Tag: fantasy

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The taker of the last breath (922 words)

She runs through the night, heavy footsteps are following her. Eating up the space between her and her predator. Her lungs are burning and her legs are slowing down; her muscles are tired and shaking from the unusual exertion. Her breath puffs out between her lips in visible clouds. Panic is all she can feel. And cold.  It is an icy cold, fueled by the terror that spreads inside her bones and infests her entire body. The footsteps behind her come closer. She keeps running. At least she tries to keep running. Panting. Gasping. Fighting for air. She is trying to fill her lungs with oxygen, but she doesn’t succeed. Her breathing is too shallow. Her heart races too fast. It is quiet in the dark. Lonely in this winter’s night. She can only hear his steps. Her own steps. The blood in her ears. Please, please. Please!  she whispers into the gloaming nothingness. She sends silent prayers to every divinity she remembers, asking that someone will stop the demon behind her. But the cold in her heart lets her know that she will not be saved. Her soul is lost. Rotting. Decaying. Turning to dust. She will be forgotten. Erased from this earth. And no one will know that she ever existed. She never left a notable trace. The woman rounds a corner, losing foot on the slippery pavement. She struggles to get her feet under her body again, partly because her limbs are exhausted,  partly because in her haste, she stepped on her scarf that came loose. She turns around, feeling the wet pavement underneath her palms. She tries to crawl away from the creature that has been following her, looking at him. Eyes wide, she finally sees him up close as he takes long strides in her direction. He isn’t running anymore. Like the predator he is, he comes closer. And closer. She makes one last attempt to get up and run away, but her body doesn’t belong to her anymore. It doesn’t follow her orders, and when he kneels in front of her, with his long cold fingers enclosing her throat she looks in his dark eyes for the first and last time. Black like obsidian. A dark abyss. Beautiful. Beguiling. Pleading? As if they were asking for forgiveness and permission, all at the same moment. But then he blinks and the gentleness she thinks she has seen is gone. It made room for something cruel and soulless. The hand around her throat closes and her breathing air becomes less. And less. She tries to gulp in some oxygen, but the hand on her throat prevents it from reaching its destination. Her body spasms. Her hands touch his wrist and her legs are flailing, trying to find enough grip to push away from her murderer.  “Please, don’t let me die like this” are her final thoughts before she feels a strange and uninvited sense of lust. Her eyes keep staring at him but her soul is on its way out of her body. The horror and confusion she felt will be forever painted on her face. In rivulets, blood runs down her throat from where his sharp claws held on to her. The demon lets go of her empty vessel, and pushes angry tears off his face with the back of his blood-stained hand.
I have to do it. I will die if I don’t. He bares his fangs and with gusto, he buries them where his claws left a bloody wound on the woman’s throat.
The heat leaves her body as one last breath, one last puff of air is pushed past her lips. He stills his hunger. His thirst. His need. Until he feels the energy of his young victim setting in his veins. He sighs satisfied, but he wants more. He needs more. He can never get enough. It is the nature of things. He lets go of the limp, pale body and gets up. He looks at her. Grief is painted all over his face. He is desperate for a companion, a mate. But who could ever love what he is? Who he is? She was his first for this night. A good start. Invigorating. Growling, he pulls his fangs in. A tortured sigh escapes his lips as he turns to leave. One last look at his prey and the peaceful way she looks. All dead people have this look. At least the ones who died because of him. If he could only feel some serenity. Not much, just a glimmer of it. If his tormented soul could only find peace. He is not asking for eternal bliss, just a moment of calmness in his mind. His hands turn to fists in his pockets as he pushes the string of weak and romantic thoughts aside. This is his life. There is no choice. No other option. His hunt continues. It has to. It will never stop. Because if it does, he will cease to exist. And with him, the tiny fragments of the souls of the people he has had the privilege to empty of their blood would be gone too. He can’t let that happen. They all are part of him now. Memories of them are in his bloodstream and nurturing his body. Squaring his shoulders, he walks into the dark moonless night. He was always a man of honour and principles. At least he has been before he turned into this… A demon… A walking nightmare… The taker of the last breath.

(Originally written in August 2017, edited today.)

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only love

“Come to me…” She heard the whispered words again and again. She saw the hand reach out for her, and she tried to grab it. But it was in vain. Her fingers never touched the ones that were outreached to her. She saw the despair in his face and tried harder to get to him, but the last inch to be there, grab him and cling to him was always missing.

Startled, she woke up. Drenched in sweat and tears. She had had this dream so many times before, and each time it became more real and more intense. She wanted to be with him, that was all she knew and cared about. The yellow streetlights illuminated her dark room, casting gloomy shadows on the ceilings. It didn’t appease her. A storm was raging outside, and branches of the large tree in front of her window whipped against the glass. It made for a frightening soundtrack of the night. She laid down again and punched her pillow a couple of times until it had the desired shape and turned to the side. She never closed her eyes. They stayed glued to the window. She was waiting for him. She waited for the familiar shadow to appear.

~~°~~

“Come to me…” He whispered the words in her ear, trying to soak in her familiar scent. She was asleep and didn’t hear him. He reached his hand out to touch her, and she tried to touch him too, but it was to no avail. As much as he wanted to feel her skin against his own for one last time, it was impossible. He couldn’t hide the pain he felt, and he knew that she saw it. He tried harder to reach her, but the last inch to grab her and take her with him was always missing.

Her time hadn’t come yet. And until then, he had to wait and be patient. He visited her every night, but on one particular night every year, she could see him. He sat on the windowsill and listened to the storm while he watched her sleep with her eyes wide open.

~~°~~

She saw him. He sat on the windowsill with a smile on his face. Occasionally, he looked outside as if in deep thought and when his head turned back to face her, she thought she had seen a frown. This night, this particular night was always the same for her, and she loved and dreaded it alike. It was the night he was back, and her dreams seemed so much more real than every other day. Days prior to this particular date, she didn’t sleep, because she waited for him to appear. She wished he would stay longer than only that night, and she wished he would talk to her. Instead, he sat there and watched her. It was all a dream. A hallucination. That’s what they said. But she knew better. She knew better because she didn’t only see him; she felt his presence.

~~°~~

He smiled at her and watched over her. Occasionally, he looked outside, and it reminded him of that fateful day years ago.

He had been drunk after the party. He shouldn’t have walked home in his state, but he had also known that he was in no shape to drive. She had called him on his phone, and he had slurred that he loved her. He had wanted to see her and took a shortcut through the woods. It had been raining that night and dark. Really dark. He had started to run with an unknown urge to be with her and then, it had happened. He had fallen down a slope, and he had hit his head on a rock. When he had woken up, he had laughed because he had known that the fall could have killed him.

And it had killed him. I took him a while to realise that the lifeless body he had been looking at was his own. It had happened so fast. A bright spark had appeared, and light-tunnel had captured him. He had fought to stay and go see her one last time, but the force that had taken him from this earth was stronger than anything else he had ever experienced. He had made a deal with the invisible force then and there. He had stopped struggling and floated willingly up into his afterlife after negotiating one last wish; he demanded to be able to see and watch over her. And he did. He came back. Every year. Until the time had come to finally take her hand and take her with him.

~~°~~

The night was fading, and the storm was calming down. The shadows on her ceiling slowly vanished, but he was still there staring at her, and she kept watching him intently, trying to remember as much of him as possible. In her mind, she told him that she loved him and that she missed him. In her mind, she told him everything she couldn’t say out loud anymore. She didn’t react when there was a knock on the door. She knew what would be happening next. A chubby woman in a lab coat bent over her and pushed her hair out of her face. He smiled at her and waved, then he blew her a kiss, and she saw him say “I love you”, but she didn’t hear the words. She fought to push the nurse away, but she obstructed her view. When she finally moved, he was gone. The woman who had entered obscured the view to the window again and helped her sit up. She stopped struggling and fighting. It was all in vain anyway. They didn’t understand. They didn’t see what she saw.

“It’s time for your pills honey.” Two cups were put in front of her, and she obediently emptied them both before she opened her mouth to show that she had swallowed everything, just like she was supposed to do.

~~°~~

The nurse patted the patient’s shoulder and retreated. She key locked the door again once she was outside and sighed. Halloween was always the worst day for this patient. It had been five years now since she was with them and although she was better on most days, on October 31st, she was suicidal and had to stay in lockup for her own safety. She had never talked, but everyone knew about the events that had ended her in the mental institution. The nurse didn’t need to hear the details of the tragedy; she knew that only love could make someone lose their mind the way this woman had.

(written in October 2014. I would change many things about this story – more details, and the writing style is weird too, but there is potential in this couple of paragraphs)