The Unseen Jury of Heathermoor Hollow

The whole thing started on a Saturday, when my brother-in-law, Marcus, got it into his head that we should visit the old hanging tree in Heathermoor Hollow. It wasn’t a tree, really, more like a gnarled, blackened finger of wood, stripped of every branch by lightning and time. They used to hang ‘witches’ there, women and girls, mostly poor, often just odd. The youngest was fourteen. Marcus had read about it online and thought it would be a lark to take photos for his horror blog.

There were seven of us in two cars: me, my wife Lena, her cousin Tessa, and Tessa’s fiancé, Cole, in the first car; and Lena’s sister, Brianna, with her cousins, Max, Dana, and Riley, in the second. We drove out past the town limits, down a dirt road that wound through dense, weeping pines. The air grew thick and still as we went deeper, the sunlight dying behind a grey overcast.

We parked at the bottom of a narrow, winding path that led up to the Jibbit—that’s what the locals called it. As soon as we stepped out, an eerie calm settled over us. The birds had gone silent. Even the wind seemed to hold its breath. We stood there, all seven of us, just staring up at that stark silhouette against the pale sky. The ground was dotted with small, decaying tributes: dead flowers, old ribbons, a child’s doll with a cracked porcelain face.

“Let’s get this over with,” Brianna said, her voice hushed. She clutched her camera like a talisman.

We started up the path, boots crunching on dry leaves. Halfway up, a pebble arced out of nowhere and struck the roof of my car with a sharp *tink*. We all jumped. Another stone hit the side door. Then a third, harder, hit the windshield.

“This isn’t funny,” Tessa said, looking around, her face pale.

“Who’s throwing those?” Cole called out, trying to sound brave, but his voice cracked.

No one answered. No one was near. We stood in a tight circle, backs to each other, scanning the tree line. The stones stopped as quickly as they’d started. After a long, tense minute, Marcus let out a shaky laugh. “Probably kids messing around. Let’s keep going.”

We continued upward, more cautious now, every shadow seeming to shift. At the base of the Jibbit, we fanned out, taking photos. The trunk was black and slick, covered in old moss and strange carvings that looked like spirals and eyes, worn by centuries of rain. I snapped a picture of Lena standing beside it, and my flash revealed a white, misty shape hovering near her shoulder. I told myself it was just dust, but my skin crawled.

For twenty minutes we photographed everything: the gnarled roots, the harsh sky, each other posing like fools. Everyone caught orbs—little glowing blurs that looked like floating specks of light. Marcus was thrilled. “We’re definitely getting something!” he said, his earlier enthusiasm returning.

Then I saw her. A figure in white, standing at the edge of the clearing where the trees began to thin. She was tall, thin, her long dress trailing over the bracken. Her face was shadowed under a hood. I froze, my camera lowering. “Do you see that?” I whispered to Cole, who was beside me.

He followed my gaze. “See what?”

I blinked, and she was gone. But where she’d stood, the underbrush was pressed flat, as if something heavy had been there.

“Just my imagination,” I muttered, but my heart was hammering.

Then the whispers started. It was like a hundred women murmuring in a language I almost understood, rising and falling with the wind. But there was no wind. The leaves at our feet were still.

“Did you hear that?” Dana asked, her eyes wide.

“Hear what?” Riley said, but her face was drawn.

Then the stones came back. This time, out of the trees, a rain of them—pebbles and rocks—pelting us from every direction, stinging our arms and heads. We cried out, shielding ourselves, and ran. I grabbed Lena’s hand and pulled her down the path. The others were running too, stumbling, yelling. Behind us, the whisper grew into a roar, like a crowd screaming, and the stones kept coming, striking the ground, the cars, the windshields.

We piled into our cars, doors slamming, engines roaring. Stones pelted the metal like hail. I threw the car into reverse, tires spinning on gravel, and we shot backwards down the road. Through the rearview mirror, I saw a cluster of shadowed figures emerge from the trees—women in tattered dresses, some with ropes around their necks, others with broken limbs. They stood at the bottom of the path, watching us leave, their mouths open in silent screams.

We drove in silence for miles, windows up, heater on, but I couldn’t stop shivering. When we finally reached the main road, Lena turned to me, her face ashen. “Did you see them?” she asked, her voice a whisper.

“Them?” I said, hoping she meant the figures, hoping she didn’t.

“In the photos,” she said. She held up her camera, the screen glowing. On it, the last picture she’d taken before we ran—a group shot of all of us, smiling, arms around each other. But behind us, pressed against the black trunk of the Jibbit, were the spectral faces of women, their features warped, their eyes hollow. And in the center, the hooded figure I’d seen, her hand raised, as if in judgment.

“I didn’t see them when I took it,” she said, her voice shaking. “But now they’re there.”

We didn’t stop until we hit the city limits, but even now, back in the safety of our apartment, I can’t shake that image. And sometimes, when I’m alone, I feel the phantom patter of stones against my window. And I hear the whispers—soft, pleading, calling out for justice that was never served.

Last night, I woke up to find Lena standing at the window, staring out into the dark. When I asked her what was wrong, she turned to me, and her eyes were not her own. They were black, like pools of tar. She smiled, a smile that stretched too wide, and said, in a voice that wasn’t hers: ‘They’re waiting for you back at the Hollow.’

I don’t know how to make them stop. I don’t know if I can. But I know one thing: I will never go back there. And neither should you.