🔵 By James Kelley. Photo by lauragrafie.
It was dark that night the storm clouds blocked out the moon and stars. I was forced to patrol the graveyard with a lit lamp. It was half full which looking back now was a blessing. I wasn’t particularly observant. This after all was a cemetery, a place where the dead sleep their eternal sleep. Rumors however have circulated of shadowy figures sighted in the centuries old lower section of the graveyard. It is complete non-sense is it not? Someone was surely jesting! I must quell the rumor spread by the town folk. I believe it’s possible that a homeless person ventured out to the cemetery for shelter from the rain. The fog is thick from the recent rains, making the grounds slick with run-off. The cemetery is such that the new area was higher than the older area. While it’s muddy in the upper area, the lower part has standing water many centuries old mausoleums have water cascading down the stairs to them from all the runoff. The iron gates are chained shut with heavy locks to prevent grave robbers and vandals from disturbing the dead’s eternal sleep. I made my way to the mausoleum that is the center of the townsfolk’s gossip. Going through the maze of headstones, the rain water flows down hill towards my destination. The rains prevented me from making this trip the previous evening. Now equipped with rubber boots I make my way. Fall leaves drift in the waters of the cemetery. The fog swirls in my wake, the night is unnaturally quiet. As I approach the crypt’s portal water rushes through the grate and cascades down the stairs. The grate however was pushed out not in… almost as if someone or something got out. I took my first steps down the twelve odd stairs that lead to the mausoleums antechamber. The room was about then foot by ten foot by seven foot high.
The small statue in the middle of the chamber is that of the virgin Mary. I silently said a prayer as a cold chill crept down my spine. An icy wind blows from the stairwell. To the right an archway that leads to the main chamber that serves as the final resting place of William Dexter. The sarcophagus bears his name and death date 138 years prior. As I approach the lanterns’ glow stretches out revealing the chamber. The lid of the sarcophagus is broken on the flagstone floor. I make my way around the sarcophagus and find crouched next to it in musky rags a sunken skinned man his skin gaunt and pulled tight on his face as if the skull itself was trying to free itself of its imprisonment. Rasping the face looks up at me revealing its sunken eye sockets empty of sight, but somehow it “saw” me through them empty voids. In my fright I drop the lamp! What manner of devil is this foul creature! The lamp crashes to the flagstone floor bursting its contents setting my legs aflame! I pay no heed to the flames licking my legs as I dashed from the room away from the horrid creature. In my haste I slam my shoulder into the archway, stumbling I catch myself, flames creep up my legs as I ascend the stairs to the threshold.
A piercing shriek fills the chamber behind me as the monster gives chase. Throwing the gate fully open I enter the midnight air. The rain coming down in sheets helps to put the fire out that fought to take my legs. Gasping I cry out. Harry hears me and the commotion, he runs towards me. He asks how I arrived at such a state, but before I could reply the unnatural thing was upon him with unearthly speed. Harry tried to fend it off using his legs to thrust upwards but the creature held fast. Over balanced they fell on the ground. It snapping its jaws and using its claw shaped hands to rake Harry’s face. I try to aid my friend, however in one quick swipe of the creatures claw opened Harry’s throat. Gargling, Harry clutches his throat his eyes wide open with terror. I can do nothing as his life fades.
With each beat of his heart his life fluid spurts from the gaping mortal wound. The thing stooped over Harry’s corpse biting down on his flesh feasting on his body. The fiend is eating my friend and I am powerless to stop it. I scream and stumble through the gravestones, I dare not look back.
I retired that very next morning. The investigation that followed turned up nothing of the creature. Evidence o fits presence existed all around. Harry’s lifeless body was where he fell, his tongue torn out, chunks of flesh removed by the monsters jaws. I was asked to go back to the scene and walk them through the events. I dare not step even a foot on that unholy ground. I gave my written statement, but refused their request for walk through. The scene of Harry’s death echoing in my mind.
It’s been three months since that day. News of an attack similar to Harry’s in the town 4 miles from here. A father was killed in the same manner throat slashed open by the creatures claws. His nine year old daughter was bitten on her arm. The child’s wound isn’t healing. The stench of death leaks from it. She goes into fits, temporarily losing herself attacking anyone, even her own mother. Her skin is pale and gaunt, her eyes sunken in her head. Could it be that the creature carries a disease that is transferred to someone by its bite? I dare not think upon it, I fear the worst for the child. The creature that attacked her, killed Harry and is now roaming the land beyond the grave.