[Fiction] Dear Posse No. 15: A Time for Hopes and Fears

I’m working on a serial fiction project. Each segment will be published here and on Patreon. It is available in full to Patreon supporters:

Plans are in motion. Our group, now almost twenty strong, is preparing to do something drastic: a ritual, using the black tree as a conduit to heal the tear in the sky.

Eliza and I spent the day gathering what we need: items of personal significance, symbols of our past, and our hopes for the future. Each person was asked to bring something that represented their deepest fears and their brightest hopes.

I’ve still got my wedding ring.

Tonight, we’ll circle the tree, each of us placing our items at its roots, sharing our stories and our strength.

I’m scared, Posse. What if it doesn’t work? What if we can’t fix what I broke?

“You worry too much,” Eliza scolded with a smile. “What’s the worst that can happen?”

I think, but don’t say: eternal darkness? A larger rift? The end of all things?

But then I see the determination in everyone’s eyes, hear the resolve in their voices, and I feel a flicker of hope.

We’ll start at midnight, under a hazy sky that should be full of stars. We’ll offer our fears, speak our hopes, and listen to the tree’s song.

Maybe, just maybe, we’ll see an actual dawn – not this endless murky twilight.