The Grinding Hymn

My cousin, Delia, and I had been volunteering at the old Bramblewood Stables for two summers, and we’d heard the whispers. The locals said the hayloft was bad news, that old Silas Bramblewood, the founder, had a nasty habit of… disciplining his horses up there. They said he’d hang them from the rafters when they bucked or bit, and that their screams had seeped into the wood. Delia and I, we were thrill-seekers, always poking at the edges of the unknown, and the stories just made the place more exciting. We’d even made a game of it, daring each other to go up there alone for a minute. We always chickened out, blaming the creaks or the way the dust danced in the light, but that day everything changed.

It was a Tuesday, and the air was thick with the smell of hay and horse. We were mucking out the stalls when Delia froze. ‘You hear that?’ she whispered. I cocked my head. Faint, rhythmic, a kind of grinding scratch, like someone dragging a heavy chain across the wooden floor above us. ‘Probably a raccoon,’ I said, but my voice wavered. The sound stopped, then started again, more deliberate this time.

By mid-morning, the sound had evolved. It was no longer a scrape but a series of heavy, dragging footsteps. Then, a low humming, a tuneless dirge that sent chills down my spine. The other volunteers, a couple of college kids named Micah and Lena, heard it too. We all looked at each other, eyes wide. ‘Is it one of the dogs?’ Micah asked, but even he knew it wasn’t. The dogs were all kenneled, and this was too big, too human.

We tried to ignore it, focusing on grooming the horses and prepping for the afternoon trail ride. But the presence above us grew heavier, as if a great weight was pressing down on the barn. The horses were skittish, rolling their eyes and stamping their hooves. Delia tried to calm her gelding, but he was sweating, trembling.

At noon, Roger, the ranch owner, came in to check on us. He saw the fear on our faces. ‘It’s just the old barn settling,’ he said, but his jaw was tight, and he kept glancing up at the hayloft. ‘You kids are getting spooked by that rumor. There’s nothing up there but dust and spiderwebs.’ As he said it, the sound stopped. A terrible silence filled the barn, so thick you could choke on it. Then, from the hayloft, a single, clear note rang out, like a bell, but twisted and wrong.

Roger’s face drained of color. ‘Get the horses out,’ he said, his voice cracking. ‘Now.’ We moved on instinct, leading the horses out of the barn, tying them to the fence. Roger followed, locking the barn door behind him. ‘It’s been quiet for years,’ he muttered, more to himself than us. ‘I thought it finally gave up.’

We huddled outside, listening. The humming started again, louder, more urgent, and with it came a scratching, like fingernails on a chalkboard, but deeper. It was coming from the door, from inside, as if something was trying to get out. And then we heard the horses’ voices. Not from the paddock beside us, but from the barn. Panicked whinnies, the sound of hooves thundering on wood, and then a sickening crack, followed by a wet, slithering sound.

Roger’s face was ashen. ‘The hayloft,’ he said. ‘It’s got them.’ He ran to the barn door, fumbling with his keys, but when he got it open, we saw nothing. The barn was empty, the stalls clean, but the hayloft floor was newly scored with deep, parallel grooves, as if something with claws had been dragged across it. Our horses hadn’t made those marks going up there; they were still tied outside, safe. But we all knew with a sickening certainty that they were not the ones who had been up there.

That night, Delia and I couldn’t sleep. We called Roger, but he didn’t answer. We drove to the stable, our headlights cutting through the dark. The barn was silent, but the door was ajar. We crept inside, the beam of our flashlights sweeping over the stalls. Everything was neat, too neat. The pitchforks were stacked, the feed bins full, but there was a new smell, a coppery scent mixed with something sweet, like rotting flowers.

Then we heard it. A chorus of them, humming in harmony, a grinding, discordant tune that seemed to come from the hayloft, but also from everywhere. And then the whispers, layered over each other, in voices that didn’t sound human. ‘We sing to them,’ they hissed. ‘We sing them home.’ Our flashlights flickered, died, and we were plunged into absolute darkness. The humming grew louder, the smell stronger, and we felt cold hands on our shoulders, guiding us forward, up the stairs to the hayloft, where we saw what had been making the sound all along. And I hear them still, even now, singing in my head, the grinding hymn of the horses that never left. They want us to join the chorus.