Violet couldn’t take it anymore! The need to explore was just too great. Her math homework could wait, she wouldn’t be gone that long. She grabbed her sweatshirt and hopped on her bike.
She wove through the familiar, suburban streets, down to the paved bikepath system down by the river.
She sped along, barely taking anything in except the air in her face. It was much like trying to find your place in a book and skimming over the parts you’ve already read, unbearably eager to get the the place you’d stopped.
She came to the spot where pavement broke to a narrow, dirt trail. Too narrow to take her bike. She locked it around a small tree, and jogged down the path.
When the path opened out unto a forested area skirting the riverbank, she slowed a bit. Her senses were completely open now…this was unfamiliar territory. She walked happily along, noticing everything she could, when suddenly, she stopped.
There stood a circle of trees, a two-trunked silver birch at the front.
“A faerie ring…”