The Sixth Ward’s Bargain

I never believed in ghosts. I had mocked the very idea with the cruel arrogance of a twelve-year-old who had never been tested. My name is Martin, and in the autumn of 2007, my family moved into a sprawling Victorian in the city of Redcliff, a place I’d only seen in old photographs. The house was our dream: wraparound porch, tiger-oak floors, and a turret that looked out over the street. The neighbourhood was quiet, studded with mature oaks, and our nearest neighbour, a retired librarian named Mrs. Calder, was a sweet old woman who brought us a lemon loaf the day we moved in. I remember thinking that this was paradise.

Redcliff, I learned, had its own buried history. Unlike the typical ghost stories, this city was founded on a deal with a native tribe that had gone horrifically wrong. The statue in the town square wasn’t a tribute to a chief; it was a monument to a betrayal. It depicted a man named Silas Kestrel, a trader who had cheated the Yurok nation out of their ancestral lands with a false treaty. The ‘war’ that followed wasn’t a battle of soldiers but a desperate, bloody rebellion that ended with the Yurok being driven into the wetlands and drowned. The old-timers whispered that Silas Kestrel’s fortune was built on that treachery, and that his descendants still haunted the streets, bound to the land they stole.

We had been in the house for two weeks, and the boxes were finally mostly gone. My mother was humming in the kitchen, my father was reading a newspaper on the porch swing, and I was exploring the attic, where I’d found a trunk of old photographs and letters. The letters, dated 1887, were written in a spidery hand, recounting strange events in the house: a maid who saw a figure in the garden, a child who spoke in a language no one recognized. I dismissed them, as I dismissed all such nonsense.

One afternoon, as I walked home from school, I saw that Mrs. Calder had visitors. Two children, maybe three years old, were playing on her lawn. They were dressed in old-fashioned, ruffled clothes, which struck me as odd. As I approached, they stopped their game and stared at me. Their faces were unnaturally pale, their eyes too large, and they didn’t blink. A cold prickle ran down my spine. Then, without a word, they joined hands and walked slowly toward the fence that separated their yard from ours. I hurried past, eager to get inside. That night, I woke to the sound of children singing—a lullaby I didn’t recognize, in a minor key. It seemed to come from the walls.

The next day, I asked my mother if she knew anything about Mrs. Calder’s visitors. She said, ‘Oh, those are the Brightwell children. They’re her great-niece and nephew. They come every fall.’ I wanted to ask why they wore such odd clothes, but something in my mother’s tone told me to drop it.

Then the dreams began. Every night, I would find myself in the back garden, which had an old, gnarled oak tree with a tire swing. In the dream, the children would be there, and they would point to a spot under the tree. The ground would be wet, and a foul smell would rise. I would kneel and dig, and my hands would become slick with mud, and then I would unearth a small metal box, tarnished and rusted. They would lean close and whisper, ‘Open it. It will set us free.’ I would always wake up before I opened it.

The dreams grew more vivid, and I started to see the children everywhere—standing at the end of my bed, peering through the kitchen window at dusk, their faces pressed against the glass, their breath fogging the pane. They never spoke, but their mouths moved as if they were trying to tell me something. I began to lose sleep, and my grades suffered. My parents noticed but dismissed it as a growth spurt.

One evening, I mentioned the children to my father. He frowned and said, ‘The Brightwells have been dead for a hundred years, Martin. That house has been empty for as long as I remember. Mrs. Calder is a childless widow.’ When I tried to argue, he waved his hand. ‘You’re just having bad dreams.’

I couldn’t let it go. I snuck into Mrs. Calder’s backyard one afternoon when I knew she was at the store. The children were not there, but I found a rusted gate at the back of the property, overgrown with vines. I pushed it open and found myself in a small, forgotten graveyard. The headstones were old, their inscriptions worn, but I could make out the names: Elias Brightwell, 1880-1887; Abigail Brightwell, 1882-1887; and a smaller stone, ‘Our Little Ones.’ I felt a chill that had nothing to do with the wind.

I ran back to my house, my heart pounding. That night, the children appeared at my window, their faces pressed close to the glass. I could hear them whispering, ‘Let us out.’ I knew then that they were trapped, likely by the very land my house sat on—the land that Silas Kestrel had stolen, and which had been soaked with death.

I had to free them. From the attic, I retrieved an old shovel I’d seen. Under the light of the full moon, I dug at the spot the children had shown me. The ground gave way easily, too easily, as if it had been recently disturbed. My shovel hit something metal. I knelt and brushed away the dirt. It was a small iron box, just like in my dream. My hands trembled as I pried it open. Inside, wrapped in oilcloth, were two tiny, hand-carved wooden birds, and a piece of parchment.

The parchment was a letter, written in sepia ink. It read: ‘We, the undersigned, do hereby claim the souls of Elias and Abigail Brightwell, as payment for the debt of their parents. In the month of October, on the night of the seventh, the bargain must be renewed, lest the claim be forfeit.’ It was signed ‘Silas Kestrel.’

As I read the words, the air grew cold, and the children appeared beside me. Their forms were more solid now, and their eyes glowed with a faint, angry light. ‘You opened it,’ they said in tandem, their voices like bells. ‘Now you must take our place.’ Before I could scream, they pressed their icy fingers to my forehead, and I felt a tremendous pulling, as if my very self was being drawn out through my eyes.

When I opened my eyes again, I was standing in the garden, but I felt different. I looked at my hands—they were the hands of a child, small and plump. I turned and saw, through the window, my parents sitting in the living room, drinking tea. I tried to call out, but what came from my mouth was a childish cry. I was Elias, or rather, I was in Elias’s body, and Elias was in mine.

The real children, wearing my form, smiled at me and said, ‘Thank you for setting us free. Now you know what it’s like to be forgotten.’ They turned and walked toward the neighbor’s house, where Mrs. Calder was opening the door. She looked at them with a mixture of relief and sorrow. ‘Welcome home, my dears,’ she said.

I stood there, trapped in a dead boy’s body, unable to speak, unable to tell my parents what had happened. The years have passed. I watch my family from a distance, growing old. I am forever a child, forever bound to the house, waiting for some other unsuspecting soul to break the cycle. And every October, the children return to my doorstep, wearing their stolen skins, and they whisper, ‘Soon, it will be your turn.’