Hung Man's Tree
Part 1
Ragged breath and rapid breathing, high grass whipped at Soul's legs. Ripped at his brown pants and separated under his dirty bare feet. His eyes quickly snapped toward every direction. Left. Right. Forward. Backward. Only tall yellow grass, high bushes and flowers. No sigh of blue hair.
Soul lowered his head, taking cover by the high dry grass. Cautiously he moved forward. The dry grass broke under his weight and loud snapping sounded. Too loud for Soul's liking. His feet carefully moved forward, one step at a time. Each step was treated with care and reduced the sound of the snapping grass. He stalked through the grass like a panther would sneak up on its prey.
SNAP!
Soul came to a sudden halt and his head whipped toward his right side. Quickly he crocked his back and neared the ground. With rapid and light steps, he neared a dry bush and dived under it. The naked branches rattled and he moved closer to the core of the bush. His eyes looked pass the dry branches and searched for the enemy.
The sound of the snapping grew louder. Crunch. Silence. Another crunch. It grew louder.
Soul's breathe caught in his throat. His lungs contracted when he saw the tall grass move, revealing feet brown with dirt and damaged hems of black pants. The grass under his feet crunched as he neared the bush. He came to a stop. Soul's eyes stayed wide, holding his breath. The grass broke under his feet and he moved away from the bush. Soul exhaled and his muscles finally relaxed.
"You know I see you?"
Soul barely had time to inhale when a large ball of dirt sored through the air and luckily for him, the naked branches were strong enough to slice through the ball and down fell pieces of soil.
"Darn!" Soul crawled out from under the bush and brushed off the dirt from his clothes. "Tell me you found Kilik and Ox before me!"
His blue haired friend smirked wide and crossed his arms over his chest. "Of course I would find those cheaters before you. We got to crush those cheaters, friend." His friend, Black*Star held out his fist, which Soul bumped with his own before he shoved his hands in his pockets.
"Where did they even hide? I never ran into them while trying to find a place to hide."
Black*Star turned and pointed toward the distance. "Close to the forest under a bush." He turned back toward his friend and smirked even wider. "Those suckers wouldn't dare to enter the dead forest."
"Speak of yourself. You don't dare to step a foot in the forest either." Soul snickered and his friend glared at him with blue silvers.
"Whatever. Next time we are going to hide in there and we will beat those teaming cheaters!"
Soul cocked his eyebrow with wonder. "Wait. Wouldn't that make us cheaters? You know it would be against the rules if we hid in the forest and we are teaming right now. Aren't we as big cheaters as them?"
Black*Star snorted and crossed his arms over his chest. "Of course not! We are simply stepping up our game. We are only doing this because they are cheat―"
"Black*Star! Soul!" Both of their heads snapped toward Soul's left toward the direction of the sound. "It's time to go home! Ox's mom is here and it's soon six!" Kilik yelled.
Black*Star cursed colorfully and turned fully toward the direction of the exit. "Let's go home. We can always kick their butts tomorrow."
"Yeah. I don't want to get yelled at by mother for being late. Again." Soul complained as he ran his hand through his pale knotted hair.
Black*Star snorted and both of them started to head toward the exit of the meadow. "Tell me about it. My father grabbed the belt when I came back and let me tell you, you are lucky for having parents who consider spanking to be wrong. Your butt isn't sore on a daily bases."
Soul sighed and rolled his eyes. "You wouldn't get the belt if you didn't sneak out to visit Tsubaki."
The grass caressed their hands and parted as they continued further. Black*Star's hand opened up and touched the straws as he went beside his friend. "Having a sore butt and meeting Tsubaki nightly is definitely worth it."
They exited the meadow only to find Kilik and Ox gone. Both of the boys blinked with confusion as their heads whipped toward the sides. "Where did they go?" Soul asked.
"Probably home." Black*Star's head rose toward the sky and immediately an "Oh-ho" left his mouth. "The sun is already sinking. We better hurry."
"Right―" From the side of his vision, he saw a bright red color. His eyes locked at a bright red coat with an equally bright red hood covering the person's face. The cloak hugged the person's waist and poured from the waist and down to the ground. The cloak was very feminine and the person's height told him it was a girl his age.
The girl headed away from the city. Sun was soon to go down and being out in the dark was dangerous.
Soul's hand absentmindedly rubbed his chest.
He knew all too well what could happen when being out alone at night. He, a boy, was in danger and then her, a young girl, would be in greater danger than he was.
"Soul?"
His head returned to his friend. Black*Star had his eyebrow cocked at him and he had already walked a few step away from him. "Um," Quickly Soul glanced back where the girl he saw enter the meadow's high grass. She was gone. "I will be right behind you." Soul waved toward his friend before he dived into the meadow, he left his friend astonished.
Soul's little stomach stirred as he pushed through the meadow, his eyes whipped from right to left in search of the red cloak.
He had no clue what he's doing, but he knows as soon as he gets home, it might be the first time his father choses to introduce him to a belt. He gulped at the thought of having his pants pulled down and meeting the hard leather of his father's belt.
Black*Star always treasured Tsubaki Nakatsukasa, the blacksmith's daughter, in a very strange way. Once Black*Star described his emotions toward the girl on earth. He grabbed a stick and slowly started to draw down what he meant. The picture ended up being a screw and a nut. Black*Star ended up saying he felt drawn toward Tsubaki, felt compelled to be in her presence and he didn't know why.
Soul never knew why Black*Star felt so strongly about the blacksmith's daughter, but maybe he's getting a taste out of the nut as well.
Soul continued to run deeper and deeper, his ears sharpened, searching for any sound of dry grass breaking or rustling.
He was taught to be a man. That women are weaker and more fragile than men. They need a man's guidance and protection. The girl he saw needed his protection. Maybe if he told his father he upheld his duty as a man and searched for a girl who could get in trouble, maybe his father would cut him some slack?
Soul came to a halt when the meadow came to an end and the small strip of sand separated the meadow from the forest.
The girl couldn't have entered the forest. Did her parents never teach her that the forest is dangerous? His own parents were very reluctant to tell him the little he did know, that dangerous people enter the forest and he could run into someone.
Just like how he ran into him.
The silence broke. Soft music broke through the silence of the forest. It reminded him of his mother's flute, but at the same time not. This felt more earthy and warmer than of his mother's cold and high tunes. The sun had started to disappear behind the trees, but the flute's soft and comforting tunes seemed to light up the eerie forest.
Without him noticing it, he'd entered the forest and was already a yard inside. The comfort of the flute warmed his chest and he simply had to follow the music. Maybe the music was produced from the girl in the red cloak, or maybe he would bump into her on the way.
Quite frankly, he was so touched with the music he thought he could do anything. Save a city with his bare hands from bandits or slay mythical creatures with a rock as long as he heard the music from the flute. The comforting tunes warmed his chest and radiating off him and purging the darkness around him. The music gave him strength to confidently walk through the darkening forest toward the source of the music.
The music from the flute grew stronger and louder as he went deeper inside of the forest. The darkness around him seemed to lighten. His pace slowed down a little as he approached the light. The sound of the flute strongly resonated throughout the forest. Soul approached the light and he discovered the source of the light; the full moon.
Soul gasped lightly when he exited the forest and found himself in a clearing. A large, very old, dead tree stretched toward the sky and its branches reached toward every direction as if it was a dying man reaching for his loved one. Chills ran down his spine when he noticed the plethora of nooses hanging from the tree's branches. The kind of nooses when someone would end their life.
In the tree, the red coat of the girl poured down from the branch she was seated on. The girl's back rested against the trunk of the diseased tree and in her hands she held a blue oval shaped wooden instrument. Lips blew into a pipe as fingers moved over the object, the object which he thought was a flute was an ocarina.
His breath was taken when he saw blond hair tied into pigtails with bands as red as blood. The girl's eyes were closed as her fingers danced over the ocarina and produced the wonderful music.
He exited the forest and headed toward the girl. "Excuse me."
The music stopped and the ocarina was removed from her rosy lips. Her eyes slowly opened and green eyes lit up the darkness.
"It is dark." He gulped. The darkness was suddenly thicker and the air sent chills through his spine. "Dangerous people enter the forest at night. You could be hurt."
The girl's eyes fluttered as he came to a stop in front of the scary dead oak tree. "Oh, I'm in no danger."
Now he was the one to bat his eyes with confusion. "What do you mean? Of course you are in danger if you play your ocarina where dangerous people enter."
She tilted her head and a smile spread on her face. "My destiny is not to die by the hands of someone else."
"Destiny?" Soul questioned. "What do you mean?"
The girl lowered her ocarina and put it in a pocket in her cloak. "It is a long story." She swung her legs from the branch and scooted away from the trunk. Gracefully her hand patted the branch. "If you aren't bothered by the dark and hasn't a place to be at, I could tell you my story."
He had a place to be at. Home.
Deep inside of him, in the core of his being, it stirred with unknown. All he knew he couldn't turn back now. Questions rose in his mind he carved an answer for. He couldn't turn away now.
Soul approached the trunk of the tree and his hands settled on the darkened bark. He used the first branch to climb up to then hoist up on the branch beside the girl.
The moment his eyes locked with her green ones, his breath was taken. They were even greener than he thought they were. Perfectly vibrant emerald filled with light and sparkled vividly. Her eyes were the light, but just underneath the surface of her unique irises, he could sense mystery. Secrets like no other young girl he had even seen.
Secrets Soul would love to get his hands on.
His curiosity will be the end of him one day.
"I'm Maka." Her rosy lips shape the words. "What's your name?"
"Soul." He paused. "Don't you have a place to be at? Aren't your parents worried about you?"
Her long eyelashes fluttered and her rich lips parted. Her head tilted slightly. "What do you mean?" She said astonished. "I am with my father. I am home."
It was his turn to be surprised. "What?" His head immediately searched left and right over the meadow in search for a third-party Maka was talking about. "Where is he?"
Her bare hand raised and to his surprise, her index finger pointed toward one of the many nooses hanging on a branch on the other side of the tree. The rope was old and started to rot and through the darkness, the circle of the noose had dark sports. He could swear on his mother's grave it was blood.
"It took him a year ago." Maka spoke softly as her finger lowered.
"What took him?" He inhaled shakily. "Was it a criminal? Or maybe an assassin?"
"What? No." She shook her head. Her golden pigtails swung at the force of her shake. "The curse took him."
"Curse?" Soul tilted his head.
Soul was beyond confused. She appeared to be… different. A young girl wouldn't defy her mother by entering the forest. She would definitely not be seated in a tree full with ropes and playing an ocarina.
Shivers ran down his spine and he shuddered.
How could a young girl, maybe a year or two younger than him, be so calm at the place where her father died? If his father's life had ended in a dark forest in an eerie tree, he wouldn't come close to it. This girl… she did it. She had the strength to return to the place where her father took his last breath. Maybe it wasn't strength, maybe she was young and naïve and didn't understand the gravity of the place she found herself at.
"It's the curse of the Albarn." She swung her legs back and forth. "The curse wanted him, and the curse gets what it wants."
"Do such things exist?" Soul questioned.
Maka nodded simply. "Yes. The curse has run in my family for generations." The cold wind of the night grabbed a hold of her pigtails. Her hand ran her right pigtail behind her ear. "Papa never told me why, only that a curse is in my bloodline and one day, just like him, the curse will collect my life."
His breath was taken. His skin prickled and chills covered his body. The eerie atmosphere. The dark tail from the strange girl. He felt uncomfortable.
"One day, any day really, the curse will take over and then―" her finger rose again and slowly went from right to left, pointing at four nooses right above them. "―my corpse will hang from the middle noose to the right and my victims will hang around me."
His heart skipped a beat. Goosebumps covered his skin.
Her arm lowered and settled on her lap. "I can't die from anything other than the curse. My life will end in this tree like all of my ancestors. My life is in the hands of the c―"
"I got to go." Soul shivered. He may be a big boy and handled the ghost stories well around the bonfire. He was the one who handled scary stories the best, but this was no ghost story. The girl gave away no signs of joking and spoke with velvet soft voice. Maka was eerily calm about the situation when he was freaking out.
Maka's eyes fluttered with confusion as Soul jumped down from the branch. "O-oka―"
"BYE!" And he hightailed away from the tree, leaving Maka behind.
He didn't get a beating from his father when he got back. Instead he got scolded and went to bed with an empty stomach. They never found out he entered the forest.
The girl in the tree, Maka, she occupied his mind. She was the solid version of mystery and strange. Hair a pale blond like an angel's and lips as rosy as cherry, her appearance was the one of the brightest of white roses. Beauty that reeled you in and thorns that stung your fingers and forced you to back off to then near the rose again. It was an evil cycle he found himself in. He wanted to see her again, talk to her again, but the memory of the cold air, strange stories and the knee-shaking tree they sat on, slammed down the idea.
He did enter the forest, this time, in daylight, and she wasn't there. No trace of her presence around the tree or in the forest.
He did learn something about the tree in the forest. After eavesdropping on strangers on the market talking about it, he did learn the tree's name is Hung Man's Tree. Every time someone wanted to kill themselves, they went to that particular tree. They had found the corpse of a man hung from a noose from the tree. The city's council had to investigate the occurrence. He'd seen the council enter the forest with the city's doctor and the black smith. The man's death had been decided as suicide and none talked about a strange girl with a red cloak in the forest. The council had tried to take down the nooses, but the next night they would be back again.
After a few years, the Hung Man's Tree and Maka was forgotten.
Soul swayed from side to side to the tunes of sweet jazz. The girl followed his lead, right and then a step backwards. She was an experienced dancer and she was attractive in her dark blue dress and her deep chocolate eyes. There was nothing wrong with the girl but…
She wasn't the one.
"The night is lovely." She spoke with confidence. "There is a full moon tonight."
"Yes it is." They took a step toward the left and then forward.
"You want to go out to the balcony and get some air?"
He sighed and shook his head. "I am sorry, Miss, but I'm not the one for you." He removed his hands from her waist and hand. "Now excuse me." He bowed and walked away from the woman. He ran his hand through his hair as he exited the dance floor and headed toward the exit. The cool air of the night hit his skin and he shoved his hands in his pockets.
"Oh no!" A hand suddenly grabbed his arm and flipped him around. Stark blue hair came into his view and narrowed eyebrows. "Are you even trying? That was like, the eighth girl, right?"
"Yeah." Soul grabbed Black*Star's hand and pried it off his bicep. "And she wasn't the one I want to marry."
Black*Star groaned with annoyance and rolled his eyes. "Seriously, all of our friends are already married. I'm married and Tsubaki is expecting our first child and here you are still a bachelor. The last one was beautiful, what was wrong with her?"
"She was attractive." Soul confessed. "But I wasn't emotionally attached to her. I do want to love my wife, and she to love me in return, I can't simply marry someone to then hope for love."
"And I want you to find love." Black*Star pated Soul's shoulder brotherly. "You deserve love. But we aren't going to live forever. Maybe you will have to lower your standards in order to find someone to love and marry. The clock is ticking and a different male could marry the woman of your dream, or maybe she's already married."
Soul sighed loudly, the cool air lowered his body temperature. "I know alright, but I didn't have any love interest when we were young. It was easy for you to choose and m―"
"Hold on!" Black*Star exclaimed and raised his hand. "It wasn't easy marrying Tsubaki. Heck, I had to prove to her father I'm worthy her by spending a night in the forest. I could've frozen to death or gotten murdered."
"But you managed and won her and you knew she was the one. I have no clue who I want and therefore I have to try out everyone." He sighed and ran his ran through his hair. "I'm a successful shoemaker and I meet women daily, but none of them has interested me." Soul took a seat on the stairway and ran both of his hands through his hair. "I don't know what is wrong with me. There are so many beautiful women who would want to marry me, but I don't feel anything toward them."
"Maybe you're just gay."
Soul snapped his head toward his friend and glared.
"Sorry." Black*Star took a seat next to him on the staircase. "Maybe it's just because you haven't met the right woman. When I met Tsubaki I knew I had to have her. Her father was very scary and had me question if she was worth the trouble, but I soon learned she was. She was worth all of those belt whips."
"I have already met all the women living in the city. No one of them is the one." Soul growled with annoyance. "Seriously, if I was meant to get married, shouldn't I already be married? Wes is already married and has a baby boy and here I am living alone in my house."
"You know what you should do."
Soul turned toward his best friend. "What?"
"You should go for a walk. Go somewhere you can think in peace and decide what you want to do on the marriage front. It is your life and you should decide how much you want to put on line to find your one true love."
Slowly Soul nodded. Tasting the idea on his tongue. "That sounds like a good idea." He stood up on his feet and smirked toward his friend. "Thanks. I will see you tomorrow."
"You're welcome!" Black*Star waved toward Soul as he went down the stairs. Soul shoved his cool hands in his pockets. He should've brought a coat with him to warm his body. It was quite a walk from the mansion of the Death family to his lonely home on the outskirts of the city.
At least, the way to his home would give him time to think.
The cool air nibbled at his skin and he pulled his thin suit jacket closer to his body.
If no women in the city was the one for him, he could always close up his shop for a while and travel to different cities in search for a wife. With that came consequences, maybe he would never return to Death City and never see his brother and his friends. He did treasure the City he grew up in and quite frankly, he didn't want to move to a different city.
Maybe searching for a wife in a different city wasn't the smartest move. His brother did have a baby, and he bet they would have plenty more, which means he didn't have any responsibilities to have children to pass on the family name. Wes's babies would do that.
He always could live alone and when the one came along, she came along. He would have love then, and maybe not any kids, but were they that important to him?
Instantly his cheek twitched.
Of course children were important. He would love to have kids with the one he loved. Kids who would bring trouble to his world by breaking plates and run right in front of his feet. He would love to have his own small problems he could love.
But then, having kids meant he had to have a wife, and the wife he wanted was someone who loved him and who he loved.
He sighed loudly and ran his hand once again through his hair. At the beginning of the night it was nicely combed back, but now it was a mess.
He was back at square one; in search of a woman to love and be loved from.
Life was a―
The silence of the night was broken by a sweet melody. Music that brightened the night and protected his cold body from the chilling air. The melody came from a… an ocarina. A very familiar tune.
He turned around at the direction of the melody. It came from the direction of the criminal's forest.
The forest he entered as a young man. He'd found a dead meadow in the middle of the forest and a huge dead oak tree, Hung Man's Tree. Soul had followed a young girl inside and found her by following her ocarina.
His eyes widened and the memories of the girl, of Maka returned to his mind. He'd been scared out of his wits when she told him about her curse, about the nooses hanging from the branches. He'd run away and left her behind in the creepy forest.
It had to be Maka in the forest. No one was as crazy as her to play an ocarina in the criminal's forest.
He could meet her again.
Without thinking, Soul hightailed into the criminal's forest. The sticks on the ground broke under his shoes and the branches from the trees ripped at his grey formal wear. The air wasn't as cold as before. His heart pumped blood rapidly through his veins and his eyes were focused at the direction of her ocarina.
Images of the little girl's blond hair and rosy lips appeared on his mind.
Years had gone by, how would she look like?
The thought barely processed fully and he threw himself through the clearing and once again, he stood at the edge of the dead meadow. The dead oak tree stood proudly in the middle with the nooses hanging from the branches. On the same branch as before, a girl― a woman, sat on it wearing a red coat, hair in pigtails and a blue ocarina against her mouth.
His breath was taken. The moon filtered through the dead branches of the tree and casted a― a― beautiful shine over her. Her fingers elegantly moved over the ocarina and kept on producing the beautiful music. The warm, comforting and encouraging music.
Slowly, he went closer to the woman. Her green eyes fluttered open and glanced in his direction before they closed, she kept on playing. He entered under the trees large branches and leaned against the tree, soaking in the sweet melody of hers. His eyes closed in content and for the first time, enjoyed himself at the Hung Man's Tree.
The song came to an end and a beat of silence. "I didn't think you would dare to enter the forest again."
He opened his eyes and watched her remove her ocarina and put it in the pocket of her cloak. "I heard your ocarina." He silenced. "I don't know really why I came. I did try to find you after I ran away like that, although, you were gone."
Her eyes fluttered with confusion and she turned her head down fully toward him. "You did? Why?"
He shrugged his shoulders. "I don't really know. I guess I was a little worried about you. A girl shouldn't be in a dangerous forest."
"Nothing is going to happen to me."
"Because of the curse?"
"Yes." She swung her legs down from the branch and settled her hands on each side of her. Maka jumped down from the branch and landed skillfully like a cat on the ground. "The curse protects me from harm. It rules my life and it decides how long I live. I know I'm not going to die from a disease or animal attack or from an accident since my life will end here."
"Then why are you even here? If you know you're going to die here, then why are you still here? Don't you want to live?"
She turned silent.
Even though the air was cold and he stood right under Hung Man's Tree where many lives had ended, he didn't feel afraid. Not even a little.
"Of course I want to live." She whispered. "But I don't know where to go. My mother left me when I was born and dumped me on my father. When he died, I was alone. I don't have anyone else than this." She made a gesture toward the trunk of the tree. "I live in this forest because it's harder to leave the forest than to live here. So I stay here."
"Sooo… you live here?"
She nodded. "Yes, in this forest."
Guilt slowly weight down his chest. She slept in the forest all alone where criminals, murderers and other dangerous people were at. Soul couldn't even imagine how it was living in the forest. He was comfortable in his house and sleeping on his bed.
He did have some extra space in his house. Maka might be a strange woman, but she appeared to be a kind and thoughtful person. He didn't help her the first time they met, but he could help her now.
"If you would like," he ran his hand through his hair. "You could move in with me. I have room for you and I could come up with a bed for you. It's better than to sleep in a dangerous forest."
Her eyebrows narrowed and she placed her hand underneath her chin. Thinking. A smile grew on her face and she nodded. "Okay." She tied her hands behind her back. "I promise you I won't be a burden and you can ask me to leave any time!"
A smile decorated his face. "No problem at all. It's cold outside. We should head home."
She nodded toward him and both of them started to walk away from the Hung Man's Tree. "You know, I thought I would never see you again after that time."
He chuckled heartily as they walked toward the forest. "Me neither. After not finding you, I didn't believe I would ever."
"Wait, no. Not that. Before."
Soul blinked in confusion to then narrow his eyebrows. "Before? We have never met before."
"Yes we have, but you were quite out of it." She spoke as they entered the forest and made their way toward the exit. "It was night and in a dark alley. I and my father found you bleeding out on the ground with a huge wound on your chest. I'm surprised you survived it."
His eyes widened.
That time. When he was only a little boy and rebelled against his parents. He went out at night even though he wasn't allowed. Soul had entered an alley and run into a very drunk man who had ended up assaulting him, cutting him open with a knife. The next moment, he woke up at the doctor with his mother crying beside his bed.
"That was you? That was you who took me to the doctor?"
She nodded. "Yeah. Dad freaked out when he saw you bleeding on the ground. I could barely keep up with him as he carried you."
He was speechless. He didn't know what to say and Maka didn't seem to have anything to say either. They strolled in silence as they went back to his house.
Soul was still unable to grasp the thought that he'd met Maka before. Well, maybe not met-met, but they did sort of meet before.
They went to Soul's home and he showed her his small shoe workshop before showing her his house. Lastly, he showed her to the extra room where she would be sleeping. He arranged a mattress, a blanket and a pillow for her to sleep on before he went to sleep in his room.
To his surprise, Maka never left him. And he never asked her to leave. Instead, he got to know her and she proved to be a very precious person. He ended up marrying her. He learned to love the woman and she ended up loving him. They were happy together. When he worked in the workshop, she stayed in their home and took care of house chores. It was pleasant to return to someone who kissed his cheek and had dinner on the table.
He truly, unconditionally loved her. He was the happiest man and his day automatically turned better as soon as he saw her beautiful face. His wedding was the happiest day in his life and he understood for the first time how much Black*Star loved his wife. How Black*Star nightly took belt whips to visit the girl he treasured. He would do the same to see Maka. She was her nut to his screw.
They lived happily together.
But they weren't meant to have their happily ever after.