The Dark Beast's Love

The first time it happened, no one could believe what was right in front of them. There was too much blood for the eyes to comprehend, and too little body left for anyone to recognise the victim. It was only due to the cry of her husband that Mrs Morrigan Evermore was identified as the torn-apart body on her floor, with barely anything left on her face except for blood and the skull that was covered underneath it. I barely got a glimpse of the scene from where I stood, the cold boulders from the stonewall numbing the feeling of my feet and the fog from my breath almost crystallising in front of my face in the winter cold, but even from that distance, the picture the sight painted in my head was enough to leave me with nightmares for weeks. No one found a trace of whoever or whatever had created such a mess, but it was all anyone could talk about for days.

The second time it happened, people spent hours of their night trying to find a connection between Mrs Evermore and the new victim, Mr Heimdenger. The murders had been about a month apart, but the corpses were too similar for one to mistake it as two different murderers, both torn apart into nothingness. There were whispers about a beast because too many found the scene to be too inhuman to be the creation of something that wasn’t a bloodthirsty beast. The most noticeable change however was the way people started rebuilding their homes. Despite not having enough money, despite not having food on the tables or even enough clothes to survive the winter, people started creating walls around their houses, most of wood, some of stone and the most unfortunate just pulled whatever they could find to replicate a wall between the outer world and their homes. My own father cut down our last tree to strengthen the wall of our home to at least get the illusion of security.

The third time it happened, people started whispering about a curse. The witches of the village had spoken and told everyone about how someone had opened a door they weren't supposed to open, and now they were all punished as the dark magic plagued their grounds. They foretold how crops would grow and people would starve only to be picked off one by one by the monster that hunts in the night until there was nothing left but blood on the streets. After that day, people made up plans to leave these cursed grounds, flee the starvation and seek new places to live. By the end of the month, two families had left, and their homes had been pulled apart to pieces by those who wanted the material to secure their homes even further.

The next month, the two families were back, all bodies covered in blood and wounds and some even with their heads even torn apart. People all around were sobbing and wailing as they realised that they weren’t going to be able to leave this town ever. These bodies were the first ones I had gotten a closer look upon, and I felt my whole stomach turn as the eyes of one of the daughters started back at me, her expression somehow echoing the desperation she must have felt when whatever it was attacked her.

From that day onwards, the village broke out in hysteria. No one wanted to take their chances when it came to the witches’ words, so people started stashing all the food they could get their hands on, and the already obvious rift between the poor and the wealthy became even greater. My father’s corpses were raided, but by then he had already hidden most of the food he had managed to grow during previous seasons.

Some months after that, a pattern was clear. The curse hit once a month, and it always occurred when the moon was at its fullest. It never took more than one person, unless someone tried to leave or approach the beast itself, in that case, no one had survived long enough to see the next sunrise. Some, however, claimed to have spotted the beast. The descriptions of it were vague, if even true. Some claimed that it was large with claws and fangs the size of pine cones. Others claimed that it had wings and a tail so sharp that they could feel the cut from where they were peeking. Some even said that it wasn’t even a solid thing, but more like a dark mist floating around in search for its next victim. But no matter what description was true, one thing was for sure, it was horrifying and we were nothing against its strength.

However, the dull eyes of the daughter still haunted me, and it got to the point where the thoughts of just waiting on my death and ending up just like her led to panic attacks alone in the night. When the sun rose again, I was determined not to leave this world without a fight even if it was a losing one. We did not have much where I lived, but my father had a set of knives from his ancestors, and my brother had an old archery set he wouldn’t miss thanks to the fancy year the upper class provided their trained soldiers. It was not much, but the first time I released the arrow, missing the target by several feet, the need for control washed over me, and I was determined to do it again and again until I had perfected every shot.

Small minutes of firing arrows became full hours of target practice, and full hours of target practice became hunts for something more than just grains on the table. The most difficult part of this however wasn’t the endless frustration every time I messed up, nor was it the dangers in the woods I found to be the best hunting grounds, it ended up being having to lie to my family about where the meat came from. Despite being on the poorer side of the population, manners from the upper class were still demanded. A lady was not to hunt or wield any type of weapon, she was to remain fair for future bachelors who wished to marry her and have her carrying his children. If any in her family found out that she was hunting during the days they would strip her of her weapon and punish her generously for misbehaving. Instead, her family was led to believe that she got the meat from a butcher on the south side of the village, in payment for her services as a maid in his house since the wife couldn’t care for it herself.

I should have known the lie wouldn’t last, my mother always had her ways to reveal even the most guarded secrets.

I had come home from a hunt to see my mother and a man twice my age standing in our home, causing the living room to seem even smaller than it was. I should have suspected atrocity when my mother started speaking with her honey-sweet voice, introducing the stranger to me and serving us both tea as she led one conversation after another. I had just played along with whatever scheme she’d planned, answering the stranger’s curious questions and doing my best to replicate the perfect daughter that my mother had trained me to be, aware that messing up whatever my mother had planned would result in unnecessary negativity. It wasn’t until he’d left, however, that she revealed her true intentions. My mother spoke of an engagement, spoke of a plan where everything was settled except for the ring on a finger, and it had taken me a moment before realising what she was trying to do.

As expected, the conversation turned into an argument when I refused, and my mother revealed everything she knew, including the secret hunts I’d been sneaking off to. She told me that this was my only chance in life, that she had to wed me before it got out that her daughter was a hunting savage, and I had cursed at her, swearing that she would no longer be my mother if she forced me through the engagement, and then just left to spend my night in the barns, as far away from her as I could.

The same night, the monster broke into our house and killed my mother.

The next morning, as I watched my father cradle my mother’s corpse, the echo of my last words to her ringing in my ear, I swore to be the one to kill the monster in the end.