The Arbor Shrine

His bare feet came suddenly upon clammy mud, and he slid to a stop. The small boy listened, trying in vain to control and quiet his quick breaths. He stepped carefully from the mud, back onto the damp leaves and forest detritus. The forest closed in around him here, and he couldn’t see far into the dark trees, whose twisting bare branches hung over him.

As he darted his eyes around, he glimpsed the faint grey of a bare tree trunk, and he remembered his mother’s warnings. It was sure to be an arbor shrine. He ran to it, the brambles of bushes grabbing and tearing at his arms and his legs, cutting his skin. He remembered his mother telling him the shrines were a last resort against grave danger. She said he’d never be far from one should he ever need it, but she warned him never to pray before one except in times of the utmost need.

He fell on his knees before the shrine’s smoke-colored trunk, which seemed to glow in contrast to the black bark of the other trees in the forest. The trunks of the dark trees were rough, but the arbor shrines’ were always bare, smooth, and covered with eyes that watched over the forest. He placed his hands against the shrine’s trunk and prayed.

“Please don’t let it find me. Please protect me. Please don’t let it find me—I don’t want to die. If you hear me please protect me. Please don’t let me die.”

He remained there, kneeling in the silent stillness. He could still smell the rain that had come and gone. He could feel the damp on his hands pressed against the trunk of the shrine. He felt warmth on his head and looked up. Through the branches and through the stormy clouds above, the sun peaked through for a fleeting moment. The glimpse of warmth filled the boy with hope that the shrine had heard him.

The wailing that pursued him came again from afar, and it continued to drone closer. The boy looked over his shoulder in fear. It was coming his way. He pressed his head against the tree and prayed one more time before running away, deeper into the forest. He ran and ran. Mud collected on his skin. Decaying leaves stuck to him. He could smell their moldy death smell as he ran, but he couldn’t stop to brush them off. The wailing droned ever closer, and the boy desperately crashed through walls of bushes.

He felt something in his hair which hung near his ears. He brushed it away while he ran and discovered to his horror that writhing spider egg sacs stuck to his hands. Baby arachnids burst from them, crawling up his arms. He couldn’t repress a soft yelp as he threw them away, back into the bushes.

He ran on, gasping, his lungs burning and bursting like the paper lanterns from the beginning of the new year. His ears itched. He rubbed them again. Again, there were egg sacs, and he threw them away. A mound of earth rose ahead, and he dove against it to hide, fighting for air and forcing back the tears. Failing to stay quiet. The wailing had stopped, and the boy waited, casting his gaze in every direction.

When he could breathe again, he crawled out from the earth, sneaking back into the trees. Then the wail pierced his ears, and he covered them. The shrieking wail struck through his heart. His chest heaved against searing pressure, as though spectral hands of flame squeezed his lungs. The hunter stood before him, upon the raised earth. Its lanky, arching body silhouetted against the grey sky gleaming through the naked branches overhead. The hunter’s eyes shone gold, glinting as its wail faded to a rumbling growl. It stepped its long legs down to the forest floor where the boy stood frozen.

Silence fell on the forest, except for the hunter’s low growl. Trembling, the boy lowered his hands from his ears to find yet another silken egg sac writhing in his palm. His body reacted on impulse to throw it, regardless of the hunter looming ahead of him.

The egg sac hit the ground, bursting with a white flash. Enormous spiders, larger than any the boy had ever seen, poured forth from it, scurrying straight at the hunter. The hunter’s growl transformed to a shriek—not the tormenting wail that chased the boy through the trees. This was a shriek of fear. The hunter turned, scrambled in the mud, and fled from the flood of spiders, howling back into the darkness.

The boy stood in disbelief, his fear melting to relief as he thanked the trees for their blessing. He reached his hands back to his ears, but this time no spider eggs came away. He had thrown the last of them. He didn’t know what to do now, remaining frozen in the clearing near the raised earth, his mud-caked and leaf-covered legs unable to move him from the spot. He stood there, listening to the hunter’s howl fade into the forest. He couldn’t make himself move, even when the howling ceased.

He couldn’t move when the hunter’s wail resumed, sounding its murderous intent from deep within the trees. His legs wouldn’t move. His knees wouldn’t bend. He couldn’t even turn to look behind him to watch the hunter’s return. He felt the blood draining from his face as the wail drew closer. His arms went pale, then smoke grey. His legs had locked, and when he looked down at them, begging them to move, he saw the smooth grey trunk of an arbor shrine. His arms stretched over his head, and he couldn’t bring them back down. He cried to himself, immobilized as the hunter passed him by, lumbering over the raised earth and farther into the forest. The eyes of the arbor shrine continued watching, forever.