Short Story: The Giving Tree

The start of a folk horror.

 The Giving Tree

You’ve heard of the Giving Tree, ain’t ya? You must have heard the story, how it all started. Of course you have, don’t be daft. Strange magic, that Giving Tree. Worse things to be than strange, though. That’s what I’ve always thought, anyway. Far worse things, I can promise you that.
	It saved that poor girl’s life, did the Giving Tree. Poor, young Margaret. Way back before anyone knew to give the tree a name, hers was the first wish to have ever come true, that which gave life to the old tree and paved the way for all wishes granted since. Don’t you be looking at me like that now, rolling your eyes. I’m sure I’ve seen ya myself, tying your own wish to its branches year after year. You never know when yours might go and get itself picked. When the Giving Tree’s gift to give might just be bestowed upon you. 

She was the first, mind. Poor Margaret. Maggie. One scar already befouling such a lovely face. Arms and legs bruised black and blue. A bastard of a husband. A wicked man; Michael. Stronger and meaner than any other man the village had known. Nobody knew what to do about him but people helped Maggie when they could. Or at least the wives did, so I’m told. 
	Except one day, Michael beat that girl so bad she was hardly an inch away from death. He’d have no doubt killed her if Maggie had not the strength to reach for the iron skillet and crack the hard bastard up the side of his head. Good on her. Down but not dead, so he was, Maggie knew that she had to run. She dragged her broken body out the front door and ran as fast as she could into that black night. Maggie’s screams roused both neighbour and kin; wary eyes came to watch poor Maggie run for her damn life. 
	‘Mercy, Michael,’ the priest bellowed as Michael burst from the house in a wild rage, one hand clasped to the side of his face, holding on to what was left of his cheek, the other clasping the bloodied skillet. ‘You must show Mercy, child!’
	The women began to bawl in fear as Michael lumbered in Maggie’s direction, begging their men to do something. Half were cowards, though, and the others weaker than brittle grass. Times were different, though. Times were tougher then. We must remember that. 
	‘Maggie!’ Michael shouted in a strange, frightening voice, blood gargling in his throat.
	He made his terrible way towards his prey. Poor Maggie had made her way to our mighty oak tree before her body could take her no further. She collapsed against the tree’s trunk and fell further down, laying upon its gnarled old roots. 
	‘Please, won’t somebody save me this terrible night,’ Maggie cried. The girl wept for her life to be spared. ‘Please, God, let him be struck down instead of me. Forgive me. Save me instead.’ Maggie prayed for mercy, for the hand of God to take Michael there and then, and she swore to atone for the sin of wishing it. 
	Michael was mere moments away, the entire village on his heels and so poor Maggie clung onto the tree, the blood from her wounds seeped into the earth and the bark. Maggie heard her husband call her name, the devil in his voice, and she screwed her eyes shut so as to accept her fate. Expecting to feel her husband’s meaty fingers tangled in her hair so as to yank her head and snap her neck, instead she felt a strong shiver rumble through he tree and her body as one.
	An almighty crack echoed throughout the night like a lightning strike but the sky remained clear. An enormous branch broke from the tree and fell, crushing that wicked man Michael, right there on the spot. Maggie heard the gasps and cries of her neighbours and turned to see her husband, all bones a split skin, laying dead beneath the branch.
	On that fateful night, the tree made Maggie a widow but it had saved her life. Widow Maggie wept with joy and her people forgave her for the sin, so amazed were they by what they had witnessed.
	‘Thank you,’ Maggie turned back to the tree and whispered her gratitude and promised to devote herself to its worship. ‘I will live for you, God, through this gift you have bestowed on me; our Giving Tree.’
	And she did. History was made that night and our Lord spoke to Maggie and those that were witness to her, and gave us the Giving Tree. Nobody mourned for Michael. He was buried as far from our tree as possible. 

We’re lucky. You understand that, don’t you? To have been chosen and blessed by God. To have his work be done through our Giving Tree and in turn by us. Give thanks. Humble yourself and make a wish this year as true as your heart. The Giving Tree will recognise your devotion. It’ll give, my Lord, it will give, but it bears no fool, and it can feel sin from the very touch of your fingertips.
	There are different stories to be told, you know. Stories of our Giving Tree’s mercy and of its wrath. Of those who have sinned; who have asked too much, who have lived and taken ungratefully, and a fate most foul has found them. One day, when you’re ready, I might tell you the story of the small, splintered child; the gift that was returned. Such sorrow. Such pain. In the meantime, you watch yourself and say your prayers, and go careful with what you wish for.