บท 3: Ch. 3 The Stunningly Splendid Superb Stump

"Are you… done?" Myrddin struggles to talk. This was a new form of torture. A death by 1,000 licks from a coyote. His back feels like it's been peeled. His strength is gone from struggling so much against the coyote for so long. Now the sun is nearly completely gone into the horizon. He already can't see it anymore due to the trees. And he couldn't even look up at the stars while he was tortured.

The coyote moves off of him and walks around him.

Myrddin rests his eyes for a moment. He eventually manages to push himself up after regaining some energy and strength. He brushes some dirt off his face, chest, and pants before pulling his shirt down.

After he pulled his shirt down the coyote went over to him let's put a small high pitched bark before licking his face once.

"I don't know if I should be happy or mad at you" Myrddin says. He isn't naive enough to believe that the coyote meant to hurt him. Well, the first one was likely to hurt him. And when it stood on his shoulders it was also probably spiting him. But besides that it was like the coyote didn't try to hurt him.

After a yip from the coyote it circles around him and then sits next to him. It moves it's head to his chest and nudges him back.

With his strength slowly returning to him he's able to stay sitting up, but just barely. And if the coyote wanted to it could just push him back.

"Wait" Myrddin scratches the back of the coyotes head and grabs his phone. Luckily there was only one text from his mom.

'Have fun! Let me know if you find any interesting spots this time! And try to make some friends. I hear there's this nice and smart girl just down the road from our house. She also has a dog. (Hint hint). Anyway! Be home before 10, you have your first day of school tomorrow'

Myrddin checks the time and it's only a little past 7. "Alright, it looks like we've got some time before I need to head home"

The coyote nudges him back again but he doesn't let himself fall.

"Hold on" Myrddinsets his phone to the side and turns the volume up a little bit. "What should I call you…"

The coyote 'annoyingly?' stares at him.

"Hmmm" Myrddin strokes his chin as if he has a beard. "How about we call you… Canis? Latrans? I know I suck at this so don't give me that. I'm trying alright? Canis Latrans is Latin for Barking Dog but Canis Latrans is the coyote's scientific name. I didn't come up with it, and I suck at names so give me- hey! No nipping! At least I nipping my fingers… How about Caval?"

The coyote just nudges him back again. And this time Myrddin let's the coyote have its way. He slowly lowers himself down onto his back and looks up. Through the leaves of the trees up above he can spot the stars of the now clear night sky. Due to there being no lights near him the sky is much more detailed.

"Wow~" Myrddin mutters in awe of the scene above him. The wind rustling the trees and causing the view to change.

He then feels the coyote move beside him and lay down on its side. It's back against his left side while it's head rests on his shoulder and arm. He takes his right hand and rests it on Caval's side. "Are you alone out here too? What happened to your family? SORRY!! Sorry… must you nip so much? I suppose I should be happy I'm not your chew toy…"

Upon saying this, Myrddin looks down at the coyote who looks up at him.

"You…" Myrddin starts but before he could cause Caval any more the coyote playfully bites him again. "I knew it!"

He grabs the coyotes ears and punches them. Not with his nails, just to annoy it a bit.

"Awwoooo, arrrr, awrrrawww" Caval howls and yelps playfully as it shakes and moves its head to get free.

"Oh? Is this how you want to play? Well you will have to wait then won't you. Because currently we are both injured for now" Myrddin reminds Caval and takes his hand from the coyote's ear and gently placed his hand on its side.

Caval flinches a little and then calms down. It puts its head back on Myrddin's shoulder and shifts itself to get more comfy.

"Sorry, I'll try to get something to help you. If you want to meet me again" Myrddin takes his hand off the coyote and lets his arm rest at his side.

"Arrooo…" Caval grumbles?

Myrddin just stares up at the sky. "Too soon? My bad. I just have a feeling school is going to suck tomorrow. And my intuition is usually pretty good"

"Arrrph!" Caval huffs, and barks.

Myrddin looks to Caval. "I can't tell if you are being nice or just being rude. A bit of both?"

"Arrrr" Caval yelps in agreeance.

——————

9:20pm. Somewhere in the Beacon Hills Preserve.

"It is time Caval. Care to lead me out of this place?" Myrddin asks as he stands up. He grabs his headphones and phone off the ground and stretches his back as much as he can without hurting it, and that's not much before he feels the pain from the bruise. "If I die from an infection I'm going to haunt you. I swear I will Caval"

"Arroooowooo~" Caval rolls its eyes and head and begins walking in a direction.

Myrddin lets his phone play music from his front pocket and places his headphones around his neck. "You think I won't? You'll be surprised how stubborn I can be"

Caval turns it's head and glares at him.

"Fine. Not as stubborn as you. But a very close second" Myrddin folds his arms across his chest as he walks next to Caval. He also lifts his chin and looks away from the coyote for extra dramatics.

But then, suddenly he doesn't hear the patters of Cavals paws on the ground anymore.

Myrddin instantly looks to where Caval should be. Sure he looked away, but they both continued walking. He looks back and doesn't spot the coyote. No hide or tail. It's like Caval just disappeared.

The half moon hangs high in the sky and illuminates the forest around Myrddin as he scans his surroundings.

"Caval~! Please! This isn't funny" He calls out into his surroundings. He isn't scared about being alone in the woods at night. It's more that his new friend had just disappeared into the wind.

He continues forward and looks around. It's so quiet. Eerily quiet. There isn't a sound from anything besides the trees in the wind and his own steps. At least he has his glasses on.

"This is what I get for thinking I can actually manage to keep a friend. Even if it was a weird coyote…" Myrddin frowns slightly for a few seconds before going to a neutral expression. He had gotten his hopes up for a little bit considering how nice and playful the coyote was… if you ignored it's playful biting and torture techniques.

Myrddin continues forward. He just wants to get home now and take a shower. Then fall asleep and wait for school tomorrow. Maybe school don't be as bad as he feels it will be?

After 3 minutes of walking he comes to a clearing.

Stirring from his thoughts he looks into the clearing and it's a majestic sight.

In the center there is a giant stump over six feet in diameter. And the thick roots are slightly visible from the ground, barely visible before they reach down to explore the depth of the forest ground beneath. The moon light brightly lights the stump of what must have been one of the biggest trees Myrddin would have ever seen. Some moss and some slightly dead vegetation was on or between the stump and it's roots. The grass was short all around the clearing like it was afraid to even challenge the tree stump.

Myrddin is left speechless as he takes in the absolutely gorgeous view. He had never seen anything like this in his life. He could stand in this spot forever and never get bored of this sight.

His body moves forward on its own, and Myrddin doesn't stop himself. He also wants to get closer to this stump. His heart beats heavily in his chest as he is pulled closer. It's like the tree stump is calling out to him. And when he gets to it he nearly falls to his knees. But he somehow manages to stay standing. The bruise on his back completely gone from his mind as his wife eyes scan the stump. He looks at the stump's tree rings and estimates the tree was easily at least over half a millennium.

And when his gaze goes from the perimeter of the ring in, he spots something poking out from the stumps cracked center.

A twig of some sort is poking up.

Myrddin knows that sometimes a tree can grow from the stump of a dead tree. But the new tree would take the remaining nutrients from the old tree's roots in order to grow.

And it's like this twig is speaking to him. Or something is.

'Accipite illum. Hoc erue et frange 12 unc. Radices non sunt necessariae et iam consummata est. Non ullis foliis vel ramis crescere conatus est. Crevit hoc tibi'

These words didn't make any sense to Myrddin, but it's like he knew what they meant. Like how a person will whisper in a different language and you have no idea what they said, but somehow your brain translates it for you. The voice came from the back of his mind but the words circled his entire brain, ringing like harmonious bells.

'Take it. Uproot this and break it at 12 inches. The roots aren't needed and it's already finished growing. It hasn't attempted to grow any leaves or branches. This was grown for you'

Myrddin takes a step closer. He can't move anymore forward without stepping on the stumps roots or stump itself. And he wouldn't want to defile such a thing with his dirty shoes.

And now looking down and across it he takes in it's true size. It's at least 10' in diameter. The sheer size of the tree is hard to comprehend when trying to imagine it based on this stump.

Myrddin reaches out towards the twig. His finger are still a foot away and he can't stretch his arm any further.

Not being able to stop now, he places his left hand on the stump and grabs ahold of the twig. And in this moment he feels something akin to an electric current shoot through his body.

And in the next instant he is standing upright with the twig in his hand and it's roots dangle from it for a few inches as the limply stretch towards the ground like it used all its strength just to co to us standing until the very moment it was held in Myrddin's hand.

He grabs the roots in his left hand and bends them.

*Krrr-Snap!*

The twig made a pitiful creaking noise just before it's roots were snapped off. But the weirdest past is that where it's roots once were there is now a flat and rounded end, opposite to the point at the other end of the now 12 inch twig.

Myrddin holds the roots in his left hand and stares at the tree as he tightly holds the twig in his right hand. He tosses the roots back into the center crack of the stump.

"What… is this?" He asks. It only to himself, but to anyone that can answer this question.

He takes his left hand and moves the twig around. It's not perfectly straight. But it really didn't have any sign of growing branches or leaves. And it was clearly solid wood. But what's weirder is that it isn't like a new grown tree or anything. It's the heartwood of a tree.

For simplicity sake, Myrddin thinks of the heartwood as the skeleton of the tree. It's harder and denser at the center of the tree. It gets compressed due to the newly formed outer rings from the tree ring. So how did this twig grow? And why didn't it snap like an actual twig? It's too smooth and doesn't look snapped.

The entire twig itself is weird. While not fully straight, it's not curved either. If he holds it out, away from himself, he could point straight at something off in the distance with it like he was pointing with his finger.

Myrddin looks up from the twig in his hands to look at the stump again.

But it's gone!

Myrddin closes his eyes and snaps them open a few times but the stump doesn't reappear at all. And when he looks around himself, he finds that he is back in the middle of the woods and no longer in a clearing.

He frantically looks around himself but spots nothing that looked like that clearing with the stump. That view is burned into his mind in a good way, not like that time he caught his parents on valentines night a few years ago. Luckily it was years ago and not last year, otherwise that photo on display at his house would be more traumatic.

He has to lean against a tree so that he can rest and catch his breath. He isn't asthmatic or anything, just very unathletic. He did quickly look around the area and might have ran enough to work up a small sweat. And as he rests the pain from his back begins to make itself known again.

The sounds of the forest also come back to him. Myrddin also realizes that his phone stopped playing music at some point. He's not sure exactly when, but it must have happened just before he saw the stump or just after Caval abandoned him.

Taking his phone from his pocket, he checks the time.

*Recharge symbol flashes on the screen three times before turning off again*

"If you have enough battery to flash that then you can tell me the time!" Myrddin curses his luck.

Lost in the Beacon Hills Preserve at night with a dead phone. Dirty headphones around his neck. A sore and badly bruised back. And a twig.

Perfect.

"I'm not going to tell a single person about what just happened. Best case scenario I end up getting 3 square meals a day in a nice, comfy, padded room with a lovely and tight jacket binding my arms in a forever hug with myself" Myrddin shakes his head.

"Awwwwwooooooo!!!"

Myrddin spins on his left heel and plants his right foot into the grass and dirt while he crouches down slightly and points the twig out towards the sudden sound. "I'll curse you!"

"Khkhkhkh" Caval snickers at Myrddin's 'unique' and 'interesting' act.

"Oy! Don't laugh, you're the one who left me you damn trickster Caval!" Myrddin shouts as he spits the coyotes blue eyes through the darkness. He points the twig at the coyote to make a point.

"Awoowoooowoowoowoo" Caval can't stop even when it tried to.

"Thanks. You're a big help" Myrddin pushes his glasses back into place after they nearly fell of from his sudden ballet. He also turns around and crosses his arms over his chest to show he wasn't in a playful mood.

The sound of paws moving on the ground weren't heard. But Myrddin felt something nudge his left outer thigh.

He looks down and sees Caval sitting down and looking up at him.

"Fine. I forgive you for ditching me and laughing at me" Myrddin goes to his right knee and hugs the large coyote. "Just don't do that again. Otherwise I really will haunt or curse you"

"Arrowoo" Caval complains as if it didn't leave Myrddin.

"Geh, ok. I think it's time you actually show me how to get outta here now" Myrddin rubs his right ear from the hot breath of the coyote and stands up. "And if you give me fleas or some other type of bug I'm gonna be slightly pissed. I know you wouldn't be able to help it, but I'll still be pissed"

"Wahwoo" Caval rolls its head and begins walking again.

Myrddin doesn't know if that's Caval's way of saying 'follow me' or it's just the way it expresses itself.

Either way, he follows his coyote companion. He does struggle a little bit to keep up. He didn't have anything to eat since lunch, he's hurt, and he's extremely tired. Not exactly the best combination for a hike through the woods.

Around 20 minutes later Myrddin spots a road leading into town. He can clearly see a 'Thanks for visiting Beacon Hills' sign way down the road meaning he had to go opposite of that.

"Huh. This is a new road, which means it likely leads to the neighboring town. How did I end up way over here?" Myrddin rubs his chin.

"Arrrwwooo~" Caval yowls. Part yip and part howl.

"I won't be able to see you tomorrow morning anyway Caval. So make sure you go catch something easy and gets some rest. I should be able to meet you near twilight again though. That way we both can be rested. I'll also bring you some food, what do you…" Myrddin slumps his shoulders. "Why do I have to bribe a coyote to hang out with me!" He suddenly shouts to the sky and grabs his head with both hands.

"Aoooo arrrwooo" Caval headbutts his stomach slightly before walking off into the woods.

Myrddin opens his left eye and watches as Caval walks away. "I'll take that as a good bye and a see you later"

As Myrddin begins walking back into town he tries to come up with an excuse to why he is late and why he's all dirty. He doesn't plan on lying to his mom. But he can't exactly tell her the truth either. If someone told him that they befriended a wolf and got a twig from a disappearing stump in the middle of the Preserve he would definitely think that person was crazy.

He isn't sure what time it is or how long it's been, but he wouldn't be surprised if it was midnight considering how long he may have been staring at the stump for.

When he makes it back to the gated community he's glad it's night time. He wouldn't like to walk around his neighborhood being all dirty like he is. He really just had to fall in the one part where it was slightly damp and all dirt basically.

Walking past the big houses he spots the same house that caught his eye earlier that day. The one with the little white dog barking at him. And just like before, there was the small ball of white fluff at the second floor window.

He waves at it but pauses when he sees someone go to the window. His eyes widen when he spots one of the most beautiful girls he had ever seen. Even at this distance he could spot her long red hair. And the fact that she was topless and braless.

They make eye contact for a few seconds before Myrddin gives a thumbs up and shrugs before walking away. He wasn't smiling, mostly due to the shock, but he couldn't help but find the situation funny. Not like he was going to get in trouble. He was just trying to get home and just happened to wave high and good bye to a dog. The thumbs up was actually for the girl though.

Myrddin hasn't actually seen anything like that before… aside from his parents late night valentines activities. But that doesn't count! And he would much rather forget anything like that when it involves his parents.

——————

Myrddin takes his colorful keychain and unlocks the front door of his new house with the bright red key.

And when he opens the door he sees his mom standing there with her arms crossed.

Myrddin gives her a small smile. "Hi mom. I'm not too late am I?"

"Do you have any idea what time it is?! Why didn't you respond to my text?! And why are you so dirty?" Ada demands with clear worry about her baby. How could he have gotten this dirty. And he looks so tired, what happened to him? Her motherly instincts were kicking in.

Myrddin takes his phone from his pocket and holds it out to her. " I don't know what time it is. My phone is dead. I plan on getting a portable battery tomorrow so this doesn't happen again. And I'm dirty because I tripped when I was in the woods near the high school"

"You tripped?! Did you twist your ankle? Sprain your wrist?" Ada takes a step towards Myrddin and begins to carefully look him over.

Myrddin grabs her hands. "Mom, I'm fine. Just tired. I got spooked by a squirrel and tripped when I was taking steps backwards because I thought it was a wolf or a coyote or something. But I did end up making a friend though"

"Really?!" Ada grabs both of Myrddin's hands. "Who is it? Is it a boy or a girl? And if it's a girl is she cute? Oh! But if they do drugs you should politely distance yourself from them a bit. I'm not saying to just toss them to the wind, but you don't need any drivers in your-"

"Mom!" Myrddin raises his voice after the third attempt to stop her.

"Yes Myr? Are you ready to spill the beans? It's a girl isn't it!" Ada gives a sly and knowing smile.

"What? No.. I mean… I don't think so at least…" Myrddin looks at the corner of the room as he tries to decide. He really didn't know.

"You don't know?" Ada is very confused.

Myrddin shrugs. "It's not like I could really ask. I'm sure I'll find out eventually"

Ada let's his hands go and looks at her own when she notices the dirt. "Did you two go wrestling in the mud or something? And what's their name?"

"Or something… this is all from my trip. I managed to find the one part of the Preserve where there wasn't any grass and it was slightly wet" Myrddin looks down at his hands. The twig in his pocket and beneath his shirt. He didn't really want to explain why he is carrying a twig through twin if anyone stopped him.

"You went into the preserve?!" Ada's eyes widen with shock. "You know that's dangerous Myrddin!"

"I know, and after I got spooked by the squirrel I tried to leave. That's when I found my friend. It's name is Caval" Myrdin changes the subject.

"That's… that raises many questions" Ada registers what Myrddin says. "Caval like Cah-vall? Caval? And it's?"

Myrddin flinches slightly. "Yeeeeaaahhhh. I don't know. It's, their, his, her. And I think it's more of a nickname than a real name. I didn't really ask their real name"

"Well you should ask their real name. But having a friend named Caval is funny. I'm glad your safe" Ada puts her right hand on his head. She takes her hand back and looks at it. "Why don't you go take a nice and long shower"

"Can do" Myrddin takes his shoes off and begins walking up the stairs that are near the front hall.

"Wait!" Ada commands.

This causes Myrddin to freeze. "What is it? Did I forget something?"

Ada nods. "2 things sweety. First, here's your phone charger. Gwen stole yours since she lost hers again. And second, did you find the middle school?"

"Thanks…" Myrddin takes the cord and gets a little frustrated that Gwen took something of his again. "And no, didn't spot a middle school. This place is bigger than I thought so I haven't had the chance to explore all of it yet. You can drive Gwen tomorrow. I can walk to school, just need to leave a bit earlier"

"Are you sure? It's not too far away is it?" Ada asks.

"I'm sure. I also want to enjoy my first day. And dealing with Gwen first thing in the morning will not be any help" Myrddin says and begins walking up the steps.

Ada shakes her head. "I know she's a handful, but she doesn't mean any harm. Just give her some time and she will see you as her cool and strong big brother again"

Myrddin closes his eyes as he pauses. "Right, thanks mom" He continues going up the steps, reminded of how he is neither cool nor strong.

Although, it is cool to have a coyote as a friend. It's not cool though to walk through town covered in dirt.

He gets to his room and hides the twig in his closet. He isn't sure why he wants to keep it, but it reminds him of the disappearing stump so why not keep it.

He takes a shower and leaves his clothes in the laundry bin. He can deal with them later since he's practically dragging his feet like cinderblocks at this point.

When his head hits his pillow he instantly falls asleep. He doesn't even have the energy to worry about how everything can go wrong tomorrow.