The Echoes of the Banyan Tree
In the forgotten stretches of the valley, isolated from the bustling modern world, lay the village of Malanpur. During the day, it was a picturesque portrait of rural life—golden wheat fields swaying in the breeze, children chasing wooden hoops down dirt paths, and the scent of woodsmoke and roasting spices hanging heavy in the air. But as the sun dipped below the jagged horizon, a profound and unnatural silence would swallow the village.
Doors were bolted. Windows were shuttered tight. Even the stray dogs ceased their barking, retreating under porches with their tails tucked between their legs. The villagers of Malanpur did not fear thieves or wild animals. They feared her.
They called her the Weeping Girl.
Decades ago, a young woman named Tara had vanished into the dense forests surrounding Malanpur. The elders whispered that she had been betrayed by someone she loved, left to wander the unforgiving woods alone during a torrential monsoon. She never returned living, but the village soon learned that she had not truly left. Now, she was a specter of rage and sorrow, bound to the village boundaries, terrorizing anyone foolish enough to step outside after twilight.
Rohan, a young and pragmatic schoolteacher recently assigned to Malanpur, found the village's strict nighttime curfew to be nothing more than archaic superstition. Educated in the city, he believed in science, logic, and things he could see with his own two eyes.
"It's just the wind in the trees, Uncle," Rohan had laughed one evening, sitting on the porch of his rented house with the village headman.
The old man's face was pale, deeply lined with years of inherited fear. "Do not mock what you do not understand, Rohan. The shadows here have teeth. When the fog rolls in and the crickets stop singing, you must be inside. She remembers everyone, and she forgives no one."
Rohan dismissed the warning with a polite nod, secretly amused by the theatrical nature of the villagers' folklore.
A week later, Rohan's skepticism was put to the ultimate test. He had traveled to a neighboring town to collect school supplies and lost track of time browsing through a bookstore. By the time he mounted his bicycle for the five-mile journey back to Malanpur, the sun was already bleeding orange and purple into the evening sky.
The ride began peacefully. However, as he approached the dense treeline that marked the border of Malanpur, the atmosphere shifted drastically. The temperature plummeted, turning his breath into plumes of white mist. The familiar nighttime chorus of frogs and crickets abruptly silenced, leaving a heavy, suffocating quiet in its wake.
Then, the fog descended. It did not roll in naturally; it seemed to seep upward from the damp earth, thick and glowing with an eerie, sickly pale light under the half-moon.
Rohan pedaled harder, his heart beginning to beat a frantic rhythm against his ribs. Just a sudden drop in temperature, he rationalized to himself, gripping the handlebars until his knuckles turned white. Nothing to be afraid of.
Chink... chink... chink...
Rohan squeezed the brakes, his bicycle skidding to a halt on the gravel. He strained his ears.
From the impenetrable darkness of the woods to his left, the delicate, rhythmic sound of silver anklets—payals—echoed through the fog. The sound was slow, deliberate, and moving closer.
"Hello?" Rohan called out, his voice trembling slightly despite his best efforts to sound authoritative. "Is someone there? You shouldn't be out here in the dark."
The chiming stopped.
For a agonizing minute, there was nothing but the sound of his own ragged breathing. Rohan swallowed hard, preparing to push on the pedals, when a voice drifted through the trees. It was a woman's voice, sweet but laced with a bone-chilling distortion, like a record playing at the wrong speed.
"Help me... I can't find my way home..."
Against every instinct screaming at him to flee, Rohan stepped off his bicycle. He was a teacher; if someone was lost, he had to help. He took a cautious step toward the treeline. "Where are you? Come towards the road."
The fog parted slightly, revealing the silhouette of a massive, ancient Banyan tree. Standing beneath its sprawling, vine-choked branches was a figure.
It was a girl, dressed in a traditional red sari that looked heavy and slick with dark mud. Her back was turned to him, her long, jet-black hair cascading down to her waist in tangled, wet mats.
"Miss?" Rohan asked, taking another step.
Slowly, the girl turned around.
Rohan's breath caught in his throat, and a cold wave of absolute terror washed over him. The girl's face was a nightmare. Her skin was a translucent, bruised purple, stretched tight over her cheekbones. Her eyes were wide, completely devoid of irises or pupils—just twin pools of endless, milky white. But the most horrifying feature was her mouth; it was stretched into an impossibly wide, unnatural grin, revealing rows of sharp, jagged teeth that gleamed in the moonlight.
"You didn't help me then," she hissed, her voice now a guttural scrape that seemed to echo directly inside Rohan's mind. "Why are you helping me now?"
She didn't walk towards him. Instead, she glided, her feet hovering inches above the ground, the silver anklets chiming furiously with every unnatural movement. Chink-chink-chink-chink!
Panic, raw and primal, seized Rohan. He abandoned his bicycle, spun on his heels, and ran. He sprinted down the dirt road toward the village, his lungs burning, his legs pumping with desperate adrenaline.
Behind him, the chiming of the anklets grew louder, faster, accompanied by a shrieking, unearthly wail that tore through the silent night. The sound was deafening, filling the entire valley with a symphony of pure rage. He didn't dare look back, but he could feel the freezing cold radiating from her, mere feet from his neck.
"Open the door! Please!" Rohan screamed as the first houses of Malanpur came into view.
The village was dead silent. No lights were on. No doors opened. The villagers were completely paralyzed by their own terror, leaving Rohan alone in the dark.
He stumbled, his knee tearing open on a sharp rock, but he forced himself up. The village temple stood at the center of the square, its large bronze bell hanging just inside the courtyard. It was his only chance.
With a final, desperate burst of energy, Rohan threw himself into the temple courtyard. He grabbed the thick rope of the temple bell and pulled with all his remaining strength.
BONG.
The deep, resonant sound of the holy bell shattered the night air.
BONG. BONG.
Rohan collapsed onto the cold stone floor, gasping for air, clutching the rope. He looked back toward the village entrance. The fog was swirling violently. At the very edge of the temple's courtyard, just where the shadows met the faint moonlight, the Weeping Girl stood.
She stared at him with those empty, milky eyes, her horrific smile fading into a snarl of frustration. She could not cross the holy threshold. For a long, terrifying moment, they simply looked at each other. Then, with a slow, deliberate step backwards, she melted away into the dense fog.
The oppressive cold lifted. The crickets tentatively resumed their chirping.
Rohan lay on the temple floor until dawn broke, painting the sky with the warm, reassuring colors of morning. When the villagers finally unbolted their doors and stepped outside, they found the skeptical city teacher huddled by the bell, his hair completely white, his eyes wide and vacant.
Rohan never mocked the villagers again. He never stayed out past twilight. And every evening, as the sun began to set over Malanpur, he was the first to bolt his doors, forever haunted by the chilling, rhythmic echo of silver anklets in the mist....