"He looked at me, leaning in, his breath more rancid than the smell of death itself. In his mouth he didn't possess the razor-sharp, clean teeth that would glow a ghostly white in the darkness. Instead, his teeth were disgusting. They were yellow, broken, and cracked. One of them was almost completely gone, and his bloody gums were starting to grow over it. He had a large overbite due to the jaw line of his bird-like face, his upper teeth digging bloody holes into his lower gums. It looked excruciating, but I could see in his eyes that he enjoyed the pain he received, thrived off of it. He cracked a smile at me, like greeting an old friend. We made eye contact while he stared down at me, his hollowed out eyes like soul-sucking pits dragging me in deeper until I disappear. A pit formed in my stomach as a chill ran down my spine. I couldn't help but picture him digging into a human excitedly, his teeth cracking on the bones of his meal as he enjoyed each, single part. My throat became dry; my tongue felt like sandpaper scraping against the top of my mouth. My mind became fuzzy. I had no chance of survival against this, this thing, and It was toying with me. It seemed to see the fear in my eyes and laughed, the metal sounding voice screeching like nails on a chalkboard. "
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A quick note from the author:
This was written as an 8th grade project. I'll probably end up rewriting it for some kind of Halloween thing.
Antique store owner Liz brings home a Victorian taxidermy hound from auction, unwittingly unleashing dark forces on her wife and son.
*****
Nat Loman has finally married the love of her life, Liz, and is getting used to her role as stepmother to Liz's 5-year-old son, Liam. The Loman family runs a bustling antique business so they attend a sale where a striking, black taxidermied hound is up for auction. Liz picks it up for the business, but it ends up being stored in their home, where Nat notices strange things occurring. She quickly discovers the past residents had died violently. Then she hears from a friend about the myth of "the devil's dog", a hound that perches in the shadows, tearing families apart from the inside. Soon, people around the Lomans are dying, and Liz is changing, darkening. It's up to Nat to save the woman she loves from the darkness closing in, and to save Liam from danger no matter what she has to sacrifice.
[[Winner of the 2018 Wattys "Hidden Gems" category]]
[[word count: 60,000-70,000 words]]