The Letterbox

by Layton Green

  Despite the barrenness of the season, the woods felt dense, stuffed with birch trees, snow, and icicles. Fingerlike branches filled the space between the trunks, spreading through the forest like a vast arboreal web. The sun had descended behind the tree line, and the icy forest shone in the near-darkness with a white glow, giving the twilight world we were about to step into a preternatural feel.

  “Darkness again,” Jake said in disgust. “If we’d left at nine in the morning, there would’ve been an eclipse.”

  “It’s so quiet,” Asha murmured.

  Jake took the lead. After a few steps he drew back, reaching for the cross around his neck again.

  I saw what had startled him. Just inside the forest, positioned behind two large trees such that one had to enter the woods to see them, hung two of the scarecrow figures. Only these two didn’t look like the others. The heads of these guardians were horned and misshapen, much more grotesque than the figures we had seen from the bus. They hung ominously on each side of the path, an unmistakable warning to those who would venture forth.

  Asha swallowed. “Someone’s taking their guard duty more seriously.”

  We took cautious steps forward, between the two effigies. The woods smelled damp. The only sounds were our shoes crunching into the frozen forest floor and the occasional crack of a branch snapping under the ice.

  Bizarre trapezoidal tombstones began to appear beside the path, their stone surfaces pockmarked with age. Jake surmised they were pagan burial markers from centuries past. As we passed a particularly thick cluster of the ancient graves, I thought I heard footsteps pattering in rapid succession behind me. I spun but saw nothing.

  “Did anyone hear that?” I said, stopping to peer into the woods.

  “It sounded like someone was running through the woods,” Asha said, drawing her coat tighter. “Only it sounded too fast.”

  A few minutes later we encountered a wooden totem, six feet high and thick as a man’s waist. Rune-like markings covered the pole, and a square-shaped cross had been carved into the top.

  Jake grunted. “Pagan symbols, or at least that cross is. I don’t recognize the markings. Commie?”

  Lou bent to study the pole. “It’s not a rune with which I’m familiar. I would say the markings are decorative, except they look too . . . deliberate.”

  More totems appeared, both on and off the path. Most bore carvings of animals, real and absurd, and all were covered in runes.

  Jake put a hand out to stop the group. Up ahead, the largest totem so far blocked the path, easily reaching twelve feet high. Standing right in front of it, feet planted wide and arms folded, was a short and stocky Amerindian man in a gray tunic, silently watching us approach.

  He had cropped silver hair and a flat face. His thin, Roman-style tunic reached to his knees. How could he stand the cold, I wondered?

  “Stay behind me,” Jake said, and started walking forward.

  As soon as we moved towards him, the man stepped behind the totem.

  “Hey,” Jake called out, running up.

  We caught up to Jake on the other side of the pole. There was no sign of the man.

  I heard footsteps again in the woods, this time on both sides, as if two people were racing through the forest at an impossible speed. I scoured the woods but saw nothing.

  The footsteps died. I paled, and Lou and Asha backed into the middle of the path.

  “It’s beginning,” Jake said.

  Asha had a slightly crazed look in her eyes. “What is?”

  Jake took the letterbox out of his pack. “This.”

  We started forward again, this time huddled together. The unseen footsteps became frequent companions. We kept scanning the woods, but there was never anything to be seen. We pressed on, becoming more and more unnerved.

  Lou pointed to our right, whispering hoarsely for us to look. Through a patchwork of branches, we saw the man in the gray tunic standing with his arms at his sides in the middle of the forest, watching us. He turned to face us as we passed. Jake took a step into the woods towards him, and the man disappeared.

  Lou blanched. Asha caught her breath, and I clenched my fists.

  Jake increased his pace. “We’ve got to reach the hill.”

  “And do what?” I said. “It could be worse there.”

  He didn’t answer, and the rest of us hurried after him. The woods pressed all around, suffocating. The footsteps in the forest resumed, and I did my best to ignore them, concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other.

  Shapes began to appear at the edges of our vision, dark things that fluttered in and out of the failing light too quickly for us to recognize. At times the shadows would seem to fly towards us, and we would duck our heads in fear, only to look up and see nothing.

  The man in the gray tunic appeared more frequently, a specter whose existence even Lou, his head roving side to side in terror, could not deny. Most disturbing was the way he watched us, staring at us with a blank expression before disappearing.

  The footsteps were all around us now. I didn’t know how much more I could take. I was frightened almost beyond reason, trying to block out the sounds we shouldn’t have been hearing and the things we shouldn’t have seen. It wasn’t real, I kept telling myself. It was a trick. It had to be.

  We rounded a bend, and the path spilled into a large, open clearing. Within the treeless space rose a large hill, its heights unseen in the blackness above. As we poured into the clearing, gibbering with fear, no one needed to ask what we had stumbled upon, for the hill was covered, as a honeycomb swarming with bees, with crosses.

  -75-

  We stopped to catch our breath, realizing the footsteps and apparitions had ceased. Crosses of all shapes and sizes blanketed the surface of the hill, leaning crazily in every direction and giving the hill a deranged appearance. Some of the crosses rose more than ten feet high, and the shortest ones rested mere inches from the ground. I saw crosses made of wood, metal, bronze, copper, iron, and silver; crosses overlapping or nailed to other crosses; crosses with poles as thick as a man and as tiny as two fingers crossed together. Some were actual crucifixes, bearing carvings or figurines of Jesus, with incredibly worn rosary beads draped across them. Pagan symbols adorned others: runes, anthropomorphic animals, and other fantastical shapes.

  We warily approached the hill. Two enormous totems stood on either side of a footpath leading upwards. Shrubby vegetation covered the hill; it would have been impossible to ascend off the path without cutting through the thicket of crosses and overgrowth.

  A square stone cross topped each of the totems. We stood in silence before the pair of silent guardians, and I knew what everyone was thinking: the forest had been bad enough, and we had yet to step foot on the hill.

  As we started up the path, a man holding a gun emerged from behind one of the totems. A man dressed in a white robe, with a burn scar on the back of his left hand.

  His cowl was thrown back, revealing the same craggy face I had seen in the atrium of the British Museum. From his unbalanced expression, I knew without asking he had seen the same things we had.

  “So this is how it is?” Jake said.

  “Hand it over,” the man rasped. “I won’t ask twice.”

  Jake pressed his lips together but slowly took out the letterbox. The Druid edged forward, keeping the gun trained on Jake.

  “How’d you find us, Nyles?” Jake said. “Magic?”

  He smirked. “You should have paid more attention to the cleaning crew.”

  It took me a second, but then I put it together: the older lady with him in the museum, and the woman I had seen shuffling out of our reading room with her hair in a fishnet. I hadn’t gotten a good look at the cleaning lady’s face, but I realized the two of them were the same height and thin build.

  “You bugged our reading room,” I said. “You knew we were coming. I don’t get it, though. Where’s the woman? The rest of your faction?”

  The man swung the gun tow
ards me, causing my knees to feel watery. Anger coursed through me as well, both at the deadly piece of metal pointed in my direction, and the derailing of our quest.

  We had been so close.

  “Move,” Nyles said, his voice quivering with eagerness. “Single file. If anyone steps out, I won’t hesitate to shoot.

  We had no choice but to obey. Asha fell in after Jake, and I stepped behind her and gripped her hand. Lou brought up the rear.

  “I get it perfectly, Counselor,” Jake said as we started forward, loud enough for the man to hear. “He’s using us as guinea pigs, and he ditched his crew because he wants whatever he finds for himself.”

  “That, and I don’t plan on coming back,” the Druid said in a low voice behind us, as if speaking to himself.

  The path wound around the hill. Despite the premature darkness, enough light shone forth from the three-quarter moon, reflecting off the sheen of snow, to enable us to see. Nyles wouldn’t let us use a flashlight; I presumed he was wary of disturbing the hill.

  The wall of crosses and totems on either side created a hedge-like passage. After a five-minute walk, the path spilled into a gently sloped clearing with five identical paths curving up the hill. A wooden signpost was stuck into the ground in front of each path.

  Nyles stopped, his face slack. “None of this was here before,” he said. “There were no signs, no paths.”

  “That’s because you didn’t have the box,” Jake said.

  “It’s because he set it all up,” Lou whispered in my ear.

  Asha risked a glance back at me, and I could tell she was as confused and terrified as I was.

  The hill possessed the stillness of an empty building. The Druid made us wait in the center of the clearing while he inspected the signs. He stopped for a long moment in front of the fifth one, then waved us forward. “Down this path. Now.”

  The signposts were set ten yards apart. As I approached, I read the wooden signpost to Nyles’s left, and what I saw made my mouth go dry and my heart pound against my chest.

  Carved in archaic, pointed font into the old signpost, appearing as if it had stood on the hill for centuries, was a single word.

  I was looking at my own name.

  -76-

  The sign in front of the Druid read Nyles Kempthorne, and the sign next to that bore Asha’s name. Jake risked a step towards the other signs, and then swore. “This one’s mine. The other is the Commie’s.”

  “Back in line!” Nyles barked.

  The Druid forced us down the path beside the sign bearing his name. He followed from behind. After fifty feet, we came to an impenetrable wall of hedge and crosses blocking the path.

  We returned to the clearing, and he made us try the path with the signpost bearing my name, and then the other three. All ended at a wall of hedge and crosses.

  The Druid snarled. “What’s this?”

  Could he have set it all up, I wondered? If so, why? And when would he have had the time?

  “The hill wants us to go alone,” Asha said quietly.

  Nyles considered her response, then pointed the gun at Lou. “You. Down your path. See if the barrier’s there and come right back.”

  Lou hesitated. The Druid pointed the gun at him. “Now.”

  Lou started towards his path as if approaching his execution. “Be careful,” I called out.

  While the Druid was watching, Jake caught my attention and gave a single nod in the direction of the signposts. I didn’t know what it meant, except to be ready.

  No one so much as twitched when Lou disappeared from view. Long seconds passed, and just when Nyles snarled and took a step forward, Lou’s voice rang through the clearing. It sounded hoarse. “It’s gone!” he shouted. “The barrier’s gone!”

  The Druid’s eyes lit up, and he shifted his attention for a split second, turning his head towards the sound of Lou’s voice. Jake took advantage. As quick as a cobra, he sprang across the clearing, barreling into the Druid with his shoulder. Nyles went tumbling backwards. Both the gun and the letterbox flew out of his hands.

  “Run!” I said to Asha. She didn’t need any urging. The signposted pathways were the closest exits, and she raced towards hers. I moved to follow, glancing to the side as I did.

  The letterbox had fallen next to Jake. He scooped it up. The gun landed close to the Druid, and Nyles lunged for it. I saw Jake hesitate, then dart for his signpost.

  “Go, Counselor!” he shouted. “Down your path!”

  I started to follow Asha, then veered towards mine at the last moment. It was closer, and what if Jake and Asha were right and the only path open to me was my own? What if, by following Asha, I botched her escape as well?

  It was a damnable choice, but I decided that if my path was still blocked, I could double back and go to Asha. Nyles would likely try his own path or chase after Jake.

  I sprinted past my sign and down the corridor of hedgerows and crosses. I ran for fifty feet and then one hundred. The wall of thorny hedge and crosses that had previously blocked my path, an impenetrable barrier I had seen with my own two eyes just minutes before, had vanished.

  I risked a glance back. Fifty feet behind me, impossibly, the wall of hedge and crosses was in place again, blocking my return. I ran back and pressed against it, feeling and probing various parts of the wall, but succeeded only in pricking my hand on the thorns.

  I swore. Now I couldn’t help Asha.

  What the hell was going on?

  A terrible sense of isolation descended. My breath drifted away in frosty wisps, my inhalations the only interruption to the silence. The pathway curved up the hill in front of me, lit by the faint white glow of the Baltic twilight.

  Should I stay where I was, or risk the path?

  No matter the danger, if there was a chance I could help Asha and the others, I had to try. Yet it wasn’t the earthly dangers that gave me pause. What would I find if I kept walking? I had no one haunting me, no one from my past to whisper my name in the darkness and urge me forward.

  I had traveled all this way, through trial and tribulation and worse, risking my life to find meaning—all to discover the answers to life’s questions.

  What if I did find that . . . something else? What was it I was looking for? Did I want to shrink in horror from something ghastly, something beyond the limits of my imagination? Did I want to lie prostrate before a perfect being I could never hope to please? Did I want to be disappointed by an imperfect one? Was there something down that path, some version of God, I even wanted to find?

  I laughed bitterly to myself. We are all too human.

  I began to walk.

  I would know.

  -77-

  When I rounded the first corner, the man in the gray tunic was standing ten feet away.

  Fear whisked through me like the shock of an icy mountain stream. He stood motionless, looking through me as if staring at a point behind my back.

  I called out to him in desperation. “Who are you?”

  He disappeared.

  I was beyond debating the reality of the things I was seeing. The journey through the woods, the signs, the disappearing walls, this . . . spirit. There was nothing left to ponder. I had to press on, dismally aware that my only means of return was lost to me.

  A high hedge of crosses still bordered the path on either side, and I trekked upwards, into the highest reaches of the hill. I concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other, trying to block out the memory of the things I had seen, focused on reaching the end of the path.

  And then I heard the voices.

  They began as a murmur in the stillness of the night. Unintelligible wisps of sound, drifting on dead currents of air, whispering to me. I couldn’t discern the words; I didn’t want to. Were they the voices of lost souls, brought to this place by the presence of the letterbox? Were the others experiencing the same thing? I tried to block it out by covering my ears, but the sound managed to penetrate. I shuddered and walked faster, dread pulsatin
g through me in electric waves.

  The man in gray appeared again on the path ahead. I stopped, and he turned his back to me. I called out to him again, not expecting a response and not getting one. I stood for a moment longer and then, not knowing what else to do, I walked towards him. He began to walk as well. I stopped again, and he stopped. I walked towards him faster, and he did the same.

  Was I following him, or was he somehow keeping pace with me? I couldn’t tell. He became a permanent fixture on my walk, his bare legs maintaining a steady cadence beneath the tunic. I even tried running towards him, but he walked faster, somehow keeping the same distance between us.

  I felt the solid edge of sanity slipping away. The voices continued murmuring, and I heard my name coalescing in the darkness. Aidan, they called. Aidan . . . .

  I didn’t know how much more I could take. “Asha! Jake! Lou!” I shouted, over and over. There was no response, no succor.

  I put my head in my hands. The whispering grew louder, invasive, a cacophony of unnatural sound. I bent down, found a rock, and threw it at the man in the gray tunic. It passed right through him.

  “Say something, damn you!”

  I pressed forward, then sensed a presence behind me. I grew cold even before I turned, somehow knowing what I would find. It was the same feeling I had had on one other occasion, an experience I had tried to erase from my mind.

  No, I whispered.

  I turned and saw the creature that had tortured my mind at Kostnice, the shadow thing, its amorphous form heaving up and down on the path.

  I careened up the path without reason, without purpose, as fast as my legs would carry me. I didn’t bother looking back; I could sense it behind me. The man in the gray tunic had disappeared, but the voices maintained their whispered assault on my sanity.

  I had to reach the summit. I couldn’t be alone on this hill, with those voices, with that thing.