They said the mountain was holy because nothing ever grew on it. Not grass, not moss, not even weeds, just red dust, loose stones, and jagged outcrops that caught the KwaZulu-Natal sun and burned with a stubborn heat. At a distance, it looked serene, a gentle slope rolling toward the horizon. Up close, it was unyielding: cliffs that cut the wind, ravines that swallowed sound, and rocks that seemed to lean toward the valley below, waiting.
   From the small town of Ndlende, the mountain loomed over everything: the tin-roofed houses, the schools, the shebeens, and the church whose white walls gleamed defiantly against the raw earth. Villagers said the mountain had moods. Sometimes it watched quietly, silent and patient; sometimes it rumbled in the night.
  Pastor Isaiah liked to preach with the mountain behind him, his arms wide as though to gather the whole of creation. “There,” he would say, voice trembling with certainty, “is where God still speaks. The mountain burns for the righteous. It does not forgive the unclean. I know this because God speaks to me clearly, and I will let you know his will.”
   The congregation hummed in unison, the air heavy with sweat, dust, and fervent belief, their minds readily accepting the pastor’s words as truth. The mountain’s shadow seemed to stretch into the church itself, filling the aisles with a quiet weight, pressing on the hearts of those who had come to worship.
   The first child to bleed was Mariah Beck. She was nine, born of a local nurse and a truck driver, and sang with the loud, fearless joy of children who hadn’t yet learned to be afraid. It happened one Sunday in late August. She had just lifted her hands during worship when her knees buckled. A thin stream of blood slipped from her nose, landing on the white tiles. For a few seconds, no one moved. Then a woman cried out, “The Spirit!” and the crowd began to pray louder, faster, as if their faith might outpace their fear.
   Pastor Isaiah rushed over and laid a hand on Mariah’s forehead. “Let her be refined,” he said. “The Lord is close to her blood.” When she didn’t wake, they wrapped her in a church flag and carried her to the vestry. By the following Sunday, her photo hung beside the pulpit. The caption read: Chosen.
   Two more children collapsed before the month ended. The mothers wept, but they kept coming. The clinic doctor said it was dehydration due to the extreme heatwave in that part of KwaZulu-Natal. Pastor Isaiah said it was the Refining Fire. One Sunday evening, under the red glow of sunset, he gathered the congregation in the churchyard. He raised his arms, eyes alight with fervour, voice low but urgent: “The mountain calls to those who are pure! Those who are faithful must climb! You must go where God speaks. Only on the summit will the fire find you worthy.”
   Some trembled, some whispered prayers. Others nodded, hearts pounding with fear and devotion. The mountain seemed to loom closer, cliffs sharp against the darkening sky, the wind carrying an almost imperceptible murmur of voices or warnings.
   “The Lord tests us,” Isaiah said, pacing among them. “He asks for courage, for obedience. Will you answer His call?” One by one, hands lifted, eyes closed. The congregation followed Pastor Isaiah and began to climb. The children, some weak, some defiant, followed, swaying between faith and terror, the mountain swallowing their murmured prayers.

   Michael Steenkamp, now a journalist in Durban, came home when the story reached the national news. He had grown up in Ndlende, baptised in that same church, disciplined under those same verses. But years reporting for city newspapers had made him cautious of certainty. He had learned that people will believe anything if you let them believe it together. In numbers, people can be manipulated; you just had to say the right thing. He now returned as a professional observer, sent to investigate the truth behind the “miracles.” He laughed at the phrasing in his own notes: miracles usually meant something had gone terribly wrong.
   The road to the mountain wound through sugarcane fields and cattle paths. The night smelled of smoke and rain. The mountain loomed above him as he climbed, massive and silent, its cliffs black in the shadows, its ravines swallowing sound. The wind carried a low hum, like breath or a warning. When Michael reached the summit, the singing had already begun, a deep, rhythmic chant that moved like wind through bone. The clearing was lit by torches. Crosses stood in the red soil. At the centre lay a flat stone, marked by something dark that caught the firelight. Blood. Fresh. Blood. Michael lifted his camera and began capturing the unfolding scene before him.
   He was startled by a voice that spoke from behind him. Calm and unhurried: “Michael Steenkamp.” Michael swung around. Pastor Isaiah stepped forward, barefoot, his shirt open at the neck. His face shone with sweat and something else, something close to peace, something almost predatory.
   “You shouldn’t be here,” he said.
   “I’m here to report,” Michael replied. His phone light shook as he raised it. “Tell me what you’re doing.”
   Isaiah looked past him, to the mountain’s dark ridge.
   “Do you know,” he said quietly, “that every covenant begins with blood? Noah, Abraham, the Cross, it’s always blood first, blessing after.”
   “You’re killing children,” Michael said.
   The pastor smiled. “No. I’m delivering them. The city poisons them before they can pray. The mountain purifies what the city destroys. Did you forget, Michael? The word of our saviour, suffer the little children to come unto me?”
   “You are utterly mad.”
   Isaiah stepped closer. “Madness,” he said, “is just faith that refuses compromise. And you, Michael, have forgotten what it means to fear God enough to obey him and me entirely.”
   Michael felt the weight of the mountain pressing down through the soles of his shoes. The congregation below swayed in unison, whispering prayers like waves breaking over stone. Michael decided to bolt, sprinting for safety down the mountain. Isaiah gave chase, screaming, “Michael, you need to obey!!” Isaiah eventually abandoned the pursuit.
   Michael went straight to the police, and his investigative article went viral on the social media networks. The police raided the summit early in the morning. Pastor Isaiah tried to command the crowd to resist, calling down God’s wrath and fire, but the townspeople, confused and frightened, froze in place. The children were removed, pale and trembling. The altar was examined, every stone photographed, every smear of blood documented. Isaiah screamed in the wind, chanting verses to a God who did not answer. When the officers finally handcuffed him, his eyes were bright with fury and certainty.
   “The mountain will remember,” he shouted. “The faithful cannot be judged by men!”
   But even as the helicopter blades thrashed above the ridges, the mountain remained silent. Its red dust glimmered in the morning sun, indifferent.

   Three months later, Michael sat in the back of the courtroom, notebook open, pen hovering, though he barely needed it. Pastor Isaiah stood before the Judge, his hands bound, eyes blazing with the same fervour that had drawn the congregation up the mountain months ago. The defence called it zealotry; the prosecution called it murder. Outside, people whispered, split between outrage, fear, and devotion.
   Isaiah’s words were calm, precise, rehearsed. He spoke of obedience, of God’s will, of the mountain’s fire. He claimed the children had been offered to God, as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God! Purified in spirit if not in body. Michael scribbled furiously, but even as he wrote, he felt the weight of the mountain pressing down through the glass windows of the courtroom, across the town, into the hearts of those who had once climbed it willingly. The congregation had mostly stayed home. Some feared the law more than they feared God. Others stayed away out of shame, or perhaps because their faith had been fractured, but not broken. Michael wondered which was worse: the blind devotion, or the quiet obedience born of terror.
   When the judge finally pronounced the sentence, years of imprisonment and a permanent ban from all religious work, Isaiah raised his head, smiling faintly. “The mountain remembers,” he said to no one in particular. “Faith is not measured by men, but by the trials it endures.”
   Michael closed his notebook. Outside, the sun hit the red dust of the summit. The mountain remained, silent, patient, eternal. Its shadow stretched over Ndlende still, indifferent to justice or morality.
   Even imprisoned, Isaiah’s voice, his manipulations, and the memory of the climb lingered in every whispered prayer, every trembling hand lifted in worship. The mountain had not released its hunger. And Michael realised, with a chill that some forms of faith could not be caged. He walked out into the heat, the red dust rising in clouds around his shoes. The mountain watched, waiting, and Michael knew that the real story, the story of fear and devotion, of obedience and terror, would never truly end.
   Months later, Michael still thought of Ndlende. Driving along the coastal highway, he would glance at the hills and see the outline of that mountain, cloaked in haze. The town tried to forget, but some mothers whispered that the children still carried the fire inside them, that the mountain had not yet released its hunger. Michael wondered if the mountain had ever been holy at all, or if holiness was only what humans gave to the places where they buried their fear, and the men who made them afraid.

– Marcus van Wyk –