by
Lakesha Landrum
The silvery moonlight speckled the bare branches of the trees and stained the snow-covered ground a bright white. The softly dimpled snow gave way as heavy boots crashed down. The shadowed form of a hunter was making its way through the woods. The form was a hunched and twisted sight in the gleam of the moon.
The hunter grunted and a stream warm breath twisted and misted away in the air as he struggled under the burden that was strewn across his back. Shifting the weight, his slow stumbling stride continued.
At last, his wandering brought him to a cabin, sitting alone in the woods. Ten years he had been coming here and the ten years had not been good, not to him or the ones who had come before. All of them fail prey to the beautiful woman, cold, lost and afraid in the woods, only to find themselves bound to a demon, whose dark promises and even darker torments kept many coming back and more willing to serve her.
He sighed as he looked at the pitiful place before him. The cabin was old. Its once proud walls of hand carved wood, were now a dilapidated sight of weathered planks and broken windows. However, this is where he had to keep her, as the many men before him had done.
Shifting again under his burden, the hunter fumbled in his pocket and pulled out a flashlight. The harsh beam cut across the front of the cabin and across the door. Walking closer the hunter peered into a window, warm breath fogging the shattered window shards.
The flashlight stuttered around the cabin, briefly highlighting a fireplace before leaving it in the dark. The gray floor planks gleamed brightly as the light briefly played along its grooves. In a corner a spider hung, its frail body frozen from the bitter winter cold. A strong wind whips past the hunter in into the room. Finding and slamming into the brittle body of the spider, it shatters it and then twirls it away into the darker corners of the cabin.
The hunter shivered in the gust of wind. Flicking off the flashlight, he strides to the front of the cabin and pushes open the door. The old floor creaks as he strides into the cabin, then turns to close the door. Wedging it shut, he turns back toward the center of the room. Once again fumbling for his flashlight, he flicks it back on and walks toward the cavernous gape of the fireplace.
Dropping his bundle to the floor, the hunter kneels before the fireplace, he grunts as his knees pop with age. Sitting down the flashlight, he fumbles around in his pocket for matches. As his gnarled fingers pull forth the matches, a skittering noise makes him hesitates briefly before he tosses the lit match into the fireplace. The match flickers as it flies threw the cold air before finally coming to rest on a bed of old newspaper. The flame immediately catches and a blooming blaze fills the fireplace. The warmth and the light pushes back the shadows and reveal the face of the hunter hunched before them. The flickering flames glistened across shadowed blue eyes and grizzled cheeks. As he stands and turns away from the fire, his clothes reveal their age. Old patches and gaping holes reveal skin in places and hastily sewn long underwear in others.
A wrenching cough bursts from the hunter and he briefly stumbles. A shaking hand reaches up and wipes at his lips. Ruby red drops flicker briefly as they are flung through the air toward the floor. The blood meant she was angry, but there was no time for that now. She demanded sacrifice and she wanted it now. Kneeling back down he turns off the flashlight so that the room is only lit by the glow of the firelight.
Hunching over the bundle, he slowly begins to unwrap it, slowly revealing the half-frozen carcass of a deer. Gently running his hand along the hunch, he trembles slightly at the feel of the deer's coarse fur under his hand. There is a light humming sound as the hunter pulls a hunting knife from its sheath at his waist.
The firelight dances along the blade, seeming to caress and test its sharpness. The hunter's eyes brighten slightly as he looks at the blade. As the blade's glint danced in his eyes memories of earlier times crossed his mind. Grayed out shadows of watching his comrades being slaughtered by it. It leaving him alone, making him promise to always feed it, feed it or suffer.
Reaching down for the deer's head, he does not look away from the knife. Yanking back the head to expose the throat, he finally looks down as he thrusts the knife deep into the deer's throat. Half-frozen blood makes an effort to slip free; instead it congeals into a slowly spreading pool.
The hunter grunts as the knife slices through the neck of the deer. Each thrust of the knife brings a drop of sweat down onto the hunch of the deer. A grizzly sucking sound fills the air as the deer's head finally falls free. Its eyes stare off into oblivion, probably still seeing the woods it had left behind.
The hunter picks up the head, stared briefly into its eyes, and then threw it into a still shadowed corner of the cabin. There is a splat and a thunk as the head hits the wall and slides down.
The hunter refocuses his attention on the deer. Its' body now missing its' head lay before him, and now the blood was flowing faster, warming up to the temperature in the ragged cabin.
Grabbing a limb and yanking the corpse toward him, the hunter went to work removing the skin from the deer. Blood flew and splashed as the knife sliced and cut, soon the blanket underneath the deer was stained dark red, as the skin was finally pulled free.
Dropping the knife and standing, the hunter takes the skin over to the fireplace, finding some hooks screwed into the face, he strings the skin across them. The fire sizzled as the drops of blood drip down, causing the flames to leap hungrily for more.
Once again returning to the carcass of the deer, the hunter picks up the knife lying in a pool of blood and kneels. Taking the knife in both hands, he plunges it deep into the stomach of the deer. A dark stench fills the air as the entrails burst free onto the blanket. Dark blood highlights the pale intestine, as their coils and folds pile onto the stained blanket.
At the sight of them, the hunter tosses the knife aside and plunges his hand into the gaping wound of the deer. His eyes hold a mad gleam as he thrust his hand upward into the chest cavity of the deer.
The demon's madness filled him as its craving for the deer grew. The muscles tore as his hand plunged deeper and deeper.
Soon a look of triumph filled his eyes as his grasps the heart of the deer, yanking his hand free, he holds the heart above his head. Lukewarm blood streams down his hands and across his arms, forming a crimson curtain as the heart is held aloft.
Bringing the heart down to his mouth, the hunter hears the dark whispers of it beckoning him to takes a bite, to pay that which is owed to it.
The thickly muscled bivalve squishes as his teeth sink home.
The demon's dark whispers fill his mind as it beckons him to sacrifice the heart, to eat the heart. The heart now torn open, is risen back above the hunters head, then lowered again as he once again takes a bite. This continues until the heart is gone.
The fire begins to die and in its dying light, the hunter is slouched over, his blood stained hands resting in his lap, his eyes closed as if in a deep sleep. A great tremble goes through him and his eyes open, standing and grasping the corpse of the deer, he walks toward the darkest corner of the room.
Dropping the carcass, he returns to the fireplace to retrieve the flashlight. Upon return, he flicks it on and highlights a trapdoor in the corner. Sitting down the flashlight so that the light focuses on the floor, he retrieves the deer's head from the corner. Dropping the head beside the carcass, he kneels to the floor and pulls open the trap door.
Inside the trap door is a heavily chained gate. Beyond the gate is a thick darkness, filled with skittering and whispers. Within the darkness piercing red eyes gleamed as they spotted the hunter above in the light, the gate rung as sharpened claws clanged against the metal of the gate as they reached toward the hunter then fell away back into the darkness.
Reaching into his tattered pants, the hunter pulls forth a thick iron key. His hands begin to tremble as he reaches for the lock on the chains. A rattle and a few clicks later, the gate is open before him. The whispering grows louder, as if reaching for the hunter and the creature in the shadows presses closer.
There is a collective groan from the darkness as the carcass is lifted above the hole in the ground. The hunter drops the carcass into the hole, and soon a sickening crunch follows as something finds the deer.
The hunter casually tosses the head in afterward. For a minute he sits there, listening to the crunching then he pulls the gate closed.
Relocking it, he closes the trapdoor so that the gate is once again hidden.
Standing and looking down at the trapdoor, the hunter begins to tremble. Stumbling to the flashlight, he picks it up and flicks it off.
Once again, only the dying fire lights the room. Striding quickly to the fireplace, the hunter grabs the still wet deer pelt and throws it over his shoulders. The fur slaps wetly as it sticks to his back. Turning toward the door, he runs over and yanks it open. The winter wind whips in and quickly doses the fire.
Tucking the flashlight back into his pocket, he walks back into the room. Grabbing the blanket, he ties it back into a bundle then straps it to his back.
Retreating to the door, he glances back into the corner of the room, faintly the whispers rise then fall back into silence. The hunter nods then strides from the room. He knew he would be back soon; she would always call him back.
Closing the door behind him, he once again stumbles forth into the harshness of winter. Hunching down beneath the deer skin and bloody blanket, he leaves the cabin, leaving nothing behind but the whispering and the ashes of the fireplace growing cold and the demon that had once been and always be his everything, until he was dust and the next was chosen.
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