Category / Horror

by Colette

Sleepless Nights

Written by Ashcloud

insomnia_time

Time is a killer. Image // Mateus Lunardi Dutra

The shrill sound of nothingness deafens.
As silent as sleep itself,
Insomnia mutes functionality.
How is it that so many hide,
Behind a facade of concealer; lies
And steaming mugs of coffee?
What they truly long for – the black blanket
To shroud their ticking minds’ wound,
Beyond capacity, the taut spring awaits
Expectantly, for the slightest nudge
That will uncoil the mind’s formal graces,
In exchange for the unknown,
feared place within us all.

Ashcloud’s poem is something many of us on The Inkwell writing forum can relate to – suffering from insomnia is probably every writer’s nightmare, though it’s probably when we acquire our best material. Stimulated by caffeine, words can magically appear, but without it we’d suffer from the inevitable caffeine crash. It’s why Ashcloud’s poetry just hits the nail on the head; a deep fear some of us can’t seem to escape. If you enjoyed Ashcloud’s ‘Sleepless Nights’, feel free to check out her other wonderful poetry, ‘Knight‘ and ‘The Root of Insanity‘. 

by Colette

Fiction Frenzy Winning Entry – Rabid

Written by Magnificent Mayhem

the_walking_dead_wallpaper

Sometimes there’s just no way out. Image // The Walking Dead AMC

It’s almost funny. You could almost say I’d been preparing for this my whole life. I had seen every movie.  Read every book, every comic. I had video games. I even recorded mini-series. My costume was a staple at every Halloween party and Comic Con event. People expected to see me in my best gaping wounds and shuffle step, they talked about it afterwards. Who could blame them?  I really committed when I was in character. So when I came home to find one in my kitchen, I suppose I wasn’t entirely surprised, not really. I suppose I’d been waiting for it for a long time.

What did shock me was to see my wife sprawled on the floor, hands pushing feebly against its back, mouth gaping noiselessly as it ate at her. Her eyes met mine for a moment and there I saw the fear, the panic. The floor was wet, sticky, slick. The smell was grotesque. I found her eyes again. Silent, pleading, tears streaming.

I never questioned my next move. Most days I still don’t.

I reached for a knife from the counter and lurched unsteadily towards the grotesque pair. I could not take my eyes from her. She made a sound then, I think she was trying to scream, maybe call out to me. But fear caught the noise in her throat and it trailed off helplessly. It – whatever that thing was – never even noticed me. It just kept eating at her, its teeth and jaws working away as she struggled to push it from her. My arm seemed to move on its own accord, plunging again and again into the base of its skull. And for the first time, it turned its attention on me, arms flailing as I hacked indiscriminately. My wife screamed then, harsh and hard in my ear as I brought myself close to finish it.

Once it lay still on the ground beside us, I took her hand in mine. I wiped tears, snot and blood from my face, in an effort to make myself a little more presentable. I even tried to smooth my hair down. I pulled her in close to me, so as to calm her harried breathing. Many of my haphazard strokes had cut her as well. Across her face, arms, hands, neck. But the damage had been done long before I arrived.

She blinked at me. She tried to speak but only managed to spill blood from her lips and mauled throat. Her hair was plastered to her skin, red and wet, clinging to her face. It hurt me more than it hurt her, I am sure of it.

I think I whispered something to her, there at the end, but all I could concentrate on was what had to be done. Continue reading →

by Colette

The Bells of Campden

Written by Miss Smiley

bells_lone

Living, breathing bells? That’s horror, for sure. Image // Vladimer Shioshvili

Campden was a small province. It was peaceful. It was a sweet place – a place you’d want to raise your children. It was practically crime-free. A place you’d want to retire to and live out your life in. It was alive. It felt alive. There was none of this dead metal people tend to surround themselves in. The land breathed and danced. And then there were the bells.

To say that they rang would be an understatement. These bells didn’t just ring – they lived, they sang, each note a clear, precise, and weirdly organic sound. Their range spanned further than a normal church bell’s, their notes singing out whole provinces, calling them into church and court in the morning, ringing out long after they’d been struck.

If you believed the myths, the bells were alive. In back streets and behind closed doors, they whispered about them.

If a man was tried in court, he was tried before the bells. Mostly it was formality, they said. But every now and then, a bell would ring by itself during a trial. And that man was guilty – guilty as sin. The lawyers knew better than to speak for their client then. Once, a lawyer had protested and no one liked to talk about his story. That wasn’t the kind of thing you wanted your children to accidentally overhear, and who knew when they were listening?

It was worse to whisper about what happened to the guilty man, though. It was a story that each child heard, just once, when they were old enough. No one ever wanted to be told twice. No one ever needed to be told twice.

You see, the bells were alive. And everything that lives needs to eat.

Miss Smiley’s short story was submitted as part of a past HHC entry, with a Horror theme. It’s possibly more suited to October’s upcoming theme “fear”, but we liked it too much to consider leaving for too long. Besides the performance from the bells is particularly enthralling. If you liked Miss Smiley’s piece, and are utterly terrified of those bells, make sure you check out some of her other tales of sneaky horror, such as “Fetish” and “Rosebed“. 

by marleylilith

Rain Men

Written by Lilith

They come through the rain…

“They came through the rain”, the saying went, but in truth it was no ordinary rain that heralded their arrival. The clouds would roll in, the heavens would open, and the downpour would not stop for weeks on end. The villagers kept to their homes, packing sandbags around their doorsteps for when the banks of the river inevitably burst, and nobody dared trying to travel in or out of Kettlebridge. The shrine, a circular stone building in the centre of town, became a safe haven for those whose homes were damaged by the ongoing storms, the old priestesses offering soup and blankets to those in need. And then at last, when the people could take no more of the onslaught from the sky, when fires guttered in their hearths and they could no longer remember what warmth felt like… Then the creatures came.

They looked human. An old man, stooped and withered, skeletal fingers wrapped tight around the silver top of his walking stick; a young woman barely any more than a child, crouching in the mud; and a boy with wide grey eyes who smiled at everything. All the villagers knew what they looked like. They’d seen the creatures from afar, peering through gaps in shutters or flimsy curtains, watching as they walked into the centre of town… but nobody who got close to them ever told the tale.

Continue reading →

by marleylilith

Rosebed

Written by Miss Smiley

Beautiful scarlet roses for Mrs Hawthorne…

I only found the book this morning. Not much I can do about it now. It was weird – I found it in my roses, just outside my bedroom window. That should have triggered me off straight-up, but no. No, sensible Mrs Hawthorn Bridge doesn’t spot anything wrong with this.

Naturally, I opened it up. I’m the person who opens up other peoples’ medicine cabinets, after all. Like I wouldn’t open up a weird book outside my house, my room. Puh-lease.

That wasn’t even my first mistake.

It was all in a weird code. I couldn’t make head or tail of it at first. That was exciting. I love a good puzzle. But I was late for work and what was I going to do, leave it there, right outside my bedroom window? I think not.

So I took it to work with me. Thinking about it, it probably wasn’t my best move, but hey – can’t do anything about it now, can I?

I took another glance at the book at lunch time. I really wish I hadn’t. It wasn’t about the code – that was easy, once I’d started. Just a typical picture code – squiggle means A, small cat means C, that kind of thing. That really wasn’t the problem. The problem was the content.

Continue reading →

by marleylilith

Where Angels Fear to Tread

Written by Lilith

One of the six, Michael's wrath is feared by all...

One of the six, Michael’s wrath is feared by all…

Michael’s shadow fell over the land, his outstretched wings blocking the light over acres of blood-soaked soil as he reached out to the souls beneath him and collected them into his wake. There had been a great battle today; some bastard king or other was warring against his younger brother in the east and the conflicts were spreading far and wide. Michael was helping them spread, in his own way, his gift of wrath turning father against son, mother against daughter and bringing the common people to arms to join the fight. The war itself had been begun by Michael’s younger brother, the angel Lucifer, who had domain over pride. It had taken very little interference to push the royal brothers into a full blown civil war when both their egos were on the line.

Somewhere below Michael’s shadow a voice cried out – one living soul struggling amidst a sea of death. He searched the fields until his bright blue eyes came to rest upon the body of a young man, his face smeared with mud, his clothes stained with the blood of his enemies, or his friends. His body shook as he cried, but he seemed to be entirely unharmed. His curiosity piqued, the Angel of Death swept down towards the boy. Continue reading →

by marleylilith

Letters From The Front

Written by Eruantien

The Civil War Letters of Rev William Salt, still perfectly preserved

from Sergeant Amanda Davidson:

Dearest brother,
We’ve been here for about a week now and nothing has happened. The living quarters are the worst that I’ve seen for a long time, but despite that it’s looking like the nicest posting I’ve had. But enough of me; how are you? How’s work been treating you? How’s the compact machine gun coming along? I hope you get all the kinks worked out soon. Lay some flowers on father’s grave for me.
Love,
Amanda
PS. I do wish it would stop raining.

Dearest brother,
We were attacked last night. Lost most of a company. The Colonel reckons that they were just probing the line, I hope he’s wrong. Have you had any ideas for how to stop the rounds getting jammed when the bolt draws back to let the next one into the chamber? Oh, it’s still raining, the place resembles a bog more than a battlefield.
Love,
Amanda

Dear Richard,
I’m writing to you from the infirmary now, there was a bit of a scuffle this morning and I took a scratch. It’s nothing really, but the colonel insisted I went to the infirmary to get it seen to. I like your solution to the jamming autorifle. I’m so proud of you little brother, now we have a weapon that might yet turn this war around.
Love,
Amanda

Continue reading →

by Colette

The Tawarkelion

Ankou

Ankou ‘The Legend of Death’ – his presence is near.

Written by Eruantien 

Within Arachnos does darkness rise
And Ankou shall watch as hope dies
For in his lands his power shall fall
And lo they shall roam, not one but all

No more shall light the dark hold back
And no safety shall be on the track
Five shall leave to tread on wood and stone
With one to pass through fire alone

Now on the fields shall they be arrayed
With the hosts of hate against them played
Arms of steel to their aid shall come
Yet through pain of loss are lips struck dumb Continue reading →

by marleylilith

It Was a Rainy March Day

Written by lost in a dream.

This beautiful rainy day in Paris is very different from lost in a dream’s rainy garden! Image courtesy of visualise.us.

It was a rainy March day when I found him.

The first time I saw him, he was looking up at me from the floor. His unruly white hair soaked with rain, his eyes darting from side to side. Someone must be missing him, he needed to go home. I didn’t know what to do.

I walked back towards the house, I would ring the police, yes, that’s what I would do. I made it to the patio, then I got the biggest shock of my life. There he was staring at me from patio door. How did he overtake me? Never mind how, he was coming straight towards me. He looked terrified. His eyes were wide and childlike in aged face and his body was shaking. He kept coming towards me until we were centimetres apart. That’s when I saw it.

Continue reading →

by Colette

A Severe Lack of Continuation of an Individual

Written by Doishy

Frankie says Relax, or in this case, Doishy says it. Image Courtesy of wallitup.com

[soundtrack – please play.]

A pristine white wall stood high and mighty within the centre of the sand. Despite its environment it seemed to give out an aura of utter cleanliness with the sun glaring down and reflecting on its surface. This same light caught a small droplet as it floated across the sky, a small dark spot in the air with a small red glow below it due to the light. This droplet’s journey took it to the wall where it hit and scattered itself into, almost, a star of red. This star was soon not alone and the wall become a galaxy of red and white until none of its original colour remained.

Now that we have the scene ladies and gentlemen, I shall turn off the lovely soundtrack that has been playing [music stop] and let you imagine the sound of the chainsaw whirring as it grinds its way through a mans body. Continue reading →