The sickle moon shall fell thee
If the Mere's waters touch thee
For Shokushu will take thee
The Mere seemed as old as time itself. Older than the town, older than the fields and forest, older still than the very hills themselves. When this world had yet to be formed, a desolate rock in a desolate corner of a desolate universe, perhaps the Mere was already there. Deep. No plummet had ever sounded its depths. Immeasurable. It had been the incomprehensible knowledge of a mere few people that had built this place, yet even their insight did not stretch to understanding the Mere. The Mere was where Shokushu lived. Cold and ancient.
An old story, designed to keep children from the city in the hills running down to the water, swimming and drowning. You see, children do not understand undercurrents, shoals, cold and the peculiar nature of such large bodies of water, but they understand monsters. You heard the children singing the rhyme mockingly in the school-yard. Yet it worked, nobody swam in the Mere.
We were not young and foolish enough to believe in monsters, we were not old and clever enough to believe in science either. And we were quietly rebellious. Upon Friday evening, Elissa and I set off from home together, travelling to meet our lovers at the city gate. And upon Friday evening, Hebe and Leuce set off from home together, travelling to meet their lovers at the city gate. Elissa met Hebe and I Leuce. Four girls heading from the town to fulfil a romance the provost would not accept and called sinful.
We took little with us, merely the clothes we had on our backs, a Ronson lighter and each a cashmere blanket to sleep under. Elissa, of the wild auburn tresses, sang as we walked along the lane that led away from the town, down hill amongst the meadows and fields of wildflowers. The hedges along the verges grew high here, filled with brambleberries, blaeberries and the occasional strawberry, which quiet Hebe picked as we went by, lifting her dress skirts to carry them, showing the slender legs that Elissa adored. Beautiful Leuce simply laughed and danced in the warmth of the setting sun, her delicate features catching the light, or her slim silhouette cutting a perfect figure. And I, Pomona, I told stories; of new things, of old things and of things of no time at all. At eighteen, all the worlds were ours.
At the stile over the gate we turned, heading along the winding path, merely a serpentine route through the meadow, where the grass had been flattened down a little. Up the field, cows gazed lazily down upon us, sat or stood as ancient gods. The track guided us to the forest, and we removed our shoes and socks to ford the stream that crossed our route. We did not put our them back on, but instead walked barefoot, for the ground was covered in a soft carpet of pine needles. We took to collecting pine nuts as we walked and trying to catch the call of birds and name them.
And in the forest lay the old stones, which seemed to glow maraschino red in the dying daylight. We undressed, folded our clothes and placed them in the care of the rocks, hidden underneath their massy bulks. And when we turned to face each other again we giggled coquettishly, smiled and ran our hands over each others' soft forms, becoming re-acquainted with what we had missed. No matter how hard we tried at night, we could never perfectly recollect what the other truly looked, felt, smelt and, when I kissed Leuce's lips, neck and hair, what they tasted like. There we promised upon the old stones that we would keep from surrendering to passion until we lay to bed and, for now, to stay pure, until we could wash ourselves in the cool waters of the Mere.
And we recommenced walking, no longer singing, dancing, gathering fruit or talking, simply whispering, kissing and holding each other as we travelled.
And the forest thinned and the pine needles turned to sand and then shingle as we came to the Mere. We hobbled a little at first, as the round blue pebbles rolled under our feet, and shivered as a cool breeze swept off the water. As a grey mirror it lounged in the cleft between the beach and the distant pike upon the opposite shore. We lay our blankets upon the ground, a little up from the water's edge and playfully gathered firewood from the fallen branches at the forest's edge. The sun slipped beneath the horizon and the strange stars seemed to turn on. We built a fire and then swam in the water.
We did not swim far from the shore. The floor of the Mere fell away slowly until I could only just stand upon the bottom. Then it suddenly dropped about thirty strokes from the shoreline. Leuce tried to dive down and bring a pebble from the very bottom at that depth. She was gone nearly a minute, and when she surfaced she seemed half-drowned and weary. She told us that she felt as if she had swum downwards for hours, but not seen the bottom. I kissed her and told her it was okay and helped her to the beach to recover. The water was unbelievably cold, beyond any cold we had ever felt, even in the depths of winter, but we enjoyed the effect the frigidity had upon our bodies. Our nipples hardening, crotches unexpectedly pleasured, shivering. When we climbed out, we ate what we had collected, dried each other around the fire and wrapped ourselves in blankets. And we made love under the harvest moon, doing all the things we could never back home. Leuce and I traded in unbearable ecstasy for such time until each flood of appeasement became sweet agony.
Then we lay back and gazed at the stars that seemed to gaze back down upon us.
Elissa said each was another sun, with other worlds full of other people living upon them, yet she would go there one day and take all of us too.
Hebe said each was the soul of someone who had died, transfixed upon the heavens to watch down upon the world they had left.
Leuce said each was an angel, protecting the world from harm, glowing white hot because of their holiness.
I did not know which was true, yet wished all of them were.
Then we slept, knotted in the limbs of our lovers, tired and satisfied, the fire built high enough to last until dawn. There were still wolves in the hills back then, and we had no intention of meeting them.
The sickle moon shall fell thee
If the Mere's waters touch thee
For Shokushu will take thee
And Shokushu will have thee
I woke.
The world came into bleary focus.
Nothing.
I settled back into the warmth of my three sisters, sliding downwards at the same rate that my mind slid towards sleep.
Suddenly, a wind came up, a harsh gust carrying a sickly smell that tasted bitter. Coming off the water it stretched out and extinguished the fire we had built with such care. It sank back down. The water was still. I stood, trying not to wake Elissa, Hebe and Leuce, attempting to locate the Ronson lighter to restart the fire. I cast about for it for a while, but found nothing, it had probably rolled underneath one of the sleepers.
Thud.
Less a sound, more a sudden blast of air that threw me to the floor, my head cracking against a particularly large stone. There was blackness for a moment.
I came to with a headache like the drums of a wild folk dance. I felt something about my left ankle and I drunkenly sat to see what it was.
I screamed.
What could only be described as a tentacle gripped my leg. Dull blue in the half-light and slowly coiling about my ankle. It had an air of unmistakable malice. Another approached my right leg. As fast as I could move I reached to pull them away. I did not know what creature had such limbs as these but I did not desire to have it touch my body.
Hopeless.
Their clasp was like steel, or stronger. My feet were held in inhuman manacles that refused to relinquish their grip. More tentacles writhed across the floor, reaching to my wrists and taking savage hold.
I tried to scream again.
It was cut short as a fifth slammed into my open mouth with such force that it threw me back to lying down. My cries were conclusively muffled. And from there I was manoeuvred into a star position, arms and legs stretched so wide that it felt as if I were to be ripped apart. At such a terrifying proximity I saw that my first description of 'tentacle' had been off the mark. They were more like vines, and in my state of shock I observed how they flowed like water, yet resisted movement with the strength of rock. Everything came into terrifying focus. Each vine-tentacle was lined with serrated thorns and hairs that shredded human flesh, and it seemed to be covered in something like formic acid; every inch of skin they touched they turned to burning nettle rashes.
They seemed to be driven by one mind and, glancing around I noticed that Elissa and Leuce were similarly held, as was Hebe who was crying. The sickle moon. The Mere. The child's story. Shokushu.
There were hundreds of them now, pouring out of the water with what appeared to be relish. They noticed that I watched them and flooded towards me, binding my head with a crown of thorns.
They snaked across my body, appearing to cross me simply for the warmth of my skin, or heartbeat or breath. The one in my mouth squirmed and I fought back an urge to be sick. It pushed backwards down my throat, deeper and deeper and I heaved. I tried to bite upon it, but was met with metal. It was warm and tasted with a disgusting bitterness. The ones that held me in place grasped tightly, I could almost feel my bones crack underneath the brute strength.
