The Fern-Damp Marker

Two weeks before the incident at the reservoir, I was cycling along the paved path that skirted the old municipal woods, a tangled sprawl of oak and ash that locals avoided after dark. I was on my way to the library, headphones in, when I saw him: a figure standing perfectly still among the ferns, about twenty feet off the path. He was wearing a long gray coat, even though it was a warm autumn day, and he was looking directly at me. As I passed, he raised a hand and said, ‘Hello.’ His voice was calm, almost pleasant, but it cut through the music in my ears. I didn’t stop. I just pedaled faster, trying to shake the feeling that his eyes were following me.

Curiosity is a dangerous thing, and the next day I found myself back on that path, my bike leaning against a gate I never remembered being there. I told myself I’d just take a quick look, that the man was probably a hiker or a birdwatcher. But as I stepped off the pavement onto the forest floor, the temperature dropped several degrees. The air smelled of damp earth and rotting leaves. I found a narrow trail, barely visible, snaking between the trees. I followed it for maybe a hundred yards, my heart thumping, my eyes scanning for any sign of the gray coat. Then I stopped. I had left my bike unattended. I turned and ran, branches whipping at my face, until I burst back onto the sunlit path. My bike was still there, untouched.

It wasn’t until I was halfway home that I noticed the blood on my forearm. A thin, dark smear, still wet. I stopped and examined myself, expecting a gash, a thorn scratch, anything. But there was not a mark on my skin. I scrubbed at the blood with my sleeve, but it had already dried into a brownish stain. I didn’t tell anyone at first. I thought maybe I had brushed against some wild animal or something. But the stain wouldn’t wash off, and that night I dreamed of a man standing in the woods, his reflection in a puddle of black water, reaching out to touch my arm.

I confided in my friend Marta, because she was the only one who would believe me without thinking I was crazy. Marta was pragmatic, a geology major who laughed at ghost stories but had a strange reverence for the uncanny. I told her everything: the man, the blood, the dream. She listened, her brow furrowed, then she said, ‘We should go back. We need to see what’s there.’ I hesitated, but she was right. We had to know.

Three days later, on a foggy evening, we drove to the edge of the woods. The gate I had seen was gone, but we found a break in the undergrowth and pushed through. Marta carried a flashlight, and I had a kitchen knife in my pocket, though I doubted it would do any good. The forest was quieter than it should have been. No birdsong, no rustle of animals. Just the sound of our footsteps and the occasional drip of moisture from the leaves.

We found the trail again, and this time we followed it all the way. It led to a clearing, and in the center of the clearing was a stone well, half-collapsed, overgrown with moss. And standing beside the well was a figure. The same man, or someone who looked just like him. He was holding a small jar, and he beckoned to us without speaking. We froze. Marta whispered, ‘Don’t go closer.’ But the man turned, and without a word, he dropped the jar into the well. A soft splash echoed up. Then he vanished, as if he had never been there.

We approached the well cautiously. The moss was disturbed, and there were fresh footprints in the mud. I leaned over the edge, and the darkness below absorbed the light. Marta knelt and picked up something glinting at the base of the well’s rim: a small, rusted locket. She opened it, and inside was a tiny photograph of a girl, her face scratched out. ‘This wasn’t here before,’ she said, her voice trembling. ‘I’ve never seen this well before,’ I admitted, and I realized I couldn’t remember it from my previous visit. I had run so fast that maybe I had missed it, but something about its presence felt wrong.

We left the woods as dusk fell, but the sense of unease followed us home. That night, I woke to find Marta standing over my bed, her eyes wide, her lips moving in silence. She was holding the locket. ‘It’s her,’ she finally said. ‘The girl from the photo. She was taken from here years ago. They never found her body.’ I felt a cold dread settle in my stomach. ‘What do we do?’ I asked. Marta looked at me, and for the first time, I saw fear in her eyes. ‘We have to put it back,’ she said. ‘We have to return her to the well.’

We drove back the next night, carrying the locket. The forest seemed darker, the trees closing in as if they were alive. The well was where we had left it, but the air around it was thick and heavy. I could hear a faint whispering, not words, but a sound like the wind through dry grass. Marta raised her hand to throw the locket in, but I stopped her. ‘Wait,’ I said. ‘We shouldn’t. What if this is a trap?’ But Marta shook her head. ‘It’s the only way to stop this.’ She dropped the locket, and it disappeared into the darkness. For a moment, there was silence. Then the whispering grew louder, and from the well rose a damp, rotting smell. A hand, pale and smooth, emerged over the edge, grasping the stones. And then another.

We ran. I don’t remember reaching the car, but I remember driving with the windows down, the cold night air hitting our faces, trembling with a fear we couldn’t name. We didn’t speak until we were in my kitchen, the lights on, the door locked. Marta looked at her hands, then at me. ‘It’s not over,’ she said. And I knew she was right.

The next morning, I found a small, wet leaf on my pillow, and a scratch that hadn’t been there before, running down my forearm, in the exact same spot where the blood had been. I haven’t told Marta yet. I haven’t been back to the woods. But I know that the man, or whatever he was, is still waiting. And I know that we have to go back one more time, because we took something from that well that we never should have taken, and we can’t undo what we did until we face the thing we brought back.