Wandering Moonlight: Writing Prompts & Short Stories

The Scents of Shadow

***** Creepy horror one-shot— An evil spirit protects and falls in love with a woman— but can evil truly love, or only obsess?

I actually wrote this like a year ago, but hey... :)*****

One of those, the typical. Terrifying, alert, always screaming to be heard, but silent as death I am. She's watching me, her eyes darkened with its disgusting visage. She's scared. Scared....

No. Terrified. She's terrified of me. Of it, that does not deserve a name. Lean towards her, take deep breaths, try to fill nostrils with the scents of her living, mortal soul. Smell life. Her life smells of breaths taken in quick succession, the one before never doubting that the next would come to be. Like the sun rising the next day. Would pray to be so sure. To know that the next breath would come. My kind never know. We, in our infinite darkness, are never certain whether our lord will allow us a new breath. Capricious he is. Life smells of heat, and lust, passion and irritation and stress; it smells of opened windows and slammed doors, of laughter and pants of breath taken in moments of agony and skin. It smells of blood and sorrow and the shadows that only the darkest of the dark and the lightest of all the good can bring.

Life smells of breaths, of joy, of all these things, but also of death, for all life must end in death. But the death that leaks from her is faraway, in the future. It is in age, dark gray and feathery age. Surrounded by those she loved in life. I am not among them. Not among them. Not among...

A new scent arises as mourning washes over this wretched, dark being. A scent of terror. A scent of her knowing that she is being watched, and not knowing that rather than harming her, this lowly creature would suffer another hundred thousand deaths. The most painful, even more so than the first. The first... was not pleasant.

"Hello?" cries she, in a voice of hesitation. The darkness is all around, bringing this one solace, but not to her – she stares blankly into nothing. Unaware is she that I am mere feet from her, taking in her scents, her sights. Seen through the eyes of me, this creature of the underworld, of all things evil and dark and grotesque and horrifying, she is love itself. She is heart-beats and a quick pulse. She is tightening bellies and aching bodies. She is lust. She is passion. I want her.

I want her.

Her eyes dart... seeing my wings? No, she only sees their shadow, only sees the talon poking up from the top. Anything besides this is not seen by her mortal eyes. It would be impossible.

"Please," pleads she, her small body, covered perfectly in tanned skin, smooth, supple skin, shivering in the chill wind my presence has brought. "Is anyone there?"

Her words, they linger in the air. Her breath washes over this lowly thing's face and it is not able to breathe... its lungs are incapable of breath for minutes. Minutes. Hours? Was it hours? Beauty knows no distinction.

Moving through the darkness, she tenses every few moments, but she should have nothing to fear. This lowly creature watches over her, feels her from just inches away. This is the cause of her fear, I... it knows this, but it is unable to care. It will protect her. I will protect her. From all the others that watch, that taste her scent, her sight, with their long tongues, their flared nostrils. I am no better than they, but they will not touch what I dare to only glance at. Her beauty will not be mine, no, but it will not be theirs, either. I am not worthy, they are not worthy. I am shadow and evil and disgusting, vile things, they are vile and evil and disgusting things. Nothing of that nature should glance at her, at her beauty and her grace and her goodness and her light, without flinching and turning away, covering their wrinkled faces with their blackened, wrinkled hands.

She reaches the light and this lowly creature resists the urge to cry out, to tear its heart from its chest. Its heart is beating, as if it is sure it will never beat again once it loses sight of her. Its heart is crying, begging its owner to come back, to touch my disgusting face, to feel my hot skin against her cold palms. My heart wants its owner back, in the darkness, but my mind and my soul know that my heart will never forgive itself for such selfish thoughts. She belongs in light, not in vivid shadow.

This lowly creature's heart dares to reach out its hand, dares to push its limits, and its fingers trace over her arm, sending shivers up her spine, and she jumps back. And this monster is satisfied. It is whole. For a while, it can feel the equivalent a monster feels to happiness. It can call itself a name, a real name, one it had long ago and lost over time, over degradation, over hatred, over sorrow and over regret.

My name.

This unholy, vile, unearthly and disgusting creature had a name. One it is unable to use anymore. One it does not deserve. But with her touch, her touch, this creature remembered its name. Flashes of memory, of scents and sounds it had long forgotten.

With gasps of agony, I remembered life and laughter. I remembered hatred and pain and love. God, I remembered love. I remembered my love for men, for the men around me and the love I had for family. Family.

With my gasps and moans, she screamed and fled, never to look back into the darkness she had escaped from. But this lowly creature, locked up in chains of its own making, would never forget the touch of her skin, the scent that lingered, never to disperse, and the agony of emotions she wrought.

This lowly creature, hated and looked down on, living in shadow and horror, would never forget its name again. It would keep it close to its breast, and never let it go.

Hope. That was my name. That was my given name, in life where I loved and lived and hated so much I died. Died in that hatred. Died in that ugliness, to be born again in this world of shadow as something too vile to love again.

She'll never know how close this creature was. Never know the depths of its feelings. Never know it almost gave its being to become the ground she walks on. She'll never know, for none know but I. I and my capricious lord and master. And as long as there is a god in this world, she will never know him. She'll never know him, or this disgusting, disfigured, horrifying soul will break from its chains of bondage and destroy heaven and earth to return her to her rightful place. In the light. Where the smell of her life, of her passion, of this creature's lust for her, will never leave her again.