A Quiet Village in the Foothills

It was a still night in the remote village of Devgarh. The crickets had quieted. The air smelled of wet earth and burning incense from evening prayers. In the small house at the edge of the woods, 78-year-old Shyamlal’s body lay cold on a wooden cot, covered in a white shroud. His family mourned, exhausted after a day of rituals. The priest had declared the final rites would be done at dawn.

But something stirred after midnight.

Rinku, the youngest grandson, barely 10, had woken up thirsty. Tiptoeing past the mourning room, he paused. The flame of the clay lamp next to his grandfather’s body flickered violently, though no breeze passed.

Then he heard it.

A groan.

Soft… broken… like someone struggling to breathe through old lungs.

He stood frozen.

Another groan.

And then… the sheet twitched.

Rinku's copper water pot fell from his trembling hands with a loud clang. The noise woke his father, Hari, who rushed in, followed by Rinku’s uncle and mother. They found Rinku crouched by the door, wide-eyed.

"The body... it moved," he whispered.

“Beta, it’s your imagination,” said Hari, holding him close. “The mind plays tricks in grief.”

But as they turned to reassure themselves, the entire sheet slowly lifted… and the corpse of Shyamlal sat up.

Shyamlal’s eyes were open — milky white, unblinking. His lips trembled. The family screamed, stumbling back.

"Get the priest!" someone shouted.

But Shyamlal didn’t speak.

He stood.

His bones cracked like dry sticks as he moved. Slowly, shakily, he turned his head toward the window. Then, without looking at anyone, he began to walk out. Barefoot. Silent.

No one dared stop him.

They followed from a distance as he left the house and entered the forest path behind it — the same one where, 42 years ago, he had buried something.

Something forbidden.

Years ago, when Shyamlal was a young man, a tantrik had come to the village. That man had promised wealth and long life in exchange for a ritual — one that required burying something living in the ground, under a cursed neem tree.

Shyamlal had done it.

Some say it was a goat. Others whisper it was a child who had no family.

No one ever proved it.

But from that day on, Shyamlal prospered.

And every year on the same date, he’d visit the woods alone.

Now, his reanimated body had returned there.

The villagers watched in horror as Shyamlal reached the cursed neem tree. He began to claw at the dirt with his bare hands. His fingers bled, but he didn’t stop.

After minutes of digging, he pulled something out.

A small, rusted locket. It was filled with ashes, bone fragments, and something dark still squirming within.

The moment he touched it, he collapsed.

But this time, he did not just lie still.

He screamed — a deep, guttural cry of a soul being torn apart.

From the trees, shadows flickered.

The air grew cold.

And a small hand — skeletal, with broken bangles — emerged from the same hole.

That night, the villagers say, they saw two figures walking back into the woods — Shyamlal, no longer moving like a corpse, and beside him, a little girl with glowing eyes and soil-covered feet.

Neither were ever seen again.

Shyamlal’s body vanished.

The tree died the next morning.

And since then, each year on that exact date, strange things happen in Devgarh. Lamps go out. Children dream of a man whispering, “Forgive me.” And sometimes, a little girl’s laugh echoes from the forest… though no one dares go in.

Because once the dead rise, it’s never just once.

And never without reason.

...NEW FAMILY, OLD CURSE...

Five years had passed since Shyamlal’s body vanished and the neem tree died. The village of Devgarh had changed — modern roads had replaced dusty paths, and tourists had begun to visit, unaware of the history buried beneath.

A young couple from the city — Raghav and Meera — moved into Shyamlal’s old house, now renovated by the government as part of a heritage restoration project. They had a three-year-old daughter, Tara, curious and bright.

The villagers warned them not to stay.

"Ghosts don’t die here," said the priest quietly.

But Raghav laughed it off. "Superstitions don’t scare us. We believe in science."

But science doesn’t explain why Tara started talking to someone invisible in her room every night.

...THE “IMAGINARY” FRIEND...

It began with small things.

Tara would laugh suddenly, whisper into empty corners, and once told her mother, “She says your necklace used to be hers.”

Meera froze — the locket Tara pointed to had been found during renovation, buried in a box under the floorboards. They thought it was just an antique.

Then, one night, Meera found Tara sleepwalking… toward the forest.

Barefoot, silent, eyes glazed — just like Shyamlal had been.

And behind her, faint footprints appeared in the mud.

Small ones.

...THE RETURN...

That night, Raghav set up a camera in Tara’s room.

At 2:11 a.m., Tara sat up in bed, eyes wide open. She turned to the corner and said, “I’m ready.”

The video showed a shadowy figure enter the frame — child-sized, but its feet never touched the ground.

When they tried to show the footage to the police the next morning… the file was gone. Erased completely.

But Tara had drawn a picture.

Two figures standing near a dead tree — one was her, the other had black eyes and broken bangles.

Written in shaky letters below:

"She wants her life back."

...THE FOREST RITUAL...

Meera, desperate, returned to the priest.

He revealed the truth: “The girl Shyamlal buried wasn’t just a sacrifice. She was cursed. A soul that never got her name spoken. Never got her justice.”

“She has found your daughter. She doesn’t want company. She wants rebirth.”

There was only one way: complete the ritual under the neem tree’s dead roots. Speak the girl’s name — but first, they must find it.

Raghav, skeptical but scared, agreed.

That night, Tara whispered in her sleep:

“She says her name is Bhuri.”

...BLOOD BENEATH THE ROOTS...

At midnight, the family, led by the priest and a few brave villagers, stood before the rotting stump of the neem tree. The ground pulsed beneath their feet, as if the earth remembered.

The priest lit a circle of salt and chanted verses from the Atharva Veda. Meera, holding Tara tightly, whispered the name:

“Bhuri.”

The wind stopped.

Then a high-pitched scream split the night sky.

The ground cracked open.

A hand — skeletal, but more human than before — reached out, holding the same locket. The priest urged Meera, “Take it. Accept her.”

With trembling hands, Meera took the locket.

Tara collapsed.

...THE REBIRTH...

Tara was unconscious for three days.

When she awoke, she looked around confused, blinking slowly.

“Where’s Bhuri?” Meera asked gently.

Tara smiled. “She’s resting now. She said thank you.”

From that day on, Tara stopped sleepwalking. The shadow never returned. But she often hummed lullabies no one had taught her. Songs in an old dialect that even the priest couldn’t fully understand.

The neem tree grew back — not cursed this time, but with blossoms that glowed faintly at night.

Bhuri had finally found peace.

Or so they thought.

Because on the next full moon…

A new locket appeared on Tara’s pillow.

And inside it was a picture.

Of a young Shyamlal… and another girl no one could recognize.

...THE MARK OF THE LOCKET...

The moon hung low and heavy in the sky, casting its pale glow across the village of Devgarh. The breeze, once again, carried the scent of forgotten secrets. It had been months since Tara's return to normalcy, but something was still wrong.

The locket that appeared on Tara’s pillow after the full moon had unsettled Meera and Raghav. Inside, there was a new photograph, one of a young Shyamlal with a girl no one recognized — but something about the girl's eyes made Meera shiver. They were the same as Tara’s. The same as the shadow they had seen that night by the neem tree.

And the worst part? On the back of the photograph was a name — written in ink that was faded but legible:

"Rukmini."

...THE HIDDEN HISTORY...

Raghav tried to brush it off, thinking it was just a coincidence, but Meera couldn’t shake the feeling that the locket was trying to tell them something. She went to the local archives, searching for any information about Rukmini. What she found was a story that chilled her to the bone.

Rukmini had been Shyamlal’s younger sister, and she had vanished under mysterious circumstances decades ago. Some believed she was taken by the same tantrik who had promised Shyamlal power and wealth, but the official story had always been that she had run away with a lover.

The villagers spoke in hushed tones about Rukmini’s disappearance, always following it with a whispered warning: “If the dead come back once, they may come back again.”

It didn’t make sense — Shyamlal had been cursed with the need to bury something alive, and now his sister’s shadow seemed to have returned in the form of Tara’s connection.

...THE BREAKING POINT...

One evening, Tara sat quietly in her room, staring at the locket. “I know her,” she said softly, more to herself than to her parents. “I used to play with her... before I came here.”

Raghav and Meera exchanged uneasy glances. “Who, baby?” Meera asked, trying to sound calm.

“Tara...,” the little girl’s voice trailed off, and she looked up, her eyes wide, “Rukmini.”

Suddenly, the air in the room turned colder, and the lights flickered. The temperature dropped rapidly. Tara's voice changed, becoming deeper and older, far beyond her years.

“She was forgotten. I will remind you.”

...UNRAVELING THE CURSE...

Late that night, Raghav and Meera decided they needed to act. They couldn’t let their daughter become a vessel for whatever curse was trying to manifest. Desperation led them to the same priest who had once helped them with Shyamlal’s reawakening.

The priest, though shaken, finally admitted the truth: “Rukmini’s soul never left the earth. She was trapped between worlds. And as long as her name remains spoken, the curse will rise again.”

Raghav demanded answers. “Then what must we do? How do we stop it?”

“You must face her,” the priest said with dread in his eyes. “The locket must be returned to where it came from — the earth. Beneath the roots of the neem tree. Only then will the curse end.”

Meera was reluctant. “But... Tara?”

“If you do nothing, she may be lost. Rukmini's soul wants to reclaim what was hers.”

...THE FINAL RITUAL...

Under a full moon, the family made their way once more to the dead neem tree. Tara clutched the locket tightly in her small hands, her eyes hollow with something ancient, something beyond her years. She had stopped speaking for hours, her silence now a living presence that weighed down on her parents.

The priest began his chanting, his voice rising and falling like a storm wind. As he spoke the words of the final rite, Tara’s body trembled. She began to walk toward the tree, slowly, with an unnatural calm.

“I remember now,” she whispered, her voice merging with something dark. “I am Rukmini. I will take what’s mine.”

Before Meera or Raghav could react, Tara’s small hands pressed the locket into the ground beneath the tree. The earth groaned as if alive, pulling the locket deeper into its soil. For a moment, everything stilled.

Then, the ground shuddered.

The earth cracked open in front of them, and from it, a figure began to rise — a young woman, covered in soil and shadows. Her eyes were the same as Tara’s, but darker, and filled with a hunger that chilled the air.

It was Rukmini.

...THE TRUE REBIRTH...

The moment Rukmini fully emerged from the earth, her gaze locked with Tara's. For a brief moment, it seemed as if they were the same person — two halves of a whole, one innocent and the other ancient.

“I’m sorry,” Rukmini whispered, her voice barely audible. “I have waited so long to be whole.”

Tara, still standing frozen in the moonlight, responded softly: “You are free now.”

The ground trembled once more, but this time, it was not with terror. The neem tree began to grow, its leaves turning vibrant green, as though life itself had returned to it. Rukmini’s figure slowly dissolved into the air, vanishing like mist at dawn.

And Tara, as if waking from a dream, blinked and looked around. She was her old self again.

The curse was lifted.

...PEACE OR A NEW BEGINNING?...

The family returned to their house, the once dark and eerie atmosphere now lifted. Tara was safe. The locket was gone, and the tree stood tall again, its branches reaching for the heavens.

But the peace came with a warning — the land of Devgarh was marked by a history that could never be erased. And the villagers, who once believed in old curses, now told their children the tale of Rukmini and Tara, the girl who had returned from the dead.

Some say Rukmini’s soul is at rest. Others believe that the curse never truly dies, only sleeps, waiting for the next full moon.

And when the wind howls through the trees, those who listen closely might hear the faintest whisper:

“I am Rukmini... I will never be forgotten.”