Angel does not belong to me and use of the character in this story is not intended as infringement of the owner's rights. I do not make any profit from writing stories, I'm just a fan.
Our Tree is the biggest in the district, or at least Father tells me so and I never saw one bigger. It stretches from the edge of the temple to the river; a forest of trunks old and new, its leaves filtering the sunlight and chattering in the breezes.
If you go inside, after a few steps the sunlight is gone and it is dark and cool. In the centre, but no-one ever goes all the way to the centre, especially children. Little girls and boys are scared to go too far in; as they have been warned by their mothers that there are dark spirits hiding in the Tree that will catch and eat anyone who crosses their path.
I am ten years old and don't believe those stories any more. The Banyan Tree is holy, everyone knows that. Consider, even when the roots threatened the east wall of the temple the elders didn't take up an axe against it, not even the merest branch did they remove. They said: God works in ways we don't understand. He will save the temple if he wishes.
And so it was. The wall still stands, despite the Tree and its roots. No-one really understands why, but we give thanks for the Tree all the same. Just as we give thanks for its shade in summer and the shelter it provides in winter. In some villages, poor families make a home in the banyan tree as they have no other shelter. There is no-one here that needs to do that, but we all do some of our living within the spread of the Tree's beautiful branches.
The Tree has always been special to me, a magical place, and now it is even more so. The spirits in the Tree may be dark, but they are good, as I discovered.
Let me start my story at the beginning. As well as the old stories about the Tree, there have, for as many months as I can remember, been tales told in the village about a dark man living within. They say he only comes out at night, and during the day he hides in the innermost recesses of the Tree. They say he is afraid of the sunlight, and that you would believe, on the evidence of your senses, that he is a vampire, a blood-drinker, except that no-one dies. No-one has ever been lured into the Tree and never come back and everyone knows that's what vampires do, and to have one in the village is to be greatly cursed.
Breathlessly, my Uncle tells a story of a village on the other side of the mountains where they were cursed like this, and had to burn their banyan tree and grind its ashes into the dust to survive. The shock we feel on hearing this is palpable; the Tree is holy, as I said before. The elders murmur and shake their heads and we children privately agree amongst ourselves that we would rather leave the village and wander forever than do such a thing.
The dark man remains with us, but still, no-one dies. Is he a spirit? Is he a vampire? Is he a just a man? For many months, we can't tell, but more and more people see him come and go at night. He becomes an established thing.
My Mother believes he is a good man who has lost his family and come to live in our Tree because it is more holy than anyone else's and he needs to find God. But if he needed to find God, why not just come to the temple and pray? Or give alms? Why hide from us?
After a while, we cease to be afraid of him and he comes and goes and no-one minds him if they see him after the sun has set.
Still, no-one dies. And then a boy, no older than seven and wise beyond his years, points out during a discussion of the dark man that there are no rats in the village any more. There haven't been any rats since he was first seen. After much whispering and nodding the village agrees, the dark man is scaring away the rats. Now, this is much better than simply not killing people, this is a gift to us, and good feelings towards our guest increase. We begin to refer to him amongst ourselves as 'our dark friend' or 'the rat catcher' and smile as we catch a glimpse of him in the evening or in the cool air just before dawn.
Sometimes we sense him watching us, as we eat, or settle around a fire, or sing songs on a pleasant evening. I see him for the first time like this, a white face in the distant dark, looking in from the outside. He is a pale, lone figure, and wears an expression of such longing that, without thinking, I get up and walk to the edge of the fire's light. I beckon him to us, and indicate a place within the circle where he might sit. He gazes at the flames and then at me, as if he wants to join us very much, but he knows he can't or won't. And then he's gone and we don't see him again for many weeks.
He seems to me to be a lost soul, and I wonder if my Mother was right.
The next time we are aware of him, is when someone does die.
A young mother is in the pains of childbirth. My Mother, who has seven children (a good and holy number, everyone agrees) helps with all the births in the village. She is inside with the young woman, bathing her head and accepting help grudgingly from some of the other older women. The men are in a group a little way off, sitting under the edge of the Banyan Tree and talking the way that men do in these circumstances. My brothers and I, and all the children, sit outside the hut and wait to hear the first cry of the baby so that we can cheer and dance and greet our new brother or sister.
It does not come, but the cries of the mother-to-be become louder. Women come and go, come and go, fetching cloths and bowls of water; some cool, some steaming from the pot on the fire. Someone leaves the curtain that usually covers the door to one side in their hurry, and so for a moment we can see a little. A woman is mopping my Mother's brow as she stoops over the bed, and we can see a mess of rags; the bedclothes, a sari, a makeshift towel, all stained with blood.
Before the curtain is replaced, we gather enough to know that something is wrong. You understand, this is not the first time this has happened, but it is always a shock, a jolt to our hope and optimism. Silently, we begin to pray and ask God that they will be spared, or if not the mother and baby, then at least one or the other.
Finally, at dusk, my Mother comes out and the men come forward and crowd round her. She is crying, but she says, with conviction, that she has done everything she knows and still the baby won't come right. She feared that, unless we are granted a miracle, both will die. The father of the child asks if his wife is in very much pain and my Mother's expression tells him the answer.
So it goes on. The mother's cries become stronger, more anguished and we would like to run away so we could stop hearing them, but no-one would think of doing such a thing, so we just sit and pray. Just before dawn the father comes out and prays with us, and we know he is asking, like us, for an end to her agony.
Then a curious thing happens. All the women leave the hut, the young woman is left quite alone, and for a moment we think it is all over, but we can still hear her moaning. They whisper to the father and his head turns towards the hut. Then he goes in and emerges again moments later. The women crowd round him and he whispers to my Mother, and then turns away and walks towards the temple.
Moments later the moaning stops, abruptly. My Mother waits, as if she has been told to wait a certain time, and then goes into the hut accompanied by her some of her helpers. The rest usher us away and say, it's over, get some rest now.
The next day, my Mother tells me what happened. The dark man, she says, came from the Tree and told the father that he could not help his wife, but that it was possible to end the pain, that he could do it in such a way she would feel very little, and it would be very quick. The father knew, my Mother said, that this was a very impious suggestion, but he loved his wife and could not bear that she should suffer, and he thought too that the dark one might be sent from God. He inhabits the Tree and eats nothing, so very God-like, so he thought, the father, on balance, that he might agree.
"And did the dark one..." I asked, amazed.
"Yes," my Mother replied. "When we went in she was dead. She was... pale. But she was unmarked, and had a beautiful expression on her face, one of joy, as if she had died holding the child in her arms."
My mother started to cry, and give fervent thanks for her own blessings, which is, as you can imagine, something I have heard her say many times before. Nevertheless, moments later I found myself joining her in weeping, and we both agreed it would be fitting to pray for the souls of all concerned at the temple that afternoon. When we arrived, it seemed as if the whole village was doing the same.
So it came about, that the dark one (after this incident, no-one called him a man any longer) became revered in the village. People started to leave gifts for him in the Tree, some of which he received gratefully (flowers, new clothing) and some he ignored completely (food of any kind). Then one day, we had great blessings and were able to leave a small, newly born goat tethered to a trunk in the outskirts of the Tree. In the morning it was still there, but was quite dead. My Father examined it himself and pronounced that it had been drained of blood.
There was much consternation. No-one could quite believe that our friend was a blood-drinker after all, and several called my Father a liar. The elders hum-ed and hah-ed and decided to make a test for the dark one. They drained some blood from a goat (an adult this time) which is quite easy to do without killing the beast, if you are careful. Then they left it in the Tree, in a bowl, surrounded by flowers and candles, in the manner of an offering to the gods.
The next day the bowl was examined; it had been drained to the dregs.
Now the village was truly in turmoil. Half the people still believed in the dark one wholeheartedly, and pointed out that if he were a true blood-drinker he would have been killing us, one by one. But as it was, he had been a blessing on the village, not a curse, so how could he be a vampire? The other half were troubled and silent, although at this stage, no-one was suggesting that our dark friend was evil. Far from hunting him down, some people even left more blood for him to find, although some said that this was not right and that God would never have sent us a guardian that required blood sacrifice.
Still the dark one continued among us.
Then, one day, a few months ago, I was walking within the tree, kicking the fallen leaves and calling out the name of my youngest brother, who was lost. Mother had sent me to find him and I knew he had a habit of playing hide and seek among the many trunks. It was a hot day, and I was in no hurry to discover his hiding place; I was enjoying the cool, green shade and the feel of the damp earth beneath my feet.
Suddenly, I came around a low branch into a small clearing dappled with sunlight. On the edge of the clearing I saw my brother. He was lying on the ground writhing in pain. Above him crouched the dark one. He grasped my brother's right foot firmly in one large hand, and held his calf with the other, and was biting deep into my brother's ankle. As I watched, frozen in horror, my brother stopped struggling and went limp, and at the same time the dark one took his mouth away, and I could see his lips were stained with blood.
I flew at him in a fury and threw my arms around his neck from behind. The force of my leap pushed him away from my brother, and then I proceeded to beat him with my fists and kick him with my feet. After the surprise of my attacking him was gone, he was easily able to get to his feet and imprison me under one arm, as my father used to do when I was much younger. He told me to stop fighting and that he didn't mean any harm, but I wasn't listening to what he said and carried on wriggling and struggling to get free. He bent over my brother again, and I was sure he meant to finish drinking his blood and then drink mine.
I think I must have fainted, and when I came round my head was laid on a root and my brother's was placed next to mine. He seemed to be breathing, but when I shook him, he did not wake. I wasted no time. I stumbled to the village and told them all what had happened. My Father hurried back into the Tree with me to guide him, and we quickly found my brother and brought him home. He was unconscious but did not seem to be greatly harmed, apart from the bite the dark one, the vampire, as we then knew, had made in his ankle. It was red and deep, and shaped just as you would imagine a human bite to be shaped.
Everyone was shocked. I told my story over and over again, and every time I told it they became more silent. I mistook the silence for doubt, and was angry at them all for not believing me. God forgive me, I started to add things to my tale, things that never really happened. I told them the dark one had laughed while drinking my brother's blood. I told them he was about to drink mine, but I tricked him by standing in a patch of sunlight. I told them he had threatened to kill us all and that he boasted we could never defeat him because the Tree made him strong.
Eventually I burst into tears and my Mother took me home and put me to bed. In the morning when I awoke, the men were gathered in the centre of the village. I asked my Mother what was happening and she shrugged and went outside to watch. All the men carried torches, and soon they lit them and marched off towards the Tree. I dressed and joined my Mother, sneaking a arm around her waist.
"They won't hurt the Tree, Mother, will they?"
"I don't know, dear."
But there was a tremor in her voice and she could not look me in the eye. She disentangled herself from my arms and walked away towards the temple. I crept back into the house and sat by my brother's bed, weeping.
After a few moments I felt his hand on my hair, and looked up to find him smiling at me. Overjoyed, I flung my arms around him and kissed his cheeks, which he hated. Then he asked me why it was so quiet and I told him that the men had gone to the Tree to find the vampire. There was a note of pride in my voice which I shudder to remember as I said, "I told them, I told them all about what happened."
"But he was helping me!" My brother struggled to sit upright.
"What?"
"The dark one! I was bitten by a snake and he was sucking out the poison. Sister, what did you tell them? What will they do?"
I left him without a word and raced to the Tree. I never ran so fast in all my life, and by the time I saw their torches raised, flaming unnaturally in the bright, sunlit sky, my breath was painful in my chest and tears were streaming down my cheeks. I had no breath to cry out, and was helpless as I saw the first torch dip down and the flames catch the dry brush at the edge of the Tree.
I reached them, and started to stamp the fire out, at the same time alternately sobbing and gulping out what my brother had said. It was several seconds before I could make them understand, and then they joined me, stamping on the flames and yelling to the women to fetch water.
We put the fire out, with God's help, and the Tree was not harmed. I apologised to my brother, and my parents, and the whole village, for the trouble I had made, and asked them all to forgive me. They shook their heads indulgently, and told me variously that they hoped I had learned a lesson, and that lying was very sinful, and that I had a lot of growing up to do.
The dark one hasn't been seen since that day, although I always look for him at dusk and dawn, and hope that somewhere in deepest recesses of the Tree, he is still watching us and trying to find God.