The Cold Forest

The Cold Forest

TRC III thanks for the great job you have done by editing this story. You have threaded the scattered pearls.

Also a great thank you to Edward. A few months back he pushed this story forward by providing much-needed advice.

Tags:

Sci-fi, Non- Human, Non/Con, Witch, Magic, Werewolf, Supernatural, Power play, Dom/Sub, Light BDSM, Solo, Rituals

Chapter 1: The Mysterious Storm

It's been a harsh weekend. The snowstorm has been raging over the entire town for the last two days. Electricity has been gone since morning. The last news on the radio was that it will get back to normal. 'Old Town', like its name, was an old town situated in the northern part of Estonia, near Pohja-Korvemaa nature reserve, which is the habitat of many species like brown bear, grey wolf, Eurasian lynx, minks, etc.

Most of the animals avoid coming into this part of the forest due to the town's human population, which often has a skirmish with some of these wild animals.

The snowstorms normally happen from November to February, so it was strange that a snowstorm came in April. Since it came so suddenly and this late in the year, reporters on television called it, 'The Mysterious Storm'.

A young man was watching the storm through the window of his old family house, which was near the edge of the forest. He was Erik Goodman, tall, 6`5, with a broad chest and red hair. He never went to the gym, but like his grandfather, he also had the physique of a bodybuilder.

The barking sound brought him back to reality. This was the only house in this region, far from the rest of the town. He had been living in this house since he could remember. After his parent's death, when he was 2-years-old, his grandfather brought him here and raised him.

They were close to each other, but six months ago he lost his battle with cancer. These few months had been heavy for the 19-year-old young man.

In weather like this, he couldn't contact the rest of the town. That's the reason why his friend Henry advised him to sell this old house and buy or rent an apartment in town, but he politely rejected that advice. It wasn't just a house for him; it's a home that holds the memory of his grandfather, his childhood.

The storm had arrived yesterday; the previous day and night had been constant wind and snowfall.

Again he heard the sound of barking. It was a stray dog, who had been living in the area between his house and the forest. He tried to shelter him, but after his stomach was full, the dog preferred the wilderness. He came randomly to visit him for some water and food. When he first saw the dog, the signs of abuse were clear. He knew that the dog had a trust issue with humans. He let him enjoy his life on his own terms instead of using a leash or calling any shelters.

He was worried about him when he couldn't find him before the storm hit the town, and had even gone into the forest in search of the dog, but had no success. So, hearing its bark brought relief to his heart.

'Maybe he is injured; I should go and try to find him again.' With that thought, he decided to go out and help the dog.

He knew from the barking in which direction to go. He just needed to search for its exact location. It would look crazy for any normal person to go out in this blizzard and try to find a dog near such a wild forest. But there are not many predators in this part of the forest and those few lived deep in the forest. Their sighting was very rare even this far outside the town.

So, it was surprising for him to see a huge, dark shadow of an animal trying to dig something out of a tree trunk, and the sound of barking coming from the small hole in the trunk.

"It looks like my little friend has big trouble."

He fired his grandfather's rifle in the air. He didn't want to kill the creature. It was huge like a bear, but from the shadow, he was sure it was a wolf--a big one, if he had to guess, more than six feet tall. Any normal human would be scared of such a large wolf in this situation, but Erik knew it might have lost direction and its pack in this blizzard.

The sound of a gunshot was enough to scare the wolf, which ran into the forest. He slowly came to the tree, put his rifle down, and started to pick the dog from the hole. The beleaguered animal quickly recognized him and came to him. Suddenly, the dog's ears were standing and he started to whimper; Erik also felt the hair on his neck stand.

The very next moment the wolf was there, blood lust clear in its eyes, which were shining in the dark. The wolf lunged at him. Erik brought his hand up to protect his throat just in time, and the wolf jaws closed over his hand. Acting quickly through the pain, he drew his knife and stuck it into the wolf's neck. This made the wolf release his hand and scurry off into the woods with the knife still stuck in the throat.

The pain was there. It wasn't the first time he had encountered a wolf out here, but it was the first time one had come so close to ending his life forever.

He picked up the dog that was freezing in cold and fear, grabbed his gun and started his walk back home. He had to be quick before it or its pack came back to haunt him. He also needed to see the wound on his hand. A hospital visit would have to be his priority in the morning once the storm was gone, but for the time being, the first aid kit would have to do.

He entered his home, set down both gun and dog, and closed the door. His body started to feel heavy. His eyes simply closed and he fell there. The last thing he could see was the dog licking his face before he was fast asleep.

Chapter 2: A New Morning

It was the chirping of birds that woke him up from his slumber. He remembered having been bitten by a big wolf that attacked him while he was trying to help the dog. He looked at his right hand to see the injury in daylight.

'Shock' wasn't enough of a word to describe his reaction when he saw the hand was completely normal, with just a bit of redness where the wound should have been.

He was confused. He looked at his bedroom floor, which had bloodstains. After musing for a few minutes, he decided to get out of the house and start the day.

'Maybe I was lucky that the wolf might not have been able to sink its teeth enough.'

He looked out of the window. The Sun rose from the horizon.

'The weather prediction seemed to be right; the atmosphere was normal.'

He searched in the house for the dog to feed him and see if it was injured but the dog was nowhere to be found.

'Guess he went out there,' he thought. He wondered what kind of abuse he must have suffered that he still chose the forest over humans.

Erik used to work in a small restaurant in town which was owned by his grandfather's friend, but he stopped after his grandfather's death and decided to solely focus on his college degree. Still, he often went to the restaurant to help the old man and longtime friend of his grandfather.

After freshening up, he closed his house, checking all the windows and doors twice just to make sure. After the experience last night, there was no logic in taking risks. It was a close call. There have been many cases of packs of wolves causing heavy injury or killing humans. In his case, it would have been the latter.

'I was lucky, I guess.' With that thought, he closed the main door and the doorknob was in his hand, ripped apart from the door. 'I think I should fix this and try to find the dead body of that wolf and the knife.'

That knife was special. It was a family treasure. No normal human would call it a treasure though; it had a handle made of stone and the metal blade had been rusting. But it was special because his grandfather had given it to him.

He started to walk toward the town, which was more than a three-mile walk. He had his grandfather's old pickup truck but he preferred walking when he was not in any hurry.

After the blizzard, it was a busy day at the restaurant. Still, he was back home after afternoon rush hour. It was a busy day but he didn't feel tired at all, which was odd to him. Even odder were the few headaches he had during his time at the restaurant.

Though he had great sleep last night, he still suffered a few instances of heavy pain hitting his skull now and again.

He realized it was the first good night's sleep he'd had since his grandfather's death. Again, everything became gloomy for him at the thought of his grandfather's death. He started to fix his house to distract himself from those thoughts. His grandfather was a jack of all trades and had taught him all his tricks.

When you live so close to a forest like this, clashes with a wild predator were bound to happen. Last night wasn't his first encounter with a wolf, but this wolf was different. It was like it had a great deal of hunting experience.

'Now that I think about it, it could have easily reached in the tree trunk; instead, it seemed to be playing with the dog, humiliating it. It's not something new. It's normal for their race to play those kinds of games to show who is in control.'

It was his phone's ring tone that broke his chain of thought. He looked at the message from his childhood friend:

"Bro, I got a new book, will show it to you when I am back in town."

'And he got himself conned again.'

Henry, his friend, was a rich kid. He was in the same college, just for the sake of the degree, and had fun with partying, booze, girls and everything in between.

A year ago he went on a summer vacation in LA. After that vacation, he started to search and collect different books and all the other things. In this time, he lost more than a million in all of this stuff, without ever finding anything genuine. He even did weird rituals in the hope to summon something, which resulted in nothing but all-nighters for both buddies.

Erik never believed in any of those books or rituals that were described in those books but he knew his friend very well, so instead of arguing with him, he let him do whatever he wanted.

'Being the moody person that he was, he will get bored of it. The message means someone again conned him and sold him some fictional book.' With that thought in mind, he slowly walked near the tree.

The hole in the bark was big enough to fit the dog in it but not deep enough to protect it from the wolf's claws and jaw.

'I guess I was right!'

He looked ahead at a majestic and high tree line, decorated with snow, standing tall guarding the forest. The size of trees stopped the sunlight, giving the forest a dark and creepy look.

No humans would dare to explore this forest alone. When he was a child, his grandfather used to tell him scary stories about 'The Cold Forest' to stop him from entering the forest. But growing up near the forest and occasionally hunting there had removed any of those fears. For him, it was like a visit to a park.

He had the rifle and another knife that he had bought two years ago with him. He followed the occasional blood stains and footprints to track down the wolf. After walking for half a mile he saw something really strange: the bloodstains and trail were nowhere to be seen. It just stopped near a small stream.

'I think the wolf survived and went down the stream from here.'

He looked at his phone. It was getting dark.

'It wouldn't be wise to search for that wolf in the night.'

He went back home. He had not seen the dog after he fell asleep last night and he was getting worried about him. He knew he was safe and somewhere in the forest and would come back for food or water sometime.

He looked at his right hand, which didn't even have any of the red marking left that he had seen that morning. It was a really strange thing, even if he was not bitten badly. He still expected a very nasty wound, but all he had seen was red skin, which disappeared in an hour or two.

He wanted to talk with someone about it. After some thinking, he decided against it. If his friend Henry found about this incident, he would turn the whole forest upside down to find such a mysterious wolf. That wasn't what worried him, but he would need to be his guide, which he could not afford at this time. He needed to complete his college degree and then get a proper job, and more importantly, pay off loans if he wanted to keep this house.

'I should start dinner and tomorrow will have to go to college, then be part of Henry's newest summoning ritual. The coming few days are going to be busy.'

Chapter 3: Same old life, isn't it?

It wasn't cloudy any more, but a bright day. After waking up and freshening up, he had a quick breakfast and drove his grandfather's old pickup to the college campus.

The first class was economics. Almost every person had their likes and dislikes with various subjects, but Erik didn't have a particular feeling about any subject. He was the kind of man who let things be the way they are.

That was one of the reasons why he didn't get involved in any particular group. Except for his friend, he didn't even talk with anyone. He had good grades in all subjects; not only his classmates, but his teachers also respected him.

Due to his height and physique, he never had been bullied in his life but because of his friend's antics, who was often at the end of the stick, he'd had to rough up a few guys here and there to save his ass.

"Good morning, Goodman."

He turned around to look at a young and petite woman, with bright red hair. She had half British and half Irish ancestry. Her name was Alice Walsh, a new student from England.

"Hey! Morning!"

"You remember our date tonight right?"

Since her arrival last week, she had been hitting on him very hard. After she asked him out a few times he had agreed to go out with her on one condition:

'If the snowstorm doesn't last after the weekend, then we will go.'

"Yeah, I remember. I still don't understand why you want to go out with me."

"Because in our class you are the only one who is so mysterious and I like solving mysteries."

"Where should I pick you up?"

"Here," She messaged him her address which was in part of town near the forest, near his house. "Around seven."

"Okay."

"I think we should go to our class." She started to walk holding his hand in her hand. He could smell her strawberry and vanilla perfume combined with her natural flowery scent. It was strange; he had smelled different things since morning, things that he'd never noticed had a distinct smell before.

"So, what do you think I should wear?"

"Whatever...you like. You would look beautiful in anything." He had not been on many dates but he knew how to talk to women. So if he was going to do it, then the least he could do was give it an honest try.

During all lectures, she was 'accidentally' touching him. If she was trying to seduce him, she was going overboard with her obvious techniques. As usual, he ignored the 'accidents'.

In the beginning, he wanted to comment about how obvious her technique was, but he stopped himself. Instead, he started to have fun too, by touching her 'accidentally'. This prompted her to go all out.

After their third period, the sound of the bell was an indication of their half-hour lunch break.

'It's like time goes faster when we are having fun.'

Like other students, he also started to gather his things. But before he could start walking out of the room, she yanked his t-shirt to stop him.

She was standing before him. He was about to ask her, "What..." but before he could complete his sentence, she was on him. Her hot lips mashed on his lips, her tongue trying to probe his mouth.

He was shocked; it wasn't like he wasn't expecting something like this, but not before their date.

'She is something!'

He started to kiss her back, parted his lips to allow her tongue. He lifted his hand, entangled behind her back, pressed his body and took an active role in their kiss. They were going at it for a few minutes before ending the kiss to take the necessary air.

She was breathing heavily and he could see the look of surprise on her face. A new scent started to come from her body. It was different from her vanilla perfume or her natural earthy scent. He was confused for a few seconds but suddenly he realized it was the smell of her arousal.

The smell was getting stronger with each moment. His body moved on its own; he was kissing her again, pushing his tongue against her lip. Within a moment, she allowed his tongue in her mouth. She used her tongue to wrestle with his for dominance. It was a fierce match.

His hands moved like they had their own mind; before he could stop them, they were on her butt cheeks. It was like a killing blow in their match; his tongue had utterly dominated her.

Before he could control his hands, which were messing with her butt cheeks, his lower body moved ahead. His erection was pressing against her belly. Which hit him like an electric shock; he had never felt so aroused in his life.

His body was operating itself, his mind was left behind, and his body was making decisions by itself.

'She just wanted to kiss me; I shouldn't be doing this.' With that thought in his mind, he decided to lift his hand from her butt cheek.

The hand moved as he wanted them to, but they also moved her body with them. The very next moment, his erection, which was pressed against her belly due to their height difference, was pressed between her legs.

He could feel her hotness seeping out through her panties, her crotch right on his rock-hard cock, which was trying to break his boxers and trousers.

Her breathing was getting shallow and before he could make any decision his nostrils were hit by a new wave of strong scent from her. The smell was so intense now that he lost track of all the other scents that he was experiencing all day long.

He closed his eyes to calm himself, to control his body. He just focused on himself for a few seconds.

When his mind came back to reality, his body was moving...especially his lower body. He was dry humping her! But it wasn't his body that was moving; no, it was her body that he had lifted and moved on his erection like a doll. Her scent of arousal was driving him crazy and making him bold about his action.

"DING..."

The bell was an indication of the end of their lunch period. The sound made the couple come out of their daze and immediately start making themselves presentable.

Whatever he did, he knew it would be difficult to hide his erection, so he just sat on his bench, putting his elbow on the desk to hide it from others. Though it was visible to someone sharing his bench. Someone like Alice Walsh, with whom he'd decided to go on a date tonight, who he'd dry humped and used her body like a doll for his pleasure, without giving her any choice.

Even though he was so aroused, his conscience was hitting him hard, which was the reason he never even once looked toward her or anyone around him. He shut all his senses and focused his mind on the classroom board.

The next two lectures ended without him losing his focus. He never looked towards her. He was sure about one thing; that he had crossed a boundary and taken advantage of a woman without her consent.

The last bell brought him out his wool-gathering. He wanted to apologize to her so he took a few breaths and was about to turn his head towards her. Suddenly he felt breathing in his ear.

"After that, you know what to expect tonight, so don't be late..." It was Alice's voice, filled with lust. Suddenly she poked him in the chest which broke his breathing pattern and he started to have a dry cough.

"Oh! Sorry! Here drink this." She gave her water bottle to him. He took two sips from it, calmed himself down, took a few long breaths.

It felt like she was indicating what happened between them during lunch period was her doing instead of him being the aggressor.