Ira Sen
Part 1 – Arrival in Assam
The plane dipped low over the wide, lazy sweep of the Brahmaputra, and Devika pressed her face against the oval window. The river spread like a sheet of molten steel under the September sun, streaked with islands and sandbars, its surface broken now and then by the speck of a ferry or a line of fishing boats straining against the current. She had read about it countless times—this river that carried myths and nations on its back—but nothing prepared her for its vastness. It looked less like water and more like time itself flowing east to west.
When she stepped out of the Guwahati airport, the first thing that struck her was the air—moist, green, smelling faintly of bamboo smoke. It clung to her skin, heavier than the Delhi air she had left behind. Rickshaw drivers jostled near the exit, their voices rising like sparrows in the morning. She let the noise wash over her, adjusted her backpack, and scanned the signboards until she found the driver sent by the local cultural council. He was a lean man in his fifties, with silver hair neatly parted and a smile that revealed teeth stained red from paan.
“You are madam Devika?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said, nodding.
“I am Phukan. They told me to take you to Sualkuchi guesthouse. You will like it. Quiet, by the river.”
She slid into the backseat of the Ambassador car, its upholstery smelling of mothballs and diesel. As they pulled onto the highway, Guwahati rolled past her windows in fragments: crumbling colonial bungalows with green shutters, billboards advertising coaching institutes, clusters of roadside tea stalls where men leaned over earthen cups. Then the city thinned, and the road stretched along the Brahmaputra, broad and solemn, lined with trees that bent toward the water.
Phukan spoke sparingly, pointing out the Saraighat Bridge, the old temples, the markets. But when they crossed a narrow road into Sualkuchi, his voice warmed. “This is Manchester of Assam. Silk everywhere. You will hear the looms even in your dreams.”
He was right. The guesthouse was modest, two stories painted in pale yellow, with bougainvillea tumbling down its walls. But behind it, the hum of looms was unmistakable—steady, rhythmic, like heartbeats of wood and thread. Devika stood on the balcony that evening, watching the sun sink behind the river, while from every direction the clack-clack of weaving rose like a single chorus.
At dinner, she sat with the caretaker, a soft-spoken woman named Malati who served rice, yellow dal, and fried river fish. Between mouthfuls, Devika asked about the silk tradition.
“Here we weave Muga silk, golden like the sun, and also Eri and Pat,” Malati explained. “Families pass the art from mothers to daughters. Every house has a loom. If you walk in the lanes tomorrow, you will see.”
“And red silk?” Devika asked casually.
Malati paused. The ladle in her hand hovered over the dal bowl. “Red silk? Why do you ask?”
“I read once that some villages here used to weave it. Brilliant crimson.”
The caretaker’s eyes flickered, then settled. “Some stories are better not written. Long ago, there was a hamlet near the forest that made such silk. But a sickness came. People died. The place was left empty. No one goes there now.”
Her voice carried the weight of an old warning. Devika smiled politely, changed the subject, but her curiosity ignited. For years she had traveled across India, writing about forgotten crafts—pottery in Kutch, bronze casting in Bastar, indigo dyeing in Tamil Nadu. Each place had its scars, its silences. And it was those silences she hunted, not just the beauty. The idea of a vanished hamlet, erased by fever yet still remembered in whispers, gripped her.
That night she lay on the narrow bed, mosquito net draped like a white veil, listening to the forest sounds outside. Crickets chirped, dogs barked faintly in the distance, and through it all, the looms continued their wooden music. Sleep came in waves, but in the half-dark she dreamed of red silk threads unraveling across the floor, threads that glowed like embers, tangling around her wrists as though pulling her deeper into the forest.
The next morning, she set out early. The lanes of Sualkuchi were alive with sound. Women sat on raised bamboo porches, their hands moving over looms, shuttles darting like dragonflies. Children played barefoot among heaps of silk cocoons, their laughter mingling with the crack of threads. Devika took photographs, filled her notebook with quick sketches, spoke to artisans about dyes, yarn, and motifs. But the thought of Malati’s half-whisper about the forest hamlet gnawed at her.
In the afternoon, she stopped at a small tea stall. The owner, an elderly man with cloudy eyes, poured her steaming black tea in a glass cup. She asked, carefully, “Do you know of a village where red silk was once woven?”
The man froze, his hand lingering on the kettle. For a moment she thought he hadn’t heard. Then he lowered his voice. “You should not go there. The trees have swallowed it. The forest remembers what the people forgot. Even today, some say they hear the looms at night. The fever was not natural—it was the land’s anger.”
Devika leaned forward. “Can someone take me?”
The old man shook his head. “Not me. Not anyone here. Maybe the young ones, who don’t fear. Ask in the next village.”
She thanked him, drained her tea, and walked back through the lanes. The sound of looms was everywhere, yet each knock of wood now reminded her of something absent, something that had fallen silent. She could not let it go. The hamlet had vanished, yes, but stories did not vanish. They hid, waiting for someone stubborn enough to follow.
That evening, standing by the river as the sky blazed orange, she wrote in her notebook: The Red Silk Trail. Start tomorrow. Find someone to guide me.
The Brahmaputra rolled on, vast and indifferent, carrying her words into the night.
Part 2 – The Whisper of the Forest
The road beyond Sualkuchi grew narrower with every turn. Devika sat in the back of the jeep, her notebook on her lap, as the driver steered past paddy fields glistening with water and villages where bamboo houses stood on stilts above damp earth. Children waved as they ran beside the road, their laughter carried by the wind, but soon the settlements thinned, and the green of the forest pressed closer on both sides.
Her companion for this leg of the journey was Biju, a young man barely twenty, with restless eyes and the wiry frame of someone used to running up slopes. He had agreed reluctantly, after much persuasion and the promise of good payment. His mother, a woman with streaks of silver in her braid, had pulled him aside before they left, warning him in hushed Assamese: “Don’t go too deep. Don’t let the forest hear your name.”
Now, as the jeep rattled over stones, Devika asked lightly, “Do you believe the stories about the cursed hamlet?”
Biju’s jaw tightened. “My grandmother told me the fever took her cousin. Whole families gone in three days. People say the forest closed around the village because it wanted silence.”
“Silence from what?”
He glanced at her, then away. “From human greed. They say the dyeing pits poisoned the river. Too much red, too much blood. The forest has patience, madam. It waits, then takes back what is its own.”
Devika scribbled his words down. She loved how stories wove fear and fact together like threads on a loom. Still, she kept her tone brisk. “We’re not here to steal, only to remember.”
Biju gave a short laugh, though without humor. “Memory is dangerous here.”
The jeep stopped where the road ended. Ahead lay a footpath, barely visible, swallowed by elephant grass and undergrowth. The driver refused to go further, muttering a quick prayer before turning back. So it was just the two of them now: Devika with her backpack and camera, Biju with a machete slung casually at his side.
The forest greeted them with a hush. Tall sal trees rose like pillars, their trunks dark with moss, their canopies locking out the sky. Only filtered shafts of sunlight made it through, falling in pale coins on the forest floor. The air was heavy with damp earth and the faint sweetness of wild orchids.
They walked single file, Biju slicing through vines, Devika watching the play of shadows. After an hour, she noticed something odd: the silence was not complete. It had texture, like a fabric with hidden patterns. Beneath the rustle of leaves, she thought she heard something—an undertone, a low hum, faint as a breath.
“Do you hear that?” she whispered.
Biju paused, listening. His face tightened. “Wind,” he said quickly, though the air was still.
They continued. The path wound deeper, skirting the edge of a dried pond, where butterflies swarmed in a sudden explosion of color—blue, yellow, orange—before dissolving back into the green. Devika tried to photograph them, but each time her camera flickered, the frame clouded with static.
“Strange,” she muttered.
Biju muttered something back in Assamese that she didn’t catch.
By afternoon, they rested on a fallen log. Devika took out her flask, sipping lukewarm tea. “Tell me, Biju,” she said softly. “Why did you agree to bring me here, if you fear it so much?”
He shrugged, eyes scanning the trees. “Because you outsiders never stop. If I refused, you’d find someone else, maybe less careful. At least with me, you’ll come back alive.”
His words struck her as both warning and promise.
As they resumed, the forest seemed to shift. The path narrowed until it was no more than a memory between trees. Bird calls echoed strangely—one cry repeating, then answering itself from a different direction. Devika found herself glancing back often, certain the trees had moved behind her, closing ranks.
Then she saw it: a thread of silk snagged on a thorn bush, glinting scarlet in the dim light. She reached out, touched it. It felt fresh, soft, impossible after decades of abandonment.
“Look,” she whispered.
Biju’s face went pale. “Don’t touch it.”
But she had already wound it around her finger, marveling at the brightness against her skin. “It’s beautiful,” she said, almost to herself.
Biju stepped back. “We should turn around.”
“Not yet.” Devika slipped the thread into her notebook like a pressed flower. “This is proof the story is real.”
They walked on, tension coiling between them. The hum she had sensed earlier grew clearer, not loud but insistent, as though carried through the roots of the trees. It was not birds, not wind. It was rhythm, measured and steady, like the beating of unseen looms.
By dusk, the forest thickened, the air turning cooler. Shadows stretched long, and the undergrowth glistened with dew. Devika felt both exhilarated and uneasy, as if each step was pulling her across a threshold.
“Where are we now?” she asked.
Biju pointed ahead. “There should be a rest shed, built by forest guards long ago. If it still stands, we can spend the night there.”
They found it after another half hour: a small wooden structure raised on stilts, its walls leaning, roof patched with leaves. Inside, cobwebs curtained the corners, and the floorboards creaked under their weight. But it offered shelter. They laid out mats, lit a lantern, and shared rice cakes from Biju’s pack.
Outside, the forest pulsed with unseen life. Crickets chirped, owls hooted, but beneath it all, Devika swore she still heard the steady loom-like beat. It filled the pauses of her thoughts, a whisper just below hearing.
That night she dreamed vividly: women bent over looms in a firelit room, their saris red as flame, their faces hidden in shadow. The sound of shuttles clacking was like thunder, and as she reached toward them, one woman looked up. Devika could not see her face, only eyes that glowed like embers. She woke with a start, breath ragged, the hum still in her ears.
Beside her, Biju sat awake, machete across his knees, staring at the dark.
“You hear it too, don’t you?” she whispered.
His silence was answer enough.
Part 3 – The Forgotten Path
Morning arrived grey and thick with mist, the kind that blurred edges and made the forest appear dreamlike. Dew dripped steadily from the sal leaves, pattering against the shed roof. Devika woke to find Biju already outside, sharpening his machete with quick, nervous strokes. His face was drawn, his eyes bloodshot.
“You didn’t sleep?” she asked, stepping out with her notebook pressed to her chest.
He shook his head. “Too many sounds. Not animal sounds. Different.”
Devika wanted to press him, but she bit her tongue. She had felt it too—the phantom looms, the strange undertones that seemed to follow them. If she put it into words, it might harden into something undeniable.
After a simple breakfast of boiled rice and tea leaves, they packed their things and set off. The mist clung to them, muffling their footsteps. Every tree looked the same, but Biju moved with practiced instincts, parting vines and tracing the faint dips of an old trail. Devika followed, noting how the ground sometimes revealed more than the trees: a half-buried stone slab, a fragment of clay pot, faint ruts that could have been cart tracks once upon a time.
“Was this the Tezpur route?” she asked at one point, running her fingers over a moss-covered milestone. The engraving had almost vanished, but she could make out a faint arrow.
Biju nodded reluctantly. “Traders used to carry silk this way, to markets along the river. But after the fever, no one came.”
Devika photographed the stone, but when she checked her camera screen, the image was distorted. The milestone appeared doubled, blurred, as if the forest refused to let her capture a clean record. She frowned, shook the device, tried again, only for the same haze to creep across the frame.
They pressed on. The trail narrowed, winding like a vein deeper into the forest’s belly. Bamboo arched overhead, swaying with no breeze. A sudden flutter startled her—parakeets scattering from a branch—but when she looked again, she thought she glimpsed something else: threads of crimson caught among the leaves, thin as spider silk, glistening in the damp light.
“Biju,” she called softly, pointing.
He stiffened, the machete gripped tighter. “It means we are close.”
She stepped forward, carefully plucking one strand free. It was intact, impossibly smooth, fresh against her skin. She slipped it into her notebook, her pulse quickening.
Soon, they found more. Tangled clusters of red threads stretched between branches, like forgotten decorations of some vanished festival. Some fluttered in the windless air, others lay coiled around roots. Devika moved among them with reverence, as if walking through a gallery of abandoned art.
“How can these still exist?” she murmured. “Silk decays. Threads don’t survive decades in the open.”
Biju’s face was pale. “Maybe they were never meant to decay.”
They moved slowly, the forest thickening. The ground grew uneven, strewn with stones half-buried in moss. Then the first sign of the hamlet emerged: a crumbling wall, bricks fused with creepers, standing alone like a sentinel. Beyond it, the outlines of collapsed huts, roofs swallowed by foliage, beams jutting like broken ribs.
Devika’s breath caught. “We’ve found it.”
Biju muttered a prayer under his breath, reluctant to step closer. But Devika advanced, notebook trembling in her hands. She ran her fingers over the wall, tracing grooves worn by rain. A faint smell lingered in the air—damp earth mixed with something metallic, almost like rust.
Inside what must once have been a courtyard, she found fragments: a broken terracotta lamp, shards of pottery, a spindle half-rotted but still recognizable. And there, under a tangle of vines, the frame of a loom lay collapsed, its wood darkened, its strings snapped but intact enough to suggest its former purpose.
She knelt beside it, heart racing. “This is it. This is the first loom.”
As she spoke, her camera buzzed again, the lens refusing to focus. Frustrated, she sketched the scene instead, pencil lines capturing the fragile skeleton of the loom. The act calmed her, as if drawing pulled the truth into her own grasp, beyond the reach of whatever force resisted the camera.
Biju remained at the edge of the courtyard, his voice low. “Madam, we should not stay long. The forest doesn’t like us here.”
But Devika ignored him. She felt an odd exhilaration, as if standing in the middle of a living memory. She imagined women weaving here once, their laughter mingling with the sound of shuttles, their children running barefoot among dyed threads drying in the sun. Now only silence remained, yet the threads—those inexplicable red strands—still lingered like veins of the earth itself.
As the day deepened, they pushed further. More ruins appeared: huts swallowed by creepers, dye pits filled with stagnant water, their rims stained faintly red. Birds perched on broken beams, watching silently as if guarding the place.
Suddenly Devika paused. On a tree trunk ahead, she saw carved markings—symbols she didn’t recognize, circles and lines etched deep. She touched them, the grooves rough against her fingertips.
“What does it mean?” she asked.
Biju hesitated. “It’s old script. My grandmother said the weavers marked trees to keep evil away. Or to remind themselves where they belonged.”
Devika copied the markings into her notebook, each line sharp, deliberate. As she worked, she felt the hum again, stronger now, vibrating through the soles of her shoes. She glanced at Biju, and from his rigid posture she knew he heard it too.
By late afternoon, they reached what seemed to be the heart of the village. Here, the ruins clustered closer together, looms lying in skeletal heaps, dye jars cracked open, threads tangled like veins across the ground. The silence was immense, yet layered, as if under it lay the murmur of a thousand voices.
Devika stood still, her throat tight. “This was once alive. This place… it breathed.”
Biju’s voice was barely a whisper. “And maybe it still does.”
A sudden wind rose, rustling the threads, making them shiver as if touched by unseen hands. The air grew colder, shadows stretching long. Devika’s camera clicked of its own accord, startling her, though she hadn’t pressed the shutter. When she looked at the screen, the image showed not just the ruins—but faint, blurred figures bent over looms, too indistinct to be real.
Her hand trembled as she shut the device off.
Biju grabbed her arm. “Enough. We camp outside. We don’t sleep here.”
Devika nodded reluctantly, though her gaze lingered on the ruins. She felt the pull of stories unspooled, threads demanding to be followed. The forgotten path had opened, and there was no turning back.
Part 4 – The First Loom
They set their mats on the edge of the hamlet, near a clearing where the ground sloped gently toward a stream. Biju insisted they build no fire, only lit a lantern dimly covered with cloth. “Light draws what we don’t want,” he muttered, his machete always within reach. Devika, though uneasy, gave in. The ruins behind them loomed like watchful silhouettes, their vine-strangled frames quivering in the dusk wind.
She tried to eat the handful of flattened rice and jaggery Biju handed her, but each bite stuck in her throat. The forest air was thick with the smell of damp clay, almost metallic. Beyond the chirp of crickets, the other sound persisted—soft, steady, like a loom’s shuttle sliding back and forth. She had thought it a trick of imagination, but now it wove itself into every silence.
When sleep came, it came heavy. In her dream, Devika walked barefoot into a firelit hut. Dozens of women sat at looms, their saris red as flame, their bangles clinking in rhythm with the shuttles. The air was thick with dye smoke, staining the beams crimson. She moved among them, but their faces blurred, hidden by shadows. Only their hands were visible—dark, slender, strong—working ceaselessly, pulling threads taut, knotting, releasing.
One woman finally looked up. Her eyes glowed with an intensity that made Devika stumble. She reached out, and when her hand brushed Devika’s wrist, a thread looped around it—hot, alive, binding her. Devika gasped, jolting awake.
The lantern still burned faintly, Biju sitting upright beside it, wide-eyed.
“You cried out,” he whispered.
Devika’s hand shook as she lifted it. Around her wrist was the faintest mark of red, as if a thread had grazed her skin. She said nothing, tucking her hand under the blanket, though her heart thudded like a drum.
At dawn, mist rose in sheets from the stream. Biju looked weary, his jaw tight. “We should turn back,” he said flatly.
But Devika was already walking toward the village center. Something pulled her—curiosity, perhaps, or the thread still burning faintly in her dream.
They reached the largest ruin: a hut whose roof had caved in but whose frame remained. Inside lay a loom, half-collapsed but recognizable, its beams twisted, strings tangled in a ghostly web. Unlike the others, this one still bore fabric. A strip of red silk clung stubbornly to its frame, faded yet gleaming in places where the sun touched.
Devika froze, her breath caught. “The first loom,” she whispered.
Biju crossed himself with trembling fingers. “We should not touch.”
But Devika stepped inside. She crouched beside the loom, tracing the weave. The silk was brittle yet soft, as if preserved by some force beyond nature. She pulled out her camera, aimed, and clicked. The shutter responded—but when she checked the screen, the image was distorted. The loom appeared doubled, haloed by faint figures in the background, women bent in mid-weave.
Her throat dried. She tried again. This time the camera went black, refusing to respond.
Frustrated, she pulled out her sketchbook instead. Her pencil moved feverishly, capturing the shape of the loom, the ghost of fabric still hanging, the way the light caught its threads. As she drew, the sound around her deepened. The shuttle beat grew louder, clearer, echoing off the broken beams. It filled her chest, her veins, as if she herself were part of the weaving.
“Madam,” Biju hissed, standing at the doorway. His eyes darted around. “We are not alone.”
Devika paused, listening. For the first time, she too felt it—not just sound, but presence. The air was alive, vibrating with unseen movement. She turned slowly. For the briefest moment, she thought she saw them: women seated at looms, their outlines translucent, their hands moving tirelessly. Then the vision dissolved into empty space.
Her pencil slipped. She shut the sketchbook with a snap, breathing hard.
“Do you see them?” she asked.
Biju swallowed, his face ashen. “No. But I feel eyes. Always eyes.”
They left the hut, but Devika’s heart lingered. She could not shake the sensation of threads brushing against her, weaving around her like invisible nets. The first loom was not just ruin—it was memory alive, waiting for recognition.
That evening, as they returned to the clearing, she sat silently by the stream, her notebook open on her lap. The forest around her glowed faintly with fireflies, flickering like tiny lanterns. Their light mirrored the blurred figures she had glimpsed. She began to write, her words spilling faster than she could contain: This is not abandonment. This is suspension. The village breathes beneath the forest, its looms still clacking in silence, its weavers invisible yet insistent.
Biju watched her uneasily. “Words won’t save you,” he said. “Better to forget.”
But Devika only smiled faintly, the red mark still burning on her wrist. Forgetting was no longer possible. The forest had spoken, and she was bound to its thread.
Part 5 – The Vanished Village
The mist lifted slowly, curling upward in pale ribbons, and with it the village revealed more of itself. What had first appeared to Devika as a scattering of ruined huts now stretched wider, hut after hut, their bamboo skeletons bowed under the weight of vines. Roof beams jutted like broken bones, and narrow lanes, once trodden by bare feet, lay overrun with weeds.
She walked carefully, each step stirring memories she could not name. The silence here was not empty; it was layered, a silence pressed flat by too many voices that had spoken once and never again. Even the birds seemed subdued, flitting only at the edges.
“Stay close,” Biju muttered, gripping his machete though there was nothing visible to strike.
Devika did not answer. She was already drawn into the heart of the hamlet. Everywhere she looked, she found fragments—remnants of a life halted mid-motion. Clay pots toppled by doorways. Wooden combs left in corners, their teeth darkened. A child’s toy carved from bamboo, its string broken, half-buried in moss. Time had moved on, yet the village had not followed.
They reached what must have been the weaving courtyard. Here the ruins clustered tightly, ten or twelve huts in a row. Looms stood in various states of decay: some collapsed, others still upright but skeletal, their frames laced with roots. And everywhere—the red silk. Threads dangled from beams, coiled around branches, knotted in tangles on the ground. Some glowed faintly in the afternoon light, vivid as fresh blood.
Devika touched one carefully, letting it slide across her palm. It was smooth, unyielding, as though it had resisted the years. “How can this survive?” she whispered.
Biju spat to the side. “Because it is not meant for us. The forest keeps what belongs to it.”
She ignored his warning. Notebook in hand, she moved from loom to loom, sketching, cataloguing, her heart racing. Each structure felt like a shrine, not to gods, but to people who had poured their lives into weaving. She imagined their voices—women singing as they worked, children laughing between huts, men dyeing threads in steaming pits. Now those sounds were gone, replaced by the steady pulse she kept hearing, low and insistent, like the memory of looms beating from beneath the earth.
Near one hut, she paused. On its threshold lay a sari, folded neatly, its red still bright though the edges frayed. She crouched, afraid to touch it, as if it were a body clothed for burial. The sight made her chest ache. This was not just a vanished craft; this was grief frozen in fabric.
“Biju,” she said softly, “don’t you feel it? As if they left in a hurry, but also… as if they are still here?”
His face tightened. “I feel it. That is why we must go.”
But Devika could not leave, not yet. She was pulled deeper, past the courtyard to a circle of dye pits. They lay in the ground like shallow wells, their rims stained crimson that no rain had washed away. Some still held stagnant water, tinged faintly pink in the light. She knelt, running her finger along the rim, and it came away red, as if the dye had never dried.
The air grew heavier. The silence thickened until her ears rang. She thought she heard a cough, faint but human, and spun around—yet only Biju stood there, tense, watching her.
“They died here,” he said abruptly, his voice flat. “The fever struck fast. First children, then mothers, then all. My grandmother said one night the looms clacked and clacked, but by dawn the village was silent. No birds, no smoke, no voices. Only the forest, closing in.”
Devika’s hand tightened around her notebook. “And no one came back?”
“No one.” His voice cracked slightly. “Fear keeps us away. And respect. The dead deserve peace.”
She looked around—the looms, the threads, the dye pits. This did not feel like peace. It felt like suspension, as if the weavers had stepped out only for a moment, intending to return. And in their absence, the forest had held everything in place, unwilling to release what was unfinished.
As dusk bled into the trees, fireflies lit the lanes one by one, their glow weaving across the ruins until the hamlet shimmered faintly alive. For an instant, Devika thought she saw movement—figures crossing between huts, heads bent over work. She blinked, and the vision dissolved, leaving only the insects’ glow.
Her breath caught. “Biju,” she whispered, “what if they never left? What if the forest is still weaving them, keeping them here?”
Biju’s face was pale in the firefly light. “That is why we leave tomorrow. Before it weaves us too.”
But Devika knew already: tomorrow would not be enough. The vanished village had opened itself, and she was inside its weave. Threads bound her, tugging her deeper with every step, every sketch, every breath.
That night, she could not sleep. She sat outside the shed, notebook balanced on her knees, sketching the village as the fireflies glowed. The hum continued, steady, like breath. In her drawing, the ruins did not appear broken but whole—looms upright, courtyards alive. Without meaning to, she sketched women seated at the looms, their hands blurred in motion. When she looked down, the pencil strokes were not hers alone; the lines seemed guided, pulled into patterns she did not fully control.
She dropped the pencil, heart pounding. The forest was speaking, through thread, through memory, through her.
And in that moment, she knew with absolute certainty: the village was not vanished. It was waiting.
Part 6 – The Story of Silence
They left the hamlet at first light, walking quickly, as if chased. Biju barely spoke, his eyes fixed on the ground, machete slashing at vines more violently than necessary. Devika followed reluctantly, her notebook pressed close to her chest. Every step away felt like a thread snapping inside her. She had sketched, she had seen, but the village still tugged at her like unfinished fabric waiting for its pattern.
By noon they reached a clearing where a narrow dirt path led back toward human habitation. A cluster of huts stood ahead, smoke curling lazily from their chimneys. Chickens scratched in the mud, children darted between bamboo fences. The ordinary life of the living struck Devika like sunlight after shadow.
Biju led her to the largest hut, where an old man sat on a low stool weaving a bamboo mat. His back was bent, his hands trembled, but his eyes were sharp as flint. When Biju bowed respectfully, Devika did the same.
“This is Hari Da,” Biju said. “He remembers.”
The elder regarded her with a long, measuring gaze. “Outsider,” he murmured. “You’ve been to the red village.”
Devika stiffened. “How did you know?”
He smiled without humor. “The forest marks those who enter. Your eyes carry its shadow.”
She shivered but nodded. “Yes. I’ve seen the ruins. The looms. The silk that still hangs.”
Hari Da sighed, setting aside his mat. “Then you must also hear the story, else the place will haunt you. Sit.”
They lowered themselves onto reed mats. The hut smelled of smoke and dried fish, homely yet heavy. Children peered in through the door, curious, until shooed away.
Hari Da began slowly, his voice like cracked timber:
“Long ago, before my beard was white, that hamlet thrived. They were weavers, masters of red silk. Not Muga like here, golden and eternal, but crimson, dyed from roots and bark mixed with secret herbs. They guarded the recipe, taught only to their daughters. The saris they wove glowed like fire. Brides walked into marriage wrapped in them, warriors carried them as banners. That silk was life itself.”
He paused, his eyes drifting to the smoke curling from the hearth. “But life has a price. The dye needed much water, much wood, much blood from the land. They built dye pits along the river, emptied them carelessly, let the poison seep. The fish began to die. The river grew angry. And then came the fever.”
Devika leaned forward. “A disease?”
“A fire in the body,” Hari Da said. “Children burned with it, then mothers, then fathers. The healers could do nothing. Within three nights, whole families were gone. Survivors fled, leaving looms mid-weave, food still on the hearths. The forest closed its arms, swallowed what remained.”
Silence hung. Only the crackle of fire punctuated it.
“And no one returned?” Devika asked softly.
Hari Da shook his head. “We are taught to respect silence. That village is not abandoned. It is kept. The forest holds it, punishes its pride. Sometimes travelers hear the looms. Sometimes they see the red threads. But those who linger too long… do not return the same.”
Biju shifted uneasily. Devika gripped her notebook. “But the silk,” she said. “It still shines. Decades have passed. How?”
The old man’s gaze fixed on her wrist, where the faint red mark still lingered. “Because some weaves are not cloth but memory. The forest remembers better than we do. And memory does not decay.”
Devika felt her throat tighten. She wanted to argue, to insist on science—humidity, preservation, pigment—but the words dried in her mouth. She remembered the sari folded neatly at the hut’s threshold, the loom that had photographed itself with ghostly figures bent above it.
Hari Da continued. “Outsider, I tell you this not to frighten, but to remind. The red silk was beauty, yes. But beauty that forgets the earth will always be cursed. That is the silence you felt. Not emptiness—punishment.”
Biju bowed, murmuring a prayer. Devika sat frozen, her mind racing. The story was not only about death but about excess, about craft consuming more than it gave back. The weavers had bled their river dry, and the forest had answered.
She asked finally, “If the forest keeps them, why do the threads still appear? Why do the looms still beat?”
Hari Da’s eyes softened. “Because not all punishment is ending. Some is remembering. The forest weaves them still, so that we may not forget. And now you carry its thread.”
Her hand flew to her wrist again, the faint red line pulsing faintly as though alive.
The old man’s voice lowered. “Be careful, child. You write stories, yes? Then write this one true. But do not stay too long in its weave, or it will pull you in.”
Devika bowed her head, a shiver running down her spine. She knew then that her journey was no longer a travelogue. It was a reckoning.
That evening, as they prepared to leave the village, Hari Da pressed a bundle into her hands: a scrap of red silk, brittle but intact. “Keep it,” he said. “But never wear it.”
Under the lantern’s dim glow, the cloth shimmered faintly, as if lit from within. Devika held it carefully, feeling its weight—lighter than air, heavier than memory.
And as they set off again toward the forest’s edge, she realized the silence was not just around her. It was inside her now, woven tight, a silence that would not let go.
Part 7 – The River’s Secret
The morning after Hari Da’s story, the forest no longer looked the same. It was as if every tree carried a watchful gaze, every rustle of leaves was a whisper pointed at her. Devika walked beside Biju, clutching the scrap of red silk the old man had given her. She had wrapped it in cloth, but even hidden, it seemed to glow faintly, a ember folded in her bag.
“Where are we going today?” she asked as they crossed a meadow wet with dew.
Biju kept his eyes forward. “The river. You wanted to see the dye pits. The stream that carried their color still flows.”
“The one they said turned red?”
He nodded grimly. “My mother swears she saw it once as a child, even years after the fever.”
They followed a narrow track through the forest until they heard the rush of water, faint at first, then louder, until the trees parted to reveal a stream curling like a silver ribbon through the undergrowth. Its surface shimmered under the morning sun, but along its banks lay shallow depressions—circular, stone-lined, now filled with rainwater. The dye pits.
Devika crouched beside one. The rim was stained, not dull brown or mossy green, but faintly, unmistakably red. She ran her fingers over it and they came away tinged, as though the pigment still clung stubbornly after decades.
“This should not be possible,” she whispered.
Biju said nothing. He stood apart, eyes scanning the forest, unwilling to come closer.
Devika leaned over the stream itself. The water ran clear, but here and there darker streaks swirled beneath the surface, winding like threads. When she touched it, the cold bit into her skin, but her fingertips emerged faintly stained. She gasped.
“It’s still here,” she murmured. “The recipe, the memory—it never left.”
Her camera dangled from her neck. She lifted it, snapped a photograph of the pits, then the water. The shutter clicked, but when she looked, the screen displayed only static, the image fractured like broken glass. Frustrated, she tried again, only for the camera to go black.
She switched to her notebook, sketching quickly—the curve of the pits, the lines of the stream, the way the water carried its phantom threads. But as she drew, she realized her pencil strokes grew unsteady, guided by something else. Instead of just stones and water, her page filled with figures—women bent over the pits, hands deep in dye jars, their saris soaked crimson. She hadn’t meant to draw them, yet there they were, appearing between her lines like hidden text revealed by flame.
She dropped the pencil, heart racing.
Behind her, Biju muttered sharply. She turned. His gaze was fixed on the opposite bank.
“What is it?” she asked.
He pointed. Across the stream, half-buried in mud, lay earthen jars. Some were broken, their insides stained red, others intact, their mouths sealed with clay. They looked as though they had been left in haste, abandoned mid-work.
“We shouldn’t touch,” he said quickly.
But Devika was already wading across, water rising to her knees, icy and biting. She reached the jars, pried one open. Inside, dry flakes of pigment clung to the walls—red, deep as blood. Her breath caught. She had proof now, tangible evidence.
“Biju, look—” she began, but her words faltered. The air shifted suddenly. The forest went still. No bird called, no insect buzzed. Only the rush of the stream remained, louder than before, almost roaring.
And in its roar, she heard it again: the rhythm of looms. Not distant now, but close, woven into the water’s flow.
She stumbled back, jar in hand. The sound grew louder, rising with the current. The water swirled, foam streaked crimson though no dye touched it. For a moment, the entire stream seemed to glow red, threads winding together into a pattern her eyes could not fully follow.
Biju shouted her name. She turned, saw him pale, gesturing frantically for her to return. She dropped the jar, its shards vanishing into the current, and splashed back across, gasping.
By the time she reached him, the water had stilled. The redness faded, leaving only clear ripples again. The silence cracked as birds resumed their calls.
Devika stood trembling, dripping, her notebook pressed to her chest. “Did you see it?”
Biju shook his head violently. “I heard. That was enough. We leave. Now.”
But she could not leave so easily. The stream’s vision had lodged inside her, threading itself into her pulse. It was not just dye and water—it was memory woven into current, refusing to be erased.
They walked back along the trail, the forest closing behind them. Devika felt heavier with every step, not from exhaustion, but from the certainty that she was carrying something more than sketches or scraps. The river had given her a secret, pressed it into her like dye into cloth.
That night, as they camped under a canopy of stars, she unfolded Hari Da’s scrap of silk. Under the lantern light, its crimson seemed to shimmer with movement, threads glinting as if still wet. She laid it beside her sketch of the stream, the two glowing faintly in unison.
Her pen moved almost without her will. She wrote: The river is not water. It is a loom. Each current a shuttle, each ripple a thread. The forest remembers through it, weaving endlessly what humans abandoned.
Biju turned away, refusing to look at her page. “You are letting it take you,” he said in a low voice. “The village, the river, the silk. It wants you in its weave.”
Devika met his gaze, unflinching. “Maybe that’s the only way to tell it true.”
The forest around them whispered, and the river’s secret pulsed in her veins.
Part 8 – The Fireflies Return
By the time they retraced their way to the hamlet, dusk had thickened like smoke. The ruins lay in half-shadow, their broken beams and vine-laden huts silhouetted against a bruised purple sky. Biju wanted to skirt the place, camp farther out, but Devika refused. The river’s secret had etched itself too deep; she needed to see the village again, to match her visions with the earth itself.
“Only one night,” she promised. “Then we leave.”
Biju muttered a curse but followed, his machete in hand, shoulders tight. They set their mats in the courtyard where the looms clustered, the air heavy with the smell of damp wood and moss. Devika sat with her notebook, tracing her earlier sketches. Something about the lines looked incomplete, waiting for the night to reveal what daylight concealed.
As darkness settled, the forest stirred. Crickets sang, owls called, but it was the silence between the sounds that pressed hardest. Then, faintly, like drifting embers, the first fireflies appeared.
One blinked above the dye pits. Another hovered near a broken loom. Soon dozens swirled through the air, tiny lanterns weaving paths of gold-green light. Devika watched, spellbound, as the ruins began to glow. Fireflies clung to the threads that still dangled from beams, making them shimmer like freshly spun silk. Others traced the outlines of huts, sketching in light what the forest had half-erased.
Biju whispered sharply, “Don’t look too long.”
But Devika could not look away. In the wavering glow, the hamlet shifted. For a heartbeat, it was no longer ruin but whole—huts upright, courtyards alive, looms clicking steadily. Figures moved in the glow: women bent over their weaving, men stirring dye jars, children darting between. The fireflies flickered in unison, and for one terrifying, breathtaking moment, the past lived again.
Her breath caught. She lifted her notebook, began sketching feverishly by lantern light, her pencil darting to capture what her camera had refused. The figures emerged on the page with startling clarity, as though her hand was guided. She felt less like she was drawing and more like she was being used to write what the forest wanted remembered.
A sudden chill swept through the courtyard. The fireflies thickened, their glow intensifying. Devika thought she saw one woman pause at her loom, lifting her face. The features were blurred, yet the eyes—deep, ember-like—seemed to meet hers directly. A thread of light stretched from the loom to Devika’s wrist, binding her in luminous silk.
Her hand shook. She dropped her pencil, clutching her wrist where the faint red mark now burned hot, pulsing as if alive.
Biju grabbed her shoulder. “We leave now.” His voice trembled.
But Devika whispered, awed, “They’re still here, Biju. The fireflies—don’t you see? They’re weaving the village back.”
His grip tightened. “You don’t understand. They want you in it. If you step closer, you won’t come back.”
The fireflies surged suddenly, flooding the courtyard in light. For a terrifying instant, Devika could see every loom occupied, every thread alive. The hum of weaving filled her ears, deafening, a chorus of shuttles beating, wood clacking, threads pulling. It was not sound anymore but vibration, coursing through her body, syncing with her heartbeat.
Her vision blurred. She swayed forward, almost stepping into their world. But Biju yanked her back roughly, his shout breaking the rhythm. The glow faltered. Fireflies scattered, their fragile illusion dissolving into night.
The ruins returned—silent, broken, skeletal once more. Only the faint gleam of threads on beams remained, trembling slightly as if disturbed.
Devika collapsed onto the mat, chest heaving. Sweat ran down her temples. Her notebook lay open on the ground. The sketch she had begun was finished, though she did not remember completing it. The page showed the courtyard whole, every loom alive, every figure in place. And at the edge, one figure was seated apart, notebook in hand, head bent in concentration. Herself.
She stared, throat dry. The forest had drawn her into its weave, even on paper.
Biju saw it too. His face twisted with fear. “Tomorrow,” he said harshly. “We don’t wait for another night. Do you hear me? We leave at dawn.”
Devika nodded weakly, but inside she knew the weave had already claimed her. The fireflies had shown her not ruin, not grief, but continuity. The village was not gone. It was here, woven into silence and light, waiting for someone stubborn enough to see.
That night, sleep was impossible. Each time she closed her eyes, she saw the ember-eyes of the woman at the loom, staring at her through the flickering glow. Her wrist throbbed where the thread had burned, a phantom binding that refused to loosen.
At midnight, the hum returned—faint but insistent, weaving itself through her dreams.
And Devika understood: the fireflies had not vanished. They were only waiting to return.
Part 9 – The Final Loom
Dawn crept into the ruins with a pale, hesitant light. The fireflies had scattered hours ago, but Devika still felt their glow in her veins. Her wrist ached faintly, the invisible thread pulling her deeper, as though unfinished business awaited. Biju was already awake, pacing the courtyard, muttering prayers under his breath.
“No more wandering,” he said sharply as she rose. “We go back today. Promise me.”
She didn’t answer. The night’s vision had burned away her hesitation. Something remained to be found, and she knew where the pull was leading.
Instead of following Biju toward the forest trail, she slipped between the huts, her notebook clutched tight. Her feet moved as if they remembered a path she had never walked. The air grew stiller, colder, until she reached the farthest edge of the hamlet, where the trees thickened again.
There it stood—a hut more intact than the others, its bamboo walls still upright, roof sagging but unbroken. Inside, shadow pooled, broken only by shafts of morning sun. She stepped through the doorway, her breath caught.
The loom was there. Whole, upright, though aged and darkened with time. And on it stretched fabric still clinging to the frame: a sari, half-finished, its red glowing faintly as though the threads held fire.
Devika’s knees weakened. She moved closer, reverent, as if approaching an altar. The weave was tight, each line flawless, yet abruptly cut mid-pattern, frozen in abandonment. One half shone complete, the other dangling with loose threads, waiting.
Her hand trembled as she reached out. The silk was soft, impossibly so, as though woven yesterday. She pressed it to her palm, and for a moment she felt warmth pulse through it, like blood.
Biju appeared at the doorway, his face stricken. “No!” he cried. “Don’t touch it!”
But she couldn’t pull back. Her eyes caught something else: on the wooden beam of the loom, faint words carved deep. She leaned closer, tracing them with her fingers.
আমাদের হাত থামলেও বুনন চলবে।
(Our hands may stop, but the weave continues.)
Her chest tightened. She whispered the words aloud, and as she did, the air thickened. The hum rose again, swelling until it filled the hut. Threads trembled, the half-woven sari quivered as if alive.
The shadows lengthened. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw movement—figures seated at looms, hands working tirelessly, saris glowing red in the dimness. Their faces blurred, yet their rhythm was clear, precise, endless. One figure turned slightly, her ember-bright eyes locking onto Devika’s.
She stumbled back, breath ragged. The loom in front of her seemed to pulse, the fabric growing brighter. For a terrifying instant, she thought it was urging her—finish what was left, pick up the shuttle, complete the weave.
“Stop looking!” Biju’s shout broke through. He seized her arm, pulling her away from the loom. The hum faltered, though faint echoes still rang in her ears.
They stumbled outside into the courtyard. Devika clutched her notebook against her chest, her whole body trembling. Biju shook her, his voice harsh with fear. “Do you want to be one of them? Do you want to sit there forever, weaving shadows?”
She shook her head numbly, though inside she felt the opposite. A part of her did want to. To touch that shuttle, to finish what had been left undone, to belong to the weave that refused to die.
Her notebook slipped open in her lap as she sank to the ground. She froze. Across the page, in her own handwriting though she had never written it, the same words appeared: Our hands may stop, but the weave continues.
Her pen rolled from the page, ink smudging, as if the forest itself had guided her hand while she wasn’t watching.
Biju stared at it, horror etched on his face. “We leave now. No more waiting. Not another night.”
Devika closed the notebook, pressing it tight. But the words had already burned into her. The loom’s half-finished sari glowed behind her eyes, its threads tugging at her soul. She knew this was the heart of the hamlet, the place where grief and beauty had been knotted together.
She rose slowly. “One more night,” she whispered, more to herself than to Biju. “I have to see.”
His face fell, but he said nothing. He only turned away, muttering curses into the air.
As they prepared to leave the courtyard, Devika looked back once. Through the doorway, the loom still stood, the red sari gleaming faintly in the dim light, waiting for hands that would never return—or perhaps for hers.
And for the first time, she wondered not whether she was documenting the village, but whether the village was documenting her.
Part 10 – The Trail Rewritten
They left the hamlet before the sun rose high, the air heavy with an unspoken tension. Biju walked fast, machete slicing vines as though every tendril were a threat, while Devika trailed behind, notebook clutched tight. Each step away felt both relief and ache, as if she were unraveling from a fabric that had begun to claim her.
By late afternoon they emerged from the forest into the fringe of cultivated fields. The sudden sight of human life—children chasing goats, women bending over paddy, men shouting across the ridges—was almost jarring. The ordinary world pressed in, noisy and bright, refusing to acknowledge the silence they carried.
In the village guesthouse where they rested, Devika sat by the window long after Biju collapsed into sleep. She opened her notebook, flipping through the pages: sketches of looms, dye pits, huts, but also things she had not consciously drawn—blurred figures, ember eyes, words carved into beams. The final page held the sentence she could not deny: Our hands may stop, but the weave continues.
Her wrist throbbed faintly, the red mark still visible. She pressed her fingers against it, half-afraid, half-reassured. She understood now—this was not a curse alone. It was inheritance, a thread passed down not by blood but by story.
The next day they traveled back to Guwahati. The city spread around them, crowded and restless, the Brahmaputra rolling vast and indifferent beside it. Devika booked her return ticket to Delhi, but each time she tried to rest, she heard the faint hum beneath the noise of rickshaws and vendors. The looms had followed her.
At the guesthouse by the river, she met Malati again, the caretaker who had first spoken of the vanished hamlet. The woman’s eyes widened when Devika placed the scrap of red silk on the table.
“You went,” Malati whispered. “You saw it.”
Devika nodded. “It’s real. More real than I imagined. But it’s not just a story of death—it’s a story of survival, of memory. The silk is still there, the looms still weave. They don’t want to be forgotten.”
Malati touched the fabric with reverence, then pulled her hand back quickly, as if it burned. “Write carefully, madam. Words can trap as much as they free.”
That night, Devika began to write. Not a travelogue, not the glossy cultural essay she had planned, but something else: part elegy, part witness. Her sentences came dense, heavy, threaded with grief and awe. She described the dye pits bleeding into the river, the looms still clacking in silence, the fireflies weaving the hamlet whole again. She wrote of the mark on her wrist, of the voices that guided her hand.
Days blurred as she poured herself into the work. By the time she boarded her flight to Delhi, her manuscript was thick, her notebook nearly filled. She titled it The Red Silk Trail.
Back in the city, surrounded by the familiar roar of traffic and neon lights, she felt disoriented. The forest lingered in her senses—the smell of damp wood, the hum of threads, the glow of fireflies. Her friends asked about Assam, expecting photographs, glossy stories of weaving traditions. She smiled faintly, handed them sketches instead, knowing photographs had failed her.
When she sent her manuscript to the editor, she included a note: This is not just a story of a vanished village. It is the story of what happens when beauty forgets the earth, when silence becomes punishment, when memory refuses to die. Read it not as travel writing, but as testimony.
Weeks later, her editor called, voice hushed with awe. “Devika, this isn’t an article. It’s a book. A haunting one. Are you sure you want the world to carry this weight?”
“Yes,” Devika said softly. “Because the weight is not mine alone. The forest asked me to carry it.”
When the book was finally published, readers spoke of it as both travel narrative and ghost story. Some praised its lyrical detail, others confessed they could not sleep after reading it. Scholars wrote about its environmental warning, weavers wept at its homage, skeptics dismissed it as embellished myth. But no one denied its power.
Devika attended the launch in Delhi, wearing a simple white cotton sari. She did not wear the red scrap Hari Da had given her. That remained folded in her drawer, too alive, too dangerous.
During the Q&A, someone asked, “Do you believe the looms are still weaving?”
Devika paused, her fingers brushing her wrist where the faint red line still pulsed beneath her skin. She smiled, though her eyes were shadowed.
“I don’t need to believe,” she said. “I still hear them.”
The room fell silent.
Later, alone in her apartment, she opened her notebook once more. On the last page, in handwriting not hers, another line had appeared overnight: The weave continues through you.
She closed the book, trembling but calm. The thread was no longer just in the forest. It was inside her, binding her to a story that could never end.
***
