Chapter II
'Here lies Antonius of the house of Ricker
who spurned the gods and bore no sons
Let trespassers heed this omen and begone
For the warmth of a beating heart is unwelcome here
- Epitaph of Antonius Ricker
Here was the grave of Antonius Ricker, with its basalt burial marker. When, on that day long ago, Marcus had bidden Herbert to seek out a shovel, the woodcutter had returned bearing not only that but also a black stone he had happened upon. So sure had the three witnesses been that Ricker was to die that Herbert, ever practical, had brought with him the tombsman's chisels, that he might etch an epitaph for the old miser. The nervous, angular marks of the now-deceased woodcutter's amateur engraving, worn smooth by time, were still plainly visible upon the ebony face of the headstone.
Such had they used to mark the miser's final resting place, for Marcus had thought the doleful black headstone would have pleased the old man with its grimness, and he wished naught but for Ricker's heathen soul to find what peace it could. This ominous monument was all that remained to honor Antonius Ricker, save the entry of his dread curse on Dormis into the local folklore, a story which even now was retold in fearful whispers behind drawn curtains and locked doors. Between the two, Jed considered, Ricker would likely have felt more honored by the latter.
Jed paused in front of the grave and stood silent in the thick fog that blanketed the land for miles around. The earth of the grave was smooth and unbroken, and although he knew not what else he had expected, this brought Jed some relief. In deference to Ricker's wish that none ever inhabit his lands, the witnesses had buried him directly before the front step of what was now the decayed skeleton of the house of Ricker. Not grass or vine defiled the grave nor the house, though elsewhere the weeds and brambles sprouted untamed and rampant. Jed found his hand resting nervously on his gun, and this seemed to bring him some measure of comfort in the dreary place.
Reticent to continue, Jed lingered. He had lost Huber's trail in the overgrown weeds soon after entering this misty vale, and before long it would be dark. Jed did not fear the night, but here, now, he paled before the thought of bearing this morbid air of oppression with naught but the pale light of the moon to guide him through the murk. He considered leaving the accursed place before the encroaching dusk could damn him with its tenebrous embrace - which would mean leaving Huber to his own fate. At this thought he balked and was disgusted with his own cowardice. Had Marcus raised him to let lost innocents die for his own trepidation? To be sheriff was to put the welfare of the village first and safeguard it against all threats, and was not Jed the sheriff of Dormis? He shook his head as if to cast out these cowardly thoughts and set his mind on the task of finding Huber Hawthorne, rather than dwelling on a coward's idle fancy.
He left the grave without a rearward glance and strode off toward where he knew Ricker's old barns had lain. Such had he seen long ago when he stood atop the peak and gazed with Marcus on the lands below. He saw now their silhouettes looming through the turbid mist, and the upper windows were hateful eyes glaring down at him, unwelcoming. Jed thought it a trick of the light, but it seemed almost that some pale lambence shone from them amid the coiling mist. It put him in mind of the wicked light in Ricker's eyes, as Marcus had a few times described to him in a solemn whisper. Few things had ever seemed to unnerve the old sheriff so much as the dying miser's piercing gaze.
The two barns, side by side, were remarkably intact despite the ravages of the elements. The house of Ricker lay broken and ruined, but here the two outbuildings stood, intact but for the faded paint and sagging roofs. Unlike the house and the grave, the barns had not escaped the encroachment of nature and were grown about with all manner of brambles and vines. The profusion of clinging creepers seemed to Jed locked in a slow struggle; the inevitable force that was nature endeavoring with the dogged determination of ages to tear down these abandoned edifices of man and reclaim these desolate lands, even if it should take a thousand years. Jed came to the nearest barn and he could not help but listen intently in the grim and utter silence of the valley as he placed his hand upon the door to push it aside.
The air seemed now to thrum with subtle pressure, as if a great heart beat its doleful dirge just beyond the edge of his senses. His free hand resting uneasily on the handle of his gun, he shoved the door open, though it resisted stubbornly. When it finally yielded, the rotten hinges gave way and the heavy door clattered to the ground amid the mounds of bones that lay piled there with what seemed to Jed like a deafening boom. He stood a moment, still, as the noise echoed through the otherwise silent valley. Cautious, he stepped into the barn and his eyes took in his surroundings as the lazy light of the retiring sun filtered in through the open doorway behind him. Among the scattered and moldering remains of hay bales and long-fermented grain lay heaps of grimy bones which after his initial shock Jed realized had once belonged to cattle and hogs, dead for some time if he was any judge. Had these unfortunate beasts been left here to perish, trapped, after Ricker's demise, Jed wondered, or had this merely been the uncaring miser's method of disposing of the remains of his livestock after a more mundane slaughter?
The sight of it sickened him, and the smell, despite the age, was still repugnant. It was with reticence that Jed strode in among the decay, skirting carefully past the foul remains so as not to disturb the heaps of bones further. He made a brief circuit of the odorous outbuilding, the only sound his own nervous breathing and the occasional creak of the sagging roof. He found naught but some forsaken tools of the farmer's trade, laying cast off among the putrid detritus: a pitchfork, a scythe, and a wooden plow. All were worm-eaten and decayed, of no use to anyone. He was about to depart and check the second barn when the memory returned to him of the pale radiance that seemed to shine from the upper windows, though surely this had just been the failing sun playing tricks in the lactescent fog.
The ladder to the loft that served as the barn's upper story seemed relatively intact, but upon closer inspection, the wood crumbled to dust in Jed's hand. With a flick of his hand, he knocked the moldering remains of the ladder down to join the rest of the rubbish on the floor. The loft was too high to climb to; though Jed was a tall man, it was some distance beyond the reach of his arm. He felt a strong inclination to investigate the strange glow, though he did not pause to consider this strange impulse. He looked about for some other way up, but the crumbled ladder seemed to have been the only ascent to the loft. He resolved to climb.
As he had scaled so many flat-trunked cedars throughout his life, Jed mounted the main support beam of the barn, testing his weight upon it. Finding it thankfully solid, he clambered up and leapt to seize the overhanging floorboard of the loft, his legs dangling freely below him as he caught the edge. For a moment the long-forsaken floor creaked and groaned with his hanging weight. He looked below, where lay the heaped and filthy bones of slaughtered beasts, and with difficulty he took a deep breath to steady himself, though the air was stifling and odiferous. The floor seemed to hold, and Jed pulled himself up.
The loft was more barren than the floor below, scattered with a scant covering of straw which even now was turning to dust with decay. The rotting planks of the floor creaked and strained as he stepped slowly toward the window. Jed thought that he saw no sign of the ghastly radiance, but as he gazed out the glowering casement over the mist he realized that the sickly fluorescence was all around him - gazing inward with the dimming sun at his back, he hadn't realized that the moldering floor of the ancient barn itself shone dimly, luminescent.
He stood a moment at the window, his disquiet renewed, and gazed out over the landscape in grim silence. Even as Jed watched, the sun was descending with what seemed like preternatural swiftness, and the mist in the yard below him parted in coiling strands of opalescence. Now, in the growing twilight, he perceived a radiance that seemed to erupt from the very earth, fluorescing dimly forth wherever the fog had sufficiently thinned. Perturbed, Jed wondered if perhaps he had gone mad and this were all some feverish dream, so queer were these happenings. For want of a lost cow he had come far from home to tread this desolate soil, blighted by some foul malevolence that was done no justice by the meager meanderings of the local taletellers. What benighted horror, Jed wondered, had he stumbled upon in this accursed place?
Overwhelmed by anxiety and the disquieting strangeness of his surroundings, Jed was frozen before the open cleft of the window and knew not what to do as he gazed out over the lambent landscape. There was the second barn to search, but now he was surely doomed to spend the night in this accursed place - he and Huber both, if the farmer had not already been dragged screaming into the same realm of tenebrous nightmare that Jed was now sure awaited him. For the first time he truly despaired, for with the swift setting of the sun his fate seemed to be sealed. The curse of Antonius Ricker was all too abominably real, he thought, and he was already within its terrible grasp - he could only watch as its death grip slowly tightened with the coming of night. Soon these accursed lands would be lit only by the cold witch-light that emanated from the cursed ground, and all would be for naught. What was a mere man to do in the face of such eldritch horror as now closed upon him from all sides?
His increasingly-agitated spell of solemn contemplation was interrupted when the inviolable air of mute silence was broken by a small sound, as if of some animal skittering about in the barn below. Jed had not in hours heard the usually commonplace arboreal sounds of animals going about, nor even of birds cawing in the distance. He had, in fact, not perceived sight nor sound of any living thing since entering the accursed valley. Nerves on edge, Jed moved across the loft to look down to the first story, but the quiet creaking of the festered floorboards betrayed his presence. Just as he came to the rotted railing - taking care not to touch or lean upon it - with a scrabbling of sharp claws on wood and a rattle of bones, the creature -whatever it had been - was gone. Jed saw only the very tip of a tail disappearing into the mist which even now was rolling into the open doorway of the barn.
His spell of anxiety broken by this sudden activity, Jed knelt and grasped the overhanging edge of the upper floorboards, swinging himself down, but he was perhaps too hasty and the termite-eaten plank broke off in his grasp. He landed hard upon the ground and sprang to his feet, leaping the fallen barn door and racing out onto the lawn in pursuit. Stopping short, he looked about for some sign of the alacritous creature but saw nothing. Jed looked back toward the piled remains and found them disturbed. Was this merely a desperate scavenger, then, some forsaken animal driven by need to rifle among these moldering bones? It seemed the likely explanation, but Jed misliked it. His finely honed instincts for trouble, overwhelmed since ever he had entered this abominable vale, sniffed now at the air and found some danger nearby. It was no longer the creeping sense of stifling dread that had before overwhelmed him. The sheriff felt now in his bones that some physical threat dwelt at hand, and his own hand grew restless on the grip of his revolver.
The flowing mists parted for a moment before Jed and in that time he glimpsed a familiar sight - a four-clawed footprint such as had been alongside those of Huber Hawthorne. Jed refused to accept this as coincidence and he strode on, following the shallow tracks, and the mist parted before him like a wave before the bow of a ship. He was led predictably to the barn he had yet to search, and as he drew near in the mounting twilight, he heard a familiar scrabbling of claws, the rattle of bones, and a cold hiss that was like a snake and yet horribly different. The clawprints ended before the door of the aged outbuilding and Jed was in a cold sweat, though he felt also something like relief in a tangible threat before him. Now, for better or worse, he could confront whatever dwelt in this accursed tomb of a valley. He took stock of the door before him and decided that although he could plainly see it was more securely latched, like the other door it would serve as no obstacle. The hisses and clicks within the barn grew frantic.
Jed took a deep breath in preparation and drew his pistol from its holster, savoring the shine of the bright metal in his gloomy surroundings. With a white-knuckled grip on the hilt of his gun, the sheriff raised his foot and with a resounding blow violently kicked the door in. Bolt and hinge both splintered asunder and it fell in with a crash, followed shortly by Jed, who leapt atop the fallen door with a determined grimace on his face and a gun in his hand. He heard a surprised hiss and before him he saw at last, laying among more moldering bones strewn on the floor, the missing Huber Hawthorne. The middle-aged man had the stout build and thick arms of a laborer, and he had a long, bristly beard that was dark brown, just beginning to be mottled with grey. The farmer was bleeding from multiple wounds, some of which had been poorly bandaged with filthy rags, and just now he seemed to be unconscious.
Standing over the beaten man was the creature Jed had pursued from the other barn - or one much like it, for half a dozen of the beasts populated this outbuilding, though only five stood before him. The sixth was now crushed beneath the fallen door and it writhed and thrashed, and its claws scrabbled desperately against the wood. Its keening cries were cut short with a crack of bone as Jed stomped down upon the door. The beasts were short and hunched, all loose scaly hide and hooked claws. It was as if some great snake had sprouted limbs and decided to walk upright like a man, and Jed was filled with revulsion at their unnatural forms. Their stubby limbs splayed out from their bodies at odd angles, and the webbed fingers and toes ended in cruel black talons. Their heads were like those of snakes, rounded and smooth with no visible ears. The cruel reptilian slits of their eyes seemed to reflect the cold light that bathed the accursed valley.Only the faintest line of a mouth was visible on the face, and around the shoulders and neck hung loose folds of the thick, scaly hide that served as their skin.
The beasts were unnaturally still, staring at him with their hateful yellow eyes, and Jed was for a moment frozen as he took in the strange sight before him. Not in the wildest tales had he heard of such strange creatures. Their gaze seemed drawn to his gun, the bright metal of which seemed to take in the dim fluorescence about them and cast it back purer and whiter. With the blazing gun in his hand, Jed felt his doubts and fears quickly disappear, and he was steadfast as he marched forward, raising his pistol until it was pointed at the monstrosity that stood directly above the prostrate form of Huber Hawthorne.
"Reach for the sky, you mangy varmint," His voice was that of unimpeachable authority as he addressed the beast, and he thought he saw something like recognition in its cold eyes as they stared down the barrel of his gun. He'd no idea if the creature spoke his language - or any language, for that matter, but it was the policy of tradition that a sheriff would never fire without warning. The face of the beast on the other end of his revolver slowly split as its thin slit of a mouth was revealed, and Jed saw rows of needle-sharp teeth there as it emitted a clicking, stuttering hiss that he took for laughter. Its fellows soon responded in kind, and Jed was disturbed to say the least by the mocking reptilian shrill all around him. He grimaced and drew back the hammer on his revolver, cocking it to fire.
"If'n you can understand me, this is your last chance to walk away before I give you somethin' to really laugh about. Your kind ain't welcome or wanted in these lands. Leave now or die," He let this statement hang in the air, and the beasts were still and silent - unnaturally so, he thought. In the utter silence, Jed heard the gentle stir of the wind outside, and the aged creak of the ancient building settling around them. The beast made no move to step away from the unconscious farmer. Jed met the creature's alien eyes and saw no recognizable emotion there. He was filled with disgust that such loathsome creatures could dwell on their very doorstep, and steal away his people and their livestock both - there was some clue as to where Bessy had gone, for the macabre detritus that littered the floor here was fresh and still bloody with bovine gore. The creature before him licked its chops with a long, forked tongue, and its spittle was red with the blood of a recent feeding.
Disgusted, Jed prepared to squeeze the trigger but he paused a moment. He thought he heard a quiet scrabble on the floor behind him, and the beast's eyes seemed to look past him. Suddenly, Jed threw himself down just as a hissing cry erupted behind him and a leaping reptilian form caught in the corner of his eye. The wicked claws missed him by inches as the creature sailed over top of him, and its jaws gaped wide enough to snap his head off clean. The long, heavy tail that dragged behind the beast caught his gun hand and sent the revolver skidding across the floor. The creature crashed heavily to the floor and Jed stood, looking all about him at the beasts whose cold eyes were fixed one and all upon his empty hands and bare throat.
As if some master's whip had cracked to unleash them, they came at him. The nearest, who stood over the unconscious farmer, leapt at him with a hissing cry of hate and hunger. For a moment time seemed to stand still as the beast's loose skin went taut to accommodate the horrible gape of its jaws, and Jed stared into the black void of its maw, seeing his death before him. Then instinct and training took over, and Jed stepped forward under the scything claws and needle teeth. With a nimble pivot, he seized the outstretched arm and slammed his back into the leaping creature's chest, levering the heavy weight of the beast over his shoulder and bringing it crashing down on its back on the floor before him. A wet cough retched from the mouth of the dazed lizard-thing and Jed grimaced, drawing his long knife even as the others came screeching at him.
The claws of the first beast left three long scores across the armor of his chest, and Jed responded in kind with a quick slash at its torso. His blade did not bite deep through its thick hide, but he had little time to worry on this, for another creature was now upon him from each side. He narrowly ducked as a pair of gaping jaws snapped shut where his head had been a moment before. Deftly he spun the blade around in his hand and thrust upward into the beast's exposed throat, slamming it home with the palm of his other hand. Finally the scaly hide gave way and the creature staggered back off of the knife, thick green blood pouring from the gaping wound in its throat. Even as it fell retching and gasping to the ground, a flurry of claws were upon Jed from behind as one of the heavy beasts latched on to his back, tearing and ripping. There was still another creature standing before him and another he could not see which he presumed was trying to flank him. Even now the first beast was recovering from its stunned state on the floor.
Jed was overwhelmed: the mocking hisses loud in his ears, claws tearing and scratching at his armor and seeking a way through to his vulnerable flesh. The cold, stinking breath of the creature on his back was pungent in his nostrils. He slammed a desperate elbow behind him and felt a satisfying impact as it connected with something hard and scaly. As the beast let out a hissing cry, Jed hunched forward then threw himself backward with all his might. As the first, stunned creature began to stand, Jed and his assailant came crashing down upon it, and for a moment all was a confusion of thrashing limbs and striking claws. The two standing beasts circled around the melee, hissing and tasting the air with their long, forked tongues, eager for their chance at the prey. With a sudden spray of green blood and a grunt of effort, Jed stood victorious over the slain beast, whose heavy mass pinned the thrashing body of the other below it. The jaws of the standing two gaped as they hissed and brayed at him.
Gritting his teeth, Jed yanked his blade free from the chest of the dead beast and kicked the pinned one in the head for good measure. Both of the remaining beasts came forward, one to assault him, one to help its fallen comrade. Jed leapt away, taking the opportunity to retrieve his fallen gun, but the swift beast met him there and it was upon him as he knelt over the shining pistol. They went to the ground, rolling, thrashing, hissing, and grunting, and the beast was atop him when they came to a halt. Jed was pinned by its weight and the creature's jaws gaped horridly wide as it bent to tear the sheriff's throat out whole. Suddenly there was a roar and its body jerked and went limp with a spray of gore from the back of its head. With difficulty, Jed shifted the body aside and, breathing hard, stood to face the other two.
Even as he rose, the tenacious beasts were upon him, but Jed had had enough. His pistol spoke in a voice of thunder, and one of the charging beasts fell dead upon the floor, leaving only one left to face him. It closed as he drew back the hammer for a third shot, and its claw flew wildly as it desperately attacked. Jed dodged and struck with his knife, unable to get a clean shot, and the beast was upon him still in its bloodlust. His knife was torn from his hand as it caught in the tough scales, and the beast let out a screech of victory as it made to snap at his throat. Instead of biting, its gaping jaws retched and coughed as the narrow toe of Jed's boot caught it square in the gut. It fell back upon the ground, the wind knocked out of it, and Jed calmly laid the barrel of his gun against its skull. He paused for a moment, and met the beast's eyes as it looked up at him in defeat. It raised its clawed hands, seemingly in supplication.
---
Hit the character limit. Read more on my wordpress.
'Here lies Antonius of the house of Ricker
who spurned the gods and bore no sons
Let trespassers heed this omen and begone
For the warmth of a beating heart is unwelcome here
- Epitaph of Antonius Ricker
Here was the grave of Antonius Ricker, with its basalt burial marker. When, on that day long ago, Marcus had bidden Herbert to seek out a shovel, the woodcutter had returned bearing not only that but also a black stone he had happened upon. So sure had the three witnesses been that Ricker was to die that Herbert, ever practical, had brought with him the tombsman's chisels, that he might etch an epitaph for the old miser. The nervous, angular marks of the now-deceased woodcutter's amateur engraving, worn smooth by time, were still plainly visible upon the ebony face of the headstone.
Such had they used to mark the miser's final resting place, for Marcus had thought the doleful black headstone would have pleased the old man with its grimness, and he wished naught but for Ricker's heathen soul to find what peace it could. This ominous monument was all that remained to honor Antonius Ricker, save the entry of his dread curse on Dormis into the local folklore, a story which even now was retold in fearful whispers behind drawn curtains and locked doors. Between the two, Jed considered, Ricker would likely have felt more honored by the latter.
Jed paused in front of the grave and stood silent in the thick fog that blanketed the land for miles around. The earth of the grave was smooth and unbroken, and although he knew not what else he had expected, this brought Jed some relief. In deference to Ricker's wish that none ever inhabit his lands, the witnesses had buried him directly before the front step of what was now the decayed skeleton of the house of Ricker. Not grass or vine defiled the grave nor the house, though elsewhere the weeds and brambles sprouted untamed and rampant. Jed found his hand resting nervously on his gun, and this seemed to bring him some measure of comfort in the dreary place.
Reticent to continue, Jed lingered. He had lost Huber's trail in the overgrown weeds soon after entering this misty vale, and before long it would be dark. Jed did not fear the night, but here, now, he paled before the thought of bearing this morbid air of oppression with naught but the pale light of the moon to guide him through the murk. He considered leaving the accursed place before the encroaching dusk could damn him with its tenebrous embrace - which would mean leaving Huber to his own fate. At this thought he balked and was disgusted with his own cowardice. Had Marcus raised him to let lost innocents die for his own trepidation? To be sheriff was to put the welfare of the village first and safeguard it against all threats, and was not Jed the sheriff of Dormis? He shook his head as if to cast out these cowardly thoughts and set his mind on the task of finding Huber Hawthorne, rather than dwelling on a coward's idle fancy.
He left the grave without a rearward glance and strode off toward where he knew Ricker's old barns had lain. Such had he seen long ago when he stood atop the peak and gazed with Marcus on the lands below. He saw now their silhouettes looming through the turbid mist, and the upper windows were hateful eyes glaring down at him, unwelcoming. Jed thought it a trick of the light, but it seemed almost that some pale lambence shone from them amid the coiling mist. It put him in mind of the wicked light in Ricker's eyes, as Marcus had a few times described to him in a solemn whisper. Few things had ever seemed to unnerve the old sheriff so much as the dying miser's piercing gaze.
The two barns, side by side, were remarkably intact despite the ravages of the elements. The house of Ricker lay broken and ruined, but here the two outbuildings stood, intact but for the faded paint and sagging roofs. Unlike the house and the grave, the barns had not escaped the encroachment of nature and were grown about with all manner of brambles and vines. The profusion of clinging creepers seemed to Jed locked in a slow struggle; the inevitable force that was nature endeavoring with the dogged determination of ages to tear down these abandoned edifices of man and reclaim these desolate lands, even if it should take a thousand years. Jed came to the nearest barn and he could not help but listen intently in the grim and utter silence of the valley as he placed his hand upon the door to push it aside.
The air seemed now to thrum with subtle pressure, as if a great heart beat its doleful dirge just beyond the edge of his senses. His free hand resting uneasily on the handle of his gun, he shoved the door open, though it resisted stubbornly. When it finally yielded, the rotten hinges gave way and the heavy door clattered to the ground amid the mounds of bones that lay piled there with what seemed to Jed like a deafening boom. He stood a moment, still, as the noise echoed through the otherwise silent valley. Cautious, he stepped into the barn and his eyes took in his surroundings as the lazy light of the retiring sun filtered in through the open doorway behind him. Among the scattered and moldering remains of hay bales and long-fermented grain lay heaps of grimy bones which after his initial shock Jed realized had once belonged to cattle and hogs, dead for some time if he was any judge. Had these unfortunate beasts been left here to perish, trapped, after Ricker's demise, Jed wondered, or had this merely been the uncaring miser's method of disposing of the remains of his livestock after a more mundane slaughter?
The sight of it sickened him, and the smell, despite the age, was still repugnant. It was with reticence that Jed strode in among the decay, skirting carefully past the foul remains so as not to disturb the heaps of bones further. He made a brief circuit of the odorous outbuilding, the only sound his own nervous breathing and the occasional creak of the sagging roof. He found naught but some forsaken tools of the farmer's trade, laying cast off among the putrid detritus: a pitchfork, a scythe, and a wooden plow. All were worm-eaten and decayed, of no use to anyone. He was about to depart and check the second barn when the memory returned to him of the pale radiance that seemed to shine from the upper windows, though surely this had just been the failing sun playing tricks in the lactescent fog.
The ladder to the loft that served as the barn's upper story seemed relatively intact, but upon closer inspection, the wood crumbled to dust in Jed's hand. With a flick of his hand, he knocked the moldering remains of the ladder down to join the rest of the rubbish on the floor. The loft was too high to climb to; though Jed was a tall man, it was some distance beyond the reach of his arm. He felt a strong inclination to investigate the strange glow, though he did not pause to consider this strange impulse. He looked about for some other way up, but the crumbled ladder seemed to have been the only ascent to the loft. He resolved to climb.
As he had scaled so many flat-trunked cedars throughout his life, Jed mounted the main support beam of the barn, testing his weight upon it. Finding it thankfully solid, he clambered up and leapt to seize the overhanging floorboard of the loft, his legs dangling freely below him as he caught the edge. For a moment the long-forsaken floor creaked and groaned with his hanging weight. He looked below, where lay the heaped and filthy bones of slaughtered beasts, and with difficulty he took a deep breath to steady himself, though the air was stifling and odiferous. The floor seemed to hold, and Jed pulled himself up.
The loft was more barren than the floor below, scattered with a scant covering of straw which even now was turning to dust with decay. The rotting planks of the floor creaked and strained as he stepped slowly toward the window. Jed thought that he saw no sign of the ghastly radiance, but as he gazed out the glowering casement over the mist he realized that the sickly fluorescence was all around him - gazing inward with the dimming sun at his back, he hadn't realized that the moldering floor of the ancient barn itself shone dimly, luminescent.
He stood a moment at the window, his disquiet renewed, and gazed out over the landscape in grim silence. Even as Jed watched, the sun was descending with what seemed like preternatural swiftness, and the mist in the yard below him parted in coiling strands of opalescence. Now, in the growing twilight, he perceived a radiance that seemed to erupt from the very earth, fluorescing dimly forth wherever the fog had sufficiently thinned. Perturbed, Jed wondered if perhaps he had gone mad and this were all some feverish dream, so queer were these happenings. For want of a lost cow he had come far from home to tread this desolate soil, blighted by some foul malevolence that was done no justice by the meager meanderings of the local taletellers. What benighted horror, Jed wondered, had he stumbled upon in this accursed place?
Overwhelmed by anxiety and the disquieting strangeness of his surroundings, Jed was frozen before the open cleft of the window and knew not what to do as he gazed out over the lambent landscape. There was the second barn to search, but now he was surely doomed to spend the night in this accursed place - he and Huber both, if the farmer had not already been dragged screaming into the same realm of tenebrous nightmare that Jed was now sure awaited him. For the first time he truly despaired, for with the swift setting of the sun his fate seemed to be sealed. The curse of Antonius Ricker was all too abominably real, he thought, and he was already within its terrible grasp - he could only watch as its death grip slowly tightened with the coming of night. Soon these accursed lands would be lit only by the cold witch-light that emanated from the cursed ground, and all would be for naught. What was a mere man to do in the face of such eldritch horror as now closed upon him from all sides?
His increasingly-agitated spell of solemn contemplation was interrupted when the inviolable air of mute silence was broken by a small sound, as if of some animal skittering about in the barn below. Jed had not in hours heard the usually commonplace arboreal sounds of animals going about, nor even of birds cawing in the distance. He had, in fact, not perceived sight nor sound of any living thing since entering the accursed valley. Nerves on edge, Jed moved across the loft to look down to the first story, but the quiet creaking of the festered floorboards betrayed his presence. Just as he came to the rotted railing - taking care not to touch or lean upon it - with a scrabbling of sharp claws on wood and a rattle of bones, the creature -whatever it had been - was gone. Jed saw only the very tip of a tail disappearing into the mist which even now was rolling into the open doorway of the barn.
His spell of anxiety broken by this sudden activity, Jed knelt and grasped the overhanging edge of the upper floorboards, swinging himself down, but he was perhaps too hasty and the termite-eaten plank broke off in his grasp. He landed hard upon the ground and sprang to his feet, leaping the fallen barn door and racing out onto the lawn in pursuit. Stopping short, he looked about for some sign of the alacritous creature but saw nothing. Jed looked back toward the piled remains and found them disturbed. Was this merely a desperate scavenger, then, some forsaken animal driven by need to rifle among these moldering bones? It seemed the likely explanation, but Jed misliked it. His finely honed instincts for trouble, overwhelmed since ever he had entered this abominable vale, sniffed now at the air and found some danger nearby. It was no longer the creeping sense of stifling dread that had before overwhelmed him. The sheriff felt now in his bones that some physical threat dwelt at hand, and his own hand grew restless on the grip of his revolver.
The flowing mists parted for a moment before Jed and in that time he glimpsed a familiar sight - a four-clawed footprint such as had been alongside those of Huber Hawthorne. Jed refused to accept this as coincidence and he strode on, following the shallow tracks, and the mist parted before him like a wave before the bow of a ship. He was led predictably to the barn he had yet to search, and as he drew near in the mounting twilight, he heard a familiar scrabbling of claws, the rattle of bones, and a cold hiss that was like a snake and yet horribly different. The clawprints ended before the door of the aged outbuilding and Jed was in a cold sweat, though he felt also something like relief in a tangible threat before him. Now, for better or worse, he could confront whatever dwelt in this accursed tomb of a valley. He took stock of the door before him and decided that although he could plainly see it was more securely latched, like the other door it would serve as no obstacle. The hisses and clicks within the barn grew frantic.
Jed took a deep breath in preparation and drew his pistol from its holster, savoring the shine of the bright metal in his gloomy surroundings. With a white-knuckled grip on the hilt of his gun, the sheriff raised his foot and with a resounding blow violently kicked the door in. Bolt and hinge both splintered asunder and it fell in with a crash, followed shortly by Jed, who leapt atop the fallen door with a determined grimace on his face and a gun in his hand. He heard a surprised hiss and before him he saw at last, laying among more moldering bones strewn on the floor, the missing Huber Hawthorne. The middle-aged man had the stout build and thick arms of a laborer, and he had a long, bristly beard that was dark brown, just beginning to be mottled with grey. The farmer was bleeding from multiple wounds, some of which had been poorly bandaged with filthy rags, and just now he seemed to be unconscious.
Standing over the beaten man was the creature Jed had pursued from the other barn - or one much like it, for half a dozen of the beasts populated this outbuilding, though only five stood before him. The sixth was now crushed beneath the fallen door and it writhed and thrashed, and its claws scrabbled desperately against the wood. Its keening cries were cut short with a crack of bone as Jed stomped down upon the door. The beasts were short and hunched, all loose scaly hide and hooked claws. It was as if some great snake had sprouted limbs and decided to walk upright like a man, and Jed was filled with revulsion at their unnatural forms. Their stubby limbs splayed out from their bodies at odd angles, and the webbed fingers and toes ended in cruel black talons. Their heads were like those of snakes, rounded and smooth with no visible ears. The cruel reptilian slits of their eyes seemed to reflect the cold light that bathed the accursed valley.Only the faintest line of a mouth was visible on the face, and around the shoulders and neck hung loose folds of the thick, scaly hide that served as their skin.
The beasts were unnaturally still, staring at him with their hateful yellow eyes, and Jed was for a moment frozen as he took in the strange sight before him. Not in the wildest tales had he heard of such strange creatures. Their gaze seemed drawn to his gun, the bright metal of which seemed to take in the dim fluorescence about them and cast it back purer and whiter. With the blazing gun in his hand, Jed felt his doubts and fears quickly disappear, and he was steadfast as he marched forward, raising his pistol until it was pointed at the monstrosity that stood directly above the prostrate form of Huber Hawthorne.
"Reach for the sky, you mangy varmint," His voice was that of unimpeachable authority as he addressed the beast, and he thought he saw something like recognition in its cold eyes as they stared down the barrel of his gun. He'd no idea if the creature spoke his language - or any language, for that matter, but it was the policy of tradition that a sheriff would never fire without warning. The face of the beast on the other end of his revolver slowly split as its thin slit of a mouth was revealed, and Jed saw rows of needle-sharp teeth there as it emitted a clicking, stuttering hiss that he took for laughter. Its fellows soon responded in kind, and Jed was disturbed to say the least by the mocking reptilian shrill all around him. He grimaced and drew back the hammer on his revolver, cocking it to fire.
"If'n you can understand me, this is your last chance to walk away before I give you somethin' to really laugh about. Your kind ain't welcome or wanted in these lands. Leave now or die," He let this statement hang in the air, and the beasts were still and silent - unnaturally so, he thought. In the utter silence, Jed heard the gentle stir of the wind outside, and the aged creak of the ancient building settling around them. The beast made no move to step away from the unconscious farmer. Jed met the creature's alien eyes and saw no recognizable emotion there. He was filled with disgust that such loathsome creatures could dwell on their very doorstep, and steal away his people and their livestock both - there was some clue as to where Bessy had gone, for the macabre detritus that littered the floor here was fresh and still bloody with bovine gore. The creature before him licked its chops with a long, forked tongue, and its spittle was red with the blood of a recent feeding.
Disgusted, Jed prepared to squeeze the trigger but he paused a moment. He thought he heard a quiet scrabble on the floor behind him, and the beast's eyes seemed to look past him. Suddenly, Jed threw himself down just as a hissing cry erupted behind him and a leaping reptilian form caught in the corner of his eye. The wicked claws missed him by inches as the creature sailed over top of him, and its jaws gaped wide enough to snap his head off clean. The long, heavy tail that dragged behind the beast caught his gun hand and sent the revolver skidding across the floor. The creature crashed heavily to the floor and Jed stood, looking all about him at the beasts whose cold eyes were fixed one and all upon his empty hands and bare throat.
As if some master's whip had cracked to unleash them, they came at him. The nearest, who stood over the unconscious farmer, leapt at him with a hissing cry of hate and hunger. For a moment time seemed to stand still as the beast's loose skin went taut to accommodate the horrible gape of its jaws, and Jed stared into the black void of its maw, seeing his death before him. Then instinct and training took over, and Jed stepped forward under the scything claws and needle teeth. With a nimble pivot, he seized the outstretched arm and slammed his back into the leaping creature's chest, levering the heavy weight of the beast over his shoulder and bringing it crashing down on its back on the floor before him. A wet cough retched from the mouth of the dazed lizard-thing and Jed grimaced, drawing his long knife even as the others came screeching at him.
The claws of the first beast left three long scores across the armor of his chest, and Jed responded in kind with a quick slash at its torso. His blade did not bite deep through its thick hide, but he had little time to worry on this, for another creature was now upon him from each side. He narrowly ducked as a pair of gaping jaws snapped shut where his head had been a moment before. Deftly he spun the blade around in his hand and thrust upward into the beast's exposed throat, slamming it home with the palm of his other hand. Finally the scaly hide gave way and the creature staggered back off of the knife, thick green blood pouring from the gaping wound in its throat. Even as it fell retching and gasping to the ground, a flurry of claws were upon Jed from behind as one of the heavy beasts latched on to his back, tearing and ripping. There was still another creature standing before him and another he could not see which he presumed was trying to flank him. Even now the first beast was recovering from its stunned state on the floor.
Jed was overwhelmed: the mocking hisses loud in his ears, claws tearing and scratching at his armor and seeking a way through to his vulnerable flesh. The cold, stinking breath of the creature on his back was pungent in his nostrils. He slammed a desperate elbow behind him and felt a satisfying impact as it connected with something hard and scaly. As the beast let out a hissing cry, Jed hunched forward then threw himself backward with all his might. As the first, stunned creature began to stand, Jed and his assailant came crashing down upon it, and for a moment all was a confusion of thrashing limbs and striking claws. The two standing beasts circled around the melee, hissing and tasting the air with their long, forked tongues, eager for their chance at the prey. With a sudden spray of green blood and a grunt of effort, Jed stood victorious over the slain beast, whose heavy mass pinned the thrashing body of the other below it. The jaws of the standing two gaped as they hissed and brayed at him.
Gritting his teeth, Jed yanked his blade free from the chest of the dead beast and kicked the pinned one in the head for good measure. Both of the remaining beasts came forward, one to assault him, one to help its fallen comrade. Jed leapt away, taking the opportunity to retrieve his fallen gun, but the swift beast met him there and it was upon him as he knelt over the shining pistol. They went to the ground, rolling, thrashing, hissing, and grunting, and the beast was atop him when they came to a halt. Jed was pinned by its weight and the creature's jaws gaped horridly wide as it bent to tear the sheriff's throat out whole. Suddenly there was a roar and its body jerked and went limp with a spray of gore from the back of its head. With difficulty, Jed shifted the body aside and, breathing hard, stood to face the other two.
Even as he rose, the tenacious beasts were upon him, but Jed had had enough. His pistol spoke in a voice of thunder, and one of the charging beasts fell dead upon the floor, leaving only one left to face him. It closed as he drew back the hammer for a third shot, and its claw flew wildly as it desperately attacked. Jed dodged and struck with his knife, unable to get a clean shot, and the beast was upon him still in its bloodlust. His knife was torn from his hand as it caught in the tough scales, and the beast let out a screech of victory as it made to snap at his throat. Instead of biting, its gaping jaws retched and coughed as the narrow toe of Jed's boot caught it square in the gut. It fell back upon the ground, the wind knocked out of it, and Jed calmly laid the barrel of his gun against its skull. He paused for a moment, and met the beast's eyes as it looked up at him in defeat. It raised its clawed hands, seemingly in supplication.
---
Hit the character limit. Read more on my wordpress.
