Author: Mychal Wilson

Cedar Sarcophagus

On August 31, 2019

Word Count: 2,461

My family was one of the first of the ultra-wealthy aristocrats to reach the new world. They arrived in North America before the early colonies seceded from the British Empire. Prior to this, my ancestors lived in a castle nestled deep in the mountains of the old country. The majestic fortress, built sometime in the 1100’s, acted as the home of untold generations of my family.

When my great-great grandparents moved to the new world, they would not allow the family’s proud stone manor to stay behind. Block by block the castle was disassembled, moved by sea to America and reassembled at the place of my ancestor’s choosing.

The arduous task took nearly a decade to complete. Labor was scarce and my ancestors felt slaves to be more trouble than they were worth. They died easily and were occasionally quite disobedient. Slaves tended to be more expensive than the work they performed.

The only way to turn a profit with slaves was breeding them, and earlier generations of my family wished to see as little of the Negros as they could. Their fear was the dark-skinned slaves would eventually breed out of control and revolt against their rightful owners.

By the time I was born into the family line, the mass influx of immigrants from all over the world began to fill the land, and their meager buildings took over the landscape.

The family castle once rested in the mountains back in the homeland. It was again reassembled in the mountains that would one day be called “The Smoky Mountains.” They chose a location difficult to access, which was the major factor in it taking nine years to put together. It only took a year and a half to disassemble it and move it to the New World.

Without the kingdom, without the servants or slaves, the building slowly began to decay. Without constant maintenance, entropy slowly took over what was once a grand palace. What were once strong, proud battlements lay on the ground, with only a few still remaining in their proper position atop the broad stone walls. The blocks lay on the ground covered in lichens of mainly two sorts, one rust in color and the other an almost luminescent yellow. Neither were native to the region, only growing on the stone from the mother land. The blocks now lay scattered and cracked by grasses fallen into the tiny crevices formed when the blocks first struck the ground.

The hall that once ran along the interior side of the east wall collapsed eight years after I was born. Every time I saw the toppled stones I wept. This was once my mother’s favorite part of the castle. The sunlight shined brightly through the morning windows revealing a variety of artworks my family acquired at one time or another. Ever since her passing, I looked at this place as a monument in honor of my sweet and caring mother.

Without warning, the entire northern wall buckled in the center and within moments it collapsed. Father so happened to be in that vicinity when the fatigued wall of stone fell crushing him instantly. I never got to know him, so the only images I have of him come from the many portraits lining the walls of the still maintained portion of the decaying structure.

Both of my aunts passed before bearing children, and my uncle’s wife was barren and thus brought no heirs into the family line. This left me and only me as the sole inheritor of the crumbling castle and its fifty-one square miles of land.

My family’s land once spread for hundreds of square miles, but at times to keep up the building, land was sold to pay the debt. Still, fifty-one square miles of land was a lot of land.

Even as a child, I explored the crumbling ruins I would one day inherit. The lichen covered stone southern wall crumbled and fell before my birth. Only a portion of the wall collapsed, leaving the rest strangely bowed inward. The stones of the far end somehow clung in place, but it too would soon fall. It was only a short matter of time before we lost the southern wall, leaving the western wall of the outer castle standing alone. It should be only a few years before it fell from lack of support. The buttresses decayed from the weather and crumbled from the foliage growing out of the stone.

I was in my first year of my second decade when the last wall finally lost its war with time and gravity. As with the other walls, I expected the western wall to fall inward. As I strolled outside along taking my evening walk, the west wall fell outward. I walked along the wall only moments ago, and were I one minute later the collapse would be my demise and my grave.

Several years later – I changed the path of my strolls after the western wall collapse – I took my scheduled daily walk. As I looked around, I thought of how selling of possessions always paid for the upkeep, and those were nearly exhausted. I did not know how I would keep the building standing at all anymore as I was the sole owner of the fortress. My uncle passed only a few years ago, so I was the last of the family line.

Never being much of a socialite, I met very few women in my life. Despite my handsome, well-attended appearance, I did not receive the attraction I expected to receive. It seems I did not have much of a charismatic personality, which really helped to push away any woman I met. I still hoped one day to marry and sire a child to inherit the land when I died, so I still tried to attend social functions when I could.

As I wondered around the grounds, I spotted what was possibly a constructed entrance into what appeared to be a natural grotto almost completely obscured by decades of overgrowth. Even though heavy vines and other vegetation obscured the opening, it seems like something I would have infallibly found by now. I thought I was familiar with every inch of the remaining grounds, but year after year I passed by this area without ever noticing it.

I approached the man-made entrance as quickly as the thick foliage would let me. Something seemed quite eerie about the place, but I could not put my finger on it. It quickly became apparent the portal was not natural.

Soon it became clear to me. The ancient granite comprising my home is the same type of stone used to create this portal. I did not know the function of the place, but once I reached the vine and lichen covered stones I realized its purpose.

I pushed away the wood-vine draped across the face of the entrance and found something shocking. A message in the old language carefully etched deep into the surface of the stone did not tell me much, but I did recognize the homeland spelling of the family name.

I stepped into the opening and discovered the small cavern was in fact a mausoleum. The instant I stepped through I could smell the dry pungent dust floating in the air like a light fog. The clouded air burned my lungs, so I removed my handkerchief from my pocket and used it to conceal my nose.

Small air-shafts let in just enough light so I could see. It took my eyes a moment to adjust to the dimness of the tomb. After a minute or so I could see what lined the walls of the room. Shelves of polished marble supported on polished granite stone created alcoves. The vertical granite slabs separated the marble slabs apart to allow the shelves to each hold a single cedar sarcophagus.

The room was larger than I expected and crypt after crypt lined the length of the entire walls. I guessed there must be somewhere between thirty-five or forty of the cubbys, and as far as the light allowed me to see they were all full.

I approached the left wall and found, engraved into the horizontal face of the marble, the names of the one contained within and the name of each of the parents. If I spent enough time in here with a pad and pencil, I could probably track my family tree back quite some way. The idea of it excited me. I now had the opportunity to find out the lineage of aristocrats leading up to my birth.

I walked along the wall of coffins and briefly took the time to glance over the names engraved into the stone shelves. Initially the names of the lineage showed on the face was in the language of old. I could interpret some of them, but not many. As a child, my mother taught me to translate and read the language. That was long ago, and I retained less and less over the years.

After passing the first twelve caskets, the language changed to the English I read and understood. I did not recognize the names on the next two stacks of shelves, but after I walked over to the other wall, I finally saw the name of my great-great grandmother and great-great grandfather.

The sarcophagus held up all these years because of the dryness of the chamber and the fact the coffins were constructed from cedar. Properly selected, cut and treated cedar coffins would hold their integrity for countless ages. In a way, I felt as if this preservation of my family line somehow brought immortality to my ancestors.

I found my grand-parents, and my aunts and uncle. One stone shelf remained empty, the only one that remained empty. The casket sat outside of it and did not appear to be sealed, so I assumed it was probably still vacant. A sudden wave of terror and panic coursed through my mind and body.

Something told me to turn and flee. I stood conflicted. Part of me wanted to run, but part of me wanted to stay. I could not say how long I stood there, my mind conflicted and my heart rate increased. It almost seemed as if I was paralyzed. Nothing but my intense trepidation held me in place.

The sun shifted position after I entered the crypt, so I knew I only had about ten minutes before the mausoleum turned completely dark. Finally my curiosity won over my fear. I knelt down for better leverage and tried to open the lid. It raised an inch or so, but I could not get it open with only one hand.

Returning my handkerchief to my pocket, I used both hands and forced the lid open. The dusty air once again burned my nose and throat. I tried to take slow deep breaths through my nose to lessen the burning.

The lid was heavier than I anticipated. Holding my breath was not an option, as I had to take a deep breath before I struggled to raise the coffin’s lid. After a moment or two of straining my arms, legs and back the lid flew open onto its hinges.

As the lid sprung open, it stirred the dust from the lid, the floor and the stone cubby next to it. The mere quantity of the dust stung my eyes in addition to my nose and throat. I withdrew my shirt so it came untucked from my waist and pulled the top to cover my face. Even then, the dust filtered through my shirt and continued to dry and burn my eyes.

The casket was empty as I expected. It was then I noticed the engraving on the empty shelf. With the dust and the shift in the sun, I could not make out the engraved message on the marble slab.

Tears ran from my eyes and the relentless dust stung them unmercifully which caused me to squint tightly. The concentrated the tears in my eyes made it even more difficult to see the lettering on the polished stone. I tried to force my eyes open a little more, but my reflexes would not allow that.

I leaned in a bit further, which put me leaning above the empty casket. Then I could finally make out the words. As with the others, two names were engraved into the stone. This one shelf was the only to have three lines rather than two. Side by side I saw two names, Gerrard and Cassandra, my parent’s names.

I had to lean in a bit further to read the other two lines. The lettering was smaller in order to accommodate three lines, making it even harder to read. I leaned in a bit further and saw my name under those of my parents. This casket was for me.

As unnerving as that was, it did not seem to bother me too much. It was not until I read the third line the fear rocked my body. Below my name I saw the words “The last of the noble bloodline.”

The shock caused my arms to fall to my side. This released my shirt from my face and once again the dust choked my nose and throat. The sudden tingling in my nose threw me into a sneezing fit. The convulsing and jerking caused me to fall face first into the casket. When I tried to stand I found something blocking my way. The heavy lid fell closed, shutting me inside.

In absolute panic, I rolled over to my back so I could push the lid open again. It did not budge. I tried to use both my arms and legs to open the coffin. The lid continued to stay tightly shut. I began kicking and screaming in a futile effort to somehow gain a grip on the wooden surface.

I never noticed the pain as my fingernails tore from my fingers. I thrashed and shouted to God to get me out of this dire situation. I knew in my heart no one was coming. Vegetation hid the entrance well enough to keep it concealed all these years. I was sure I would never attract someone’s attention in time. I was to meet my end very soon.

Sparks of light filled my eyes as I now struggled to breathe. My thrashing and screaming served to do nothing but rapidly deplete my oxygen.

Grasping my throat as if that was somehow helpful, I thought to myself. I never married and thus never sired any children. I am the last of the bloodline and this casket was made for me. Trapped alive, I realized my ancestors somehow knew and prepared for me to be sealed away forever in this cedar sarcophagus.

In His Place

By Mychal Wilson

On August 26, 2019

In Aetet 1, First Triad

Word Count: 6,607

I was only thirteen years old when the hallucinations began. A few weeks after my birthday, I began to perceive objects not visible to others around me. That is why I find myself where I am now.

In the very beginning, I did not realize the unusual things I saw were real. The first situation in which I recall seeing something intangible, some friends and I were hanging out in the forest behind our small, secluded neighborhood. A buddy of mine snatched some pot from his father’s stash, and we darted off into the woods to hide while we got stoned. Back here in the country, there were not many places besides the forest where teens could hide and hang out.

The four of us lay with our backs against a large smooth boulder in a small clearing. We spent many of our days speculating on what our futures would be like. Brandon dreamed of being an agricultural engineer, as did Francis. This was nothing unusual as this was primarily an agricultural community. Scotty dreamed of being in politics; he thought he could help change the way the world thinks. Me, I always thought I would be a doctor. I wanted to help sick people.

I thought I must have gotten a major head rush, because I swore I saw a couple of men standing to the right of where I sat. What instantly clued me in to the fact what I saw was not corporeal was both men wore clothing common to the days long before the American Revolution. To compound upon this surrealist nature of the scene, the men conversed in a dialect of the English language not spoken in more than four hundred years. I remember reading words like these in school, but this is the first time I ever heard them spoken fluently.

Immediately I pointed the unusual sight out to my friends, but all they did was laugh at and mock me. The three other young men with me thought I was just incredibly stoned, or I was pulling their leg. Either they lied to me, or I saw things that were not there. I don’t think my friends had any reason to lie. We’ve been pals for a long time. Surely, they would say if they beheld the same site as I. That left only one option; I must be going crazy.

Drug propaganda at the time tried to make the public believe any mind-altering substance brought about with it serious mental and neurological ramifications. I did not believe it initially, but as the number of visions increased, I started blaming them on the marijuana. At first, when I gave up smoking the psychedelic plant, the visions did seem to stop, but not for long though, for slightly more than a month later, the strange sightings resumed.

An old road – a road cleared hundreds of years ago – twisted through the endless forest behind my small neighborhood. Our town consisted of nothing more than six residential blocks of homes. Even the nearest convenience store was thirty minutes from here.

Grass and weeds now choked the long-abandoned thoroughfare. Young green saplings rose from the grass in spotted clusters with the occasional climbable tree mixed in among them. To the untrained eye, it may not be evident at all that this pathway ever saw the traffic of an innumerable amount of horse-drawn carriages, wagons, and stages. No one used this road for travel or trade for hundreds of years. To be fully honest, I did not understand why the trees did not completely conceal the road. Still, anyone from around here knew without a doubt it was indeed an old travel route.

A few weeks later I had about the most terrible day. I failed a test, I was sent to the office because of disruptive behavior, and the resident ruffians threatened to beat me at the end of the day when the school bell rang.

Fighting was not a skill I possessed in any large quantities. Thinking and attentiveness were more descriptive of me. My exceptional intellect and my small size made me the target of not only the resident bullies, but also by most every other student in school.

Because of my advanced book smarts and my uncanny perception, the school placed me in two classes higher than the other children my age. I was glad to be taking courses that somewhat challenge me intellectually, but it always made me the smallest student in class. It aggravated many of the other students that I had such an easy time with my schoolwork; some of them studied constantly in order to receive marks one or two letter grades below mine. I knew they resented the ease with which I approached my assignments, but I didn’t really understand why. It is not as if my good grades made theirs worse.

I slipped out one of the side doors as soon as the school bell rang. My antagonists expected me to get on the bus where they would torture me until the transport reached my stop. I knew the trails through the hardwood forest very well, so I decided to flee into the woods and walk home rather than let that football player and his pals amuse themselves at my expense.

I meandered along the winding trail until I reached the old road. By following this pathway, I would reach the back of my family’s yard within thirty minutes. This long stretch of the old path was unfortunately filled with thick briars, so I was forced to walk through the cover of the trees for a good hundred yards or so. When the mass of thorn bushes finally came to an end, I got back on the road and bounded off for home.

Grasshoppers, crickets, and innumerable flying insects created a blur of motion as I pushed my weight through the four-foot-high grasses. My disturbance of the foliage roused gnats, flies, and worst of all mosquitoes. My body was accustomed to the needlelike bites of those bloodsucking insects, but it was still annoying when they swarmed and fluttered around my face.

With the skill of a veteran hunter, I trod along the old, pockmarked road at a fair pace. Not really focusing my attention, I enjoyed the sounds of the birds, frogs, and insects. When the noises nature sang to me ceased abruptly, I knew something was terribly wrong.

The abrupt cessation of nature’s singing was not due to the presence of other children. Their presence may cause a ruckus among the forest denizens, but if anything it would rouse even more noise. Not even the gnats and bloodsucking mosquitoes buzzed about the late afternoon air. I grew so accustomed to hearing the sounds of nature after my parents moved me out here in the country, and when their songs ceased, I instantly knew something was amiss.

I turned in circles trying to catch some glimpse of whatever was responsible for the sudden change in the behavior of the insects and reptiles causing them to cease their songs. I did not see anything; I didn’t see anything other than what I should expect to see in this forest. Still, I knew something aberrant was happening. Exactly what that was I did not know.

I stood motionless for several long minutes afraid to move. I didn’t want to alert the unnatural thing that may be hidden. It might spot me if it did not do so already. I carefully scanned the area with my eyes, too trepid to move anything else. I finally mustered the courage to move my head, and once again scan for anything atypical of this region of woodlands.

I turned back towards my house and ran. Even as familiar as I was with this old thoroughfare, I still could not miss all of the potholes and ruts dug by wagons centuries ago. I tripped on one of the old ruts, and then I heard something strangely anomalous.

Not too far off in the distance, I was sure I could hear horses coming, but that was not possible. No one I knew who owned horses ever rode them along this road, not at the speed at which they seemed to be coming. It would be really easy for a horse to break its leg galloping here. Regardless, I knew the clatter of horses, and this was it.

The sounds drew nearer, and the crack of a whip pierced the air. By now there was very little doubt the horses were towing a wagon, but no wagon could possibly navigate the old tree spotted road at this current rate of approach. I tried to jump above the tall grass so I could see the source of the noise, but unfortunately, I was not able.

I should have run. I should have dived off the road. I should have done something more than I did. I stood petrified in front of the venerable dual carriage-way unflinching and unmoved. The absence of the croaking and chirping of the forest creatures, hearing the sounds of a horse-drawn wagon, and the congested foliage told me something not normal was heading right for me.

It seemed to leap out of nowhere. A stagecoach followed four draft horses, and they were moving at a hurried pace. The driver wore the clothes of a seventeenth-century pauper while a nicer dress man sat atop the carriage tightly gripping a blunderbuss.

By the time I saw them, I ran out of time to jump out of the way. The driver of the wagon did not seem to notice me. He could not avoid hitting me without turning over the coach anyway. Throwing up my hands in a futile effort to protect my face, I prepared for my imminent demise.

None of the foliage choking the road wavered; none of it gave way as the wagon barreled down the path. Instead of trampling me, the horses passed harmlessly through me. The wagon did not run me down. It continued to advance along its way and left me without ever seeming to have any idea I was present.

I turned to look at a horse-drawn wagon as it sped away from me. Not only did the conveyance manage to pass through the tall grass and weeds, I watched it pass unhindered through an 18 foot tall oak tree.

I did not know what to think, believe, or trust about the things I witnessed. Pushing through my panic and fear, I tried to remember everything I saw. I thought if I could recall more of the ghostly apparitions, I might understand more clearly their meaning.

By no means was I any sort of historian, but I was still sure the clothes worn by the driver and the man riding shotgun belonged to a time long forgotten. The weapon the man sitting on top of the stained wooden carriage carried was a very early version of the shotgun. The blunderbuss was never a widely used weapon because of their tendency to explode in the face of the user. That was a weapon much more associated the 14th to 17th centuries. I remembered the style of weapon as shown in the illustrations in my history books.

The wagon was of early colonial design as well. Thinking of these spectral images, I believed what I saw to be ghosts. Even though I sustained no physical injuries, my mind went into sensory overload. My limited brain could not logically explain what happened. Although the apparitions ran right over me, I did not think they meant any harm. Regardless, the whole ordeal terrified me, and I ran as fast as my trembling legs could carry me. In less than five minutes, I found myself jumping over the fence into our backyard.

Mother and father still were not home, which was a relief to me. That gave me time to wash off my face and calm myself. My parents would never understand me if I told them what I saw. They thought me peculiar enough without telling them stories about ghost carriages. I felt it best not to inform them about anything concerning my recent hallucinations.

During supper, I lingered around the dining table not saying much of anything. It took me much longer than usual to finish my plate. My parents could see something was bothering me, and I could feel their worry over my well-being. It was obvious they were concerned about me.

After dinner I cleaned up the dirty dishes from the dining room and headed on up to my bedroom and went straight to bed. The dreams I experienced during this night’s rest put me in a setting very early in America’s history. When I awoke, the memories of my dream quickly faded. I grabbed a pencil and notepad and instantly recorded everything I could remember. By the time I touched lead to paper, nearly all memory of last night’s dream was gone.

It was now the weekend, and I politely ask Mother if she would be so kind as to take me to the community library. I hoped I might find some answers to help explain my visions. Mom already planned to head into the tiny municipality we called the city – and we lived quite some distance from town – so she said she would drop me off at the library before running her errands.

I went straight to the back of the book repository because the bulk of the town’s recorded history was stored there. With fervor and speed, I flipped through the pages of the book until I found some information about this area around the year 1665. The book was old and unique, so I could only study it very carefully under the closely watching eyes of the librarian.

I went through several books – most of them contained dry historical facts of the time – but I finally found the information I sought. I did not know what I was looking for when I began, but I knew what it was when I found it.

My neighborhood, the town, and much of the rest of the area were settled by what were repeatedly referred to as witches. In truth, they were not witches. They did not worship Satan because they did not believe in the devil. The people of this new settlement paid homage to on archaic pantheon of gods.

A common misconception was settlers first came to the New World so that they would have freedom of religion. The problem was these Christian sects wanted freedom only for their own creed, not for everyone else in the budding country. The Christian denominations in the New World did not stand for any sort of religion that did not acknowledge the Christian savior as their own.

The original settlers of this community faced hatred and persecution from any nearby Christian settlements. After repelling several attacks, the settlers turned to nature to protect themselves. Suddenly outsiders found the perimeters of the nature worshippers’ territory surrounded by a thick wall of thorny blackberry bushes.

Within days, wide bands of poison ivy wove through the briars, climbed the trees and created sheets of the caustic plant stretching from one tree to the next. Trespassers attempting to lynch the founders of the community began to mysteriously disappear in the forest never to be heard from again. Eventually, outsiders learned to leave the pagan settlers alone.

Many generations passed and the citizens of the reclusive community resumed trade with the surrounding settlements. It seemed others forgot the stories of the pagan society as the decades passed. The communities growing in the region now remembered such things as nothing more than legend and myth.

Despite the reclusive peoples’ assimilation into “normal” society, no amount of acceptance would get the nature worshippers to stop worshiping their false gods and join the Christian fad that seemed so popular at the time.

Over the next several hundred years, many of the descendants of my town’s forefathers gave in to the pressure and placed their loyalty in the trio of gods all of my ancestors believed to be false. Despite those who renounced their true belief in their gods, the old religion continued to thrive and grow.

When the witch hunts of Salem began, the worshipers of the ancient gods moved their religion to the underground. They held meetings in secret. They hid their sacred relics in a variety of sealed chambers, and many faithful worshipers held their rituals in secret behind closed doors.

The elderly yet beautiful librarian approached me from behind. As I glanced at my watch, I knew she was about to make me leave. Sure enough, the kindly woman told me the building was closing. I wished I could bring some of the ages-old books home with me. Unfortunately, due to their condition and uniqueness, the tomes were not allowed out of the archives room.

Because of school five days a week and the distance to town, it would be several weeks before I could again return to the library. Until then, most of my free time was spent out in the woods looking for something not truly there. A whole week passed without any more strange visions. Then the sleepwalking began.

My parents began finding me sleepwalking and sitting on the floor engrossed in a book or magazine. Never once did they find me reading textbooks or any other similar educational materials. Most of the time they found me reading unusual materials such as owner’s manuals for their cars, the warranty packets for our kitchen appliances, and even the phone books. When mom and dad could rouse me awake, I never remembered any of this strange behavior.

Nearly three long weeks passed as I awaited my next visit to the library. I held anticipation for my return as many children would look forward to Christmas. I took a stroll in the woods after school one day to clear my head and calm down my fear of being a target for bullies.

I tried to find the trails I walked countless times, but I did not come across a single one of them. I knew the pathways winding through this forest like I knew my own name. The trails twisted and crossed through one another in hundreds of places, so I should not have to walk far to find one of them. I walked this forest virtually every day and I could not find any of my usual landmarks. None of the trees were where they were supposed to be, and the heavy undergrowth appeared to completely obscure all of my familiar trails.

Until this point, none of my hallucinations possessed any tangible forms. I thought the same might be said about the hidden trails, but I was wrong. As I felt about for spectral foliage, I discovered everything felt very real. I could not find any walking trails at all. The only trails in the area were those created by the forest animals.

Something else was not right, the trees. The woods in which I spent countless hours were all hardwood trees. A majority of the trees now surrounding me were massive cedars. I never saw such gigantic cedar trees in my life. A thought suddenly occurred to me. Just outside of my neighborhood sat a small village comprised of recovered historic homes. The logs from which the buildings were constructed were cedar.

Even though none of the forest appeared as it should, I knew my direction by the position of the sun. Afraid I might become hopelessly lost, I turned and followed the blazing white orb towards home. As I walked, I examine the passing underbrush and saw many plants I was not used to seeing. I spotted a beautiful flower – it appeared to be a perennial – and reached down to pick it.

My heart lept into my throat, and I could not breathe. I trembled in panic as I looked down at my hands. Jumping back from the flower as if trying to jump away from my hands, I nearly tripped and fell on my back. Up to now, it was other things that appeared out of sorts. What I saw now horrified me. The flesh on my hands and arms was wrinkled and covered in liver spots. Fungus stained my fingernails a sickly yellow. I stood and stared at the hands of a very old man.

Experiencing intense reluctance, I finally raised my aged hands, probing the flesh on my face with my bony fingers. This skin I felt with my callused fingers was that of a man my grandfather’s age. I fought to take in a breath. It seemed like my chest constricted and squeezed the organs beneath. It all became too much for me to take, and I fainted.

When I awoke, the sun was close to setting. My immediate reaction was to check my hand. To my relief, I saw the hands I should see. My short stubby fingers showed healthy and clean fingernails. The skin was tight and elastic. I looked at my arms and saw no liver spots. Feeling my face, I felt the skin of a 14-year-old boy.

Early in the morning of the following Saturday, I decided to go and check out the historic village a few miles down the highway. I emptied all of the school supplies from my backpack and loaded it with things I would need for my hike. Among other things, I packed a few bottles of cola; some toaster pastries and potato chips; and a magnetic compass. I did not want to have to rely on landmarks and the sun for directions. I told my mother I was going out in the woods to explore and was on my way.

Walking through the forest rather than walking along the highway, it took me nearly two hours to reach my destination. When I arrived, I once again found myself in a place out of time. The village was exactly where it was supposed to be. One major indicator I once again suffered from my hallucinations was, rather than being a place for tourists and school field trips, residents moved about the area. One modestly dressed woman ran laundry through a hand-crank drier, one woman drew water from a well while a young boy carried firewood from a pile and into a house. I watched for hours as the 16th century Americans went about their manual chores.

I examined my body as the multiple families tended to their daily duties. Once again I found myself occupying the frail body of an elderly man. This time, I paid attention to the garments I wore as well. My britches were made of itchy wool and I wore no shirt at all. Instead, a tunic folded over my upper body, which hung down to my thighs. The belt holding it together was crafted from leather and the buckle was either silver or platinum. I never saw anything remotely resembling the design of the valuable ornament. It was so very out of place when compared to the rest of my garments.

I nearly jumped out of my skin and my heart fluttered when someone addressed me from behind.

“Master Picard, is everything all right?”

I spun around to see a poorly dressed man who, judging by the close resemblance of his face, was the father of the boy toting the firewood.

The only thought in my mind was, how in the hell did this guy know my last name. The anxiety and panic overtook me, and I fainted as before.

When I awoke, the sun long ago set behind the horizon. No clouds appeared in the sky, so I had an excellent view of the stars. Growing up in the wide country, I learned to navigate by the constellations years ago. Just in case, I withdrew the metallic compass I brought with me. Something was not right.

I immediately realized the needle did not point north; it pointed at the historic village. Thinking it might be stuck in position, I tapped the top to try and jar the needle loose. It came loose all right, but it still did not point north. Now it pointed directly at me. No matter which way I turned, the needle swiveled in the water filled compass to point directly at me.

Already too disturbed to deal with a broken compass, I stowed it in my backpack and followed the stars homeward. Within an hour, I found my familiar walking trails. Now on a well-known route, I tried to jog as much as I could. I knew my parents were already upset with me. We always eat dinner at 5:30 PM every day, and it was much later than that.

I did not know what I was going to tell them. If I told them I got lost in the forest, they would immediately recognize it as a lie. No one knew the woods surrounding our diminutive neighborhood like me.

I quickly began to formulate a story about a bobcat. Those wild creatures were known to inhabit the area. Several dogs and house cats over the years fell victim to these feral animals. Taking advantage of my knowledge, I quickly selected a location for the alleged incident. I knew of a very good place for me to climb an outcropping of massive stone, which would have afforded me safety. As I made the remaining forty-five minutes of my journey, I worked out the specific details.

For no reason could I tell anyone the truth. They would think I was crazy. I was beginning to think that very thing about myself. When the encounters I experienced were no longer incorporeal phantasms, I thought for sure I was losing my mind.

Why was I now having visions of me as a very old man? Why did the forest change to be as it was centuries ago? What was the meaning of that ornamental belt buckle?

Mother and father exacted a punishment of grounding me for a few days for my missing supper. I accepted the consequences without a question. I did not really think they bought the whole bobcat story, but telling them the truth would have been much worse. I would be headed to the county hospital to be locked away on the fifth floor.

I stayed restricted to my room until time for school following Monday. During the bus ride, I looked out the window to see a caravan of five horse-drawn wagons. I looked over the other children on the bus, and it was obvious none of them saw the wagon train I saw as reality. The weeds along the road blurred past as the yellow school bus headed to the school. The wagons were well behind us in no time. I watched them – making their way through an open meadow until the bus turned and entered part of the forest.

If hallucinations were only the figment of one’s imagination, I could never have imagined such intricate detail. I knew very little about early America, the history of the region, much less the type of clothing people wore. Regardless, the things I saw displayed more detail than was in my head.

Two weeks before my 14th birthday, the unwanted images ceased their assault against all my senses. I expected them to return any minute, but three years passed without incident. I was both relieved and anxious at the same time. I felt relieved I did not see any more disturbing images, but I was overanxious from anticipating the images return.

At the beginning of my sophomore year, my sleepwalking spells returned. First my parents found me reading Mom’s magazines and novels set in modern times, not those set in a fictional past. On more than one occasion, they found me going through the pantry and reading everything from cereal boxes to the cleaners under the sink. After I read everything in the house, I waited out on the porch every morning for the newspaper to arrive.

Following the end of the school year, the audio and visual hallucinations returned. Again, the things I saw came from early American history. This time, these phantoms increased tremendously in frequency. Sometimes I found myself witnessing the same scenes over and over. It became obvious to me quickly the things I saw occurred at the same time of day every time. From different places, I saw the images from multiple angles. If these things were truly only in my mind, then my mind was capable of creating a very real and vivid world.

I began to study the things I saw. Before long I was very familiar with some of the people I viewed, as well as their homes, wagons, and virtually all of their belongings. Such intricate detail, things that look this real and this consistent, it was hard for me to believe it was simply the product of a delusional mind.

When I was old enough to drive, I decided to return to that library to see if I could learn about the early settlement that grew to become the community I know today. Ever since the visions became more frequent and more real, I avoided returning to that library for fear of what I might find. Now, I felt it may be the only hope I had to avoid going completely insane.

Cold sweat seeped from my pores as I entered the archive room. Chills ran down my back as I looked at the shelves containing those centuries-old books. I saw them once before when I first studied their contents, but now they possessed a familiar quality going far beyond my previous work with them.

It took a bit of conscious effort before I could muster the courage to walk my way over to them. I felt a consciousness present, calling me through the century’s old tomes. I felt a darkness to this unseen presence that made me want to flee, yet something inside me made me stay. A voice inside my head told me these were something very important I must see, something inside one of the three-hundred-year-old books.

Stepping only a few inches at a time, I reluctantly made my way to the aged leather-bound books. Their antiqued weathered appearance made all of the books nearly identical to one another. One book seemed to me to stand out from all the rest. When I came here to research several years ago, I looked through the books at random. Now, I knew exactly the book I needed.

I recalled seeing no tomes during any of my hallucinations, but I was always too afraid to get close to any of the wagons or log cabin homes I witnessed in my all too real visions. I examined my recurring visions from different angles, but I always made sure to keep my distance from them. Ever since that man identified me by name during my spying on the small hamlet, I was afraid to approach any of the spectral images too closely. I was too scared I would again be noticed. I supposed any of those wagons or cabins may have housed one or more of the books through which I now read. As a matter of fact, I was sure of it.

My apprehension caused the short walk to the far bookshelf to feel as if it lasted for an eternity. I knew, I had no idea how, but I knew the exact book that would make this make sense as soon as I read the pages in that tome. I could sense I was about to get the answers to all the questions echoing in my thoughts.

I finally reached the shelf, opened the glass cabinets, and retrieved that beckoning manuscript. I treated it with such care; I had to treat it very carefully. I stepped over and placed it gently upon the table. I did not pay long attention to the cover of the book, but then I saw embedded in the thick cover of the aged tome the platinum belt buckle I saw around my waist as I spied on the small village. I recognized some of the scratches and scuffs on the item embedded in the tome as the same item I wore when I saw myself as a man my grandfather’s age.

Visions suddenly surrounded me from all sides. Phantom trees appeared, their trunks rose out from the floor of the building and climbed through the ceiling. My heart murmured when a herd of deer bound through the walls. Sheets of vines and brush replaced the tables and bookshelves. Within seconds, the forest became real and the library faded to illusion.

I became aware of the sound of dogs barking in the distance. The chirping of forest critters sang an eerie song, and I felt a gentle breeze blowing against my liver spotted skin. The pleasing evergreen sent of cedar hung heavily in the damp air. The foliage looked every bit as real as any other I have seen, and I could feel the soft cushion of a bed of needles under my feet.

Glancing down at my hands, I found myself holding two artifacts. In my left hand I gripped tightly onto a crystal sphere. It was not a clear crystal ball like the fortunetellers use. The crystal appeared to be made up of opaque lines and produced a cat’s-eye like effect. I believed it was selenite.

What I held in my right hand was much more repugnant. It seemed to be a wand or totem of some sort. The yellowish shaft appeared to be crafted from a human forearm bone. Rawhide twine sewn through holes bored through the knuckle fastened tightly bound feathers and three strings of beads. Unrecognizable symbols appeared to be burnt into the length of the bone, and the grip was wrapped in a skin I could only hope belong to a pig.

The distant dogs barked in frenzy. I figured they must be on the trail of some game animal. They sounded like hunting dogs who finally stumbled on the scent of their prey. When the noise drew closer, I realized the prey was me.

Panicked, I spun myself trying to find a trail or some other escape. Seeing no easy route, I decided I would try to push this frail body through the thick virgin undergrowth. A shock hit me when the thorny foliage moved out of my way. I ran as fast as the old body could take me, and the underbrush never stood in my way. I looked back to see it closed behind me as quickly as it opened.

Using the sun as my guide, I fled to the East as the dogs approached from the West. I did not travel far at all before my muscles and lungs burned. With my own young body, I could run for thirty minutes at a time. In this frail form, I tired after only a few short minutes.

The dogs narrowed the gap between them and me with incredible haste. Even with the cooperation of the thorns, I simply could not travel very fast. I felt them closing in on me when I reached a curtain of poison ivy. The caustic vines covered nearly an acre of forest. To my despair, the skin irritating ivy did not yield its way to me. I thought all hope was lost, and then something amazing happened. The overgrowth of vines opened under no control of my own to reveal a long tunnel.

Not wanting to second-guess the stroke of luck, I walked into the tunnel. Within a couple of minutes I reached the other side. I found myself standing at the edge of a small 16th-century settlement. It was the same town I recognized as the historical attraction only a few miles from my home. The ravages of time had not affected these buildings, and the people living in them were quite real.

They looked upon me startled but not surprised. It appeared they knew me and apparently expected me. I collapsed from exhaustion and several young men came rushing to my aid. Helping me to my feet, they escorted me to a rocking chair positioned in front of the nearest dwelling. All through this, I managed to keep a tight grip on the articles in my hands.

I drew the attention of everyone in this secluded hamlet. One young woman ran to me with a burlap cloth wet with cold water. Using it to dab at my cheeks, she looked at me as if she were suspicious of something.

A young girl came to me with the bowl of bitter tea served in a kiln-baked clay bowl. Everyone seemed concerned with me, and I got the distinct impression they were more worried with making me coherent than with my overall well-being.

When the herbal tea soothed my parched throat enough to allow me to speak, I inquired as to my whereabouts.

“Master Picard, dost thou feel well?” one man asked. It was the same man who asked me that question once before.

“What’s going on here?” I asked with a weak voice.” Who are you people?”

“Did not Master Picard have a safe journey?”

“What do you mean?” I asked out of general confusion.

With that, the villagers turned and walked away from me. The children went about playing and chores. All the men of the village moved across the courtyard to talk. On more than one occasion, I caught them peering at me. I was not being paranoid; I know they were talking about me.

Suddenly I heard the dogs closing in on me again. I turned my head to the barrier of poison ivy as it withdrew from my sight. One of the younger men in the hamlet ran out into the fresh clearing and began to shout to the hunters. The muffled ears of this decrepit body could not make out the contents of the man’s calls. Even though I could not make out the words, I recognized the tone as one of anger.

A group of approximately fifteen men emerged from the forest tightly gripping the leather leashes of their hunting dogs. The villager pointed to me and led the angry mob across the open courtyard to where I sat.

“There is the witch,” the man shouted. “Even now he clings to his scepter made from a human bone, wrapped in the skin of a virgin.”

I could not find it believable this thing in my hand was what they said it was.

The newcomers drug me out into the courtyard by my long unkempt hair. The resident villagers pelted me with flasks of lamp oil while the hunters threw fistfuls of dry pine needles, nearly covering me in the evergreen leaves. The pain from the shattering pots was incredible and the chemicals splashed over my body and blinded my eyes. I never felt or saw the other men piling dry leaves over my body.

A burning lantern smashed against my now broken jaw igniting the flammables with which I was covered. Agony like I never thought possible slowly coursed over my body as the flames spread. My flesh blistered and sizzled as the oil and pine sap burst into an enveloping flame.

It turned out my visions were not hallucinations at all. I saw things from this time because someone was pulling me here. The warlock born to this aged body now inhabited mine. The evil soul of one of my pagan ancestors sent me back here to this time to die in his place.

The Orchard

By Mychal Wilson

On August 24, 2019

In Aetet 1, First Triad

Word Count: 2,674

I became a source of disquiet unease for my parents at a very young age. It troubled Mother and Father that I appeared incapable of interacting with other children. I did not act like a ‘normal’ child and this greatly disturbed the people who brought me into this mundane world.

I was the first and only child. My parents did not bring me any siblings for fear they would turn out like me. Mother and Father did not understand me; they did not know how to communicate with me and this made them afraid of me.

It was not that I had and inability to interact with other children; I simply shared no common interests with them what-so-ever. I could not enjoy the company of children my age because they saw me as an oddity. As a general rule, I paid them no mind. I preferred the company of my other friends instead, for they understood me in a way no one else could.

My parents tested me for autism when I was a toddler. Of course the results came back negative. Enduring a multitude of tests over a period of several years, I proved to be normal in every sense of the word. None of the doctors Mother and Father carted me off to found anything wrong with me.

Simply because I had an uncanny ability to discern and detect patterns in the mundane ignorant people missed, the parents of my birth thought surely I was somehow mentally disabled. They almost seemed disappointed to find out I was not mentally challenged. It was as if they hoped something to be wrong with me.

As the years progressed and other children my age went off to Kindergarten, my parents decided to keep me home. They were undisputedly sure I would not be able to assimilate into the close social environment school provided. Truth be told, I didn’t want to waste my days learning at the slow pace of the dull dimwits who would be my classmates anyway.

Before my mother began to home school me, I spent most of my time out in the pecan orchards. The trees there were hundreds of years old, the land being passed down through several generations of my family. That was where my true friends made their home.

They were so joyful and performed beautiful dances accompanied by the sweetest of music just before each sundown. Most of the time, I simply watched them, clapping my hands with the beat of the music. The dances sometimes being very intricate, they were too difficult for me to perform. I was satisfied plenty simply being in their presence.

During their holidays, my beautiful friends insisted I join in on the gaiety of the festivities. Every night was a celebration for them, so their holidays were over-the-top. I felt very awkward attempting the dances of my friends. I knew I was in the way and looked so out of place, but they did not mind in the least. They only wanted for me to share in the joy and happiness filling their lives.

My excursions into the orchards many times did not go uninterrupted as my birth parents sometimes snuck into the woods prying on my happenings. Were they to catch me clapping and dancing, they would think me insane for sure. Luckily my friends noticed my parents long before my parents noticed me. I never went unaware of their approach. When they found me I was typically reading a thick book for the duration of their eavesdropping. After my parents departed the orchard, I rejoined the festivities.

Several years passed and my education accelerated. At only age seven, I surpassed the materials typically given to seniors in high school. The concept escaped me that other children were not equally as smart. I could not understand how others demonstrated such difficulty in learning. Mother home schooled me because my parents feared what the people of our small community would say about their freak son. The town developed enough gossip of its own concerning me and my lack of friends, much less if others observed me on a daily basis.

I returned home following one joyful sunset celebration to catch some exceedingly disconcerting news. A large corporation was buying up all of the land around here. It planned to develop all of the beautiful orchards and farmlands into apartments and shopping malls. Dad said, when the representative from the corporation returned, if he got a good enough offer, he was selling the orchard. First he planned to cut down all of the pecan trees to sell for lumber. The developers did not want the wood, only the land. Pecan lumber caught a substantial amount of money, and he planned on making a hefty profit from this.

A panic filled my gullet with the receipt of the devastating news. What was going to happen to my friends? Cutting down the trees meant the death of them all. In a state of shock I began yelling “You can’t kill them! You can’t kill them!”

All reason left my mind and I began to fight them physically, but my struggle was a futile one. Dad was much bigger than me: I was still only twelve. I soon ceased my struggle and dropped hard on the tile floor beneath my feet. Balled up in the fetal position I continued to whimper the same words over and over, “You can’t kill them.”

The local doctor worked out of his home very close to our own, and he did not mind making house calls. Almost immediately after his arrival, the doctor gave me a strong sedative. In only a few seconds everything became an absolutely blissful peace. The next day I awoke in my room. My dream friends did not visit me that night; the manmade medications prevented them from doing so.

When I awoke the next day the clock was already close to striking noon. Quickly I changed into my outdoor clothes and ran out of the house. I saw my father working the pecan harvester, gathering the nuts off of the ground, and I mustered a slight gleam of hope. He worked since early morning, judging by the amount of completed work. That meant he had not yet been to town. At least for now, I did not fret over the sale of the land. I knew he did not speak to the corporate man yet, and he would not until the next morning.

After dinner that night, I cleaned and put away the dishes. I waited until everyone fell asleep and made my way deep in the heart of the manicured forest where my friends always awaited my arrival. I thought along the way about how to break the news to them. I did not know how to tell them we would never again cavort in the light of the full moon. We would never again celebrate one of their sacred holidays. I did not know how to tell them their world was about to be destroyed, their lives were about to come to an end.

Immediately the others knew something terrible was on my mind. It ripped my heart to find out I would never see my dryad friends ever again. On this night there was no celebration. No dancing and no joyous singing filled the cool night air. Tonight we mourned, for we knew soon all of my friends would be dead and I would be alone.

The elders and I sat for a serious discussion, something we never did before. The topic, of course was how to save the lives of these century old trees and those who resided within them. We talked until the sun began to set.

During supper that night I stayed quiet and took in every last word my parents said. Dad told Mom the men were coming to start cutting down the trees on Friday. That only gave me four days to figure out how to save the lives of thousands of innocent beings.

After my parents went to bed and had enough time to drift off into a deep slumber, I snuck out of the house. I had to climb down from the third story, which I did in the past with great difficulty. I walked toe to heel from my bed to lessen the noise of my footfalls and over to one of the windows. This was always the easiest to escape. I looked out to see a heavy mass of vines grown up the southern wall of my home in only a matter of a few hours. My friends were helping me escape the confines of my bedroom.

The elders and I discussed again our possible options to save their lives, but it always came back to one specific solution. However horrible it was, it was something that had to be done. Once we reached an accord I went to sneak back into my third story window. The vines grew to the thickness as a small woman’s wrist, which made it incredibly easy to climb back into the window.

The next morning I looked back out my open window and noticed the ivy retreated from the walls and back into the flower bed. I went down the stairs for breakfast and made it a point to act a bit odd. I would take a long pause before answering any questions my parents might ask me. I would make myself zone out on something just to bring to their mind something was wrong with me. I shoveled the food into my mouth rather than displaying at least a rudimentary etiquette.

Father went outside after breakfast and Mother commenced to cleaning up the dishes. I sat at the table ten minutes or so after I finished, just to arouse much more suspicion to the situation. Finally I rose from the kitchen table and shuffled my feet against the hard wood floor in the hall, standing in front of the door a good minute or two before I exited the house.

I found my father was already at work. He began to use the belt vibrator to shake the loose pecans from the trees, but he was nowhere close to my usual hangout. As I sadly strolled to that one single clearing, the dryads began to exit their trees. While they walked along side me, they spoke to me and I spoke to them. I hoped my parents would see this and come up to do one of their regular spying visits.

It must not have taken long for Dad to see me apparently talking to myself. I could hear the belt vibrator stop some ways behind me. I could not resist the temptation not to turn around to look and found my father quickly making his way to the side door of the house. Just as planned, I slowly made my way to the clearing where all of the celebrations took place. My strange actions worked, and my parents thought they snuck up on me in my favorite place of that massive orchard.

The others began to sing and dance as they would on any other day while I clapped my hands and swayed my head with the beat of the music. Things progressed as normal and we all tried to ignore the presence of my prying parents. They could not see the dryads as their minds were too dull to perceive anything beyond their five limited senses.

Mom and Dad watched my actions and thought I was dancing and singing in the warm sunlight all by myself. This finally confirmed what they always believed about me. They thought I was insane and probably planned to institutionalize me. We anticipated all of this though, even counting on it as a crucial part of our plan.

They watched me engaged in my strange spectacle for over an hour before I heard them calling my name. I continued to ignore them and persisted in my joyful activities. My friends and I all hoped they would make their way up to me. When I failed to heed their calls, I knew they would come and drag me home physically. The eldest of the dryads, along with a few others, lay in wait.

When my parents were within their reach, the roots of the trees rose out of the ground like tendrils. Clumps of dirt fell as the roots coiled like pythons, holding my dim witted parents tight. The roots did not strangle them like the snake would. Instead the roots held them firmly in place.

They screamed out to me, begged me to help them. I paid them no mind. The only good thing they accomplished was blessing the world with my presence. I continued with the dryads in their nightly celebration.

The roots of the elder shook my parents violently sending dirt flying everywhere. What happened next should have terrified me; it should have horrified me to my very soul. Instead, I found solace in the actions of the elder.

The smaller roots burrowed their way into my parents’ flesh, digging into them as they screamed in pain. The elder drained them of all fluids in their bodies. The screaming weakened, and eventually it stopped. When he was finished their corpses were dry and stiff. They looked like mummies without the rags.

The elder opened a hollow in his massive trunk, depositing their bodies inside. Withdrawing the roots from their bodies, he pulled them back into the earth. Two large bunches of mistletoe sprouted from his branches. There my parents’ souls would remain. So long as the elder lived, they would live as well.

At the end of the celebration, four of the dryads walked into the circle of the others. They carried a large box by means of two long poles. The dryads set the ornamented box to the ground and turned it on its side. Precious metals, coins, and jewels poured onto the ground. The dryads dug all of this out of the ground; items lost over many centuries. Some of the coins were minted from a metal I never saw before.

I picked up one of the odd coins to examine it closely. It almost appeared to be glass filled with microscopic flakes of gold and platinum. Most of the coins I sold to collectors through a prestigious auction house. The strange coins sold for millions of dollars each, but the coins of common metals brought in a lot of money as well. I worked with the auction house to sell the jewels, jewelry and other antique items.

I hired an attorney to act as my proxy and to handle the recordkeeping. Through him, I purchased all of the land around mine, dozens of square miles. We created a tax fund, a banking account holding twelve million dollars. The interest alone would pay the taxes on the land for an indefinite period of time. There was no way I was going to let some corperation to come in and ‘modernize’ the area…

I protected my friends and insured their continued existence. I took their seeds, the pecans they dropped to the ground, and planted them all over the land I purchased. The seeds would sprout the next year, giving life to the dryads’ progeny. When they saw me doing this, the maples and the oaks asked me to spread their seed as well.

During this time and for several years to follow I planted trees, tended the forest and enriched the soil. This allowed the dryads to grow healthy and strong. To show their gratitude, the dryads promised to grant me one wish. There was no question of what I wanted. I did not have to struggle to find my greatest desire. My request was a simple one.

The next spring, growing near the elder, was a small vibrant sapling. One day I would grow into a big strong tree. For untold years to come I would celebrate nightly, living with my friends of the orchard.