The year is 1879. When thirteen-year-old Ruth Merritt Holbrook emerges from her family's burning estate, bloody and charred, but entirely numb--She makes headlines. Reporters believe she is deranged. They accuse her of having set the fire. All the h...
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I dreamt I was standing in a field of red poppies. They were tall, as was the grass surrounding them. I stood in only my nightdress, my hair loose and blown by a hot wind. It smelt of fire and rain but there was neither. Instead, in every direction, there was endless field. It stretched out for eons, bleeding into charcoal skies heavy with storm clouds.
I was not alone in this field. A man stood across from me, the two of us separated by a few dozen feet. Neither of spoke and he did not acknowledge my presence. He wore simple black pants and a cotton shirt only partially tucked in. Aside from those details, he was shrouded in black shadows. He had no face, no eyes—nothing to make him recognizable. I neither felt he was a stranger nor felt as if we were friends. He was merely a boy and I a girl.
This boy stood with his feet shoulder width apart, shoulders slumped and head bowed. It was as if he were praying, his body swaying back and forth rhythmically. We stood like that, him looking down and me looking at him, for what felt like hours. And then, just when I want to speak, to ask who he was, the dream shifted. It was subtle at first, the storm clouds seeming to gather and roll over one another until they swirled above the boy's head. He did not move, did not acknowledge that anything was happening. It was as if he could not see or feel any of it. But I did.
I realized, just as the clouds darkened and dipped down, that they were in fact shadows. They hovered around the boy, forming the shape of a person, a second man. He stood behind the first, his shadowy hands braced against the boy's shoulders. The two of them rocked, back and forth, back and forth, dizzyingly fast until the boy jerked, as if hit from behind and collapsed to his knees amongst the poppies.
He did not utter a word. His head did not move up, his eyes still stayed locked on the ground. His face still remained unrecognizable to me—and yet this felt familiar. I have not seen this before, but I had felt it.
The shadow bent down and a buzz filled the air around us, like thousands of insects or millions of quiet voices—all of it blending until it was one solid bone-shaking noise. The boy reacted, he held out his hands palms up, spread his five fingers wide as if waiting for the sky to split itself in two and empty itself into his awaiting hands.
I was so afraid. So terror-stricken that I could not speak, could not scream, could not understand what this feeling was or what was happening to this boy. All I knew was that it was terrible and he was willing and there was nothing that I could do but stand and watch. The sword that appeared in his open hands was made of onyx and glass—I know it and yet I do not have any reason to.
As soon as this sword appeared, I knew what it was meant to do. I was not surprised as the shadows leaned down and the buzzing intensified. They were saying something, telling him something. A chant. I wanted to yell, to speak to him to call his name and tell him not to do it; but no words would come, I was entirely mute.
The boy lifted the sword, adjusting it in his hands so that the tip of the sword was angled towards his abdomen. With the way he was holding it, all he would need to do is pull it forward sharply and it was pierce directly under his rib cage. I was screaming in my head, five words that I did not understand and yet felt in my very soul.
You should have told me.
You should have told me.
You should have told me.
You should have told me.
I woke up just as the boy thrust the sword into his gut.
