It was a tree that stood in solitude atop a
hill where silence in form of gray mist hang; the fog seemed to carry all the
cries the whole human race had let out: it was a cold and desolate cloud
enshrouding a one-tree hill. No other life was to be found there. The grass
that struggled to raise its fingers to the sky was impeded and killed at the
moment of their conception by an unknown force. The tree stood like a victor as
it cast a deathly shadow upon the sterile hill. The tree itself, towering is if
it wanted to reach the sky, was as black as night. It was a skeleton of a time
long past. A monument of a glorious and chthonic part. But it stood, as
persistent as the red moon that guarded it at night, as if it was pointing its
fingers accusingly to the sky. It was like a cross to mark someone else's
grave. The wind was persistent in its journey toward the unknown. Had the
tree--lonely and alone--been clothed with leaves, it would have swayed to the
cadence of the mountain's breath. But it did not have leaves to begin with. The
only thing that swayed on that dead tree was a noose. The rope was tied to the
seemingly strongest branch, its end formed to serve as the most grin of all
execution device. The cold symphony of the misty wind was the only mark to indicate
that time was still affecting the quiet hill.
Through the mist, a young girl as comely as a
blooming rose was passing. The countenance conveyed the purity of her heart.
She was a small girl for her age. The face, framed by a neatly cut hair the
color of the blackest night, was a canvass for the curious and intelligent
eyes, a small nose and a mouth that held all the inertia of mystery and
pulchritude. She was known for her mildness, her fragility and curiosity. A
typical young lady who would partake on a caucus around a camp fire. Well, she
was, in her own way, a girl around a camp fire.
She eventually saw the foreboding that was the
raven-black tree. At first, the tree was, for her, a crack upon the white mist,
a rift upon the sky. But as her steps progressed, as she approached, the place
was revealed to her. It was indeed a funereal tree of whose grave she did not
know. She knew of the infamy the tree had. She grew up with the people who
feared it. Why? Why would they fear it? It was just a dead chunk of wood! She
did not fear the tree. The girl who made the place a temporary refuge came back
there again and again. It was always misty whenever she came. She felt hidden
from the rest of the world. She would sit on its roots and contemplate on the
tree's being there for hours on end. She would look at the noose and wondered
who would have used it to kill himself. The question would always taunt her,
interest her to no avail. She would also wonder why the townspeople would let
the lifeless tree alone. As it was. Don't they care? Was she the only one who had
the liberty to ask questions? To--as the other people would say--blaspheme? She
would ask her mother what that tree was doing there. Why it was feared. The old
lady would scold her for being inquisitive and admonish her. She would be told
to drop the matter off. And never to go there anymore. She became silent but
the questions remained. The girl asked other townspeople, creating theories as
she went on. Maybe someone who was in despair committed suicide there. But upon
telling them what she was doing there, they would tell her, just like what her
mother told her, to never return to that place again. The raven-black tree was
cursed. It would drive her insane, or kill her, if she would keep on going
there. This remark made a big impression on her; this only strengthened her
desire to go back. Nothing could stop her, even the ghastliness of the place.
Even the cloudy foreboding that descended and eventually veiled the place. The
tree standing in the middle of that hill became a symbol of her inquiry.
The town wherein she lived was never to
prosper; it was, as the old fellows said, the curse of the raven tree. Why?
Again, she was not told. She was only forbidden to utter anything concerning
the tree; otherwise another curse upon them should befall. The history of that
malefaction, the tree, the one who committed suicide there would not be
disclosed. It would remain a mystery. They just believed that via tree was
powerful to cast a curse of perdition upon its blasphemer. No words were
uttered against the infamous tree. Upon observing those she asked, she noticed
that they conveyed ad nauseum a kind of reverence upon the tree. The tree with
its concealed part was left alone amid the fog. No one ever dared to go there.
When night fell, the villagers shut their houses
tightly lest something--a progeny of darkness, they reckoned--would enter the
house and kill them all; the practice was reminiscent of Egypt back in the
Mosaic times. The wind would blow and shake the roofs of windows slightly. Fear
was with them as they suppered and eventually went to sleep. The girl did not
share the prevailing atmosphere. In fact, she was growing more curious. If
given a chance she would open a door or a window, to have a peek outside.
That morning, she decided once more to visit the
forlorn place. She touched the dead bark, feeling its roughness; it made her
skin infantile in comparison. Her touch lowered until it reached a cavity.
Something was telling her to plunge her hand into that hole. And she did. Her
trembling hand explored the hole. She was like an inexperienced spelunker in
search of a hidden treasure. She jerked her hand to the other direction.
Nothing. To the other direction. Noth-- she gasped. There was something that
greeted her skin; it was like a smite of a cold air from another world. She
grasped the object and extracted it from the hole: a leather-bound pocketbook.
The wind, with its symphony, continued to blow, swaying the noose and her hair
frantically. The mist-veiled hill seemed to warn her against opening the book.
She remained standing on the foot of the dead tree; she was deciding whether to
unravel the book's content or let it be. She opened it.
The book's content was let out like a dam
breaking before her eyes. It answered all the questions she was shouldering:
about the tree, the noose, the past, the fear. In her mind was the fog
dispersing. According to the book, there was once a witch whose description was
not given-- she had to rely on the stereotypical appearance of one-- who
disseminated fear upon the village. The witch was a one-woman army victorious
upon her mission. The villagers lived in fear for far too long. No one rose to
defy the supernatural ability of the said scoundrel. It was an irrational fear
deemed rational by irrationality. Man fears death: this the witch used to
manipulate the village people. But one man stood up to end that reign of
darkness; he persuaded the others to rise up and end this crow-black tyranny.
It was strength in number against a demonic art. They vanquished the evil incarnate
and hanged her on that tall tree; but before the execution occurred, the old
witch cast a curse upon the row of pitchfork and torch: the rustic place would
be relentlessly beaten by storms every now and then, the fog would haunt them
like the howling of wolves, a specter would fly every night in search of human
flesh, and the utterance of her story would bring a curse. The tree that once
bore leaves died when the witch's breath of life left her. It was a nightmare
to remember. It was a nightmare to forget.
It was
a legend according to the book; it was a myth studded with sheer mendacity and
exaggerated by fear. It was a hearsay nevertheless. A gossip opted to be
believed by people who could not think for and by themselves. The shame! she
thought. Evidences gathered by the writer of that book led to the contradiction
of such an absurd tale. At the tree she looked. In her eyes grew indignation--
a righteous anger for her townsfolks. She cursed the tree for bringing fear to
her fellow townspeople. Now, the time had come to liberate them from such
foolishness. With that book in her hands, she strongly believed that that naïve
people would take her word.
She
ran swiftly towards town; her feet were given a surge of juvenile energy to
fulfill a task. Through the sulky vapor and fields of leaflers trees she
darted. Liberation was tightly clasp upon her hand, and she wanted to impart
that freedom she had found to the folklore-chained dwellers of that dismal
town. When she reached the town, she screamed despite her gasping for air:
"All that you believed in all your life is a lie! It's all a lie! You're
just deceiving yourselves!"
They
stopped walking, talking and working. Their collective and scrutinizing eyes
were focused upon the young girl. Each and all eyes wondering. An old man
approached her, his eyes although softly alarmed was inquisitive. "What's
the problem, child?" His hoarse voice blared through the fog. That kid he
recognized was the daughter of the weaver; he knew that the child was a gentle
soul. He saw her eyes: eager, naïve but inquisitive.
"The
hill. . . The tree!" And all the words of veracity poured out from her
mouth. She narrated with vigor the story behind the accursed tree, unravelled
the truth about the fear that consumed them all; the fear that they devoutedly
regarded. The urgency was in her voice. The need to free her fellow villagers
overflowing.
But as
she related her tale, the anger in the old man's face began to form and rise.
He was horrified. Enraged. He seized the young girl by the hand, shook it and
shouted at her. "What did you-- Do you know what you've done?!?!"
Incredulous,
she looked at the old man shaking her. When she recovered, she tried shaking
herself from the man's tenacious grasp. But her efforts to tear herself from
the old man's grip was in vain. The man continued his harassing, his asking,
but she did not want-- and ultimately could not-- answer the questions. Slowly,
like the cold embracing the land, her heart was gripped with fear. Tears welled
from her comely eyes-- eyes that could magnify the most minute of all her
emotions.
"What
have you done, you foolish child! Do you know?! Do you--"
At
last, with a vicious heave, she managed to free herself from the man's anger.
Her mind was as misty as the frigid air; she could not think. Fear and
confusion overwhelmed her. What did I do wrong? this echoed in her mind. What?
The backward step she made was an initiative to find and retreat to an unknown
comfort. She must run! She must hide! What did I do wrong? With all the strength
she could muster, she looked at the face of the old man; she realized that that
one countenance was also the collective faces of all those who dwell in fear.
Dwellers of the shadow. She became the object of humiliation. The ignominy
incarnate about to sentenced of being banished. She must run! She must hide!
The hand was about to get her again. She felt as though it were a snake about
to bite her. She must run. She must hide. Mustering all the feminine and
childlike strength left in her she scrambled once again through the mist
towards the veiled comfort of the cold.
---
The
wind blew harder. The fog seemed to grow thicker and more dismal than ever
before. The sun seemed to have betrayed them. But the curse had not befallen
yet. However, despite this, some people talked about its impending arrival.
They feared, and the fear was enough to drive them crazy.
"It
was always like this. We would like peacefully without any worries as long as
we consecrate the tree until a girl with a preposterous idea would come to
distort our way of living," that same old man said..
"I
know. I'd rather obey the tradition than to risk my neck saying something
wretched about it." One would say. "Besides, the tree has taken many
lives. If it couldn't be attributed to it, I don't know what is."
·
They were afraid that
via more "innocent" minds would be affected by the discovery. They
were afraid that all the things they know, all the things they believed in--all
the things they reverently feared-- would be questioned and ultimately alter
their their ways of life. They feared the tree and dared not to go near it. As
long as the wolves howled at the moon-- wishing for its lunar guidance-- they
would believe that it was the voice of the tree. As long as the nocturnal
rustles and noises existed when darkness fell, they would believe that they
were the witchcraft of the tree. As long as the fog hang ominously, they would
think that chaos would stretch its arms and wipe them off the face of the earth
with the most sickening notion of pestilence. The dusk would come with the
darkness it conceives and the dawn and the light with which it deceives, and
between those two they would live in false fear forevermore. The girl saw all
of these and more. She was an anathema from that point on. A blasphemer to a
persistent belief. A victim of traditions. But on the other hand, she liberated
herself from the curse of the raven-black tree. With no second thought, she
poured the gasoline on its roots and struck a match. The fire, which the
thickest of damp mist could not fight off, rose to the sky. The fingers that
accusingly pointed to heaven was devoured by flames of fire.
Yes. It "was" a tree that stood in
solitude atop a hill where silence in form of gray mist hang. The fog that
seemed to carry all the cries of the whole human race had let out rose with the
smoke of a once infamous tree that scared a whole village-worth of fools.
