Wary Townsfolk

The village had no name on newer maps, and on gps it shows as a dead end. It is mostly know to exist through word of the mouth for people with relatives on there, like Karina. Hidden between dense pinewood hills and rolling valleys, it existed in solitary from the world beyond.

By day, it was a place of muted routines. The sun would rise, brushing the crooked rooftops in gold, but the warmth never seemed to reach the people. Doors creaked open slowly and cautiously. Farmers bent to their fields without speaking. Children played and ran around, but never far from home.

Strangers, if they ever wandered in, would find no anger here, no cruelty. Only distance. The villagers weren’t unfriendly. Just unreachable. Eyes lowered when met. If familiar, a quick nod. Smiles faded too quickly. A greeting might be offered, but never a name. Karina took note of this and kept to herself on her jog around.

‘Is there seriously no where to buy a sanitary pad around here?’ Karina mumbled to herself as she slowed her pace in front of her grandmothers house.

Winona, her grandmother, was originally from the city, like her. She fell in love with her late grandfather who was a resident of Aklan and they both decided to move into the village after retiring. Her grandfather, Gregory, was known by the villagers to be a very outstanding man. He was born and brought up in the same house.

They both lived a humble life. They worked the land. They mended their tools. They lived simply, bound to the earth and to each other.

‘What did I tell you about wearing those ear piece things when going out?’ Winona welcomed with a grimace.

‘And what did I tell you about lifiing heavy objects?’ Karina rebutted. She was her own granddaughter after all. She had the same level of feisty.

‘Didn’t I come here to help out with the heavy things? Why can’t you take it easy for a second? You’re lucky someone found you lying on the farm and not left overnight.’ Karina said as she grabbed a container full of leafy vegetable and herbs from Winona.

‘Alright. Help me cook. And no more going out. The sun sets early today.’

‘Which of this neighbour rescued you?’ Inquired Karina.

‘Don’t speak of it.’ Winona warned.

What’s so wrong with thanking personally the person who saved my grandma? Karina thought to herself as she heeded Winona’s advice to not ask.

The villagers were not cruel nor unwelcoming. They simply survived. Each home was quiet. Neat. Worn, but cared for with a kind of quiet reverence. Protection symbols were carved into doorframes and window sills. Old runes and twisted figures passed down through generations. Salt was kept in little glass bowls, never empty, never touched. The well in the center of the village had a lid bolted shut each night.

The forest surrounding them was old, its trees heavy with secrets. But it was not the forest they feared. It was what moved through it. What watched. No one spoke of it during the day. But at night, when the winds shifted and the fire crackled a bit too loud, they remembered.

The skinwalker.

Some said it was a cursed spirit, once human, born of betrayal and blood. Others claimed it had always been here, older than the trees themselves, a thing of hunger and mimicry. It came in winter mostly, when snow swallowed sound and prints in the earth could be mistaken for human, or not.

It could howl.It could roar. It could whisper.It simply appeared in the corner of your eye, in the shadow of someone you thought you knew. It wore faces. It walked like someone you know. And by the time you realized the lie, it was already too late.

People asked, ‘why stay?’

The truth was whispered only behind locked doors and over dying embers.

They couldn't leave.