave her. After a moment of watching the others, she thought of her dream.

"I had the scariest dream the other night." Laura began.

"Oh?"

"The scariest part of it wasn’t the dream itself, but the familiar feeling of it. It was as if I’ve been through it before."

"Kind of like what we talked about on our drives?"

"You mean the one about having gone through this before?"

"Yeah."

"Something like that." Laura fell silent for a moment. "You, Helen and I were there. There was another two with us and we could do things. The things chasing us didn’t wants us to."

"Because we’re too powerful." Was the bitter remark. Laura looked at Kisha in surprise. Kisha looked confused at what she said. "Don’t ask me. It just came out. Anyway, go on."

Laura kept silent for a moment trying to figure out Kisha’s comment on saying that they were too powerful. Helen had mentioned that too when they had gone to Horsetooth. The comment felt right, but it didn’t sit well with her.

"Anyway, we were doing something in a forest when these things came at us from the trees, yelling at us that what we were doing was forbiddened by the gods. We ran from them. There was someone waiting for us at the end of the trail. I didn’t see who it was, but it was someone we have been looking for. He said a word before we started running again. ‘Betrayal’ was what he said." She shook her head, amazed how the dream could still affect her after having it two nights ago. "Then the things caught up with us and I got a good look at it. That was when I woke up."

"What did it look like?" Kisha’s voice sounded worried. Laura didn’t turn to look at her. Unseeing, she stared through the trees to the lake.

"Funny... I don’t remember now how they looked like, except that they had glowing yellow eyes." She frowned. She thought she remembered, but it looks as if she’ll need to look in her dream journal again.

Then they could hear a song being sung from somewhere near the lake. It was a song they were all familiar with since they themselves have sung it at one time or another for different reasons. This time, the song did not sound as innocent as it normally was.

"This is the song that never ends. It keeps going on and on, my friends. Some people started singing it, not knowing what it was. Now they keep on singing it forever just because... This is the song that never ends....."

Kisha and Laura exchanged looks, feeling chilled to the bone. Then they looked at Helen and found her to be watching them. Helen mouthed the words, "Bad feeling."

They nodded in agreement. There wasn’t anything else it could be. As one, they turned to T’Nell. Almost unwillingly. They knew she could percieve things at times, like the time she percieved something about Helen’s dream that she had on a number of occasions.

T’Nell was paler than her usual shade of pale. She swallowed, not looking at anyone but out towards the lake where the song was coming from. Abruptly she got to her feet. "Let’s get out of here."

Helen, Laura and Kisha complied wordlessly. They knew how she was feeling though they knew she was spooked more than they. They offered no explainations nor did they say a word. Tom and David exchanged looks of confusion before helping in packing up their picnic. T’Nell urged them on.



After they were gone, it came out of the trees grinning. Laughing at their meek retreat from a song.

Return to beginning

The sounds of a someone crying echoed through the forest. The sound tore at the heart; tugging and pulling, causing people to mimic the sobs. A heart heart breaking sound that started the myth of the forest being haunted.

It was said in the middle of the forest was a cabin haunted by the ghost of a dead woman, a woman that died from a break heart. The feeling had permeated the small building, spilling over into the surrounding forest, causing it to echo through the lonesome trees. The story may have been true that she had fallen under a spell of her beloved. A betrayal that lead to her body forever cased in a youthful beauty, dead. Her soul continued to live on, crying out for help. It was the soul’s grief that people heard.

It was these sort of stories that brought James O’Brien around the world. Myths, legends and stories of places being haunted always intrigued him, ever since he learned Roman and Green mythology in middle school. There was something about them that tugged at his soul, crying out that it was indeed for real. Yet, no one can provide him with enough solid facts to convince him.

Something echoed, stirred, through him sending him on what his friends called a mad quest. No matter how insane it was, it always felt right to him. Sometimes, he felt at home learning the stories, seeing how they integrated with the society or community present at that particular location.

Now he was in the Grand Tetons, investigated this story. That night, as he camped in those very same forest, he heard those cries. He laid in his bedroll, listening to the eerie sobs. Some people had told him the sounds were from the wind blowing over holes in the mountain side.

James knew they were wrong. Gray eyes stared up at the star filled night sky, listening not only with his ears but with his other senses as well. The story held a ring of truth. There was someone that was crying in these forests. His eyes slid close as he breathed in deeply and allowed his awareness to spread.

There. Trapped beneath rocks was a cabin. His awareness delved deeper, images springing into his mind. A body that had decomposed but the soul had been trapped within. There was something in the rocks that kept her there, something that was trying to trap him as well. In fear, he returned to his body. Something.

De ja vu.

It took him awhile before he was able to settle comfortably within his physical body. Someone had tried to trap him like that before and succeeded. Something ...

He sat up to stare into the fire thinking. These episodes had happened to him in the past as well as he searched for myths and legends the world over. They had a similar feeling, in a way. That it was the same person that had done it to him.

That night, he dreamed.



"It’s all your fault they cast me out of the circle!" The voice echoed through the darkness. The voice sounded familiar, yet so strange. It was the same voice that accused him in so many different dreams.

"You did it to yourself!" He called back. She had done something to the Circle. Broken it. Twisted it to the way she wanted it. Lied. He had the feeling that he didn’t mean to take her place, only that it had been necessary at one point.

"Liar! You will pay dearly for this!"

Dread filled his body as he began to run. Where, he didn’t know, only that he had to go. There, in the forest was a cave. The minerals there would keep the hounds at bay for the time being. He could contact the others from there.



Yellow eyes followed him everywhere. At one point, he had hopped onto a train, heading northbound. The earth around him as cracking, falling within itself. The vertigo of a long dropped filled him as he screamed. Something followed him down and his vision soon filled with a bright light It came closer, the heat searing his skin ...



With a gasp he bolted up right, his breathing was like that of someone who had ran a mile. His hand reached over to the side to pick up his water bottle to soothe his parched throat and paused. There was an odd feeling by his bottle.

Slowly, he turned to look. There sat the same mineral that had surrounded him in the dream. Warily, he turned where he sat to make sure he was the only one there. No one.

James was unsure what to make of it. No one was there, but suddenly he felt unsafe being out in the open like this. His watch told him it was still two hours before sun up. Might as well pack up and leave. There was another stop he wanted to make before he returned to his home in Virginia.

It was an off chance that he felt like visiting Colorado. Sure, he’s heard some myths and stories from the red state, but it was something different that called him there. A month or so ago, he had been playing with some of the minerals he had found during his journeys when one rolled away from him to land atop a map, marking Colorado.

He wouldn’t have thought anything of it except it seemed to captivate his attention. There was something there he needed to find.

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