The depth of short stories and micro-fiction 2

Beneath the Surface: A beast within

The village of Ravenswood lay shrouded in an eternal mist, as if the very heavens themselves were weeping for its fate. It was here that Jenson, a young blacksmith's apprentice, toiled away in the depths of the village forge. His days blended in a haze of sweat, fire, and the endless clang of hammer on anvil.

Jenson was a quiet soul, content to keep to himself as the world outside seemed to grow darker by the day. Strange occurrences plagued Ravenswood: livestock went missing, eerie howls echoed through the night, and an inexplicable sense of malevolence hung over the village like a spectre.

As Jenson worked, he began to feel a creeping sense of unease. It started with small things: a growl in the back of his throat when he stubbed his toe, a fleeting urge to lash out at his mentor, Thorne, when the older man chastised him for a mistake. At first, Jenson dismissed these incidents as mere frustration, but as the days passed, the sensations grew stronger.

One night, while walking home from the forge, Jenson caught a glimpse of himself in a window reflection. His eyes seemed darker, his pupils dilated, and his skin took on a faintly greyish hue. He spun away, telling himself it was just a trick of the light, but the image lingered in his mind.

Thorne, a gruff but kind man, noticed the change in Jenson too. "Lad, what's eating at ye?" he asked one day, as they worked side by side at the forge. Jenson hesitated, unsure how to explain the growing sense of malevolence within him.

"I don't know, Thorne," he admitted finally. "I just feel... wrong."

Thorne's expression turned serious. "We'll get to the bottom of this, lad. Maybe it's just the village's troubles getting to ye."

But Jenson knew it was more than that.

As the full moon approached, Jenson's transformations became more pronounced. His senses grew sharper, and he could feel the call of the wild, like a primal scream in the back of his mind. He began to experience vivid, disturbing dreams: visions of himself running on all fours, chasing down prey with an unholy glee.

One night, Jenson awoke to find himself standing in the middle of the forest, his hands covered in dirt and leaves. He stumbled back to the village, his heart racing with fear. What was happening to him?

The villagers, once friendly and welcoming, now eyed Jenson with suspicion. They whispered among themselves, pointing at him with nervous glances. Jenson knew they sensed the darkness growing within him, the monster he was slowly becoming.

Thorne, however, remained steadfast in his support. "We'll figure this out, lad," he said, his voice firm. "We'll find a way to reverse this curse."

But as the days passed, Jenson's transformations grew more frequent and more intense. He began to lose himself in the madness, surrendering to the primal urges that threatened to consume him. The villagers, fearing for their safety, started to avoid him altogether.

One fateful night, under the light of the full moon, Jenson felt the final threads of his humanity snap. He transformed into a snarling, slavering beast, driven by an insatiable hunger for destruction. The villagers, realizing too late that Jenson was the source of their troubles, barricaded themselves indoors as the monster rampaged through the village.

When the sun rose the next morning, Jenson lay exhausted, his mind shattered by the horrors he had committed. Thorne, his eyes red-rimmed from grief, stood over him, a heavy iron chain in his hands.

"Forgive me, lad," the old man whispered, as he bound Jenson's wrists and ankles. "I should've seen this coming. I should've stopped it."

As the villagers, armed with torches and pitchforks, closed in on the forge, Jenson knew his fate was sealed. He was no longer human, but a monster, a creature driven by primal urges and darkness. The last shred of his sanity screamed in despair as the villagers dragged him away, intent on putting an end to the terror that had haunted their village for so long.

In the darkness of his cell, Jenson's mind fragmented, consumed by the monster he had become. He knew that he would never be free from the curse, that he would forever be trapped in this abyss of madness and terror. The villagers, fearing his escape, whispered of a plan to lock him deep within the nearby abandoned mine, to seal him away from the world forever.

As the darkness closed in around him, Jenson realized that he was no longer himself, but a shadow of the monster that had haunted the village of Ravenswood. The last remnants of his humanity faded into the darkness, leaving behind a creature driven by an insatiable hunger for destruction, a monster forever trapped in the depths of the mine, a cautionary tale of the horrors that lurked within the darkest recesses of the human heart.