The Old Church of Haroldstown
The church at Haroldstown was never finished. Its stones were laid, its walls rose straight and sure, but the roof was never set. Each time the builders tried, storms rolled in from nowhere, tearing timbers down before a slate could be fixed. After the third attempt, the masons abandoned their work, leaving the ruin to the ivy and the wind.
The graveyard grew around it all the same. Crooked headstones tilt in the long grass, names half-vanished or lost to time. A black yew tree bends low over the altar, its roots tangled in the very stones.
At dusk, locals give the place a wide berth. They tell of a bell that tolls where no bell ever hung, and of figures drifting among the graves, faces pale and eyes unblinking. A farmer once swore he saw his grandmother kneeling at her own headstone, her lips moving in silent prayer. He left Haroldstown that very week and never came back.
The darkest tale is of the door in the southern wall. Hidden by ivy, too small for a grown man to pass through, it breathes a damp, cold air like the mouth of a cave. Old folk say it leads not to the fields beyond, but down — into hollows older than the church, older even than the dolmen by the roadside.
From time to time, some daring child squeezes inside. The ones who return are never quite the same. One wandered home white-eyed, whispering in a language no one knew. Another was never found at all, save for his cap snagged high on the yew’s lowest branch.
And when the moon rides low over Haroldstown, villagers swear the ruin does not stand empty. Through the gaps in the walls, they glimpse a congregation crowding shoulder to shoulder, their faces turned upward, waiting for a sermon that has lasted seven hundred years.
The Crazymad Writer Writes Again 