By E. A. P. Duffy

I used to make a point of avoiding the woods behind my house. A small cottage that bordered a main road, in clear view of passersby, not at all disconcerting to look at. Cozy but for the towering trees that beckoned to the unknown - a forest that stretched for miles beyond my little home. It was dangerous enough to live alone, being a woman, though not a young one. Even more dangerous if I ever ventured out into the woods, but I knew better. I stayed firmly planted in my little cottage, and if I heard of a bear attack, or a cougar, or some other foul creature, I counted myself not lucky, but wise.

There was never any indication that there could be something more dangerous than wild animals in the woods behind my house.

In midwinter, I very nearly felt brave enough to venture out. I had company coming the next evening, a dear old friend of mine who I wanted to welcome with my coziest, warmest greetings. However, I had almost run out of firewood. That day, with the impending approach of a guest, and the cold weather, and the promise that any wild animal would be deep in hibernation, I stepped out into the woods behind my house. In one hand I held an axe. In the other, a lantern. My coat was tied tight around my waist as I trodd on frozen ground into the woods.

I didn't go far, mind you. There was really no need. I only needed to sever a few branches, some tinder.

Not far, no. But far enough to stumble upon some trouble.

A rocky cliff sat a few yards behind my house, into the woods. Covered with spiky barren brush and the remains of fall, frost covered dead leaves like a carpet. I walked past it, around a corner. My little cottage was just out of sight.

That is where the trouble began.

What caught my eye was not the cave itself but the scent that came from it. Like mold, rotting things, and death. Not a sharp scent, nor a sweet one, but wet. Musty. My nose wrinkled in spite of me, and my eyes followed my nose towards the scent.

The biting cold air bid me not to look closer. I was tired, but my curiosity grew stronger as the scent did. Slowly, I wandered towards it, my grip tightening on my axe as I lifted the lantern higher.

Around a rocky outcropping, on the side of the cliff facing away from my house, I found the source. Not quite a cave, but more of a hole. I lifted my lantern - strange, I remarked, that though it lit the woods around me quite well, I could see no further than a few inches into the hole in front of me. It was as if it was consuming the light as quickly as my lantern could give it off. I almost wondered if I could see the fire leaning towards the hole, being sucked in a steady stream. Fancy that. A hole that ate flame.

Like starlight it danced towards the darkness, changing colors and twisting and dancing. It seemed to sing. There was almost a beckoning.

I set the axe down at my feet, and reached up, towards the stream of flame that was trailing into the hole, disappearing into an almost misty void. As I did, I immediately regretted the action. The moment my fingers brushed the flames, I felt not heat, but a strong, irresistible tug at my fingertips. Too late, i tried to pull back, violently, but the pull only became stronger with my struggling. My hand was dragged to the mouth of the hole, and my torso with it. My entire body was being sucked in.

Numbness swept over my fingertips, then my palm, and began to creep up my arm as I dug my heels into the frozen earth. A shatter of the lantern as it fell from my fingertips was the only sound, I hadn't even thought to cry out, though my mouth hung agape. Mind racing, I flailed wildly, and then, a saving grace occured to me.

The axe

The axe, the axe!

I grabbed it with my free hand and gave one more attempt to pull away, stretching out my arm until I could see where my arm gave way to darkness right at the mouth of the hole. With adrenaline racing through my veins more parts than blood, I swung the blade down towards my wrist.

The cut was not clean. But immediately, I was released.

I flew backwards, free of the pull. Upon my harsh landing, I looked down at my wrist, the only thought to stop whatever bleeding might have been caused by my hacking my hand off with an axe.

I never thought there could be a worse sight than a bloodied stump where my hand ought to be. Indeed, I will put those thoughts forward now, though. The sight worse than a bloodied stump was the sight that greeted me then - a clean, smooth, bloodless and rounded nub. Not as though I had severed my hand with an axe. Rather, it was as though I'd never had my hand at all.

My blood ran ice cold. The smell was stronger now, intoxicating.

The only thing that kept me from going back to that dreaded cavern, strangely, was the sudden thought of my guest. What would they think, I wondered, as I blankly stared at the stump of a wrist. I tried to get to my feet, and stumbled. By the time that I had found the wherewithal to use the axe to prop myself up, I had all but forgotten the hole, and the smell. My eyes were focused on the woods around me, on the path home. My mind was focused on nothing much at all, in a haze. Around the cliff I staggered, and into my cottage.

With my one hand, I closed the door.

With one hand, I propped my axe against the wall.

With one hand, I pulled back the covers on my little bed.

With one hand, and only a quarter of my mind, I fell asleep.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Peterson was with me when I woke up.

A hearty, friendly man with a thick beard and smiling eyes, Peterson was a family friend who had always been a little too warm for me. I needed his warmth, though, and his bluntness as he immediately questioned the obvious.

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"What in the blazes happened to you, my girl?"

I sat up in my bed, hazily. Everything came back to me quite quickly. "Oh god, I didn't get firewood."

"Nevermind the bloody firewood!" Peterson cried, "You're missing your hand!"

Oh, yes. Indeed I was.

"It's nothing."

Peterson was deeply unamused. "Ester." he said, his warm eyes filled with concern. "Something's happened to you, hasn't it?"

I shook my head, rubbing the end of my arm with a no real feeling of shock, or of anything, really. Numbness permeated my soul, and robbed me of any common sense. If it hadn't, perhaps I wouldn't have done what I did next, and perhaps I wouldn't be telling you this story now.

Perhaps. There is no use, however, in wondering what would have happened if I'd been in my right mind.

What actually happened was this:

I took Peterson around the back of my house, into the woods. Over frozen ground, around the back side of the little cliff.

There was no hole in the back of the cliff.

There was a pit.

The hole appeared to have eaten through the cliff and created a cave about the width of a rich man's bathtub, with a low roof, and no bottom in sight. The pit stretched down, and as we stopped at the edge, my stomach turned.

Branching from the walls of the pit like mushrooms on a rotting log were hands. Hundreds of hands, swaying as though in some unseen breeze. The smell was back, strong as ever, like acid. Like vinegar. I retched, and tripped over my own feet as I backed away from the edge.

Whatever curiosity had gripped me the night before had left me. Unfortunately, it appeared to have infected Peterson. He didn't join me where I now stood, a good ten feet away from the edge of the pit. Rather, he stood two feet back, and rubbed his beard as he looked down.

"Hands." He said, in a sort of shocked observational tone. It was clear that what he was seeing had robbed him of the ability to say anything more than the obvious.

"Hands!" I repeated, equally lacking in tact.

"Pale pale hands." Peterson added, kneeling by the edge of the pit.

"Don't - " I stepped forward, but as the hands crested my view again, nausea hit me again, and I gagged. My stump wrist was tingling wildly as my eyes flicked back and forth.

"Are they growing out of the walls?" Peterson wondered aloud. "Did some madman nail them there? They seem to be swaying, but I feel no wind. Only sort of a pull -"

"Peterson!" I shouted, "Stay back from the edge!"

"I'm being careful, Ester." He assured me, and backed up a foot. He picked up a stick, and slowly reached towards the pit, poking softly at one of the hands. It didn't react, didn't move, didn't grab. This bolstered his confidence. "Hmm." He said, poking it harder. Still, no reaction.

I should have stopped him.

But he reached down, with his left hand, towards the pit. Carefully, he stroked the palm of one of the outermost appendages, and immediately pulled away in shock.

"It's warm!" he said, disgusted.

It was then that the smell grew stronger again. The soft sunlight that had been streaming into the cave, barely lighting it, seemed to swell. I could see, even from where I was standing, that the pit was indeed lined with hands, spiralling down, all shifting and swaying as though in a current, or a breeze. The wrists were limp, like the hands of a woman who has fainted. But they did not seem dead. And, more worryingly to me, they seemed familiar. I recognized them instantly as the hand I had seen for every day of my life until now. I felt, instantly and urgently, that we must move away. Immediately.

"Peterson - " I said, but he seemed in a trance. The smell was suffocating. I had to step back again, feeling that if I didn't, I wouldn't be able to breath. It hovered around the pit like a cloud, and Peterson seemed lost to it. "Peterson!" I called, as loudly as I could.

He didn't seem to hear me, reaching once more towards the pit.

I watched, helpless and in horror, as his fingers brushed the darkness.

And rather than some sort of nameless suction that had grabbed me, he was immediately seized by hundreds and hundreds of hands.

I saw the ones nearest the edge wrap around his forearm, clenching with stoney strength. He said they were warm to the touch, but they looked dead and mechanical as they grabbed him.

At first, he didn't react at all.

Then, suddenly, the air cleared.

The intoxicating, sickening scent vanished.

And Peterson screamed.

He screamed my name, guttural and horrified, as he disappeared over the edge of the pit. There was a horrible, visceral sucking noise, a slurping almost, and I ran towards him - just slow enough to see his eyes staring up at me as the hands pulled him down, his own arm outstretched towards me. He was too far down. I couldn't do anything - nothing but listen as he continued to scream my name, fading out of view, as I stood at the edge of the pit.

And watched.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

For nearly a day I didn't move from the edge of the pit. Well, not quite the edge. I didn't dare sit near the edge.

No, I sat ten feet back, on my knees. Without a hand. Without Peterson.

Until I heard his voice again.

"Ester..."

The word he had said with his dying breath - or, I had assumed he was dead. Foolishly, I felt a spark of hope upon hearing his voice. I stood quickly, and rushed to the edge of the pit.

I was greeted with exactly what I should have expected. From the wall of the pit, I saw the hands i had seen before. My own hands, still branching out, still swaying in the breeze, no longer clenched but relaxed once more. And then, from amongst the hands, I saw full arms. Brawnier than my own, harrier. I saw legs, feet. I saw... eyes. A face.

Peterson.

Several Petersons, more than a dozen, were growing out of the walls, much like the hands. Attached at the spine, it seemed, with the arms and legs hanging loose and free, still swaying in that unseen breeze. Eyes wide, rolled back into skulls, and soulless. Tongues lolling out of mouths, spittle dripping down chins.

"Peterson..." I whispered, choking on my voice.

"Ester..."

Dozens of voices, barely whispers, echoed my name.

"Come down, Ester."

I jolted back at the idea. Too fast.

The ground beneath me seemed to give way and suddenly, I was slipping. I reached out to grab something, anything, to steady myself.

A hand grabbed me, first.

Then another, then more, as I fell.

Hands, hands, passing me down deeper. It was far from a freefall,I struggled to free myself, to climb using the hands as footholds, but they simply grabbed onto my feet as I tried. The stronger, calloused hands of Peterson joined in.

The sunlight started to fade out of my view and I felt the hands prodding at every part of my body. Unnervingly warm, unsettlingly mechanical. They pulled at my legs, wrapped around my throat, and my waist. Stretching my lips apart, their fingers forced between my teeth. I choked.

I felt a sharp pain in my shoulder and a tearing. Then another, and another. My eyes, which had been closed to avoid the prying fingers, snapped open to try and find the source, but i could see nothing in the muddle of body parts. The pain came again - I realized I was being bitten. Eaten alive. Peterson's teeth tearing into my flesh, followed by my own hands ripping apart the exposed wounds. Whatever they were, they were consuming me.

This was too much for me.

Unceremoniously, I passed out.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

A hand shot up over the edge of the pit. My hand.

Followed by my shoulders. My head. My body.

I pulled myself up, and stood on the edge, surveying the void I left behind.

The hands were gone. The Petersons were gone. Left behind were circular impressions where they had once been attached to the stone, bigger ones where the Petersons had grown. There was nothing now. No scent, no voices, no suction. No allure.

Not from the pit, anyhow.

My gaze left the pit and examined my hands. Two hands, pale but stoney strong. I ran one of them through my hair, down my cold face, to my neck, and down my other arm. A body, indeed.

My body?

Ester?

....

I stumbled back around the bend towards the cottage.

Behind me, there was the soft sound of something sealing. The pit, certainly, sealing into a cliffside that would look as if it had never changed. But something else had sealed, too.

A gate, perhaps.

A cell door, maybe.

Sealing, but too late.

For I had already escaped.