Week Sixteen

Haven, Part I

"This is not going to go well," thought Cooper, carefully stepping over a fallen tree branch. His hands dripped with sweat - even in the dead of night, the air was thick with humidity. It'd been a few hours since he'd heard the dogs, and the full moon gave him just enough light to push the dogs and their masters behind him.

Throughout his short journey, he'd seen faces everywhere. In the limbs of trees. In patterns on the ground. And in the shadows of his periphery. Even this far into the woods, he felt like he was being watched. He called them the fatalwoyi, a name that traced its lineage to that land across the sea. Many had claimed to see the fatalwoyi sitting menacingly in the rigging of the slavers' ships, floating above the fields of cotton, or as phantoms crawling through the dark woods. Cooper felt like their bony claws were tracing over his body, just waiting to catch him off guard. And it was that feeling that propelled him forward.

Cooper vaguely knew the direction he was heading in. Rumors had spread throughout the South about these camps - small free settlements in hard-to-reach areas that were populated by escaped slaves. Old Joe, the plantation's oldest slave, claimed to have actually been to one years ago, long before the war. The thought of freedom sparked hope in Cooper, and he listened to Joe's every word, dreaming of the day he'd step into just such a village. Joe taught him to look for the signs and symbols, how the tides worked, and the best way to travel safely without fear of discovery.

On the night Cooper prepared to leave, Old Joe - who'd outright refused to accompany Cooper on his journey due to his age - created a perfect, surprising, and devastating distraction that gave Cooper just enough time to escape. Cooper's tears soaked through his eye lids as he hugged the dying man. And with strained breath and voice, Old Joe pulled him in and spoke one simple word into his ear, "run."

He never looked back. Cooper made a beeline through the fields toward a row of trees that stood at the far end of the property and dissolved into the lowlands beyond. Once there, he ran down the dirt road away from Eden Fields, away from town, and toward freedom.

Cooper only travelled at night and followed the murky waters of the inlets that sliced into the South Carolina Coast. Small piles of stones and sticks arranged in unique patterns were telltale signs left years before by fellow runaways letting Cooper know he was headed in the right direction. If he'd planned well enough, he'd make it to Moreland in a few days.

The camp of Moreland was established along a tributary of the May River a few miles north of Savannah. After the Union freed what was then known as the "Sea Islands," and the white population fled, this section of South Carolina was given to the freemen in what became the Port Royal Experiment. Moreland, situated on the southern reaches of the Sea Islands, focused more on fishing than the farming that was done inland, and because it was swampy and hidden, it was perfect for a small group of people looking to find peace. Cooper didn't care what the conditions were like at the camp, the only way he'd return to Eden Fields was as a corpse.

The moonlight was dulled beneath the Spanish moss that clung to the oak where Cooper had stopped to rest. He used a rock to break open a few chestnuts he'd collected throughout the night, and complemented those with a handful of partridge berries he'd pulled from a bush nearby. While it wasn't a feast by any stretch of the imagination, if this is what freedom tasted like, he'd take it. 

He let out a deep breath. A mixture of relief and exhaustion.

And still, the fatalwoyi persisted. Noises far in the distance. Movements in the underbrush. Unexplainable lights that dashed over the treetops and sent his heart racing. Cooper's respite was short lived. A snapping stick a few feet from him sent him running. His ragged shirt flapped behind him, and the forest blurred into a deep indigo as he sprinted forward. 

The forest floor seemed to float below his feet as his fear propelled him forward into the darkness. The fatalwoyi, the plantation owners, the dogs, or whatever other evils pursued him would never catch him.

His toes dug under the root of a tree, sending Cooper flying forward into the dirt. His face pressed into the ground, he couldn't detect the presence in front of him. Slowly lifting his head, he traced the two feet up the body and into the face of what could best be described as a woman both human and not. Eyes with no pupils. Hair that flowed despite the lack of a breeze. And skin that seemed to suck in any and all light in the vicinity. He went to scream, but the apparition raised a long bony finger to her mouth and exhaled with a guttural "shhhh."

Cooper couldn't tell if he were paralyzed due to fear, or if this fatalwa was actually keeping him from moving. In the distance, he could see the flicker of torches; no doubt the same group of men who'd been tracking him since he left Eden Fields. In a last ditch effort, he grabbed a rock and hurled it at the fatalwa, but instead of knocking her back, the stone went through her.

At this, the fatalwa looked down at Cooper with her dead white eyes. Her mouth opened larger than humanly possible revealing a black nothingness inside. The scream that escaped from the giant maw was hideously loud, and, to Cooper, filled with all the sounds he'd ever heard in his life coming out as one chaotic mass. And despite the sonic blast escaping the fatalwa, Cooper found himself being pulled toward her. He grabbed for purchase in the dirt, but the mouth continued to grow larger and larger until finally, as Cooper fell into the abyss of the vacuum, he found all of his senses turning out like separate candle flames extinguishing in the night.

---

"Hey," the voice said, followed by a gentle shake of the shoulder, "Hey you. Who are you?"

Cooper slowly opened his eyes and the bright light of the sun hit his pupils and shrunk them to the size of a pin head. 

"I said, who are you?" repeated the voice, "what's your name?"

The world came into focus, and Cooper found himself in the same low country forest he'd been in last night. He quickly started and looked around nervously for any sign of the fatalwa. 

"It's okay, son" said the man, "you're home."

"Home?" Thought Cooper, confused and still trying to get his bearings.

"Yes. Welcome to Moreland."