The Third Mistake

If I had just been more courageous and had cut her festering wound and rotting flesh away, she might have begun to recover physically.

By now, I was also quite sure that her continuously degrading mental state was correlated to her physical wound.

I didn't delay it any further and held back the urge to puke as I removed the clothes surrounding the rotten black flesh on her right shoulder. I did that very carefully, avoiding any contact with the corrosive liquid. Finally, when it came to removing that liquid and cleaning and dressing up her wound, I opened her backpack in hopes to find something of use.

Thankfully, Sister Hin was really too prepared for this adventure. I found a rusty old blade of shoulder length wrapped in a piece of cloth tucked in a corner, along with some herbs that we normally used for disinfecting the wounds. Although I didn't know how to use each of them, I somehow managed to crush them and mix them together.

Finally, using my final bit of strength, I hacked at her damaged shoulder, again and again, until deep red blood began gushing out in waves and the corroded flesh was torn away from her body. Such was the toxic nature of its existence, even the sandy area where it fell upon began to show signs of being corroded.

Lastly, I used the concoction I had made from mixing up the herbs to stop the blood flowing out and used the cloth she used to cover up the rusted blade to dress it up. It was shabby work but it was supposed to hold until I carried her home.

I vomited twice as I did all that, and cried again when I was done. I was sure that she had not only lost her sense of reason but also lost the connection to her emotions. I didn't know how the liquid infected her nerves but even as I was hacking at her and chopping her arm, she was smiling. When she saw me crying after I was done, she came to pat my head once again with an innocuous look on her face.

With tears still bubbling, I smiled along.

Aside from not stopping her when I could and turning to look back at the red-eyed monster when the green-eyed monster bit her arm, not daring to deal with her infected arm was the third mistake I had made.

Somehow, when I thought nothing worse could have happened, my negligence had caused another grave loss to Sister Hinisha, who had degraded into a broken doll by now, and the guilt I felt every single time I looked at her kept making it worse for me.

By the time I reached the entrance of the town again, it was already late at night.

The wound on her arm that I thought couldn't get worse, was also slowly deteriorating as the shabby dressing wasn't able to stop the loss of blood completely.

The urge to drop her at the entrance where someone would quickly find her and escape somewhere isolated to bury myself to atone for my sin came again but I suppressed it.

I couldn't escape, it was already too late for that.

Whatever came, beatings, abuses, lectures, I was ready to toil through. I was even hoping for that, believing that somehow, that might help me with my crushing guilt.

The walls didn't cover each part of the town. There were places where walls couldn't exist. Most of those places were shortcuts that led to the outside world, one of which we had taken early in the morning to visit that dam*ed location.

Cheerfully, we had skipped over there, for a memorable and exciting adventure. It was memorable, of course, but the reasons for that were all too different.

After coming into the town, I soon started seeing the movement of people, as usual, some tired after the day's work, some searching for opportunities, some making connections with others, casually expressing their opinions, some buying, and some selling, all contributing to a perfect senseless and happy crowd.

My presence that day, though… was distinct.

My eyes were still red and swollen from crying all day, my clothes were damp and smelly from sweat and tattered and muddy as well.

Perhaps, I was still sobbing senselessly as I walked in the middle of the crowded street, carrying my best friend, who was foolishly making creepy faces at the passersbys.

People made way for us, casting us peculiar and concerned glances. This was one of the superstitions they believed in, one whose effects I experienced for the very first time: They had reluctance talking to strangers after the night fell.

In our state, we really appeared to be two little demons who would curse them with something bizarre. If it was a few days ago, I would've merely laughed at it and called them superstitious. But after experiencing what Crimson Lake nearby had to offer, I could figure out a few reasons why.

Anyway, this was why although most of them seemed to be concerned for us after gawking at our state, they didn't come forward to ask us about our reasons.

Soon, as I reached 26th Street and was only a few steps away from home, my heart started pounding dangerously again.

Before I could enter 27th Street, an old man walked over to us. His head was covered in sparse white hair, and his facial skin was so wrinkled that it resembled a used rug, but the energy with which he came to me didn't match any of his decaying facial features.

This was Uncle Traffer, his house was the sixth one on our street, making him our next-door neighbor. He lived with his sick wife and tended to her with care and devotion. He had a single daughter that moved to Tafilat City to earn, leaving the old couple alone.

It was kind of funny because everyone in our street referred to him as Uncle Traffer. Things occasionally got awkward when I and my mother or my father called him 'Uncle' together.

From what I had heard, his daughter hadn't come back because she had a low-paying job, and with the expenses in the city and the money she kept sending home, she never had much savings.

Uncle Traffer, therefore, took responsibility for taking care of his old and ill wife. He wasn't a very outgoing person as far as I can remember but he spoke in a soft and attentive voice that gave him a friendly and trustworthy vibe.

His old house was the only thing stuck between mine and Sister Hin's, and since my mother loved conversing with her mother, they frequently bumped into Uncle Traffer, who got used to being swept in their conversation.

He was a friendly old man, however, and I never saw him peevish or cranky, never unhappy or gloomy, and never distrustful or anxious, that was until then...

As he came towards me, his usually soft and calm tone was laden with anxiety as he glimpsed at our state and asked,

"Where have you two kids been? We have been searching for you for more than two hours now. Little Tiff, your father is planning to go to the City Guards for help. Follow me."

The part of the street where we were standing when he saw us was relatively dark, which was why he wasn't able to notice the corroding wound replacing Sister Hin's right arm.

In his eyes, we were perhaps just playing around in the mud outside of the town walls somewhere and got late. That would've been a logical assumption as well since we were also quite dirty, but as he turned around after instructing us to follow, Sister Hin snickered and giggled at him foolishly.

Uncle Traffer turned around to take a closer look at us, perhaps also to berate Sister Hin. As soon as his old eyes gave us a deeper look though, he let out a surprised sound. Then, he took a step forward in an attempt to scrutinise us closer.

My silence and Sister Hin's silly antics were enough to indicate to him that something was seriously wrong with us.

I bowed my head down, waiting for his reprimand. My eyes were closed, but thin tears were still coming out. I was simultaneously feeling weak and nauseous, which was probably due to overexerting myself all day. As soon as I closed my eyes, I was met with a swirling darkness that caused me to feel even more helpless.

But the reprimand that I was waiting for never came. When I opened my teary eyes to check what was happening, I saw that Uncle Traffer was devotedly assessing the state of Sister Hin's wound, completely ignoring me.

His face was the most serious I had ever seen in my life. In fact, I couldn't even have imagined that a jolly old man such as him would have the capacity to show such emotions. When he spoke, his tone reflected some of his fear and anxiety as he abruptly turned to me and asked,

"WHERE DID THE TWO OF YOU GO!?"

My chest ached at his loud voice and harsh questioning tone, but I was prepared for it. Bowing my head to look at the ground again, I whispered,

"...t-the Crimson Lake."

"WHAT!? Y-YOU…"

As soon as he heard the words that came out of my mouth, he stood up from the crouching position and took a few steps back. His gaze also possessed something that I hadn't seen in him until now… wariness and caution.

And that wariness only appeared because of the legends and myths that revolved around the place. There was, however, a major difference in how we perceived those legends and superstitions.

For children like us, who hadn't seen much of the town, much less the world, they were quite similar to the romantic novels, the fairytales, and the bedtime stories that we read. Only such enormous ignorance could have granted us the bravery to enter the place that scared even old and weathered men like Uncle Traffer into stumbling.

From his perspective, things were very different, because although he might not have seen much of the world, he had indeed seen and heard much much more than us. Things that we shrugged off as fiction like monsters, curses, and demons, might even have been encountered by him in one form or another.

The abomination that bit Sister Hin's arm, one that could possibly be called a mix of all three, a monster, a curse, and a demon. The wound that the thing left on her was undoubtedly a powerful curse because even if it was some kind of acid, it wouldn't be moving and corroding her for such a long time.

Sadly, Uncle Traffer might be more experienced than me, but he wasn't all that more knowledgeable in the field of curses and supernatural infections like these.

All it did was make him step away from us subconsciously. I didn't blame him, as even I was not sure whether I was cursed or not back then. It was indeed a wise choice to avoid us at the moment.