The Forest

I knew the whispers that spread about me. They thought I was insane. "Oh, that guy stays in the forest all night? What does he do there?" One person would whisper to another.
"Probably buries his victims," the other would answer. But they didn't understand. They thought she'd run off and I couldn't handle it. Some thought I'd killed her and came out here to visit her makeshift grave. Whatever the rumor, once it started, it spread like wildfire and I couldn't shake it. No matter how bad the rumors were, I wouldn't stop coming into the forest. To the clearing four miles off the main trail. To the clearing she had become obsessed with the last few years.
"I heard it," she'd told me that last night, her brown eyes shining with excitement. She'd already had her pack on and was raring to go. As usual, she'd stopped to beg me to come along.
"You probably heard a dog, or a fox," I'd told her, wrapping my arms around her slim frame in an attempt to make her stay. "Stay in tonight. We can have a Children of the Corn marathon," I'd told her. She'd smiled up at me, then stood on her tip toes to kiss me.
"A valiant effort, my prince," she'd laughed, "but I can't let it slip through my fingers again." She was slipping through my fingers, I realized. She'd pulled out of my arms and I'd suddenly wanted to yell at her. To shake her and scream that monsters didn't exist. To force her to stay. But I hadn't. I'd let her go. As usual.
Now I sat in the clearing with a pack of my own, huddled in my tent, trying to keep warm. I had to find her. To find what had taken her. Four years. Every night, I came out to this exact spot and waited. Four incredibly long years since she failed to creep into our room with the sun just peeking over the horizon.
A twig snapped outside, bringing me out of my thoughts. Heart pounding, excitement driving the cold from my body, I wondered if this was what she had felt. I dove out of the tent, hunting rifle in hands, knife tucked in my belt. Icy wind blew my too long hair away from my face as I heard something give a low moan behind me. I whirled in time to see a shadow too big to be a man dart between the trees. A second later, a low growl came from behind me, causing me to whirl again, nearly losing my balance. Something huge lumbered from the undergrowth. My first thought was bear, but my mind immediately dismissed the ridiculous idea. I felt my eyes widen as I took in the hideous beast.
Moonlight reflected off of fangs as thick around as my forearm. There was no fur on the torn, scabbed flesh that was it's twisted muzzle. The thing stepped forward on naked, misshapen legs that looked as if someone had taken a bat to them until they bent backwards at the knees. Huge black hooves dug deep furrows into the frozen ground. A hand as big as my head crashed down in front of me, the razor sharp claws slicing open my shirt, barely missing my skin. Another gutteral growl emanated from deep in its throat. I stumbled away in shock, aiming my rifle with shaking, numb hands. She was right! A voice yelled in my mind. She was right and you let her go! You fed her right to it! Its serpentine tail, as long as I was tall, flicked out and struck the gun, wrenching it from my grip. It crashed through the trees on the far end of the clearing just as I registered the pain in my fingers. It opened its burned jaw and let out a roar, assaulting my nostrils with its hot, rancid breath. I coughed and wrinkled my nose, taking another step away from it. My hand went for the knife in my belt, still numb, only acting on my basic need for survival. Then I saw its eyes and my hand faltered. They were a shade of brown that was neither light nor dark. They were filled with pain, a light shined deep in them that could only be r awe>6'4*&$_/ as madness. Despite the madness, I knew those eyes. I had spent enough time staring into them to recognize them anywhere. They were once the doe-like eyes that had stared adoringly up at me on our wedding day. I stared, frozen in shock, as those eyes softened to the ones I know so well.
"C-Chloe?" I stuttered, my mind going blank. The beast whimpered and stumbled a step back, turning its face away from me. Her body trembled and she howled in pain, twisting my heart. What happened? She turned back to me, her eyes now two cold stones as something settled in her mind. That was the look she got when she had finally settled something she'd been fighting herself about. She leaped forward faster than I would've thought possible. My wife dug her dripping fangs into my shoulder, sending waves of pain tearing through my body. Wave after wave of white hot fire consumed my flesh, licking at my organs. Dimly, I heard screaming. On some level, I knew it was me, though I never knew I could scream like that. I heard it whimper as the world went black.
"I blinked my eyes open, groaning in pain. My whole body hurt. I stood on wobbly legs that screamed in protest. So. Much. Pain. Bringing my hands to my face, I stopped short, a feeling of dread settling in the pit of my stomach like a stone. I stared in horrified shock at the red tinged claws that were my fingers. Breathing hard, fighting panic and trying to ignore the agonizing pain my body was in, I ran until I found a still pond not far from the clearing.
My horrified icy blue eyes stared back at me above a naked, twisted muzzle that seemed frozen in a snarl to make room for fangs too big to fit comfortably. Thick, green tinged goop dripped from the fang like liquid fire, burning my scarred lower jaw and causing ripples in the pool, sending up thin strings of steam. Pain suddenly wracked my body and I writhed on the ground, howling, accidentally splashing cool water on my burning face. "This is how she lived for four years," a voice whispered in the back of my mind as the pain became somewhat bearable. "She transferred the curse to you so she could go home."
How many days had passed? I couldn't remember. One painful day bled into another and I still hadn't found somebody to pass the curse onto. I'd decided to to prowl the edge of the forest, despite the pain the sunlight brought my eyes. Maybe I'd catch sight of her again.
My heart lurched when I caught sight of dark curls spilling over thin shoulders. A flash of brown eyes made the pain recede for the moment. She was smiling, laughing and sending flirty looks to a man I'd never seen before. A little boy bounced along between them, tossing a ball in the air. They stopped long enough for her to stand on tip toes and kiss him while the little boy complained about the heat. The pain returned with a vengeance, worse than it'd ever been before. It ripped a howl from my throat as I writhed in the undergrowth, my hooves feet carving deep gouges in the bark of a tree.
"Mommy, what was that?" the little boy's frightened voice carried over my panting breath. I peeked through the leaves and saw her standing there in all her beauty, clutching the boy to her with one hand, her other on the man's forearm. Fear shone bright in her beautiful gaze as she met my eyes.
"Nothing. You two go to the car, I'll catch up and we'll get some ice cream," she said, waving them away. The man murmured something to my wife and pecked her cheek as I fought off another wave of agonizing pain. Then he scooped up the boy, roaring like like a lion and walking off, bouncing the giggling child. Chloe stepped up to the tree line, never breaking eye contact. "I'm sorry," she said, her voice cracking as a single tear slid down her face. "I tried to find someone else, Luke. I really did. But you were there every night, and the pain only got worse," she told me. Then her face hardened. "I've moved on. Remarried. I have a son. I'm fighting for them to make a rule about who is allowed into forest. The curse has to end somewhere, Luke. It'll kill you eventually." With that, she spun on her heel and walked away quickly. The pain worsened, emotion squeezing my broken heart and a roar, dangerously close to a scream, was torn from my vocal chords. My eyes stung, but no tears came. They never did.