The Falling Tree

This is part of a choose your own adventure story, ‘Through the Black Door.’ Go to the first chapter here. Or head to the previous chapter: ‘Pursue the Black Horse’ or ‘The Mysterious Bouquet.’ Check out the chapter guide here. See the bottom of the story for notes.

You didn’t get this far in life by being a coward. So with a deep breath, you run as fast as you can, while the tree topples down like a guillotine.

Just one second more, and you’ll be triumphant and free.

But at the last instant, a loose branch snags your back foot. You trip and fall.

With a heavy crunch, the tree lands on your back leg and you scream in pain.

The black mare is nowhere to be seen.

In vain, you try to pull your leg out from under the trunk, but it’s too heavy.

Bitterly, you curse yourself for not even bringing a knife. Otherwise, you might have been able to saw off the trunk.

Now, all you can do is lie there, helpless. Maybe you’ll be lucky and someone will come by and save you. Perhaps the black mare will have mercy on you and free you from the tree.

But you know the chances are extremely slim. You slowly wait to die.

The End

Note: Novus Grey wrote the original first chapters, but she has deleted her account on Medium, and unfortunately did not respond to any emails or messages. Hence why I’m writing new chapters to replace the ones she deleted, so that the later chapters I wrote can still be playable. These new beginning chapters contain the same basic plot but have different details.