Exit the throne room towards the south and you’ll soon find yourself wandering through treacherous terrain. Marble pillars that once supported more than just the sky rise up around you, slabs of stone that once made a roof in pieces at their feet. Venture West and you’ll find a myriad of stone structures that paint a vague picture of the city that once was. Enter these buildings and you’ll find that time has taken anything of use to you away, leaving only rotting furniture and stone statues of common folk scattered throughout, placed in such a way that suggests what day to day life may have been like in this strange and empty kingdom. You’ll pass through an empty market square and a small field of gravestones, tilting back towards the earth with age. Venture East and you’ll find yourself amongst the broken rubble of what must once have been a training yard surrounded by the base of what was an outer wall. The forest has been more aggressive in its efforts to take this area back, trees shoot through rubble, their branches protect staircases that suddenly end from the elements. There are more statues here, these ones less intact, their expressions grim, or twisted with pain. Broken, rusted weapons stick out of the earth here and there and instinct whispers, “Perhaps it is not so smart to linger here.”

As you leave behind rock and rubble fields, they give way to root systems that seem to mingle and connect in tangles at the base of trees you cannot see the tops of. Every so often, stained green stillness slants through the path ahead, deep gold light from the sun bending and breaking between branches. The twisting maze of lantern-lit pathways lead to small, almost subterranean alcoves, their cobblestone floors often filled with shallow pools of water. Beds of moss, sponge-soft and inviting seem to beckon you forth, luring you deeper and deeper into this hidden place, until one begins to hear the immense beckoning, as if from a far off sound of music, some voice humming a lullaby in the distant wood. Your limbs feel weighty, loose and heavy all at once as this place’s secret blooms within you: that it is a garden, standing at the base of a mighty tower, left to grow over itself, to be lush and wild once more, to feed roots of its own. Those who dare pursue that sorcerous song wind up in the center of this overgrown place, the nearest window a hundred feet up the vine-covered face of it, just beneath the steeple. You feel something heavy take root in your chest standing there, and when you turn, you realize the entrance too has grown over, and you don’t know the way out.

It feels as if the woods are endless, no matter which way you turn all you can see are trees. Then finally the sky in the gaps between the densely crowded trunks seems to lighten and you step out from the underbrush to find yourself standing at the edge of a small, glassy pond. Pools of clear water that go up to your knees at their deepest, stretch out before you as far as the eye can see. You contemplate the water and it feels as if it is doing the same back. Life thrives in these pools. Lush, emerald moss coats every surface and forms thin strips of dry land that serve as walkways and connect the pools to each other. Trees take root on these mounds and high overhead, a leafy canopy lets in bright spotlights of sun. Further back, there is a spot where the trees have formed a circle. Sunlight cascades down in a single, steady beam into the center of the gathering and this is where it seems to shine the brightest.

A hush lies over the flower forest as soon as you step foot within and the back of your neck prickles as if you’re being watched. Where the thick canopy kept the light out before, the trees are more sparse here and have allowed for more delicate plants to grow. Flowers cover the forest floor in a dense network and climb up the base of the trees that grow here. While you may recognize most of the species, there is one that remains a mystery to you. Old stone structures protrude from the earth but it is almost hard to tell that they are manmade as every free surface is overladen with the flowers. More statues seem to have been placed here, dotting the landscape with people in different states of rest. You almost miss some as the flowers overtake even these. At night, the mystery flowers emit their own light, there is no need for the flame of a campfire here.

The rubble of the old castle is far behind you as you step into this plethora of trees and are enveloped in darkness. Looking up does you no good, as intricately woven branches tower high above you, blocking out almost all of the natural light. It’s not long before the eeriness of this dimly lit place settles in. Little grows here where there is so little light, though every so often brightly colored fungi take shape amongst the base of trunks, or emerge from the cool damp of the forest floor. Sooner than later shadows begin to loom in the wood ahead, prowling in that way only hunters do when they are in search of prey. Some of you may find your way up on your own, but those that don’t will find the way lit by small dancing lights, fireflies guiding lost tributes away from the dangers down there and up into the safety of the climbing trees. They lead you up small pathways amongst the root system that wind up and up and up, cobbled together with rope bridges and supported platforms in the upper levels of the canopy. Many of their beams have fallen prey to time rather than creature, wind and damp taking their toll on the strange city that once seemed to hide amongst the treetops. The boughs of neighboring trees seem to reach for each other, holding one another like lovers and lifelines, providing support for this place even as the elements have tried to reclaim the city for themselves.

A tremor runs through you upon sighting it for the first time, like a wave cresting over the surface of the sea, until you realize the gooseflesh rising on your arms is the only visible burst of movement in this place. You shut your eyes against it for a moment, blinking away the lovely expanse of color spreading towards a lone, densely wooded island on the horizon. You can’t help yourself from leaving that massive system of climbing trees behind and stepping onto a sloping dune of pillow-soft sand that cushions your feet even as you begin to slide towards the water’s edge. Small wooden boats lay overturned, covered in vines and branches, as if someone intentionally hid it away here to wait for you. Whether you clamber into the boat and use the oars or you splash in the blue for a swim, the cool water welcomes you. The depth plunges immediately, soft sand giving way to open water as you begin to notice giant monuments and statues beneath the surface that reach their hands up towards the brightness all around you. Light tiptoes across the water, almost perfectly still and undisturbed save for the way it gently breaks and reshapes itself around massive bubbles, sent up by creatures unseen. As you travel over those still waters, some may catch a glimpse of the massive tail propelling something scaled towards the bay’s cooler depths.