Literally anything would be better than following a straight path right now. The moment you find some rocks which don’t look too slippery, you clamber out of the creek and start running through the woods. You’ve given up on not making noise a while ago, and you’re going to leave wet footprints regardless of what you do, so you’re focused on putting distance and obstacles behind your pursuers and nothing else.
…Are you even being pursued right now? No time to check, your legs are burning with exertion as you march up rocky slopes, lungs gulping humid air and never feeling like you’re getting enough. The shady treetops block most of the afternoon sun, a small consolation while loam and dead leaves cover more of you every time you trip and fall. Every distant bird sounds like a hunting hawk, every creaking branch sounds like a stalking wolf, and your own heartbeat sounds loud enough to give you away. It doesn’t matter if anyone is following you; you’re unsure if you’ll ever be safe again.
The top of the hill is leaving you exposed. When you squint your tiny eyes, you can still see the school grounds; however far you ran, it’s still not far enough. Attempting to brush the filth off of your swimsuit is only spreading the tree resin you accidentally touched several minutes ago. Charm school doesn’t exactly teach wilderness survival skills. Your only real idea at the moment is to climb down the other side of the hill and keep running until you find… what, exactly? An adult who won’t just send you back to the school? A cargo ship bound to South America? Some sort of wizard who undoes curses pro bono? It could happen, this all started with getting lost in a completely different forest after all.
“Eek!”
You can’t help but shriek like an ordinary child when you jump off the last few meters of the cliff into a pile of leaves. The valley is deeper than you’d assumed it would be, possibly even below sea level. This remote place is free of the garbage and improvised fire pits which usually haunt forests. It’s not exactly a plus in your case; the vegetation is so thick that your progress is limited to narrow deer trails winding between the trees. Prickly green thorn bushes border you on either side, quietly threatening you with pain and regret.
…Come to think of it, those thorns might be your guaranteed chance to lose anyone pursuing you. You find a gap in the prickers just wide enough to fit a preteen boy crawling on his belly, so you do just that. Without enough room to even move your knees or hips, you’re limited to dragging your poor body along with your arms, only occasionally being forced to go in reverse as the thorns snag on your spandex-clad backside. The sun’s starting to go down by the time you see any end to the maze of brambles, but you made it, by God you made it.
Every part of your body is sore now, but you don’t exactly have the option to go to sleep in the middle of a deep forest with no shelter or even food. Forward, ever forward goes the march… and then you walk face-first into a spiderweb.
“Ack! Ppthbt!” Even as an adult you never liked the sensation of a cobweb in the face, but something about this feels different. This web isn’t just clinging to your face, it hasn’t broken away from whatever trees it’s hanging between yet. Pretty tough spiderweb… you back up as far as you can go without ending up back in the thorny hedge and it still doesn’t budge until you hear a distant crack. A single chunk of bark falls off of an old oak tree… holy crap, the tree broke before the web did.
“I’ll… just go AROUND this, then.” Considering yourself very wise, you halt and start looking for a safer route. The minute you turn towards the setting sun, you see lines of warm, orange light suspended in midair. Looking in the one other direction… more webs there, too. This is why your mother always told you not to run off by yourself, wasn’t it?
Opting not to run into a visible trap, you instead start climbing a tree. At the very least, you’ll be able to disembark somewhere the giant spider web isn’t. It seemed like a good idea for the first sixty seconds, but then you remembered that you are very small and very, very tired. By the time you reach the crown of the tree, your grip weakens, and you fall…
RIGHT into the center of an almost picturesque, orb-shaped giant spider web. The snare you’ve blundered into would look like a Halloween decoration if it didn’t have a screaming, cross-dressing child stuck to it. A futile attempt to move your legs only manages to pin them together in the webbing, so you decide to not panic and stay still. Yes, just stay perfectly still and nothing worse will happen. Maybe the spider’s already dead or something. Maybe the webs will eventually dry out and crumble, and you can just… walk away.
Or maybe the dog-sized spider will casually walk up right in front of you. Their black carapace shines with a halo of fine hairs in the evening sunlight as they skitter over you. Their legs end not in sharp points, but with flat pads which rest on your body far too much like a human hand for your liking. Their eyes stare into yours, and…
“And who are you supposed to be?” The spider speaks! Somehow!
“I uh… uh… my name is… Crystal? Please don’t eat me.”
“Oh, don’t worry, you aren’t getting eaten. You see…”