A Mother's Lullaby

Prompt: Each night, you hear the faint sounds of a beautiful song emanating from the forest surrounding your town. Everyone seems to be talking about it and you can't help but feel intrigued by the strange phenomenon. You and your friends decide to explore the woods in the hopes of uncovering its source.

We've been circling around in the forest for an hour, but we are still unable to find our way out. We can no longer take the heavy feeling the place is giving off. It feels like someone is watching our every move and the rotting smell is overwhelming our sense of smell.

But that's not the only reason we want to leave this forest immediately.

There are constant footprints that do not belong to any of us. There are only four of us: me and my three friends, who are 2 boys and 1 girl. All of us are wearing shoes, but there's a sign of barefoot prints on the mud trail that we are walking.

And it is following us. It is following us very closely, even if there is not a single shadow that can be found on its spot.

At first, we were just curious about the phenomenon of the forest—curious about the source of the lullaby that we hear every night. So we decided to explore the woods.

However, it was a huge mistake. Coming here is a huge mistake.

After following the trail where the lullaby was coming from, we found ourselves in front of the dried river. However, it is only the river that is dry; its surrounding land is wet, and that's when we noticed the additional foot marks following us.

The first one to react is Lily, the one with the most sharpened senses of all of us. She immediately dragged me and yelled at the two guys to hurry up because we were leaving.

And now we are in front of the huge tree again that we have passed by multiple times now. We left stone scratches on the tree to check if we were just circling around in the same spot, and we have just verified that.

My heart is beating fast, both from nervousness and from constant running. I'm sure I'm not the only one.

"What should we do? We've been in the same spot over and over again. This is ridiculous! " Chris cried out, kicking the stone near his foot. "If only I hadn't followed you guys here..." he added.

Hearing what Chris said, our other friend, Loid, became furious and pulled the collar of Chris' polo. The two guys continue to quarrel.

I was about to stop them both, but I found Lily to be oddly quiet. I discovered she was frozen in place, staring off into the distance. So I also looked over to the spot where she was staring.

And I froze. I also realized that the lullaby had stopped sounding.

Not far from where we are is the figure of a smiling woman. Her dress is heavily soiled and her skin is full of scratches.

Her few strands of hair are all tangled up with a few burnt spots. But her face is the most horrifying. Her eyes are pure white without any color on their iris, with her lips cut long on each side, giving her a bigger smile.

On her two hands, with missing fingers, is a baby's skull.

At first, her face was angled to show she was looking at Lily, but she suddenly looked my way. The sound of my beating heart is suddenly deafening.

The earlier arguing guys have also caught up and frozen up from the sides.

This time, the first one to react is Chris, who immediately sprints out to run to the opposite side of where the figure is. I soon followed, not forgetting to drag Lily along.

From above us, we can hear a manic laugh, following us very closely. The woman crawls and jumps from branch to branch to follow us.

From my hold, I felt Lily shaking before I heard her scream, "Astra! Let's go right. The woman will jump to the left tree. "

I did as she said, but suddenly, I felt Lily being grabbed from me. I looked back and saw that the woman had used her tongue to try and haul Lily up to the tree.

In return, I tried to strengthen my hold on Lily's arm, but the woman successfully tugged her away from me. Lily let out a deranged scream, and tried to resist.

I was about to ask the guys for help. However, I found that they continued running without waiting for us.

I felt cold inside. I looked at Lily and gave an apologetic look before running away as well to save myself.

Before I got far, I heard Lily's desperate cries of my name, screaming for help. Still, I didn't look back.

Not too long after that, I hear different shrieks coming from two different directions, which sound like Loid and Chris. I cover my ears to stop hearing the sound of their screams, which is like a squealing pig being slaughtered.

Finally, I hear the sound of the rustling leaves from above me, and I know my turn is up. I stopped and turned around to confront the terrifying figure instead--as running became a futile effort. However, I immediately came face to face with it, her nose a few inches away from mine.

My breathing hitched and my mouth went dry. My knees are shaking and I can barely stand up. In the end, all I could muster was to whisper the question, "Why?"

The woman raises her hand, which is holding the baby's skull. She swung it and I felt my head being hit hard. Before I passed out, countless memories flew into my mind.

I don't know who it belongs to.

There is a beautiful young woman who is strolling in the forest, casually picking flowers and herbs. On her back is a baby tied safely using a big scarf carrier. She is singing lullabies and swaying from side to side. The baby's giggle is pleasant to hear.

At this very peaceful moment for both mother and child, four girls suddenly passed by and one grabbed the baby from her back.

Two followed suit and grabbed both of the young woman's arms. The four girls are laughing manically as they torture the woman by stomping on her, cutting her skin and dragging her around.

They said they were enraged by the woman's guts to marry the most handsome bachelor in their province. They say she didn't deserve him.

The earlier peaceful atmosphere is replaced by a woman's screams and a baby's cries.

When everything went quiet, what was left were the remains of both mother and child, which they threw into the river.

Even though the four women looked young, I recognized all of them.

Three of them are the mother of my friends. One of them is mine.

They say the dead tell no tales...

But does the soul ever die?