[ IP ] The Mothers

`` A little wormy'' Jezkin wiggled his pinky, imagining it wet and dirty. `` That's all'' His breath puffed out in the cold forest. He reached down and touched the thread tied around his waist. He wanted to tug it, but knew he was n't meant to yet. 
 
 The sound of a stick cracking made Jezkin gasp and look up. The first snow of the season had just fallen and as the sun died, turning the sky gold, then bruised violet the snow went from glimmering white to gray. In the trees nothing moved. No shapes but the natural. Jezkin's small heart slowed back down. 
 
 `` Are you lost, child?'' Jezkin spun and almost slipped. The soft voice had come from behind, but no one was there now. 
 
 `` Are you cold, child?'' Asked another voice. This one was different from the first and reminded Jezkin of fall leaves being crushed beneath boots. The boy moved his head about, but the forest remained still and empty. 
 
 A hand reached out and touched the boy's shoulder. 
 
 `` We can keep you safe, child'' Her voice had the cadence of a toad being smashed with a rock. Jezkin looked up. 
 
 Descending from the tops of the trees, like the coming dusk, was a dark form. It reminded Jezkin of a centipede. Each section was the upper half of a moldering woman corpse whose lower half disappeared into the shadow that connected them all. He could n't move as more of the dead women reached down to touch his warmth. 
 
 `` Yes. I would like that'' Jezkin replied. The women things cooed. Their hands took him then, passing him up from one horror to the next. Worm eaten faces and hollow eyes took in the boy. Those with enough skin left even smiled, revealing teeth like snapped bones. 
 
 Jezkin tugged at the line then. The thread soaked in the tears of the women of his village and it went from slack to taut almost instantly. It began to pull him and the Mothers toward town. 
 
 `` A little wormy on a hook'' Jezkin breathed, between tears, watching the light of the town growing brighter as they were pulled closer.
