Kendall Elder

The valley of Perish is one of many, without much to distinguish it besides different faces attached to different bodies. In it resided ordinary folk, living day by day. It had its town drunk, a single local healer, and a run-down town center. They even had a school at some point, but not enough boys cared to learn how to read or subtract, and the girls weren’t allowed. The people there were not very superstitious, too busy tracking the harvest to worry themselves with creeping shadows and trees with faces. But they still set out a bowl of milk each night, the same as any other village, for there was one superstition the villagers could not ignore.

If you venture deep into the surrounding forest, you would wander upon a stump. Some said it gave off a stench so sickly sweet that it made your stomach turn with hunger. Others said the stump oozed a sticky red liquid similar to sap but not quite right. But no matter where the tale came from, it was always said that if you sat on the stump from dusk to dawn, a creature would grant you your greatest wish. This gift always came with a price that was often far too large for the gift given. It was a tale meant to keep children out of the woods at night, but every once in a while, someone would enter the woods in the evening and return the next morning. They would perform a miracle only for tragedy to strike. 

In this small town lived an old widowed farmer with a single boy as his company. The boy, who was nearly a man named Kallan, never had a mother nor wanted one. He and his father, the farmer, were plenty close and only needed themselves and food to eat. They were content and as close to happy as one could be in the town of Perish. The boy was of the sordid type, never attracting more than a mewing stray cat wanting attention and pets. Perhaps it was his father to blame, who was also just as much of a sad character as his son. 

As it happens in these tales, the farmer was a lonely, guilt-stricken man. “Never quite the same after the wife passed,” is what the townspeople whispered when he made his short trip to the village. A misanthrope through and through, always looking over his shoulder and his son’s, too, who was too busy playing make-believe to look over his own. Paranoid of disease and the creature that stalks the wood. And sometimes, his paranoia was justified.

 One early autumn, an illness struck the village. It clogged the nose and created sores that even the healer from the next town over couldn’t ail. The boy thought himself and his father invincible. There was no reason for worry. 

One morning, Kallan woke up with the sun just like any other day. He brought the now-empty milk bowl into the kitchen and prepared breakfast. He sat at the table, waiting for his father to wake up like he always did. When the food became cold all the way through, the boy became worried but waited in fear of disturbing his father. When an hour passed and the sun had fully risen from the mountains, he cautiously walked towards the door. He entered the room of his father to find him sickly and pale, overcome by the disease that had struck the town.

Having heard of the suffering that came with the sickness and what followed, the boy was overwhelmed with grief and worry. He’d heard the stories of the stump, how it could help you perform miracles. He’d also heard of the tragedy that struck soon after, but he paid it no mind. He was different; he could charm anyone, maybe anything. 

At a quarter past noon, he set out after leaving his father with food, drink, and medicine to calm the pain. He marched through the forest, searching for the stump. When he noticed the sun starting to set, his nerves began, and he started to lose hope. But right as the sun’s edge touched the horizon, he turned a tree, and there it was. The stump had sap leaking from the sides, just as the stories said. The surrounding trees were grey and withered. The stench was overwhelming and made his stomach growl with hunger and disgust. 

Without hesitation, he sat and waited. His feet were exhausted and his head felt heavy, but he refused to give in and stayed awake until dawn. As he sat there in the darkness of the forest, he noticed the silence. No wind, no branches snapping as a squirrel climbed over them. Not even the sound of a bird was heard. At some point, the boy became aware of the sound of his blood rushing in his ears, the thumping of his quick heart. Fear was pumping through him, but he just thought of his father. His father was always too safe. His father lying in that bed, weak and scared. 

 When the blinding sun finally peeked over the mountaintop, a creature’s silhouette blocked it. It was long and wiry, its body made of tangled roots and vines. There were bones in between them, some small and delicate, others unmistakably human. The same sap that left the stump also slipped in between the creature’s labyrinth of bones and earth, occasionally hitting the ground with a sizzle. The stench that left the stump also came from the creature’s breath as it spoke. It leaned its long body forward until the heat of its breath rushed over the boy’s face.  

“Who are you to sit on my stump? I waited all through the dark for you to give me back my resting place. For your resilience, I will give you a gift. For your ignorance, I will give you a punishment as well.” 

The creature spoke from a head of white bone, its voice coming from nowhere and articulated by no tongue, just echoing throughout the quiet. 

“I am looking for the touch of health. My father has come down with an incurable illness, and I wish to help him.” The boy said, swallowing the fear surfacing from the sight of the thing in front of him. 

“A noble cause indeed.” It spoke without an ounce of humanity, “Fine, I will grant you your gift.” Its voice resembled no gender nor had any distinct pitch. It was static, and silence formulated into words that filled the woods around.

“And my punishment?” the boy asked, feeling his muscles begin to coil into the position of flight even as he tried to appear calm.

“You will know soon enough,” it said, then brushed its long fingers against the boy’s cheek. Although the creature used little force, blood poured from the new scratch on the boy’s cheek. 

The boy ran then, no longer able to contain his fear and ecstasy. He ran back to the farm, never looking back. He ran to his father’s room, driven by the hope that his father would be cured. He gripped his father’s hand and watched as his skin brightened and his sores faded. His father awoke, a new spark in his eyes that the boy had never seen before.

They celebrated, dancing and yelling. Only when his father had fallen asleep did the regret sink in. The creature had accepted too readily, not even a hint of restraint on making the deal. But again, the boy was naive and full of happiness. His father was smiling and singing, and he was just overthinking it. They fell asleep with the day’s clothes still on and their smiles wide. When they woke, an expression of dread instead clouded their faces. Across their field, every single crop had died. The boy panicked, and the man fell silent. The boy ran through the fields and rolled in them, but his touch did nothing. Tragedy had fired, and it had hit its mark.

The father, who had no idea where his son’s power had come from, didn’t understand his son’s guilt. He was blessed, and the night’s frost must have killed the crops, nothing to do with his little boy. No one was stupid enough to seek out the stump.  

Once the boy had seen his father to bed, he set out again. He ran until the stump was there in front of him again. He sat down just before the last of the sun dipped behind the mountains. He sat there until sunrise, not ever feeling the pull of sleep. But the creature never came. He waited and waited, losing tracks of days, never leaving the spot. 

The boy’s will ran thin. His stomach ached, and his bones creaked. He was just about to leave when the creature appeared. 

“Day and night,” it said, the stench from its breath suffocating, “you have waited at this stump, robbing me of my peace and rest. I warned you of your punishment, and you received it rightfully so. And yet you sit here, upset over what? A fair deal? No, I will not tolerate such things. There will be no gift, only punishment. You will know nothing but suffering.” It reached its hand, and the boy was so tired he had no time to react. 

The creature’s hand swept and whipped against his cheek. He went flying into a tree, its dead bark flaking onto him. He stood and found the beast once again gone. He walked home, dragging his feet through the now-dead fields. He walked into his once lively home and found it disheveled. He made his way to his father’s room, dread creeping into his chest, lungs, and stomach. The door creaked open against his gentle nudge. He knew that smell. 

There his father lay, lonely, starved, and dead, hanging by a rope that draped over the roof’s support beams.  The boy realized how many days he’d lost track of, how many days he’d left his father alone to deal with his mistakes—the father, who thought that once again, he had been abandoned when life went wrong.  The boy, overcome with grief, ran into the village to seek help. 

He ran through the streets, screaming for someone to pity him, but no one did. They had seen what had happened. They had known of the miracle that was performed on his father, and they had seen the calamity that followed. They knew that there was always someone desperate enough to go to the stump, and now the boy was that fool.  No one dared look him in the eyes,  to speak to him, to acknowledge him. He was a ghost. 

So he left the village and did what he thought best. He could not return home, not with the carnage left there, with his father’s rotting body still hanging. He set out to the woods for the final time, now driven by anger rather than desperation or fear. Hot burning rage that warmed his body in the cold autumn air. He walked and hiked. His anger started to fade, and his feet ached. At some point, his walking turned to wandering, looking to end the stump and the misery it caused. But it never showed. He wandered, retracing his steps. The sun set and rose again. He wandered, singing and waling a song of grief and disturbance. Of lost happiness. At some point, his feet stopped aching, and his stomach stopped growling. He no longer felt an ache in his bones that prevented him from walking further to find that cursed stump. The leaves stopped crunching beneath his feet, but he didn’t notice. He didn’t care. He wanted to find the stump and fix this madness. To be given the miracle he deserved. He wailed, and he sang the same songs he and his father had sung that night they had danced, and all seemed right in the world. He walked, and he wandered. 

***

In the valley of Perish, whose residents were ordinary peasants, there weren’t many superstitions. But every night, after a bowl of milk was left out for the creature in the woods, mothers would tuck in their sons and daughters. They would tell the tale of the boy who wandered into the forest, grieving over the father who paid for his mistakes. It is said that if you seek him out, he will brush your cheek and heal your soul, but the price you will pay will never be worth it. 

The children slept easy, believing in the boy just as much as the creature and the lost stump. But on late summer nights, when the harvest is known to be its best, you can hear his wails. He never leaves the forest but wanders, looking for the lost stump.

–

Kendall Elder is a 16-year-old high schooler who uses writing as a way to put some of her thought out on paper so that some others might relate and understand. She discovered writing through the help of her teachers and has fallen in love with it ever since.