Free Five Stories for the Dark Months by Katherine Traylor

cool, and wet with
condensation.
    “Take a sip,” the old woman urged
her. Sabrina obeyed.
    It wasn’t beer—she wasn’t sure what
it was. It had a strange, spicy flavor she couldn’t quite place.
Was it mead? Some kind of cider? She took another sip. “I’m
Sabrina.” It seemed suddenly important that they should know
that.
    The three strangers nodded. “We
don’t use names much here,” said the girl, “but I’m pleased to meet
you, Sabrina. I was Hannah.”
    “I was Tom.” The man
smiled.
    The old woman smiled, too, but
didn’t give her name.
    A few feet away, a girl with red
curls paused to give Sabrina a filthy look. She was very pretty,
and wore a tight sweater that showed off an excellent
figure.
    “Who was that?” Sabrina said, when
the girl had moved on.
    The other sighed. “That was Kelly,”
said Hannah. “The riverman brought her last year.”
    “Sour grapes,” said Tom, smiling
again.
    The old brown woman just shook her
head, and filled Sabrina’s cup.
    Sabrina took another
drink.
     
    Time passed in a pleasant haze.
Whatever was in the mug proved mildly intoxicating, and she didn’t
get sleepy no matter how much she drank. From time to time she
thought to look for Cyrus, but he was never nearby. He moved from
fire to fire, greeting friends and smiling mysteriously at
everyone. Once she saw him pat Kelly on the shoulder and kiss her
cheek. Another time he seemed to be exchanging secrets with a
beautiful dark woman in an old-fashioned dress. Not once did he
look at Sabrina.
    She soon forgot her disappointment,
because it turned out her new friends were excellent company. They
constantly asked questions about her life, and seemed fascinated by
every answer, even things as simple as “I go to State,” or “I have
three sisters.” Soon others joined them, and greeted Sabrina like
one of their own. They all plied her with drink, and with food in
little clay bowls: deviled eggs, cornbread, muffins, brownies.
Everything was perfect, and she never felt full.
    Before long she
was in the middle of a large crowd of people, roasting homemade
marshmallows over the largest bonfire. Its heat scorched her face,
and the air was rich with smoke and sugar. Someone had remembered
an old drinking song, and was teaching it to the others amid waves
of laughter. “‘ Twas on the good ship
Venus—by Christ, you should’ve seen us...’”
    Halfway through the song, Sabrina
noticed that the crowd was getting a bit thin. Several of the more
flamboyant partygoers were nowhere to be found, and most of the
fires and pavilions had been abandoned.
    As she watched, two Native women
who looked like sisters embraced, sighed, and disappeared
altogether. Before she could move, a little blond boy ran into the
shadows and didn’t come back. Then a person in a long white cloak,
whose face she’d never seen, bowed once to the crowd and
vanished.
    One by one, the guests disappeared.
Some of them just left, walking from the torchlight into the
darkness. Others faded slowly from sight, waving sadly to their
friends. Others still were there one minute, then gone the next
time she looked for them.
    She knew, in whatever part of her
brain was still active, that this was not right, but she couldn’t
make herself move. The disappearing guests seemed like someone
else’s problem—an unfortunate fact of nature that no one could
really change. Framing a comment along those lines, she turned to
Hannah—and gasped.
    In the last few minutes, Hannah’s
lovely oval face had shriveled like a month-old apple. Her dress
hung from her body like a tablecloth, and she smelled of sweat and
illness. She seemed to be dying of some wasting disease.
    “What happened?” Sabrina
said.
    Hannah smiled faintly. “You know, I
almost made it,” she whispered. “I got as far as the river—then I
broke my leg. So...” With a sigh, Hannah disappeared.
    Tom, next in line, was covered in
blood. It poured from a fist-sized wound in the center of