#hermit's queue

Susy sat straight up, her sleepiness suddenly gone from her. She looked around the room, confused and terrified for what had happened to her siblings. To her shock and amazement, she was back in her own room. She was in her own bed.

“What?” She said “How-how did I get here?!”

She looked over at her sister’s bed, her heart leaping when she saw the tiny form laying there. Susy scrambled out of bed and ran to her sister’s.

 “Faith!” She called, shaking the younger girl’s shoulder. “Faith, wake up!”

A tiny groan came from the girl as tired eyes opened and glared up at her.

“Waswrong?” Faith mumbled, struggling to keep her eyes open.

“Are you alright?” Susy demanded, shaking her once again to keep her from falling back asleep “Are you hurt? Are you in pain? Did something-”

“’Mfine,” Faith mumbled, turning over and closing her eyes once more. “’M still tired. Not wakin’ up yet.”

Susy let out a breathy laugh, tears of relief welling in her eyes. Her sister was alright, albeit tried, but fine. Now all there left to check was-

“Susy?” She heard a tired voice from the doorway call, causing her to whip around “I heard you yellin’. Somethin’ wrong?”

“JOE!”

Without a moment of hesitation, Susy ran to her brother and threw her arms around him. Joe nearly fell backwards, not having been expecting that reaction. He froze for a moment before returning his sister’s embrace. Susy buried her face in his shoulder, her sobs causing her body to shake.

“Hey,” Joe said, shocked at his sister’s behavior. “What’s wrong? You sick ‘r somethin’?”

“You’re back,” Susy sobbed, holding her brother tight. “You’re back ‘n you’re okay. Joe, I-‘M so sorry! I didn’t mean it! Any of it! I thought you were gone ‘n-Oh, Joe, I’m so sorry!”

“’Course ‘m alright,” He said softly, running a hand through her hair to calm her. “It’s alright. You ain’t done nothin’. We’ve fought before, ain’t it so? ‘M alright. I ain’t gone nowhere.”

“But you were!” She cried “You were gone for so long. And all the other times, I thought you were jist bein’ mean! But you weren’t! You were hurt so bad, ‘n jist tryin’ to keep us safe, ‘n ‘m so, so sorry!”

“Susan,” Joe said, forcing her to look at him “I ain’t gone anywhere. I ain’t even sure what you’re talkin’ ‘bout.”  

  Susy looked at him for a moment, wondering if perhaps it had all simply been a bad dream. But as she looked over her brother, seeing the dark circles under his eyes, the bruises that he was now marked with and how skinny he now seemed, she knew it hadn’t been a dream.

‘It….you….don’t remember?” She asked, wiping her eyes and looking at him. “You…everything that happened….all those times you ran off and what happened to you….you don’t remember?”

 “I reckon you jist were havin’ some pretty awful dreams,” He said, giving her a smile. “It’s alright. ‘M sorry for goin’ off, I were only on Jackson’s Island, but I reckon that we both needed time to cool down, ain’t it so? ‘M back, ‘n there ain’t no harm in what happened. ‘M alright.”

Susy hugged her brother, tears coming to her eyes once more. She didn’t know why he didn’t remember, she didn’t know just what had happened. But it didn’t matter. She did know one thing for certain, and that was all she needed to know.

“Joe!” She yelled, tears forming in her eyes “Joe come on! This ain’t funny!”

“Susy…” Faith began, tears falling down her fair face as she pointed to her brother. “Look.”

Susy let go of the boy for a moment to look him over. Joe looked terrible. Though he had always been thin, he looked as if he hadn’t eaten in days. His arms and legs were bruised and there were terribly dark circles under his eyes. His chest didn’t seem to be moving.

“No!” She cried, gently feeling around the boy’s neck for a pulse “No, no, no, no, no!”

Susy let out a choked sob as she felt a very faint heartbeat.

Faith’s sobs rang out loudly in the night air. Trembling, the younger girl gently took a hold of her brother’s hand.

“Please,” She begged, “please wake up, Joe.”

Susy, not willing to give up, stood. Eyes wild and tears falling freely, she called out into the night to the one who had caused this all.

“Stop it!” She cried “You stop it right now! I weren’t meanin’ what I said! Not a word of it! Please! Give him back! I-I don’t want to lose him! I can’t lose him!”

The girl fell to her knees, completely and utterly distraught with grief.

“Please don’t take my brother from me.”

A soft thump behind her caused her to whip around, hoping it had been from Joe. To her horror, the body of her little sister now lay crumbled, leaning against that of her brother.

“FAITH!” She cried, moving quickly towards them “NO!”

As she neared them, her vision began to blur and darken. She collapsed beside them, no longer feeling in control of what was happening to her. As her vision began to go black, she took a hold of her brother’s hand, clinging to him with all she could. Everything went black.

And then, it began again.

At first, Susy thought they were her nightmares returning once again. She saw the grey skinned monster moving about, but this time, he didn’t seem to see her. She watched in horror as the demon, rather than running towards her, took off in the opposite direction, the glass shard glinting in his hand.

Suddenly, the scene changed. She found herself within the cornfield, the demon close by. She watched as it quickly moved toward a figure nearby and plunged the shard within its back. Susy ducked as a murder of crows swarmed around the demon, its screams causing her to bring her hands to her ears.

Again, the scene changed, this time, she was in the woods. Walking along a path before her were a tiny sheep and a creature unlike one she had ever seen before. It was big, tall enough to be a human, but it had fur, a tail, a canine like face and the claws and teeth of a wolf. The color of its fur and its face was, however, one that she couldn’t mistake.

It was Joe.

She watched as the two creatures walked, the wolfish form of her brother becoming more and more agitated until finally he let out a terrible howl and turned upon his poor sheep companion. Susy closed her eyes, not wanting to see the rest and not realizing until she opened them a crack that the scene had changed again.

It was Joe, once again, and he sat cowering within the woodshed. But upon seeing him, it was clear that something was very wrong with him. His skin was the color of a corpse’s and his eye were flaming red. She watched as he curled in on himself, wanting nothing more to help him. She flinched as she heard what seemed to be his stomach growling. She took a step back as he let out a deadly hiss, revealing a pair of sharp fangs and dangerous light came into his eyes. The boy shook his head, causing the light to fade, and pulled his legs tighter to his chest.  

“I…I ain’t gonna give in,” She heard him say to himself “I ain’t gonna hurt anyone.”

Susy’s eyes went wide as she continued to look at the monstrous version of her brother, finally realizing what she was seeing, or rather being shown.  

Though the second one that would come never would get as close, she could feel its presence just as strongly as she could feel the devil who had taken the form of her brother. It seeming to loom over her, as if it was death himself. She ran and ran, but she was always too slow. Just as he would catch her, however, she would jolt awake again. She had a bad feeling that the dreams were tied to what was happened and prayed to Providence that they would go away once they had found Joe.

As Faith half way through the night had awoken and crawled into her bed beside her, Susy had the feeling that her sister wasn’t being spared from the nightmares either. Susy had tried to ask her what she had seen but the little girl wouldn’t answer, instead choosing to curls herself close to her older sister and try to stop trembling. Susy could have sworn she had heard Faith mutter something about a wolf, but if her sister didn’t want to talk about it, she wasn’t going to push it.

Both girls, to say the least, were more than relieved when the first lights of day came spilling through their window. However, their relief was short lived as the morning’s light revealed the white envelope that Susy had somehow known would be waiting for them. With trembling hands, she detached her little sister from herself, picked up the letter and tore it open.

𝓒𝓵𝓮𝓿𝓮𝓻 𝓓𝓪𝓻𝓵𝓲𝓷𝓰𝓼, 

      𝓘 𝓪𝓹𝓹𝓵𝓪𝓾𝓭 𝔂𝓸𝓾 𝓸𝓷 𝔂𝓸𝓾𝓻 𝓫𝓻𝓪𝓿𝓮𝓻𝔂. 𝓨𝓸𝓾’𝓿𝓮 𝓶𝓪𝓷𝓪𝓰𝓮𝓭 𝓽𝓸 𝓻𝓮𝓽𝓻𝓲𝓮𝓿𝓮 𝓪𝓵𝓵 𝓽𝓱𝓪𝓽 𝓘 𝓱𝓪𝓿𝓮 𝓪𝓼𝓴𝓮𝓭. 𝓐𝓷𝓭 𝓼𝓸, 𝓽𝓻𝓾𝓮 𝓽𝓸 𝓶𝔂 𝔀𝓸𝓻𝓭, 𝓘 𝔀𝓲𝓵𝓵 𝓱𝓸𝓵𝓭 𝓾𝓹 𝓸𝓷 𝓶𝔂 𝓮𝓷𝓭 𝓸𝓯 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓭𝓮𝓪𝓵 𝓪𝓼 𝔀𝓮𝓵𝓵. 𝓑𝓻𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓸𝓫𝓳𝓮𝓬𝓽𝓼, 𝓪𝓵𝓵 𝓽𝓱𝓻𝓮𝓮, 𝓲𝓷𝓽𝓸 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓭𝓮𝓮𝓹𝓮𝓼𝓽 𝓹𝓪𝓻𝓽 𝓸𝓯 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓸𝓻𝓬𝓱𝓪𝓻𝓭 𝓽𝓸𝓷𝓲𝓰𝓱𝓽 𝓪𝓽 𝓶𝓲𝓭𝓷𝓲𝓰𝓱𝓽 𝓪𝓷𝓭 𝓽𝓱𝓮𝓻𝓮 𝓪𝓵𝓵 𝔀𝓲𝓵𝓵 𝓫𝓮 𝓻𝓮𝓿𝓮𝓪𝓵𝓮𝓭 

𝓢𝓲𝓷𝓬𝓮𝓻𝓮𝓵𝔂,  𝓐 𝓕𝓻𝓲𝓮𝓷𝓭

“Revealed?!” Faith asked, tears forming in her eyes. “I thought you said they were gonna give 'em back!”

“They’re gonna,” Susy all but growled. “’M done playin’ their game. If’n they try ‘n hold ‘em any longer, they’re gonna regret it.”

                                                          ********

The day had gone both entirely too slowly and too quickly for the Harper girls, both scared out of their wits about what they would be facing that evening. But the two sisters were determined. They had done what was asked and hell or high water, they would be going home with their brother that night.

As the hour drew near, the two girls prepared themselves for the journey. Susy had considered taking Joe’s gun with them, but decided against it. She had no idea what this person had in mind for them, and she didn’t want to risk hurting her brother in any way. With the glass tucked in her apron pocket, the sickle in her hand and the broken crook in Faith’s, the two girls snuck out of the house and made their way towards the orchard.

Everything felt wrong.

The trees that had over bared witness to some of her happiest moments now filled Susy with a sickening sense of dread and fear that they never had before. Faith, feeling it as well, stuck close to her sister’s side and took a hold of her hand. The entire orchard felt wrong, as if a cold, vile winter wind were blowing through it, the kind that left you feeling as if you would never be warm and happy again. Susy felt as if their every step was being watched.

As the sickening sweet laugh that had haunted her dreams filled the air, her fear was confirmed. Faith clung to her, scared out of her wits, but Susy stood firm, her temper rising.

She had had enough. She was done playing. She would get her brother back.

“We’ve brought what you asked,” She said into the inky dark of night, her voice grown stronger with each word. “We’ve done what you wanted. Now you do what you said you would! Where’s Joe?!”

The laugh began to grow louder and colder, making Susy feel as if whoever it belonged to were standing right behind him.

“ 𝓗𝓮 𝓲𝓼 𝓱𝓮𝓻𝓮,” A chilling voice came from seeming nowhere came “ 𝓤𝓹 𝓪𝓱𝓮𝓪𝓭. ”

Susy nearly froze with fright as she heard the voice on the one who had done this outright. She would have stayed frozen, if Faith hadn’t let out a cry and pulled her forward.

There, laying crumbled beneath one of the trees up head was Joe.

“‘Lost within the sea of tall reeds holds a memory from the past. A small and dreadful token, ripped from a drunkard’s grasp. Not full itself, it’s just a part, but sharp enough to pierce a heart. So run off now, don’t try to hide, should you get lost, the crows will guide.’ It’s shard from a bottle ‘n it’s in this cornfield somewhere, the reeds ‘n crows sayin’ that much, but I hain’t got a clue what somethin’ like that’d be doin’ here or why anyone’d be wantin’ it.  ”

Susy shuddered, not liking this one bit. Though she feared that she had put her little sister in danger by allowing her to come along, she was grateful to not have to search for the object alone. Still, the sooner they found the object and got out of there, the better.

 “I’ll go this way ‘n you go ‘n look over there,” She said, pointing to the opposite direction. “If’n you find anythin’ ‘r need anythin’, you yell right away ‘n I’ll come runnin’.”

Faith nodded and headed off, leaving Susy to her own search. She tried to focus on finding the glass, but the eerie feeling that seemed to surround the cornfield was really getting to her. The place, which was perfectly normal in the day time, felt dark and haunted in the dim light of twilight. She pulled her coat close, eyes straining to see any glimmer upon the ground that could be the glass.

Susy’s blood ran cold as she felt a presence behind her. Whipping around, heart beating wildly, she nearly screamed at the sight of the old scarecrow that was behind her. She let out a small sigh of relief, chiding herself for her fear. Though the old scarecrow didn’t cause her any unease now that she knew it was there, the three black crows that sat upon her made her feel slightly nervous. Their black eyes glared down at her, almost watching her every move. She looked over the scarecrow, wishing the birds would go away. Her eyes narrowed in confusion as she looked closer at the dummy, somewhat confused by the large cut hole within its back.

“What-“

“Susy!” Her sister’s excited voice called from a ways off “I’ve got it! I found the glass shard!”

Susy ran over to her sister, trying to ignore the feeling of the crow’s eyes still upon her. Sure enough, Faith had found a large shard of glass. The piece was old, covered in dirt and looking as it had been out there for a while, but it still looked wicked sharp.

“You reckon it’s the right one?” Faith asked, looking up at her sister with wide, worried-filled eyes.

“It’s gotta be,” Susy replied “’N if’n it ain’t, then whoever’s doin’ this’ll jist have to be content with it on account of them not bein’ specific ‘bout which glass in a cornfield they was wantin’. Come on, Faith. Let’s get goin’ home. Ain’t no point in stickin’ ‘round ‘n riskin’ Mama ‘n Pap findin’ out we’re gone.”

This whole mess was really taking its toll on the young girl. She hadn’t been sleeping and she had hardly eaten since the day she had talked to Ben. Susy wanted nothing more than to have her brother home safe and sound again. And to make matters worse, Faith hadn’t spoken a word to her since their fight. Out of the three of them, Susy knew that Faith had the kindest heart and was the least likely to hold a grudge or anger. But this was different. Both of the girls, though Susy would never admit it out loud, saw their older brother as their hero, and it was her fault that Joe was gone. Perhaps one day Faith would forgive her, but things between them would never be the same again if something were to happen to Joe.

If she failed, if she couldn’t get him back, Susy knew she’d lose both of her siblings and it would be entirely her fault.

She shook her head, trying to send the thoughts away. She knew they wouldn’t do her any good and there was no point in lingering on them. With a sigh, as to prepare herself for the letter she knew would be there, she went into her and her sister’s shared bedroom.

As she entered, her skin paled and eyes grew wide. The letter she had been expecting. What she hadn’t been expecting was to see it in the hands of her little sister, who looked horrified and had tears running down her pale face.

“Faith,” Susy started “I-“

Whatever excuse she had been planning on giving was cut off as the youngest Harper child threw herself at her sister. The force brought both of the girls to the ground. Susy managed to sit up, despite that Faith continued to cling to her.

“I thought you were gone!” She cried “You didn’t come home last night, ‘n you weren’t here when I woke up! I thought you’d disappeared, jist like Joe did ‘n I-Oh, Susy, ‘m so sorry!”

Susy, still in shock, simply held the crying girl close, running a hand through her hair in an attempt to soothe her.

“It’s alright,” She said softly “It’s gonna be okay. ‘M here. I ain’t goin’ anywhere. I ain’t disappeared. It’s okay.”

“Where were you?” Faith asked, still sounding miserable, “‘N whose been sending you letters like this’n? I don’t understand what it’s meanin’, asking you what it is ‘n givin’ a riddle.”

“It’s-“ Susy started, but the look of fear and desperation to understand on her sister’s face caught her tongue. She sighed, knowing that it would be wrong to keep lying to her and that it wouldn’t do any of them any good at this point. “Alright, I’ll tell you. But you ain’t able to tell nobody, promise?”

The tiny girl nodded, looking up at her sister with bright, frightened green eyes.

“It’s a crook, that’s plain ‘nough,” She thought. “But what’s that got to do with Joe? We ain’t ever had any sheep!”

Never the less, with the hint of the emphasis on forest, Susy had ventured deep within the forest in search for the shepherd’s crook. The more she wandered, the further her thoughts wandered as well. Where was Joe? Was he safe? Was he hurt? What on earth did these objects have to do with anything?

 She sighed, once again coming to a large tree and the end of the path. She had been searching for hours and yet still hadn’t seen any sort of a sign of the shepherd’s crook. She sat down on one of the trees long exposed roots, trying to think of just where the crook could be. But the more she thought, the more discouraged she became and the more her hopelessness grew.

“Oh, Joe,” She sighed “I’m so sorry. I…I weren’t thinkin’ straight. I ought not’ve ever said that truck to you ‘n I wish I’d’ve listened to Faith ‘n taken it back…”

Her brother and she fought so very often and it was something Susy regretted, though her pride would never let her admit it. They were simply too different, like night and day, and so they butted heads. But there were times, those rare and precious moments, where they got along and saw eye to eye perhaps in a way that not even their younger sister could.

Though she would never admit it, being tricked into believing Joe had drowned had done her some good. She never had felt as terrible as she had the day of his funeral, thinking she would never see him again.

“’N now he’s gone for real this time,” She said miserably “It ain’t jist him bein’ foolish. He’s missin’. He could be hurt bad for all I know! He could be-“

Tears began to well in the girl’s eyes, her heart near breaking at the thought, but she quickly brushed them away. There was still a chance to save him, a way to get him back and Susy knew that sitting there crying certainly wasn’t going to help either of them.

Susy slowly stood, determined once again to continue her search. As she went to walk away, a bit of her dress snagged on part of the root she had been sitting on. Not wanting to tear her dress, she leaned down to gently pry the fabric away. As she did, she noticed something strange. The root, or rather what she had thought was a root, that her dress had snagged on didn’t look like a root at all. It looked like splintered wood.

Confused and yet hopeful, she carefully gave the piece a small tug. By and by, the piece proved not to be a root nor part of the tree at all.

It was the crook.

The tool was broken, looking like it was missing its bottom half, but Susy figured the top half would do. Smiling, she looked over the strange object, wondering just how it had come to be there.

Still, she had to try. But it felt as if she wasn’t going anywhere. As if her feet were made of lead and the ground was trying to hold her down. All around her she could hear its laughter, so familiar and yet so cold, mingling with that of another’s.

Suddenly, her foot caught on root and caused her to trip. She fell, hitting the ground hard and sending a surge of pain running through her. She tried to get back up, to scramble away, but it was too late. His icy grip had a hold of her ankle. She twisted and fought, desperate to escape, but it was hopeless. He was so much stronger than her.

He pinned her to the ground, holding her wrists tight. She looked up at him, wide blue eyes meeting his pitch black ones. Eyes that should have been emerald green, gray skin that should have match her own and that horrible grin that never should have appeared on the face of her brother.

“Please!” She pleaded “P-please let me go!”

“Ain’t gonna happen,” The creature said, grinning down at her “’Sides, it’s your fault ‘m here. Ain’t this want you wanted? Your brother gone? I reckon we both win this way.”

The eyes of the monstrous version of Joe began to glow and an icy, painful feeling began to run through her. She desperately tried to break free of his hold, but his grip was too strong.

She screamed as the pain increased, causing the devil to laugh. As her eyes began to darken, the pain too much for her to handle, she heard a voice. The voice was sickening sweet and far different from that of her brother’s or the monstrous version of him.

                    “ 𝓣𝓲𝓶𝓮’𝓼 𝓽𝓲𝓬𝓴𝓲𝓷𝓰, 𝓶𝔂 𝓭𝓮𝓪𝓻, 𝓫𝓮𝓽𝓽𝓮𝓻 𝓱𝓾𝓻𝓻𝔂.”

                                                             ****

Susy woke with a jolt, her eyes wide and wild and her heart beating hard. She looked around, lost and frightened to have woken in a strange, dark place. As she recognized the familiar sights of the woodshed bathed in moonlight, her heartbeat began to slow. Her dream still left her feeling chilled to the bone and she shuddered as she thought of the dreadful creature.

“Skin gray and his eyes as black as coal”

Though there parents hadn’t allowed the girls to know very much about what had happened to their brother that October years ago, Susy had heard enough of the stories. Though Ben and some of the other boys who were loyal to Joe were trying there hardest to put the rumors to rest, they weren’t able to heal the uneasy feelings that had been created by the story that Muff had told. The thought of her brother doing so horrible or worse, having something so horrible happen to him made Susy’s blood run cold.

She shook her head, trying to push the dream and her thoughts from her mind. She slowly got to her feet and looked around. It was late, very late, and she knew well enough that if she would be caught going back into the house at this hour she would be in a great deal of trouble.

 “I must’ve fallen asleep,” She said to herself, stifling a yawn “must’ve got tired while I was waitin’ to get-“

The sickle!

Susy looked up and, to her great relief, it appeared that the winged creatures that had previously guarded the tool had flown for the evening. Being as quick and as careful as she could, Susy climbed back up the wood pile to retrieve the tool.

As she took a hold of the sickle to bring it down, a bat suddenly swooped out from the darkened corner of the room. Susy let out a scream and, having lost her footing on the wood due to her fear, fell to the ground with a loud thud.

She groaned in pain, glaring up at the place the bat had come from.

“Low down, awful, vermin,” She huffed under her breath as she picked herself up. “I’d have my Pap shoot you if’n he’d do it.”

As if it had been listening, a bat crawled down from the ceiling and hung upon the woodpile, looking at her with small dark eyes. She shuddered and quickly hurried out of the shed, feeling rather uneasy.

“Least I got it,” She said with a sigh, looking down at the silver sickle in her hand “I jist hope whatever they want next ain’t got anythin’ to do with bats.”

Susy headed back to the house and sent a word of thanks to Providence when she was able to sneak in the house without waking her parents or sister. Too tired to change out of her clothes, she hid the sickle under her bed side table and slid into her bed.

She’d come up with an explanation for where she’d been and the coat she still wore in the morning. For now, all she wanted to do was sleep and hopefully sleep without any horrible dreams.

She pulled open the doors and made her way inside the tiny shed. Though most of their tools were kept within the mill, a few, such as the sickle in question, were kept in the woodshed so that it would be easier for their mother to find them when she needed them in her garden and flower beds.

A small frown came to the young girls face, however, as the hook on which her father usually hung the sickle held not the tool, but rather a dark old coat. Susy went over to it and pulled it down, looking the old tattered thing over.

The poor coat had certainly seen better days. It was well worn and tearing in some places, the bottoms of it terribly frayed as if someone much too small had been wearing it and allowing it to drag upon the ground. She searched the pockets and, much to her surprise, found not the sickle as she had hoped but another note, this one containing but two words

                                                  “ 𝓛𝓸𝓸𝓴 𝓤𝓹”

Susy looked up and felt her heart sink. She could see the sickle, hanging from a board and easy enough to reach, but what was there alongside caused her to nearly shriek out of fear.

Bats.

The poor girl trembled, torn between her fear of the tiny creatures and her desire to retrieve the object. She didn’t dare go near them, knowing too well that a bite or a scratch could leave her horribly ill, but she wouldn’t give up on her quest do to something so small. She couldn’t. Who knew what was happening to Joe? Where he was at? If he was safe?

Taking a breath for courage, Susy carefully began to climb up onto one of the wood piles to retrieve the sickle. The pieces of wood shift beneath her as she climbed, hoping with each moment that they wouldn’t slip out from under her.

She went as high as she dared risk and reached a shaking hand out to try to snatch the tool. Just her fingers brushed against the metal of the blade, one of the bats awoke and let out a dreadful shriek. Susy snatched her hand back in fright and nearly fell. Taking a bit more care, she climbed down from the wood pile, eyes never leaving the winged creature above her.

“I-I’ll wait,” She decided, sitting down upon the ground. “I’ll wait till night, ‘n then when they wake up ‘n fly away, I’ll get the sickle.”