The Circle in the Clearing

My buddy Ray and I have a tradition. Every fall, we pack our gear and drive up to his uncle’s land in the Allegheny foothills, a sprawling tract of woods that’s been in his family for generations. It’s not the Catskills, but it’s got that same haunted feeling—like the trees are holding their breath. Ray’s uncle, old Mr. Harlow, inherited the place from his father, who bought it cheap after the war. Nobody in the family says why, but they never talk about what happened on the ridge. They just call it ‘the back forty’ and stay out of it after dark.

Last November, we went up for the opening weekend of deer season. The air was crisp and smelled of pine and wet earth. Ray dropped me off at a tree stand he’d built years ago, overlooking a natural clearing that the deer liked to cross. He was going to set up on the other side, about a mile away. We’d communicate with walkie-talkies.

I climbed up the ladder, settled into the stand, and propped my rifle across my lap. The sun was just starting to warm the frost off the grass. I sat there for an hour, maybe two, and nothing moved. I pulled out my phone, checking Facebook, scrolling through the same posts. The woods were dead silent except for the occasional caw of a crow.

That’s when I heard it. A low, rhythmic thumping, like a heartbeat coming from the ground. It wasn’t the regular crunch of a hiker or the rustle of a deer. It was steady, almost like drums. I looked up from my phone and scanned the clearing. At the far edge, about four hundred yards out, there was movement. I raised my rifle and peered through the scope.

Through the magnified lens, I saw people. Eight or nine of them, in a loose circle, holding hands and shuffling in a circle dance. They were dressed in old-fashioned clothes—women in long, tattered skirts, men in worn overalls, like something from an old photograph. They moved with an eerie synchronization, their heads bowed low. Their mouths were moving, but I couldn’t hear any singing, just that relentless drumming.

My blood went cold. There was no way anyone could have gotten out here without crossing the field, and no one lived within ten miles. I fumbled for my walkie-talkie and pressed the button. ‘Ray, you seeing this?’ Static. I tried again. ‘Ray, answer me!’ Nothing but static.

I watched as the circle began to move closer, still dancing, their feet never leaving the ground in a normal step. They were gliding, almost floating, and now I could see their faces. They were pale, dead white, with black hollows where eyes should be. The drumming grew louder, pounding in my chest, and I realized it was coming from inside my own head.

I wanted to run, but I was frozen. The circle grew until they were just at the edge of the clearing below me. They stopped, and one of them—a tall figure with a crown of twisted roots—looked up directly at me. It smiled, a wide impossible grin that split its face, and then it raised its arm, pointing a gnarled finger at the tree stand.

Suddenly, I felt a hand on my shoulder. A cold, dead weight. I spun around, but there was nothing. The stand shook. The tree groaned. I looked back down, and the circle was gone. The clearing was empty again, but the drumming had stopped. I heard a soft whisper in my ear, like a woman’s voice, saying, ‘You see us now.’

I screamed, scrambled down the ladder, and ran. I didn’t stop until I found the truck. Ray was already there, pale as a ghost, chain-smoking. He wouldn’t tell me what he saw, but he said we were never going back there again.

We drove out of the mountains, and I haven’t been back since. But sometimes, in the quiet moments of the night, I still hear that drumming, and I see that smile in the dark. And I wonder if the circle is still there, waiting for the next visitor to join their dance.