My family went camping at Lake Nereus. None of us left unchanged.

When I was young, camping was the one thing that everyone in my family enjoyed.

Every year, we’d drive out to some national park, split into groups, and make a game out of seeing which of us could reach the other end of the park first. No matter the weather, no matter the terrain, we always had the time of our lives.

But when I turned ten, my grandfather suggested a new location for our annual trip, one that none of us had ever heard of: Lake Nereus National Park, Oregon.

“I’d camp there all the time when I was younger,” Gramps told me, as we packed for the journey. “There’s no tourists around this time of year, nobody to get in the way of the fun. It’ll be a real adventure.”

None of us knew anything about Lake Nereus: it wasn’t on any map we could find, nor was there any record of it even existing. But Gramps somehow had maps of the area ready to go and he’d never steered us wrong before.

So, all eight of us took the drive to Oregon, winding along endless byways and mountain passes until we finally parked on the side of a lonely dirt road, at the very edge of a huge stretch of dense forest. Beyond the trees lay a vast becalmed lake with waters black as oil.

As always, we divided up the family into teams and set off along different routes to see who could reach the northernmost campsite first for the big fireside party: Grandpa teamed up with my parents for the easternmost route; my older brother Sebastian teamed up with Aunt Marcie on a northerly route along the shores of the lake; and I was teamed up with my eldest sister Nina and her boyfriend Jason as they made their way west.

Once we’d collected our compasses, supplies, walkie-talkies, and maps, we marched off into the forest, ready to rendezvous at the north end of the lake.

However, about half an hour into the trip, I realized that my map was slightly different from the others.

Where Nina and Jason’s copies were showing straightforward locations and distances, mine had been graffitied: seemingly random areas had been circled and labeled “Beasts”, “Gluttons,” “Secluses,” “Tricksters,” and “Apexes”.

I tried to tell Nina and Jason about it, but they weren’t in the mood to listen. Nina was grumpy at having to play babysitter to me, and Jason was practically itching with impatience for the moment when he’d finally have some precious alone-time with his girlfriend. So, they ignored me as we marched uphill through the sparser end of the forest that bordered the western shore of Lake Nereus.

That first night, we stopped right on the edge of the zone marked “Beasts” on my map, and after setting up the tents and cooking dinner, we went to bed early.

Or rather, I went to bed early.

Nina and Jason had plans for an after-dark walk through the forest ahead, but the map’s warnings had spooked me, so I decided to stay behind. And while I slept, they went off to enjoy their privacy in the depths of the forest, inside the “Beasts” zone.

I dimly remember waking up later that night to see lights in the distance, accompanied by faint howls and barks, but once the glow and the noise faded, I drifted back to sleep almost immediately. (In my defense, I was really tired.)

When Nina and Jason came back the next morning, I knew at once that something was wrong: they’d left shirt buttons undone, boots unlaced, jackets left hanging off one shoulder, and neither of them seemed to notice.

I tried to ask what was wrong, but they struggled to even speak: Jason could only grunt, while Nina barely mumbled out a few vague sentences about what had happened.

“Can’t think,” she mumbled. “Hurts to think. Saw lights in the forest. Lights gave something… but took something away.”

Whimpering, she staggered off, muttering under her breath. From what little I could hear, it sounded like she was reciting the alphabet, but she kept forgetting it.

Still, the two of them tried to go about their morning routine, preparing breakfast and packing up the campsite, but Nina had trouble working the camping stove, despite being a veteran camper of more than a decade, while Jason could only clumsily paw at the tent pegs.

I tried to help him, but the moment I got within arm’s reach, Jason spun around and snarled at me like a wild animal, eyes flashing scarlet, his teeth lengthening into fangs.

While I fell backwards in fear, Nina suddenly seemed to grow several feet taller, tearing her boots open and almost ripping through her shirt as she rounded on Jason, roaring at her boyfriend like an angry bear.

Jason bowed his head and cowered, visibly shrinking until his clothes almost engulfed him, the hairless tail of a rat snaking out of his oversized jeans.

My now-giant sister then clumsily helped me to my feet, nuzzling my face like a mother dog worrying over a wounded puppy, lowing in concern as she checked me for injuries, clumsily promising to keep me safe.

“Will go hunt,” she grunted. “Will bring food. You stay. Not safe out there.”

And without another word, she shrugged out of her ruined clothes, shrank into the form of a hawk, and flew away.

Behind her, Jason expanded into the shape of a fox and took off after her with a garbled shout of “wanna come too!”

I was left sitting alone by the tent, quivering in fear, calling for help on the walkie-talkie without hearing a single response for the next half an hour.

Eventually, I set off in the opposite direction, hoping to track down one of the other family teams. I didn’t know how they could help Nina and Jason, but I wasn’t thinking that far ahead: all that mattered was finding help.

As I left, I could see vultures watching from the branches above me… and all of them had human faces.

—

It took hours for me to return to the starting point, and even longer to find Sebastian and Marcie’s planned route, but I somehow managed to find their temporary camp on the eastern shore of Lake Nereus by four in the afternoon.

The place was deathly silent, with no sign of my aunt and older brother to be found except for their untouched backpacks. About the only thing missing from their belongings was the spy novel that Sebastian had been reading.

A quick look at the map confirmed that the two of them had made camp right between two of the marked zones: the “Secluses” zone in the forest bordering the eastern shore, and the “Gluttons” zone in the shallows of the lake itself.

Just as I was starting to panic, I remembered that Aunt Marcie had always liked to swim after a long journey. Hoping that she’d decided to take a dip in the lake to cool off from the hike, I made my way to the shore and called out to her at the top of my lungs, praying that at any minute, I’d see Marcie striding out of the lake, maybe a little surprised to see me but otherwise unchanged.

Instead, I found myself alone on the shore except for a huge elk that had stopped to take a drink from the murky water.

And then I caught a glimpse of movement around ankle height and saw something wriggling through the shallows towards the elk. At first, I thought it was just a leech… up until I realized that it sported a tiny human head, no bigger than that of a Barbie doll.

“Hungry,” it shrilled at helium pitch. “Hungry.”

As I watched, the human-faced leech shot out of the water, fastened itself on the unsuspecting elk’s flank, and began to feed, gorging itself on the animal’s blood… and as it fed, it grew, bulging and swelling out of shape, expanding first by inches, then by feet.

And as it grew, it sprouted long, rubbery arms that wrapped around the startled elk, anchoring itself in place and keeping the elk from shaking it off as the leech grew bigger and consumed even more of its blood.

In a matter of seconds, the elk was dead and completely exsanguinated, and the leech was now roughly the size of a Nile crocodile, but it still wasn’t finished eating. Reaching out with its improbably-muscled arms, it shoved the carcass into its colossal jaws and swallowed it whole – instantly ballooning in size once again.

Then, the hippo-sized leech turned and finally noticed me, and in that moment, I recognized the now-gigantic face of the leech.

It was Aunt Marcie, transformed by her zone just like Nina and Jason… and yet differently.

She was now what the map had called a Glutton.

“HUNGRY,” she boomed, her voice now a thunderous bass throb. “HUNGRY.”

I didn’t even bother trying to negotiate. I could tell from the way she was licking her chops that – unlike Nina – she didn’t recognize me as anything other than lunch.

So, I turned and ran for the forest as fast as my feet could carry me. Fortunately, her newfound size made her slower, and though she transformed again and sprouted millipede legs to accelerate her along the rough ground, I had a headstart.

By the time she’d picked up serious speed, I’d already beaten her to the trees, where the forest was too dense for her to follow.

Of course, I didn’t realize that for several minutes, so on I ran, too terrified to remember that I was now sprinting into “Secluses” territory.

—

A few hundred yards past the tree line, I tripped and crashed headfirst to the ground.

When I regained consciousness a few minutes later, something was jabbing me with a stick.

Groaning, I looked up just in time to see something human-shaped drop the stick and leap backwards, springing onto the side of a tree and clinging to it like a frog.

Now that I could see it clearly, I saw that it looked more akin to an octopus than anything else: it had writhing tentacles in place of fingers, disproportionately long arms, a bulging, pulpy skull, and enormous eyes with slot-like pupils.

Also, it was holding a John Le Carre novel under one arm – straight from Sebastian’s backpack. Judging by the leaf bookmark, the creature had been reading it recently, too.

And that’s how I finally realized that this thing, this Secluse, was my big brother.

“Seb?” I whispered.

Sebastian said nothing, but his tentacled fingers sharpened into blades as a silent warning not to get any closer.

He was more intelligent than the other victims… but just like the others, something of himself had been stolen. All the showboating and bravado he’d been known and admired for was gone. In their place was left only suspicion and fear.

As I watched, he tucked the book in a hollow at the trunk of the tree and began inching backwards into the branches until he was well and truly out of reach.

Then, he began to change, his skin rippling as it shifted to match the texture of the bark, limbs and skull flattening against the trunk of the tree until they were almost two dimensional. He even sprouted a few branches of his own, complete with real leaves.

“Please, Seb, talk to me. Where are the others? What’s happening?”

The slot-pupiled eyes glared down at me for a moment. Then they too vanished, leaving him as just another part of the tree.

As I later learned, Secluses are very shy creatures: they don’t like being seen, either by predators or by their prey.

You might wonder why, if that’s the case, Sebastian bothered poking me with a stick; I like to think he was acting on some last shred of human feeling for me, checking to make sure I was okay.

Then again, maybe he just wanted to check to see if I was dead before he started eating me.

—

Out of ideas, I went on walking, hoping that I could finally find help if I went far enough.

Eventually, my route snaked out onto the northernmost end of Lake Nereus.

Out here, there was no shoreline, only a jagged maze of rocks and pinnacles almost as tall as the trees, and north of that, a stretch of bare hills jutting from out of the surrounding forest.

On the map, the pinnacles had been marked as “Trickster” territory, and the hills belonged to the “Apexes,” and getting anywhere near them would be incredibly dangerous, but the camping ground where we were supposed to meet was situated right on the edge of the two areas, and this might be the only chance I’d have of finding my parents and grandpa.

By then, it was getting dark: making my way out of Secluse territory had taken about two hours, and the sun was plunging rapidly out of view, and I really didn’t want to find out just how many of these shapeshifters liked to hunt at night.

So, when I caught a glimpse of Dad’s telltale orange jacket through the trees ahead, I put on an extra burst of speed, hoping the camping ground was only a few yards beyond, and that I’d be safe there with Mom and Dad until we could call for help.

But before I could reach him, Dad walked off, vanishing behind the trees to his left.

Baffled, I followed, sprinting around the corner ahead, only to find that Dad had walked off yet again.

Now he was heading into Trickster territory.

I immediately shouted, trying to get his attention, but no matter how loud I screamed or how urgently I tried to warn him, Dad just didn’t seem to hear me.

In desperation, I galloped after him, sprinting wildly towards the pinnacles with all the speed I could muster.

And then, less than five feet away from me, Dad finally turned.

He was smiling.

But then, that’s far too short and simple a word to describe the hideous grin he wore in that moment. Real human smiles don’t literally stretch from ear to ear, and they usually don’t sport long, needle-sharp fangs.

And his eyes were no longer their usual murky brown, but a gleaming luminous gold.

As I skidded to a halt, Dad changed.

His body shifted into a dazzling display of transformation, sprouting giant feathery wings from his shoulders, his body stretching and bulging ludicrously as he took on the shapes of cartoon characters, his head suddenly a blurring collage of faces from everyone in our family including me, his skin blushing with lurid shades of color from neon purple to radioactive blue, all of it happening so quickly that my eyes struggled to make sense of it.

Too late, I realized that the performance was a distraction, and I turned to run – but in that moment, Mom swooped in and knocked me off my feet, sending me crashing to the ground.

I landed heavily on my back, dazed and unable to do much else apart from stare up at the darkening sky as Mom descended on her own set of enormous wings. She too was smiling that same impossible Cheshire Cat grin, her eyes gleaming metallic gold in the fading light.

These were Tricksters, I realized, and they’d lured me into a trap.

Together, she and Dad grabbed me by the arms and began dragging me away, towards the distant hills of the Apexes Zone.

At that point, something inside me broke. I didn’t know what they were going to do to me, but I knew I couldn’t endure another minute of this nightmare, least of all at the hands of my parents. So, I started to sob, begging for mercy with all dignity thrown to the winds:

“Mom, please… please don’t do this, I don’t want to die. Let me go, please. Please, Dad, stop her, help me…”

My parents only laughed, a shrieking burst of hyena-like laughter, and parroted back echoes of my own sobbing plea, perfectly replicating my voice and words right down to the whimpering.

Together, they brought me to a small outcropping just on the edge of Apex territory, overlooking the barren hills beyond.

There, towering above me, stood Gramps.

—

“I knew I should’ve been more careful with that map,” he sighed.

“…what?”

“Not a mix-up I would’ve made in my younger days; I’m definitely losing my touch. Still, no use crying over spilled milk, and you made good use of the map; perhaps you belong here instead of in Beast territory with Nina and her idiot boyfriend.”

For a moment I could only stare.

“You knew this was going to happen?” I whispered.

“Of course. I told you I’ve been here before, remember? I found it only by accident when I was young, and ever since then, I’ve been exploring it. Not that it’s been easy: Lake Nereus is only accessible for three days out of every year, and for the rest of the time, it’s gone from this world.”

“Then why did you bring us here?”

“Because I wanted to share it with you,” said Gramps, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“There’s power in this land, the primeval energy of transformation itself – too great for the world to tolerate for more than a few days a year. And that power seeks out sapient vessels whenever they trespass. Humans touched by it are reborn in protean flesh to embody an aspect of the wild: animalistic simplicity, endless hunger, watchful solitude, primal cunning… or a true hunter’s intellect and ruthlessness.”

“But how did you figure all this out?!”

“By trial and error. On my first visit, I explored it with a team, and through their sacrifice, I survived long enough to escape a year later. On every visit since, I’ve brought people with me to test the limits of its power, learning more with every sacrifice. But I’m getting too old to lure tourists out here, and I’m not sharp enough to document it anymore, so…”

He smiled. “I’m retiring to spend more time with my family.”

There was a pause, as the last remaining seconds of daylight finally bled away.

Then Gramps clambered down from the outcropping towards the barren hills of Apex territory, and my parents began dragging me after him.

“The Lights of Transformation always shine at nightfall,” he mused aloud. “Maybe you glimpsed them from a distance before, but it’s very different to see it up close. Those Lights are the energies of metamorphosis, rising to find vessels. Once every hour until dawn, the Light shines, and all that are bathed in its purest radiance are reborn.”

By then, I was crying again, but Gramps just scoffed.

“Don’t be such a drama queen, Johnny: it’s not like I’m killing you. The people taken by Lake Nereus live on as shapeshifters, healthier than any ordinary human: my first two test subjects are still thriving as Secluses than seventy years on! I’ve met Tricksters who fought in the Civil War, Apexes who can remember meeting George Washington. Don’t you want to live forever?”

I tried to tell him I didn’t want to forget who I was or lose my personality, but by then I was bawling too hard to make the slightest bit of sense.

“This is a blessing, young man,” he continued. “This way, we’ll be free of the world and all its miseries: Nina and Jason will be mated for life as only animals can be, your aunt will never know shame again, your brother is liberated from the pressures of being idolized, and your parents have cast off their suffocating responsibility to truly enjoy life. And you? You’ll never have to grow up, never be tamed, never learn to expect disappointment; your entire life will be a family camping trip!“

Ahead, a faint, pale glow began to ripple across the hills.

“But what do you get out of this?” I sobbed.

Gramps just smirked. “I’m no longer doomed to spend my final days rotting away in some miserable nursing home, and I get to be together with my family forever. And best of all, as an Apex, I’ll never be troubled by my conscience ever again.”

Across the barren hills, a searing white light coursed through the air, and Gramps stretched out his arms to bask in the hellish glow.

“At last,” he hissed. “Why did I ever hesitate?”

For a split-second, I thought I was next to be consumed by the radiance.

Then Nina galloped into view in the shape of a horse, her face still almost human.

She must’ve been following me for the last few hours, still babysitting me despite her transformation, and while Gramps could command my parents easily enough, he’d never been able to control Nina.

At the last moment, Nina swept me onto her back and went thundering off in the opposite direction, away from the barren hills, back towards our starting point.

I still remember hugging her as we fled, wrapping my arms around her neck and crying into her mane out of sheer relief, even as Gramps bellowed with rage in the distance.

And I remember the shadow that blotted out the moon as it pursued us across the forest, sending Beasts, Gluttons, and even Tricksters fleeing before it.

I remember Gramps – now an Apex with eyes as black as night – chasing after us as anything from a flying mass of blades lashing Nina’s flanks to a giant spider the size of a bus.

But Gramps was still getting used to his new body, and Nina outran him in the end.

My last clear memory from that night is of being dropped off at the entrance and allowed to stagger off into the road, trying to ignore the sight Nina and Gramps watching me from the trees.

They couldn’t follow me.

As I later learned, only a handful of shapeshifters have broken free of the Lake during its annual three-day reappearance, escaping to become the cryptids of urban legends.

But even so, I didn’t want to meet their gaze.

I didn’t want to start crying again.

—

I was found wandering along the side of a highway two days later, starved and dehydrated.

After a long stay in hospital, a brief media furore, a failed police investigation, and some rigorous counselling, I was told that Lake Nereus didn’t exist, then tossed into the foster system with only a few keepsakes of my original family.

And as luck would have it, one of those mementos just happened to include my grandfather’s diary.

It’s been twenty years since then.

And I find myself needing to write, because someone needs to know what really happened before it’s too late.

You see, ever since I was released from the mental hospital for the third time, I’ve been traveling across the country, migrating from town to town, getting work where I can find it, but always moving on sooner or later.

I’m living in Oregon now.

And little by little, I’m making my way back to Lake Nereus.

It’s not because it entranced me or because Gramps brainwashed me or whatever; no, it’s simply because, after twenty years of loneliness, nightmares, failed relationships, brain-smothering therapy, and condescending social workers, Lake Nereus is the only place in the world that makes sense.

So, I’m writing this to ensure that some record of what really happened will remain, because I know I won’t be able to stay away forever.

Soon, those precious three days of the year will arrive.

Soon, I’ll be with my family again.

Soon, I’ll be home.