Story of a Ghost Town

by Francesco Brasiello

  This chilling spectacle is impressed in my mind in a few seconds of bewilderment... as always when we are in front of something overwhelming.

  There is no need to talk, we know that we absolutely have to leave, and we do it without exchanging a look. We walk away silent through the medieval village, avoiding to make any noise. That hateful and dreadful cantilene, is our ally, at the moment.

  I feel observed, I feel presences around us. -That fucking wine! I shouldn’t have drink it!-.

  The wind hiss, the rustle of leaves...But...they’re not natural sounds...they seem voices... they ARE voices, hell...I can distinctly hear them. It seems the same language we heard before...how could it be?

  ‹‹Nuixib yuum k’iin...nuixib yuum k’iin››, bounces everywhere. At first we didn’t hear it, why?

  The mist on the ground is now a thick white cloud, I can’t see the soil I’m walking on, nor I can see my feet.

  I look at my companions and they look lost, are they hearing the same things? I don’t want to ask... let’s go away, bloody hell...LET’S GO!

  We arrive to the gate with the skull, this time is closed. I snatched it tightly, but immediately keep off my hands... it’s so frozen that it looks sharp and it is so rusty that it seems sprinkled with sand.

  The all three of us cling to it. To feel that metal against our hands, it’s a dreadful sensation, but we have to open it.

  We see nothing blocking it, but the fact is that we cannot open it. It is necessary all our strength to move that rusty thing that seems closed from ages.

  Finally it starts rotating. We wanted to be silent, but we couldn’t make more noise. Forget the ghastly squeaking of abandoned houses: that scrap iron moves at shots and every shot corresponds to a powerful metallic noise like a hammer on an anvil that makes the gate and our grip shaking vigorously.

  At every movement the hinges seems to yield and the whole gate seems to be falling over us from one moment to the next.

  We manage to open it enough to let us go. A gust of chill wind comes over us as if we were opening the door of a room with wide open windows. We have to fight against that natural fury ( even though it appears everything but natural), to manage to get out of it.

  We overcome it, I don’t know if they heard us, it doesn’t matter! The mist on the ground turn to be again a slight coating, just out the gate. It looks as if there’s a wall between the two environments, one can understand it by the way that soft white cloud can’t cross over it; indeed It dissolves as soon as it passes it.

  We take care not to hurt ourselves on that hateful crumped trail, nevertheless we try to walk as fast as possible. To have some light we use our cell phones lights, pointing them toward the ground, also because we don’t want to let them discover us.

  There’s a tree trunk, completely slashed by a lightening, that still emits smoke. It’s open in the middle and there we see a face, we don’t stop...we look away and run. It seems to me to hear a breath behind me...we have to go, there’s something really bad here.

  We should already be at the point of the path where the pavement is better. No, indeed it’s getting harder. There seems to be a black mud on the split stones and there is also a nauseous stench, what the hell could it be? The plants, then: black, dried, rotten, purulent...perhaps this bloody smell is just due to the corrupted vegetation that surrounds us.

  I’m beginning to think worst: and if in the hurry we got the wrong way? Impossible!

  On the ground there are the stones, it isn’t a classic mountain path...it can’t be!

  The descent continues and the path becomes increasingly dull. A thought rumbles in my head:

  -They concealed the initial passage-.

  And soon after we have the confirmation: the stones are becoming more and more smaller untill they completely disappear. We have never passed this path !

  We can’t go back because maybe they are following us, we made so much noise!

  This one is just a distant memory of a path. I think this passage wasn’t use for ages. It’s abandoned! In here too we find fallen trees that hinder us. It’s steep trail where you risk to fall or to slip.

  We try to enlight what surrounds us as better as we can, but we are really risking. The vegetation enlighted by our cell phones assumes dreadful shapes. Finally the full moon: huge, white and so bright, for our eyes now used to obscurity. Surely there’s a gap between the clouds that held it concealed. Good for us! Now we can make a better idea about the surroundings: no more than trees. Anyway the moon light manage to pass through them, also because these trees are all dead. We help ourselves with sticks found on the ground. Falling here would be the end. Some traits are really dangerous, you can’t identify the path and you have to do your best not to make the wrong step.

  I don’t know how much time we are spending, it looks like ages, this path is endless; I begin to cold sweat. The passage is now very close, you can barely pass one by one. The mountain is on our right and on our left an infinite descent ending in the dark; before us a natural canal that goes downhill, a probable escape route for torrential winter rains. The path has probably been swept away because it proceed on the other side. In the center there’s a hollow large a couple of meters, full with soil, rocks and fallen trees... but we are forced to overcome it: we’re not allowed to go back. I’m the first to go; I help myself at best with the stick, by pointing on what I find under my feet. I try to avoid the rocks, cause certainly they’re not stable. I walk completely oblique as I proceed and the earth falls under my feet. I continue to go inexorably, one foot after the other, touching the ground with the shin and the right hand, almost as if I was kneeling. If I stopped, I would go downhill.

  I didn’t realize that my companions were following me, I was too busy.

  the vegetation enlightened by our cell phones assumes dreadful shapes.

  Surely is not the best thing to do, walking in single file in this occasions, but hassle and fear are bad counselors, there’s no space for rationale reasoning.

  After me is Anna to put herself in safe, only Antonio is missing. Finally he also comes to destination, but the path falls. He too falls, finding himself face down, looking for a grip with his feet, that he desperately moves, and with the hands. Anna quickly offers him the stick and he manages to take it. We both pull him tightly and keep him safe. It’s done! We breath raised, but we don’t have time to rest: we have to keep going downhill, hoping not to find others points so badly dangerous.

  We hear voices; we came to the end then, but who knows where. We switch off the phone’s lights, continuing to walk carefully, the trail is still dangerous. We see other lights, surely they’re more fires. The path ends in a grove. Not far we see figures around a fire, they’re surrounded by trees, so we have some seconds to look at the scene. The cantilene is always the same:

  ‹‹oooo...nuixib yuum k’iin...››

  But here, alas, we see something else. Now we clearly distinguish human figures, but what they wear is too realistic to be masks. The man that is standing has too a wolf’s head, or rather, he’s wearing a wolf carcass...or something like that. The hair is spotted with extensive bloodstains, especially at the extremities; these, more than cut off, you would say they’ve been torn off. There are rough shreds of meat dripping blood, on the shoulder of the wearer.

  Standing by the fire there is also the big belly-man... I recognize him.

  A mutual look is enough to understand: from the beginning we all suspected that he was involved in what was happening there. Because he hasn’t got a human face: the head is that of a wild boar.

  For some reason unknown to us, these people cover the face and part of the body with animal skins; they surely make a sort of ritual, but we don’t understands its dynamic.

  There is the standing man with that bloody tongue, there’s the big belly man that owns a long machete and there’s a woman who’s naked, her head completely bandaged, including the face.

  She’s tied to a pole, arms back, .
..she probably has a support that helps her to be suspended from the ground; she’s turned back, but not completely. In front of her is shaking one of those beings with animal’s head. We can easily imagine what’s happening. We hear screams, but we don’t know if they’re pleasure or pain’s screams. The man in front of the woman has the head of a goat on: I recognize the horns, of which one is broken, and this one too is revealing fresh meat drips with dripping blood. The eyes of the beast are surrounded by black spots (I don’t know if real or drawned), they reminds me of ruthless eyes drawn in the comics.

  Other naked women are dancing and dangling around the fire, they too have bandaged heads. The bends are dirty (with blood I think): they remind me of Silent Hill’s nurses.

  Anyway is a matter of moments, we have to get away. We keep ourselves on the right, along the rock from which we came down because we thought that we could arrive at the departure point. It isn’t like that!

  We are again in the old town, between the collapsed houses. We think that there we can find a moment of respite...but this is just for a few minutes. We hear steps, I think they’re looking for us. Perhaps they are those who were hunting us, maybe they divided themselves into groups. we have little time, we’ll soon be surrounded.

  We carefully take shelter in a house, flattening against the walls and keeping us low so that we can’t be seen from the now non-existing windows. From there we hear them walking outside. We stay still.

  Then it happens something unreal: I hear that breath, again; all of a sudden there’s a chilly air. At the same time Anna gets up without any reason, she’s frightened and agitated. I hold her right away, without speaking, but with the gaze, intimidating her to stay still and warning her to be silent contemporary indicating outside...as to say:

  “Stay! Where the hell are you going? They’re outside!”

  She looks at me as if I was stupid, and with a look half angry and half incredulous she tells me to look in the middle of the room, a little bit enlighted by the moon. I don’t see anything and I try to make her understand to stay down. Dismayed, she looks quieter, but she’s not. She sits hesitant, but while she glances at one of the windows, she gets up and once more she wants to go away. I hold her as much as possible, she seems out of herself. Then that voice:

  ‹‹mum››...

  The voice of the little girl! I can clearly hear it. It becomes from the middle of the room, I turn, but can’t see anything. Anna leaps up, I can’t hold her anymore, we both, Antonio and I, try to keep her calm...even though we don’t know what’s the best thing to do.

  Fortunately, our trackers seem to go further, so, moving carefully, we reach a window looking on the street. It’s all dark! No one is there.

  ***

  ...we just arrived in that hovel partly destroyed, we just sat down and everyone was trying to see something through the windows. Out of the corner of the eye, I saw something moving in the middle of the room and it was cold, too. In that moment I didn’t give it any importance, we were alone, I was surely getting impressed. I had else to think about. The more it was moving, though, the more attracted my attention. So I turned instinctively and I saw the shadow of a little girl, but just for a few moments. The shadow of a little girl, yes, but more than a shadow, she was alive, she was there, but yet it was a shadow, I don’t know how to explain myself. She approached and stretched the little hand. I was scared, so I tried to go away, but Francesco stopped me and I didn’t understand why. How could he be so quiet? Probably he didn’t see her...I turn and me too can’t see her anymore. When I turned, I saw her again out of the corner of the eye. I just wanted to get away, then that voice again:

  ‹‹mom››...

  So, there she was! We couldn’t stay there, not with that presence.

  Then... I came to cry...I have nausea when I think about it...I don’t remember much, but I know it’s been terrible...

  Anna

  ***

  I’m still holding Anna’s hand, to avoid her to go out; we have to be cautious!

  All of a sudden, she manage to escape, I lose my grip. The first thing I do is to try to catch her arm again, but in a moment I notice that something changed. I just look a bit, my friend is in a grotesque position: straight back and head low, she’s slowly opening her arms.

  I try to grab her, but immediately I block myself, and I just manage to lightly touch her: as soon as I do this I feel an intolerable pain from the middle finger to the shoulder, my arm stiffens. I would scream with pain, but I manage to keep calm: I saw so many horrible things today, and I know that I can control myself. I stay still to look my arm, incredulous about what was happening to me.

  I turn my eyes toward Anna that is still moving strangely: she lazily open her arms, slowly raises her head, and in the meantime becomes higher, or better to say, she rises from the ground. I can see her face: her eyes turned backwards. Her arms are stretched out, but slightly bent at the height of her stomach, her head is now turned slightly upwards, but the most absurd thing is that she just touches the floor with the tip of her feet, as if she was lifted by an invisible wire. A grey aura completely surrounds her body, as if she was enveloped in smoke.

  She slowly begins to move her lips and her head from one side to the other. Her voice is terrifying. It’s not her voice, is the voice of the little girl. Her face has an expression of cry; that voice is still in my dreams:

  ‹bad men, go away! Mum, mummyyyyyYYYYYYYY...››

  This growing cry continue for a few seconds, and all of a sudden her skin becomes wrinkled, filled with grooves. She becomes very old in a few moments, until she becomes skeletal. Her eyes are sagging in the orbit, the mouth opens in an unnatural scream discovering the teeth and grey gums. That is no more Anna, it is the projection of what she would become after resting eternal sleep in her grave.

  She ends the sentence and the final and deafening acute, breaks the remaining glasses of the windows, forcing us to rub our ears. All of a sudden it’s all finished, we hear a thud, as if it was a falling sack of flour. In that same moment Antonio and I are thrown away by a sort of shockwave that push us against the wall on the other side, Anna falls slightly on herself.

  I get up and look in her direction; I’m scared by what my eyes could see, I don’t know what to think. She is there, backside. She doesn’t move. What happened? What was the matter with her? I’m shocked, I look at her but I cannot move. My arm, I almost forgot to say, still hurts, but it’s getting better.

  Then I see her hand... her arm is along her side...the hand is no more skeletal, it’s normal. The rest too? I’m no more sure about the metamorphosis I’ve seen, because of its speed and inexplicability.

  I approach cautiously, trying to see her face, but it’s covered by the hair. I keep looking at her hand, that is normal by now, to convince myself that there is nothing to be afraid of. I don’t know what has happened, but it’s gone. I approach a little bit more, push away the hair from the face, saying:

  ‹‹Anna...is everything ok?››

  Her head lifts up as soon as I touch her hair, as if it was shocked by an electric shock. I almost got an heart attack, but she’s herself again. She lie down, this time with her face well in sight:

  ‹‹Mmm...yes, what happened? I’ve got nausea.››.

  I probably had the expression of somebody who just saw a ghost because she asks:

  ‹‹Ehi, what’s the matter with you? Why you look at me like that? Stop it! You are scaring me››.

  I too am confused, adrenaline flows fast through my body. I’m feeling as if I just woke up after a nightmare in the middle of the night. My arm is now tingling.

  ‹‹Nothing happened, but we have to go...come on I’ll help you››.

  Antonio and I help her to get up, and she says:

  ‹‹I think I can manage, I’m feeling ok...I just have a little bit nausea, but it’s almost gone. What happened?››

  ‹‹We’ll talk about it later, let’s go away now!›› exclaims Antoni
o.

  I always remember that terrible transfiguration. I’d like to convince me that I only imagined it, but this is impossible to me.

  We’re all out, and what do we see on the wall of the building? The little girl’s tombstone with that indecipherable epigraph below: “PAACH UTIA’AL LELA’ NOH KAAH”.

  Without knowing it, we were hiding in that same house. It doesn’t matter anymore, the street is empty. We run and, this time, I’m the last one.

  We run bent to avoid being seen. We almost reached the point where begins the climbing trail. From our position we can see three or four figures with torches that are climbing to the castle They surely are our hunters patrolling the path back up.

  We wait for them going out from our sight, and we start to run again.

  In front of us there’s the bush that, beside the path, also hides us now. We still see discontinuous light...fires. Those fires are still on, as I expected.

  Again the same rhymes that is rumblings in our ears:

  ‹‹oooo...nuixib yuum k’iin...oooo nuixib yuum k’iin››, what the hell could it means?

  We cautiously stop behind the bush some moments yet. As we are calming down our breaths and our hearts, we keep in sight the little street that goes up to the old town. In the meantime we try to observe everything with more attention.

  The scene is always the same: people wearing animal’s heads around the fires that are all still on. While some of them were chasing us, the others obviously didn’t interrupt the rituals. We also identify the fences, but this time there’s something inside. Certainly they’re animals, but my vision is not clear because there’s little light. Are they the same animals they use to cover their head and part of the face and body? What is the reason? What kind of rituals they make? What a horrible scene! We have to go as fast as possible, these people are crazy.

  Those words, that language...fill me with dismay.

  There are also them, the young women. They all get up together, take the carcasses off their heads (they seems sheep); they are still naked with only the bandages to cover their heads and faces. Their body is completely tattooed: arms, breast, back, legs...They frantically dance around the fire.