Short Stories

The Hillside Village

Once there was a young girl named Moira. She lived in a small cottage alongside her mother, just outside the town. She was an outcast. Cast out by her love of questioning myths, legends; alienated by her ability to see places found on no cartographer's map and people recorded in no town's record. She frightened children and adults alike. Frightened those who did not understand her burden. Frightened those that did not know her curse.

Moira had the ability to see. See the past, the present and the future as one. One might think she would confuse her realities, if not for the fact that she only had her Visions at night. Some labelled her a madwoman. Others a witch. And she might have been thrown into an asylum or burned at the stake if not for her mother fervently insisting that she would keep her away from the townspeople and control her outbursts by keeping her on the outskirts.

Moira's mother, however, was incredibly interested with her daughter's ability and she had discovered that if she touched her daughter's skin in the hours spanning past twilight till dawn, she too would be able to see both the wonders her daughter was witness to. She would ask her daughter once a night if what she was seeing was savoury or not. If Moira dared lie, it was twenty lashings, her back baring the scars of many a whip's stinging cruel brand.

In the daytime Moira remained at home, neglected by her mother and made to tirelessly clean, cook and maintain the house while the mistress attended the market or went to gossip with local spinstresses. While her mother was away Moira often found herself plagued by the townsmen who harassed her endlessly, attempting to get a self-disparaging reaction out of her.

Moira eventually took to feigning fatigue at the end of the day, and, if her mother acknowledged her harassers or was feeling especially empathetic, she would allow her to retire early to bed. And during those nights when her mother, consumed in her own inconsequential thoughts, failing to remember her daughter, would Moira escape to the one vision that was recurring. The hillside village. Precisely five minutes before midnight, Moira would head north of the village, past the lake, towards the Rolling Hills. There she would wait, bursting with excitement, as the very air around her held its breath in anticipation. For, when the curtain of moonlight fell onto the hill, the sky would fall into what seemed to be a drunken stupor. It would shirk its responsibilities as the shy, quiet night sky, and choose instead to display a myriad of colours, bold, bright, beautiful.

And in the midst of all of this, sitting atop the highest hill, was the most unconventional town anyone would hope for. A fantasy made real. People rode clouds, walked vertically up walls as if on they were on the ground, and the ground itself rippled and pulsated with every footstep, a living being itself. Everything about this village was otherworldly, and that suited Moira just perfectly. She knew the villagers, as well as the villagers, knew her. She made friendships, relationships that far surpassed the one she shared with her mother. And every night, when she could, she would make her way cautiously to the hill to engage in such splendours, to regale the villagers with the sights she had seen, to seek solace with them when her Visions became more than a little terrifying. And every morning after, the village would slowly evaporate, the colours melting into a mist, the sky into settling into dawn. And it was Moira's secret.

One day, Moira happened upon a young man as she made her way to the top of the hill. He was struggling to walk, hobbling down the path. She watched carefully as he stopped, attempted to take one last step, fell. Now, as much as she wanted to, Moira couldn't just leave him there. So she made a wary beeline towards the man. She rolled him over, exasperatedly taking note of his unconsciousness. As she hoisted him up and onto her shoulders, the sky began to transform and liquefy, resembling an oil painting. The town began to bleed into existence; the most terrifying moment of the night. Moira knew if she wasn't immensely careful, she could end up trapped in a wall or stuck as part of another person. Alone, avoiding everything was difficult enough, but now, she had this dead weight holding her down.