Dancing Children

"A pound of flesh I require! You're willing to make that deal?" the Piper yelled over the screams. Maran didn't say anything, but picked up her sister with as much force as she could and walked back to the shore. Setting the struggling, screaming girl of thirteen on the ground, she waited for her to balance before yanking the splintered post out of her grip. Her mind said goodnight the moment Maran swung at her stomach and winded her enough to cause unconsciousness.

"Sure." The laughter and song began to course through her once again, and the peace came back to her, promising the things she so desperately thought she could find with him. For the first time that night, she let herself think it was possible, and she faced the bay. The Pied Piper of Hamelin took his dues.

Kirsa woke up in the morning, groggy and her head pounding as the music faded. Stretching on the wet ground, her body rolled until she rested on her back. There were sirens in the background and she was pulled into a sitting position after awhile. The signals from her brain weren't reaching her limbs very quickly, she was so tired. "Kirsa? Answer me if you can hear me!" The person, a male, was trying to wake her up, and slowly the night came back to her. What was that sound, she asked herself as her body shook awake. Then she remembered cold water, eerie music, and her sister fighting some small man. Where was Maran? Kirsa remembered she was pulled into the water, and then what?

She remembered nothing then, nothing but the music. It lingered, and how it came after her. She couldn't scream, could barely talk when they asked questions. The sea called to her, like they had everyone else, but she was frozen in place from fear. All she could say was, "The music played, it played until they were all gone, it promised to take me away and I'd never felt so happy. But somehow the music stopped and I couldn't go too." She cried.