The Journal of the Walk, Tuesday, March 22nd
I awoke to the sound of weeping. It tore me from my deep slumber and chilled me to the bone, my teeth grinding into each other as I shot up and looked around – first with dazed fear and then with concern – only to realize that the sound was gone. The warm springtime night was a chorus of chirps and croaks, of hoots and howls, but no weeping. I thought to myself that I must have heard it all in dreams, but I could not fall asleep again. My body was drenched in sweat, my clothes sticking to my body within my sleeping bag, which now felt like a cumbersome restraint, a cocoon that I must shed. I slithered my way out and sat to look at the stars.
There were thousands of them spread across the black expanse of night, uncountable and unnamable even for the most avid and devoted astronomers and astrologists. Being a complete stranger to either of these fields of study, I dared not presume to fare any better: I could not have identified a single constellation to save my own skin. I suddenly felt lightheaded, overcome both by the immensity of the heavens above me and the sensation that these stars were somehow not my own. Indeed, something was amiss, for though I have walked under many a foreign horizon, never before had I felt like I was an intruder under the mantle of night.
Then I heard the weeping once again. Again it drove frozen needles into my bones, and again I looked around, trying to find its source through the shadowed tree trunks. Another sob came, and I stood up and followed it into the darkness.
After a few minutes of walking, I found a young, dark-skinned woman dressed in white garments, surrounded by a swarm of reddish-brown moths. The insects drew closer to her with every sob, only fluttering away for a few moments when she angrily swatted at them before returning to her lamentations. She must have heard me as I approached, for she immediately turned to look at me with fiery, daring eyes, as if telling me not to pity her.
"I'm sorry," I said, startled. "I did not mean to intrude. I heard you and feared someone might be in need of help."
She said nothing, merely gazing at me with an accusing frown, occasionally swatting at the moths when they got too close to her. One of them separated from the swarm and flew towards me, landing on my outstretched hand and remaining there for a few instants under the starlight. I was marveled as I observed the pattern on its brown wings – white markings that looked like serrated fangs, like molars shed from an infant’s mouth to make way for adult teeth. With its wings fully opened, the moth resembled a gaping maw, a mouth about to close and bite me. I was tempted to touch it, to caress its delicate frame, but it took flight and faded into the night.
"You should not have done that," the woman said while wiping her tears. "You might have upset her already."
"Upset who?" I asked.
"My Queen, she who we call Obsidian Butterfly. Even now, she sends them – her eyes and ears – to harass me, to persuade me to go back into her service. I do not think she will take kindly to you interfering with her designs."
"I cannot imagine that I could somehow trump her plans any more than you already have," I said. "The choice to leave is yours alone; the choice to return also belongs only to you."
The woman scoffed, a few more bitter tears streaming down her face.
"What do you know? You know nothing, nothing of our ways. We are sworn to a duty; to betray it is unheard of."
"Yet no one leaves without a reason," I ventured. "If you left Obsidian Butterfly–"
"Not just her," the woman said. "My sisters too. They begged me not to leave, but I did not heed to their pleas, nor to their threats. It was my own decision, yes, but the consequences are also mine to bear alone."
She continued sobbing, no longer swatting at the moths, who landed on her one by one until she was covered in a living mantle of chitinous wings. Cautiously, I sat next to her and said:
"Please, forgive me if I have been imprudent. I do not intend to presume that I understand your troubles. I can offer you nothing but to listen, if that is what you wish."
The woman stopped sobbing, and the moths took flight once more. As they dispersed, she turned to look at me, and I witnessed fear itself: her youthful visage was gone, and in its place remained a pale, gaunt face with hollow eyes and black teeth flanked by no lips. Her white dress glimmered with painful light, and her hair floated wildly despite there being no wind. Still, something remained within that terrifying vision that kept me from fleeing into the woods, a sort of understanding that we were alike in many ways, both of us wanting to roam farther than we had before, carrying with us nothing but what we held within.
A hoarse cackle emerged from her skeletal throat.
"Are you not afraid?" She said. Her voice was harsh and dry, like bone dragged across a stone floor.
"I am," I replied with honesty.
"Yet you do not run."
"Should I run?" I replied. "Not all that is terrifying means one harm. I do not think you are going to hurt me; if you were going to, why let me come this close?"
"Perhaps I wept to lure you here, like a predator who imitates the lost child to drown the worried parent," she clicked her black mandibles.
"Fair point," I could not help but laugh. "But we are still conversing, and I am still in one piece."
Again she said nothing and merely sighed as if conceding. We remained in silence for a few moments, gazing at the silhouette that the galaxy cast over the night sky.
"In elder times, I would have ripped you apart as soon as I saw you," the woman mused. "My sisters and I would have feasted on your flesh and used your bones to braid our hair. Your heart would be our tribute to Obsidian Butterfly, and your blood would be water for the flowers in her garden."
I nodded with caution. She sighed deeply and stood, her form almost levitating as the fluttering of the moths became more frantic. They almost seemed to call out desperately to her.
"And still, tonight I allow you to live. I am changed, too far down the path I chose to walk. What use would there be in backtracking my own steps, but to lose myself again?"
Her visage reverted to how it was when I first saw her. On her eyelashes, the remnants of her sorrow sparkled like a phantom light.
"You know, it's funny," she then said. "It is usually those like me who people ask for a sign, yet it seems as if tonight it is I who has received a sign from you."
"I don't think I've answered any prayers lately," I joked, "but I'm glad to answer yours."
For the first time in our conversation, the woman smiled. She stood and bowed courteously to me, then shone so radiantly that I had to avert my sight. When I looked again, she was gone, leaving me alone and surrounded by nothing but shadows and an encroaching army of moths. In the mantle of heavenly darkness, a single star – one of the brightest in the firmament – flickered and went out like an extinguished candle, leaving behind a black void, a wound upon the face of night.
I, of course, did not return to sleep. Instead, I went back to my campsite, picked up my things, and walked away. With every step I gave, I felt as if someone watched me from above, a thousand thousand bright eyes fixed on me, all of them unblinking, all of them burning with rage. I kept walking until I saw morning and gave praise to the rising sun.