The Forsaken

On the shores of once upon a long time ago, an old, abandoned shrine stands guard over the dilapidated, little town of Orinshire. Each and every night, as the sun approaches the horizon, the strong, solemn staccato of the shrine’s bell punctuates the quiet shuffle of life below. The streets empty of people, in unison everyone files into their ramshackle homes; ‘closed’ signs simultaneously snap in storefronts; and a resounding ‘click’ of doors locking into place echoes throughout the forsaken town.

Night is on the verge of falling and with it the promise of unsolicited darkness. Those unfortunate souls who are caught outside when the final vestiges of light fade and the darkness settles, are those who are forsaken.

It is why the shrine bell rings it’s warning toll, a beckoning to run and hide.

Tonight however, the bell does not toll. Only when someone looks up and sees the sky has turned a spectacular, fevered red, do they realize what has happened.

“The darkness comes!”

Upon hearing this doors slam shut and everyone is clambering to find shelter. It is no holds barred as Orinshire seeks asylum from oncoming chaos.

In the midst of all of this, a young, freckle-faced girl with a shock of wild, red hair, runs.

Wren Hart’s bare feet slap against the cobblestone road, as she maneuvers around packs of panicked people. At first glance it might appear that she is running away. There is determination in her deep-set eyes though, intent on a destination; she does not run away, but towards something.

Everyone, however, is too focused on finding refuge to notice and that is exactly what she is counting on.

Old, iron street-lamps start to flicker to life, casting pools of warm amber light onto the quaint town streets. It is not, by any means, enough to dispel the danger of the dark, but it does break it apart long enough for Wren to see what is up ahead.

Mangled bodies lay crumpled in a puddle of freshly spilled blood. She swallows the bile that rises in the back of her throat as she leaps over the bank of bodies. They are not casualties of the darkness, but of human desperation, and it is this, not the wreak of death, that sickens her.

The heart-shaped locket nestled under her tunic slams against her collarbone as her feet land and she starts running again.

“Let us in!” The crowd chants as she wheels around another corner.

One of the local shop owners - the Candy Man as he is affectionately referred to by the residents of Orinshire - has made the fatal mistake of opening his door. A swarm of them rush at it. The closer she gets, the more obvious it becomes that he, despite being seven feet tall and a wall of muscle, will not be able to hold them back. She tries not to think about the Candy Man’s kind, crooked smile and his promise to save her one of the purple lollipop, when the door comes crashing down. She tries to ignore the crunch and the agonized screams of the Candy Man being trampled, as she darts by the confectionery and towards her destination.

In her peripheral vision she can see the shadows start to shift from harmless, flat shapes, into danger incarnate. Only the horizon remains lit, still bright and spectacular with the fiery remnants of the sun’s light; it is not enough to keep the darkness at bay however, and it won’t be long before Hell reins down on the sleepy little town.

Emancipated from its obscure imprisonment, menacingly sharp talons of darkness reach out, grabbing for her, as she rounds a corner. She feels the claw graze the cloth of her tunic and she shivers from the cold that radiates from that touch.

Wren had hoped that the chaos Orinshire had been thrown into would be enough to distract the darkness, but the shadows stay on her, nipping at her heels. She tries to pick up her speed, but with each step she takes brings with it a jolt of fresh, unsolicited pain. It won’t be long before her muscles give way, and she is tumbling back down into the open maw of darkness.

Until then, she runs.

Up ahead is a well-kept shanty dressed in lush grass, vines and pops of colour - Aunt Carroll’s house. With this realization comes relief, but not because she has finally found reprieve - she knows better. Only those with a heart bigger than their brain, as Gram Hart liked to say, will open their doors now.

No, relief finds her because she nears her destination.

Faced now with long, narrow and steep stairs, she feels the first traces of doubt. Exhaustion is already weighing on her small shoulders, her breath comes in hard and fast, and her vision is starting to blur at the edges; she wonders if she has made a terrible mistake.

Perhaps if she just had a few moments to rest her battered and bloodied feet, she could go on.

‘Do not stop.’ It is Gram Hart’s voice that urges her onward.

So, Wren climbs; one by one she pulls herself up the stairs that lead up to the shrine. Adrenaline is not enough to keep her going though; her legs are starting to shake from the effort, and she stumbles, cracking her knee against one of the concrete stairs.

It takes all of one second for the darkness to take advantage of her misstep and wrap its cold fingers around her bare ankle. This is enough to startle away the lethal combination of fatigue and doubt that has ensnared her willpower. She rips her ankle free and starts back up the stairs, this time with the disadvantage of a limp.

Over the crest of the stairs, she can make out the bone-white columns of the timeworn shrine reaching up towards the increasingly darkening sky. It looks more like a jail cell than it does a holy site.

Reinvigorated, she tears up the stairs until the shrine’s ornate fountain becomes visible and she can hear the water splashing over its three tiers.

She almost weeps at the sight of Orinshire’s symbol of hope.

That’s when a blast of cold air slams into her and the weight of eternal darkness presses down upon her.

“The darkness does not kill. What it is does is far worse than death.” Gram Hart had warned while her old, gnarled hands worked away at the clasp on Wren’s necklace. She can still feel the gentle touch of her hands brushing back Wren’s hair as the heart shaped locket settled on her collarbone. “Those who survive the touch of darkness are what we call the living dead. They cannot die.”

“What’s so bad about that?” she remembers asking, looking at her Gram through the vanity mirror.

“That’s what the first victims of the darkness thought…” Gram Hart had clucked. “Though they cannot die, they continue to age and be plagued by whatever ailments come with old age …They became shells of what they had once been, barely existing past the pain. Never let the darkness sink its teeth into your flesh. It is a curse, Wren.”

Suddenly the world around her is thrown into pitch dark. She tries to scramble out of its reach, but it is everywhere and nowhere all at once; the darkness slips over her and terror pours through her.

This is it, she realizes, this is how it ends.

Vaguely she feels the locket Gram had draped around her neck all those years ago. Her calloused finger traces the intricate details carved into the soft gold locket where, not a picture, but a note scribbled in her Gram’s cursive remains.

‘Hope is being able to see that there is light despite all of the darkness.’

If she could, she might have laughed at the irony of the note she’s read over and over again since her Gram was taken by the darkness all those years ago.

That’s when she sees it - a light out of the corner of her eye.

At first, she thinks death is upon her, that she is seeing the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel, but then the world around Wren flickers back to life. In each one of the surrounding stone-walled shanty windows sits an unsteady candle and a shadowy, skeletal figure framed by the light.

Wren can’t believe her eyes.

Often called the Walk of the Damned, the district leading up to the shrine is inhabited by survivors of the darkness. Those cursed by immortality live here, on the outskirts of town, exiled.

Wren had been under the impression that the living dead were long since expired -not quite dead, but incapable of living. So quiet and unimposing, it is a surprise -and a relief- to see that they can still function.

There is hope yet, she thinks.

Though only sunlight deters the darkness completely, it loathes any source of natural light. In response, the darkness peels back from the candlelight spilling out onto the street, hissing.

Nonplus, Wren watches as the darkness yowls in what might have been pain.

“Wren, run!” A shrill, familiar voice - Gram, she realizes - breathes into her ear.

Light-headed, the world around her tilts as she tries to regain her footing. Brought to her senses, she doesn’t dare look over her shoulder before running like hell towards the shrine.

Down the Walk of the Damned, Wren runs. She can feel the darkness breathing down her neck as she leaves the safety of candlelight.

Wren careens around the fountain and through the garden. So close, now she can see the talismans undulating in the gust of wind summoned by the darkness.

Tears of joy slide down her cheeks, as she stumbles up the final stairs up into the shrine.

She’s made it!

There had been a time, many moons ago, when the Shrine of Orinshire had housed the darkness, keeping the world safe from its ravenous hunger. Curiosity in the form of a child however, had opened the shrine’s door on a dare one devastating night, setting it loose on the world. The High Priestesses did what they could to save the world, but it meant a sacrifice.

Orinshire was that sacrifice.

No one could enter or leave the forsaken town, which meant they were stuck there doomed to live forever under the reign of darkness. A small price to pay to put a stop to the end of the world.

There is only way out.

If the darkness can somehow be led back into captivity, then Orinshire would be free.

Over a century has passed and everyone has all but given up trying to break free from the curse. Too many have become victims of the darkness, set to live in this hell forsaken town for eternity.

Until tonight.

Of the many tales her gram had once told her, one had always resonated with her. It was the one about the greedy fox who chased a rabbit around the garden, determined to catch its prey, no matter the cost. This went on for many days and many nights. Tired of running, the rabbit laid a trap. It ran circles around the garden, ran and ran and ran, until the fox was so intent on catching him that it didn’t notice the hole the rabbit hopped over. By the time it realized its mistake, the fox had fallen into the hole and was trapped.

So intent on feeding off of her, the darkness didn’t realize it had fallen into her trap.

Wren had succeeded where the others had failed!

Her foot finds purchase on the top stair and she eagerly pulls on the sliding screen door, the final hurdle in her campaign for freedom.

Except the door doesn’t yield.

Locked.

Darkness descends.