Chapter Text
The village didn’t use a calendar; we used the Great Ash.
When its bark bled, we fasted. When its leaves fell like gentle rain, we danced. This year, the Elders said that the tree demanded a “unification”. They chose me because I walked the line. Neither the blacksmith’s son nor the weaver’s daughter could claim me, so the Elders claimed I belonged to the earth itself.
They buried me waist deep in the ancient soil, my body a bridge between the world of mortal men and the silently weeping dead. As the roots began to wind around my thighs, drawing blood and sucking it up, I realised I wasn’t just feeding the tree.
The tree was knitting the village into a single, screaming mind. And I was the yarn.