BY LIAM SPINAGE
Copyright is held by the author
ON THE first night of the hunter’s moon, it took my youngest brother.
We had all made our claim to farmsteads in Virginia and lived close by to each other as brothers should. You never met anyone as carefree and happy as my youngest brother. He was not a natural farmer, but he did love nature. He would spend all day lazing on his porch and gazing up at the birds as they flew across the cornfields.
And in one night, he was lost to me.
In truth, I do not know fully what came for us. We had heard rumours of a haunting presence in the woods, but had never seen it up close. At night, the wind would howl outside but we were as safe as houses. Or so we thought. This is not to say that I was idle ; I had ordered several books of local folklore which I studied assiduously when the hard work of the day was done. I wanted to be ready.
I cannot say the same for my brothers. Routinely they chastised me for studying when I could be idling my evenings away swimming in the lake or playing the fiddle on the porch. Their summers were merry and bright, mine was full of threat and worry. If what I read was true, we were in big trouble. My brothers did not want to believe in the histories I had collected. They were determined to stay put, as was I. We had too much to lose.
Then one night, it came. The wind rose from a low whisper across the lakeside reeds until it reached fever pitch. I dared not open the window, but stared through the pane in horror as I saw the face of our nocturnal villain. It’s form was huge, evil and somewhat lupine in countenance. I heard it howl at the wind, I heard the wind howl back in a unity of cacophony. The wind rose to a full gale, sweeping across the fields at its master’s bidding; a fetid, rancid breath that tore through the whole valley with a rapacious appetite. I bolted my door and shuttered the windows, I hoped that my brothers had the good sense to do the same.
It was not to be.
For precious moments the howling abated, only to be replaced by a different sound. I hope you never have to listen to the drawn out death rattle of one of your own close kin. I hope that never happens to anyone. I knew from the first moment of that high squeal that he would not survive. Never once did I move from my position, safe inside the circle of stones I had prepared on the floor. I bit my tongue and let the tears flow down my cheeks as his life ebbed. But I did not move, for I knew that to do so would be to invite disaster. By my beard, I would not risk letting that horror inside where it might devour me.
We buried him the next day on the shore of the lake. Neither my remaining brother or I wanted to talk very much that day. We dug, we hugged and we parted. I asked if he wanted to stay with me. I knew the lore. I had the protections. Inconceivably, he shrugged off the suggestion. Maybe he wanted to be alone with his thoughts. I suppose I did too, otherwise I would have been stronger in my insistence.
The next night, it came for him. At first there was nothing but the crickets and the bubbling creek to disturb our sleep. Then the moon shuddered bright silver through the clouds and shone upon that solitary, hungry form. I watched through a crack in the window. It stood on its hind legs, tall and terrible, and let out a low mournful howl which set my very soul on edge. I withdrew, checked the traps and the protective stones and squatted in case it came knocking. At the last moment, I called out to my brother – as loud as I could before the gathering storm made it impossible – begging him to join me in safety. There was no reply.
Dare I move? Dare I open the door and race to his aid? To lose one brother was enough tragedy for our family. I should use the remaining time to fetch him to safety. I went to the door, unbolted it and called again.
I could see his pale pink face pressed against the window of his log cabin. He knew now that I was right; I swore he even mouthed an apology to me before the shape bound into view, snarling long white teeth and reaching out with vicious claws, thrashing around itself in ecstasy as he brought forth the storm. I closed my eyes, withdrew and began chanting.
I never saw my brother again. In the morning, when the land was no longer dark and the wind no longer came whistling across the plain, I left the safety of my stones and opened the door. Of my brothers’ houses there was no sign. The wind had raised them whole from their foundations and carried them away in its fury. I stood rigid in fear and grief alike. I knew that tonight it would come for me. Would I stand firm and not let it in? There was a part of me, and is still, that wanted it to be over, for me to rejoin my kin in the hereafter.
If it should be that you have discovered this note in the ruins of a stone Virginian farmstead, or perhaps in a collection of old documents in a distant dusty library — a curio from a place and a time long forgotten — know that it came for me also and that I was afraid.
***
Liam A Spinage is a former philosophy student, former archaeology educator and former police clerk who spends most of his spare time on the beach gazing up at the sky and across the sea while his imagination runs riot. Occasionally, this imagination has been known to spill out onto paper. His first anthology, Tales Told at Midnight, which contains this story, was published last year by Gravestone Press. His first fantasy novel, The Search for Farozaina, was recently published by Double Dragon Press.