The first stars began to twinkle through the precipitating twilight, blinking through a fuchsia sky that sank into murky lilac and wine hues while the brimming moon guarded its sky. Checking the hands on the clock of his yellowed dashboard, the traveller could see he wouldn’t be making it tonight. Endless stretches of dusty horizon lay between him and his destination, sandy particles hanging in the air like moonlit mist. He gripped the rubber of the steering wheel and huffed out a disapproving sigh. With eyes dreary from the road, he scanned the skyline before him for any sign of civilisation – anywhere to lay his head for the night before continuing in the morning.
Far in the distance he made out tiny twiggy fences surrounding sprawling fields and little villas thrown together from adobe, as if they’d grown from the soil itself. He wouldn’t be likely to find anywhere else along the roads that night, so providing they had room for him it would have to do. It might even make a welcome change from the dilapidated budget motels he was used to.
The traveller slowed his car to a crawl as he entered the village, craning his neck to see out of the windows. There were no signs on the clay walls, nor hanging from the logs that made up the skeleton of their structure; not even in the single-glazed antiquated windows nestled within bone-dry wooden frames with their sun-bleached netted lace curtains. Instead he saw eyes peering back at him with a mixture of both intrigue and distrust, drapes twitching as shadowed fingers grasped them to draw them back just far enough to gaze out. A withered old man sat on a three legged stool, his hands on his lap and his back against one of the worm-ridden posts of his home, watching the traveller’s car inch past and kick up dust through the droopy skin of his eyelids.
He made a left turn into the village centre. A small fountain and pool beneath it lay dry and dusty, presumably for years, and more adobe houses circled around it. A small number of weeds crept up through the soil, parched but hardy, barely swaying in the wheezing breeze. He found a place to park in an empty space on the road in front of a house and shoved open the door of his car, the half-rusted metal hinge groaning beneath its weight, and took a step out into the dusty hamlet. Slowly turning to survey his surroundings, he shook his legs one by one and swept back what was left of his greying hair before reaching for the inside pocket of his corduroy jacket to retrieve his packet of cigarettes. Glancing around he removed one from the packet and pushed it between pursed lips and swapped it for his lighter, cupping a hand around the end to protect the flame from the wind.
Now he scanned the windows again, drawing lazily from the end of his cigarette and exhaling from his nostrils. There was no clear indication of a place for him to stay, and the locals didn’t seem too tolerant of his presence. The back of his car was filled with boxes and bundles containing all of the value to his life, tokens and trinkets to remind him of the things in his life he’d once let go. He pushed the key into the lock and turned it before strolling down towards the main road on which he’d drove, still turning his neck to survey the scene before him.
He reached the end of the road and glanced left and right. Slowly he raised the cigarette back to his mouth and pulled on it once more, the embers growing to light his face before dying down to a subtle glow again. The ramshackle wooden door of one of the houses opposite clattered open and caught his attention. From the candlelit darkness within the figure of a woman appeared. As she emerged into what light remained he caught a better look of her. Clad in a blood-soaked linen apron with the carcass of a chicken in one hand and a cleaver in the other, he could make out her crinkled skin and sagging jowls, her sunken eyes and drooping neck. She raised her head as she made eye contact with him in an upwards nod, inviting him over. Curious, he made his way over the road, checking both ways before crossing. There was no traffic, nor would there be any that night. His upbringing in the city was engrained into his being, even here.
“Outsider, why do you come here?” she smiled. Her voice was filled more with curiosity than enmity, but her question caught the traveller off guard.
“I’m… on my way to attend a convention.” He wasn’t even sure if she knew what a convention was. This place was so far removed from what he would consider to be society that she may not be familiar with the term. She just smiled back at him, drinking deep of his brown eyes and scrutinising the man that stood before her through them.
“Where am I?” The traveller asked, genuinely lost. Not that it mattered where he was; he knew he was on the right road, but he hadn’t taken the time to familiarise himself with every little town on the map.
“You’re here.” She cackled. What few rotten, yellowed teeth remained in her mouth hung delicately in her gums. She motioned to the houses around her. “You’re here!” she repeated happily. The traveller was unnerved slightly and took cautious glances at the cleaver trapped between her calloused fingers. If she was making a joke, it wasn’t landing with him.
“That’s good, but where is here?” He responded. She shook her head and exhaled deeply.
“Outsider, do you know what day today is?” The traveller simply responded with a silent shake of his head.
“Today – it’s harvest day.” The fields were full of corn, wheat, and they did look ripe for harvesting with their golden hues. How they grew anything out here in the clay-laden soil was a mystery to him, but he’d seen it with his own eyes. That said, it was a little late in the day to be harvesting anything.
“The day is already over. You mean to harvest at night?” he responded. She tutted at him, shaking her head. She turned around slowly, waddling inside. He waited, but she turned her head back around and waved him in, the chicken in her hand shaking about loosely. With a flick he loosed the cigarette butt to the ground.
He made his way inside, crouching his way through the doorframe. Links of preserved meats hung from the wall alongside dried flowers with faded family photos of people long gone. Wooden beams lay inches from the traveller’s head and the strange woman put down the chicken near a pile of chopped meat along with the cleaver. A slender stairway with wooden steps worn into curves by years of abuse lay off the main room, with another room hiding in the back.
“Come.” She said, her tone more serious this time, her voice almost a whisper. In the distance a bell struck, softened by the distance. She seemed to pick up her pace at this, pushing open the wooden door to the next room with renewed haste. Inside a simple coffin lay atop a stand, within which a young girl lay, a crown of pretty blue wildflowers atop her head. With closed eyes she rested peacefully, her lips almost in a smile. The traveller had many questions; how she died, who she was, and why the lady was showing him this just as a start. Once again, the bell called out.
The strange woman leaned over the coffin and stared down with heavy eyes, reaching out a hand to the girl’s face and caressing it softly. A sullen look washed over her drooping eyes and her lips pursed together as she shook her head. It didn’t take long for her to move away, her hand to her face, unable to take the sight of her dead relative.
One final time the bell rang out. Moments later there was a knock at the door. The woman spurred into life, still with the serious look about her countenance, rushing as best she could to greet the people waiting outside. Two men, one with a moustache, one clean shaved but wearing a hat, made their way inside. They bowed their heads before the coffin and raised it, moving it out of the front door and into the street. Unsure of if he should follow, the traveller stood by the door and watched.
From the adobe houses the people of the village emerged, house by house, each carrying candles and joining a great procession to accompany the dead. There were only two caskets in total, but for a small village such as this two was more than enough.
“Harvest day.” The lady repeated, taking his hand in hers. He felt uncomfortable but didn’t wish to offend her by snatching it away, especially given the circumstances. Together they joined the procession, following the twitching candlelight through the streets and towards the fields that shimmered in the moonlight. The crowd stopped at the wooden fences around the fields, while the pallbearers sat the caskets down deep in the middle of the fields before returning to join their neighbours. All was silent, save for a few weeping women and the whooshing wind blowing through the crops.
The traveller looked on, wondering why they chose not to bury their dead. Why, in this field so full of life, would they leave their dead out in the open, soon to be baked under the blistering sun? Not wishing to disrespect their local customs, he held his tongue. Still gripping his hand, the strange lady tightened her hold around his fingers. For a time nothing happened. The crowd just looked on, waiting, as the last flecks of colour in the sky died off into darkness leaving a sheet of stars across the heavens.
Abruptly, from the distant edge of the rolling fields, long stalks of wheat began to shuffle aside. A few of the villagers noticed and started to murmur among themselves, pointing and nudging one another. All eyes were fixed on the movement as whatever made its way through the fields grew closer and closer, bit by bit. It moved slowly but steadily, edging ever closer towards the caskets until it reached a stop. Through the darkness the traveller could see what looked like a stone block, with two white heads bobbing around in the sea of wheat. One casket rose above its surface and vanished within the block, then the other. He didn’t know what to make of this – stealing corpses? He had to know more.
“Who are those people?” He asked the woman, not turning his head away from the action. She looked up at him with a look of relief in her eyes.
“Who were those people?” She corrected him. He thought to ask more questions, but quickly realised he wouldn’t be getting any answers from her. He needed to know what was going on with this strange town, and a resolve possessed him – he was going to find out for himself. Snapping free of the woman’s grip he climbed over the rickety wooden fence and began to wade through the tall stalks towards the coffins. Elbowing his way through and stomping down the plants as he went, he pulled another cigarette from his pocket and lit it, holding it between his teeth as he pressed on.
Finally he reached a little clearing where the coffins had been. The crops had been pressed down by something heavy, pushed aside into a loose path of broken plants. He wouldn’t easily be able to find his way back from here but he quickly pressed on. Stomping in rhythm his arms swung quickly as he raced to catch up with whatever it was he was chasing and he soon came across it – a simple wooden cart with two large wheels, one person pulling from the front and one pushing from behind. Inside lay a huge block of stone, within which the two coffins had been nestled. In the misty darkness he could make out their white heads but was quickly startled by the rest of their bodies. His heart sank and his stomach churned at the sight of milky white bone, dry as the wood of the houses in the village. These weren’t just people, but skeletons brought into animation by some unseen force. Part of him wanted to run, to find his way back to the car and drive off to the nearest place that he could consider normal. For a second he glanced back as he considered it, but decided he had come too far already. The thought crossed his mind that he might had been going mad, but the traveller pressed on to catch up with the skeletons as they forced their way deeper into the field.
“Hey!” he called out to them against his better instincts. It had no effect and they simply continued along their way. Breaking into a jog he managed to catch up and walked alongside them, attempting to make his presence known.
“You can’t just take those people, they have to be buried!” he called. Again he got no reply. He repeated efforts to stop them even going as far as to pull them back, but they moved with such constant force that no matter his strength they would not be budged. The traveller resigned himself to following them, observing them, at least until they reached their destination.
What seemed to be hours passed by but the fields remained unrelenting. He was sure that no stretch of farmland could be that vast; that they should have reached the other side by now, but all he could do was follow. Eventually the living bones started taking turns through the seemingly endless crops, what seemed to him to be completely arbitrary lefts and rights to which he paid no notice. Finally the crops began to recede, thinning out and revealing colossal stone walls behind them that towered above him. Within each block of stone was space for a number of coffins, all of which were filled. As the three of them made their way through the soaring maze of burial blocks they passed more skeletal workers, busying themselves arranging and rearranging the blocks, moving the coffins; toiling at tasks that seemed to serve no purpose intelligible to the traveller.
At last, the skeletons stopped. A gap in a wall needed to be filled and so they dropped the cart and began sliding out their block with the utmost care before raising it up atop another. He thought the weight might crush them and instinctively jerked into action to help, but he reminded himself just to observe. He lit another smoke and puffed away as he watched, puzzled. Once the workers had placed the block, he took a moment to reflect on the girl that he’d seen laying there in the coffin and took the opportunity to scan the rest of them. He assumed they were all full, or at least had been at one point. One of the two skeletons he’d followed in took control of the cart and began to pull it away while the other walked off in the opposite direction. They made no contact with one another, only seeking to go about their business. This was his first inkling that he was well and truly lost. Thinking quickly, he decided to hop in the back of the cart and let the skeleton take him for a ride. Hopefully, he thought, he would arrive back in the village field. He rested his head back on his hands as he stared up at the stars through the puffs of smoke on his breath, between the towering blocks of stone and coffins. It had been long enough now that he’d grown tired, his eyes drooped and his whole body felt heavy. A groan from his stomach reminded him that he needed to leave this forsaken place.
“Hey, excuse me… skeleton?” he spoke up again, only to be ignored. He called out to a few more of the walking bones that passed, but none of them answered his call. The cart stopped moving in a crossroads of the grey blocks and the skeleton at its helm walked away, blending in with the rest of the workers as they scurried about their business. Before he knew it, he’d lost track of the one he’d been following. Dread finally caught up with him and a tingle ran through his spine, swelling through every fibre of his muscle and fizzed up to his skin, sending the hairs on his body standing on end. He stared down all four paths as skeletons clattered around him, one knocking him over without even noticing he was there.
“Help!” he asked them, glancing from face to bony face as they glided expressionlessly past him. “Help!” He called again, louder, hoping that anyone would hear him. Getting to his feet he fought away tears, trembling as he decided to clamber his way atop the stone cubes. Using what little strength he had left he made his way up and stared around, trying to get his bearings. Before him the maze stretched on beyond the darkness, through mist and haze in every direction. As he plotted a path the blocks continued to move, the maze shifting and twisting before his eyes. Exasperated, he lay down atop the blocks and stared back up into the stars before closing his eyes to formulate a plan.
By the time he opened his eyes it was morning. He took a long look out around the misty horizon and spied in the distance a sea of shimmering wheat through the haze. It was a long way out still, so far that it might take him all day to walk, but at least he had a direction in mind. Scrambling his way down the blocks he managed to catch a lift on another cart, jumping out as soon as it changed direction away from where he was headed. His eyes could no longer focus and his feet burned but still he pressed on. Making his way through the shifting blocks and avoiding the stampeding skeletons he finally found himself stepping into the field, the crops thickening around him, followed by a skeleton with a cart. He wasn’t out of the woods yet, but at least he was out of that place. The sun had started to set, but he knew he must press on quickly, at least until he found a road, a town, a house, a farm – anything. He needed food, water, nicotine, a living person. He didn’t look back, focusing solely on reaching the end of the field.
For what seemed like forever he pushed aside stalks and forged his way onwards, filled with a renewed vigour as hope fuelled him. Once more the stars twinkled above him, but he knew what he must do. He stopped upon reaching a small clearing where the wheat had been pressed down by a long wooden box that lay before him. He stared down at it, early moonlight shimmering on the metal decorations hammered into it. A coffin.
He reached his hands down to the brass handles and cautiously lifted it up from one side. He hadn’t realised he was still being followed by the skeleton, but it took the other side. Together they lifted it into the empty recess within the stone block. He stared out above the surface of that sea and finally glimpsed the village there, little whisps of smoke puffing from chimneys in the distance. He turned to the cart and lifted it, the other skeleton pushing from behind. They had to get back to work.