The sun was deceivingly cool as it filtered through the leaves in the early afternoon that late October day. A slight breeze swirled along the skin, dancing with the promise of the first coming chill of the season, crisp and invigorating.
One foot before the other they crept, silently, arms raised, weapons in hand, prepared to strike with deadly precision, if need be.
Along with the chill, the breeze carried with it a soft voice, almost a whisper at this distance, and with each passing verse the trees, and even the very sun, seemed to sway and dance along. But from here the voice had no owner, no discernable source, and so they crept, one by one, on silent feet, following the ghostly sound toward the tree.
The tree, the sacred ground, the beacon that called year upon year on the anniversary, as it did so every year, and as it did so this year; called upon the small clan to gather, console, and pay their respects to their fallen member.
To their fallen brother.
The isolated farmhouse in New Hampshire had always been a sort of sanctuary for the small family whenever they needed some time to regroup, gather their thoughts and resources, or to simply repose – and later to lay to rest. It killed the remaining members of the clan to leave their fallen behind, and alone, time after time, but they took comfort in the safety of their sanctuary's isolation, and the tree. And in the knowledge that someday, they would each join their fallen into solitude.
But today, despite the beauty of the changing leaves and twinkling sun, that solitude had been disturbed. Step after step, the clan continued their approach. The soft voice grew louder with each silent progression, the words sung more clear, more comforting, and ominous.
Drawing closer to the voice a new sound clung to the crisp cool air, the same sound one makes when digging through layers of soil, dirt, and debris, and with that a handful of once hardened ground was tossed from the hole before them, landing on the edge of the small pit at the base of the tree, scattering amongst the grass and fallen leaves.
The pit had been open before, only once, to receive the one contained within. It was cold and dark that day, so much different, so lonely. Passing a look around to his right, to his remaining kin, and then to his left, to the rest of the members of their small clan, he solemnly nodded, accepting the responsibility of final approach.
Stepping forward to peer into the pit, he stopped cold, his arms gently dropping to his sides.
That day had begun as surreal as all the days before, as all the days since their brother had fallen. They had never recovered, not really, each awakening bringing with it the chasm of his absence, a gaping hole with no substitute. They had lived while he had died, but they had not thrived.
Standing on the edge of the pit, no longer prepared to strike, he found he could no more move now than he could that day, that moment when they knew. So, instead he, and every remaining member of their small clan, including their father, watched. And listened.
"Are you, are you, coming to the tree? They strung up a man, they say who murdered three."
Inside, at the bottom, kneeling on the rough uneven ground, a girl was meticulously digging, her bare hands clawing at the moist, black soil, tossing it, almost daintily to the surface as she sang those eerie words with that ghostly voice.
"Strange things did happen here, no stranger would it be, if we met, at midnight, in the hanging tree."
She was pale, what they could see of her through caked mud and lingering adipocere. Her nails were torn and jagged, ripped from her toil in the sacred ground of their brother's final rest.
"Are you, are you, coming to the tree? Where a dead man called out, for his love to flee."
Her waist length, chocolate hair was pulled back into a low bind but was tangled and damp with sweat despite the coolness in the air. She appeared unaware or indifferent to their presence and discomfort as she continued to dig, and sing, slowly exposing his cold corpse with dirty fingers.
"Strange things did happen here, no stranger would it be, if we met, at midnight, in the hanging tree."
Moments bled into minutes, bled into hours, yet no one moved but the girl in the pit, clawing and digging, brushing and smoothing. Fully exposed from head to toe, the embrace of death and decay had done little kindness to his body; the vessel that was their fallen member, their brother, their son, yet none looked away or strayed.
"Are you, are you, coming to the tree? Where I told you to run, so we'd both be free."
He looked so wrong in that grave, just as wrong as the day they lowered him down. Death had robbed him of life and decay had robbed him of everything that made him, him. No longer vibrant, his skin was dull and stretched unnaturally thin across a skeleton that now seemed far too small for the shell to which it was attached.
Where the skin had completely degraded they could see where the spine attached to the carapace, where the ribs fused into plastron, a strange amalgamation of both animal and man, and a cruel reminder that the remaining brothers would someday bear the same fate of death followed by decay.
For isn't that the debt that all men pay? Even them?
"Strange things did happen here, no stranger would it be, if we met, at midnight, in the hanging tree."
Straddling his hips she leaned forward, softly brushing away the remaining black, fetid soil, with bare and dirty hands. Her movements were careful and precise, more akin to a lover in a bed than a stranger in a grave and as she smoothed the ruin that was his face she smiled through her singing, her fingers trailing along the edge of his rotted mask reverently.
"Are you, are you, coming to the tree? Wear a necklace of rope, side by side with me."
Sliding her hands down along his neck and chest she sat back and gazed upon the body beneath her, undaunted. Decades of training alone allowed the small band of observers to hold fast despite the gruesome display before them – though it wasn't easy. This wasn't the brother they wanted to remember.
"Strange things did happen here, no stranger would it be, if we met, at midnight, in the hanging tree."
Almost imperceptibly she produced a small tool from the waistband of her pants, passing her free hand one last time along his sallow arm. The unmistakable metallic click of a blade captured their attention and before the sound could register the girl ran the cold, unforgiving metal along her forearm, from palm to middle, spilling her own blood and exposing fat and muscle.
"Are you, are you, coming to the tree? Where I told you to run, so we'd both be free."
Just as quick, the blade was passed again, along her other arm, then allowed to fall with an unearthly clatter as it bounced upon their brother's plastron, coming to a rest on the darkening soil at his side.
"Strange things did happen here, no stranger would it be, if we met, at midnight, in the hanging tree."
Holding her hands out, palms up, she cupped them, collecting the blood as it flowed freely. Bringing her hands together, pooling the blood as it began to over top, she began to pour the warm liquid liberally upon his chest, filling the pits and whorls of his plastron with deep red pools.
"Are you, are you, coming to the tree? Where they strung up a man, they say who murdered three."
Bringing her hands down she began to smooth and spread her blood along his exposed skin, drawing swirls along his collarbones and arms, coating his neck and face in a macabre red mask, and bathing the wounds that ended his life. All the while she bled, she sang, indifferent to her audience and the dark veil of death that began to descend upon them.
"Strange things did happen here, no stranger would it be, if we met, at midnight, in the hanging tree."
Leaning forward again she cradled his face in her hands, smoothing her thumbs along his cheeks, smearing the blood and rubbing it into his skin. Her singing started to seem more like a call, a beckoning to the fallen and if not for her continued intonations she looked as though she might place a kiss upon his drawn, withered lips.
"Are you, are you, coming to the tree? Where a dead man called out, for his love to flee."
Gathered as one on this anniversary, as they had done on every anniversary since, they stood over their fallen, the small family of a clan, members, brothers, and father, in silence as the sun filtered through the changing leaves and whispering trees, as the cool autumn wind danced across their skin, and that ghostly soft voice stilled them in their advance, weapons once raised and ready.
"Strange things did happen here, no stranger would it be, if we met, at midnight, in the hanging tree."
In that moment time stopped. The veil of death that had settled upon them, as heavy and suffocating as the day he died, was lifted just a fraction but that was enough. In the stark silence of the farmhouse, in a pit six feet below ground the girl sat back and smiled and it was only then that anyone realized her beckoning song had stopped.
Looking up to the trees she scanned the empty canopy with deep green eyes, which seemed to see both nothing and everything. She supported herself against his plastron with dirty hands caked in muck and blood; her blood and his decay – life and death. Not so much as a breath passed through their lips in that moment that time had missed. And it felt like they were somehow cheating, but cheating what, they did not know.
But she did.
Standing, face tilted to the sky, resolute smile still in place, she listened for something only she could hear, turning her head this way and that while the soft patter of blood dripped down to the soil below. It was the only sound produced. Finally she stopped, her breath caught in her throat and her eyes shone bright with knowing.
Turning away from his body she jumped with as much strength as she could muster, grasping the edge of the pit, digging her raw fingers into the ground and pulling herself up and out. Startled by the sudden movement everyone took an involuntary step back, raising their weapons again in defense.
She was smaller than she initially appeared, barely halfway between five and six feet, and only now did any of them realize just how entirely engulfed by the pit she had been. Her eyes were smiling as much as her lips and she looked very much like a child searching for something she hadn't seen in a very long time. Turning her head this way and that, she scanned the open ground around her, her eyes passing over them but seeing none. She wasn't looking at them, she was looking for someone else – she was looking for him, they knew.
In the moment that time had missed, the remaining brothers looked between each other and their father, their own eyes bright with, as yet, unshed tears. The tentative grasp on sanity that each of them had somehow maintained anniversary after anniversary, already frayed by the heavy burden of grief, threatened to finally snap in a way it never had before. No one spoke, for what could possibly be said in that moment that time had missed.
Eyes settled forward, behind those before her, she focused.
All at once time began to move. Suddenly deafening, the trees began to whisper as the cool autumn breeze once again began to dance across their skin. And finally they all could breathe.
The sudden intake of air chilled the small family to the very core, more than it should at this time of year, and brought with it the tangy scent of copper and the stark reminder that the girl standing before them was slowly bleeding to death. Dirt and decay had caked the wounds, producing a sort of pasty black poultice that did much to curtail the flow of blood but did not stop it completely.
Undaunted she stood, impossibly tall and intrepid as her life dripped from her fingertips. Suddenly she moved, advancing forward and again the small family started, pulling back another mote in their growing unease as she swept past the closest members, barely brushing them with her wake.
Halting as suddenly as she started she thrust one bloody arm out into open air, palm to the side and fingers splayed, open to nobody yet expectant all the same.
"It's time." Her words were carried away on the breeze, barely tickling their ears as they went.
There she stood, without question or doubt, hand out and palm open and for the briefest of moments the small family had dared to hope, but for what they could not acknowledge. Because their brother was dead, rotten and decayed in the pit behind them, and no longer in peace, but exposed in all the ugliness that only death can bestow.
Withheld tears now began to flow freely from sad eyes and broken hearts as even more broken souls wept unabashedly in despair. If not for their duty the remaining brothers would have already followed their fallen in sorrow – for no greater was the bond between the four, and no greater was their sorrow upon his death.
Despite, their gaze did not avert, nor did they move. This too they would see to its bitter end.
Grasping with her hand, her fingers closed around something unseen. Planting her feet steadfastly, digging her heels into the hard ground she began to pull on nothing, and everything.
The cool breeze picked up into a cold wind swirling loose leaves and fallen twigs around the observers, tugging on clothes and whipping at hair and fur. The trees that whispered now began to sing, not in voice but in breath, as it seemed the very Earth was calling to them all. Darkness descended upon them, though there wasn't a single cloud in the sky, and the sun shone high and bright.
Still she pulled, embroiled in an unseen war, white knuckled and panting. Her forearm was indented, the skin taut and red, as though something was clasping at her as ardently as she. Every muscle in her small frame was strained, every vessel distended, as she struggled.
Her open wrist continued to bleed, each drop of blood appearing to glow in the darkened sunlight until the glow emanated from the wound itself, growing and snaking long tendrils of light along her arm and along that of something unseen.
Wrapping around her the light began to glow brightest from her chest, over heart, the source of her blood. Opposite her, in mirror and twin, another light began to grow, the same and yet different, and where the two lights strayed close they swirled together producing something new and yet not.
Relinquishing her fight she leapt forward wrapping her free arm around the growing light, crushing it to her chest, to her own swirling glow, not once releasing her grip. Holding tight and closing her eyes, the light grew as it swirled around her engulfing her in brightness as the cold wind roared and the trees chanted a parable overhead.
Turning away for the first time to shield their eyes the family too was engulfed by the blinding light. Wrapping them in a fleeting moment of warmth, tendrils snaked along their skin and for another brief moment the remaining brothers felt whole once again before the light began to recede replacing the warmth with the cold of sorrow in that late October afternoon.
The light began to dim and fade away and with it the cool breeze returned, the trees dancing languidly as trees oft do, waving their changing leaves in greeting and farewell. Turning back to the source the small family allowed their arms to drop to their sides, muscles slack, weapons loose, and exhausted.
As the last vestiges of light dimmed away there stood not her, but their fallen brother, glowing and radiant, and so very alive. His face was tucked into her neck with his eyes closed, one arm wrapped unbearably tight around her waist, the other gripping her forearm, crushing it between their bodies.
Far too afraid to dream so big, the brothers, one by one, their father and their small clan turned their eyes to the pit beneath the tree.
The pit lay bare.
Facing forward again, mute in shock, not unlike the day he died, and the day they placed him in the ground, each member of the small family broke down and cried. Some slumped to the ground, others did not; some shook their head in disbelief, but all believed.
His eyes were open now and he had released his grip on her forearm, instead cradling her cheek in the palm of his hand. His arm was still wrapped around her, holding her close, holding her up.
Raising his tear filled eyes to his family, his father and his brothers, he let her cheek go and her head fall back. She did not stir, her lungs did not draw breath, and her blood did not flow. She was impossibly cold and pale, yet only moments ago she had been so very alive, so very determined.
Breathing deeply, pulling oxygen into lungs that hadn't tasted air in so long he smiled a bittersweet smile, scooping her up and cradling her just the once. He hadn't known who she was, had never seen her before, but she had called to him and he had felt compelled to answer, without question.
She had given him, given them, the greatest gift imaginable.
She had made them whole.