The Hunt
The fire had died down to embers and the wind shifted slightly, blowing the smoke westward out of camp. I shuffled my feet in the dirt as I looked up at the sky. Grandfather knew the names and histories of the stars; he used to tell their stories when I was still too young to understand. Father says he wishes he had listened to them, because now when he looks up to Grandfather’s ghost, he has no idea what it is trying to tell him. When I ask Grandmother if she knows, she smiles and hugs me; she doesn’t say much at all anymore. Mother says her ghost has already left to be with Grandfather, and when I ask what she means, she says that I need to wash the cooking pot and to please stop pestering her. It was a full moon, which meant it was bright enough that I didn’t need to keep the fire burning to see, but Mother says I should do it anyway, because the fire is all that separates us from the wild.
The wind gusted again carrying woops and whistles out of the forest. Riding it, a cloud of chirping bats arced over the camp before turning back towards the forest. The fire flickered and danced in the wind as the embers eagerly lapped up energy from the passing air. I sat with my head resting on my knees, while the cool breeze wicked the sweat from my back. My eyes followed the bats back towards the lightless forest. As they retreated, the droning of the crickets returned and the night dove back into placidity.
I looked back up at the sky and squinted my eyes. I still couldn’t see Grandfather, and figured I’d give up and set the fire up for the night. The firewood was stored behind the chief tent under a tarp. The mute said it would rain tomorrow, and he hasn’t been wrong yet. Father says that all things in life are equal: that what is lost can be gained in other ways. The mute cannot speak, so the world whispers secrets to him that others cannot understand. Mother says that’s a lie: the world only takes, and the mute is just lucky. As I approached the chief tent, I could see that a light was still on. The candlelight spilled out from the cloth that covered the entryway of the hut. I peaked my head around the cloth to see if Father was still awake, only to find him slumped over his table with candlelight emanating around him.
Father carves things. He can no longer hunt with the rest of the men since he was maimed by a boar some years ago, before Grandfather died. Uncle says it was the biggest boar that had ever lived, tusks the size of tree trunks and a maw that could devour the moon. When it walked, the ground shook, and when it charged it could level a forest. He says Father was lucky to have lost only his leg, and that when the pig returns, he will eat up all the little boys and girls who don’t listen to their mothers. And if he thinks any of us aren’t listening to him, he’ll jump up over the fire and pretend like he is going to eat us. Uncle calls the boar The People Eater Pig; Father just calls it Big Ass Pig.
I stepped into Father’s hut to extinguish the candle. Father sat slouched over his worktable. He had to sit with his feet straight out, as his left leg could no longer bend properly after the big ass pig had gored him. He had fallen asleep with his arms crossed, his forehead resting in the crook of his right elbow, and his left hand loosely holding onto the mask that he had been carving. The likeness of the mask, though not fully finished, was unmistakable. Deep empty eyes looked out from below a furrowed brow, and long pointed tusks protruded from the corners of a mouth, itself beset with long, flat, bone-grinding teeth. When Mother painted it, she would certainly make the eyes red and the teeth bone-white. Uncle could use it to scare my sister and I when he told the story. I wet my thumb and index finger in my mouth, and observed the mask as I extinguished the light.
The room was plunged into darkness. I could sense the red paint from Mother’s brush seeping into the eyes of the mask as it grew and morphed into its namesake. Its maw opened to consume the darkness surrounding me, but as I felt the jaws closing in around me, as Big Ass Pig closed its people-eating teeth around me, my eyes adjusted to the moonlight coming through the cloth door.
The maw receded and the red drained from the eyes; the mask sat motionless under Father’s grip, vacantly staring up at the ceiling of the hut. My footsteps were barely audible as I backed towards the cloth door. I refused to take my eyes off the mask until I could feel the course fabric with my outstretched hand.
Thump.
The whole hut shifted. The sticks creaked, and the grass roof shivered in terror. I froze. My eyes remained fixated on the stoic mask laying on the table.
Thump. A second thump. Louder. Closer. Stronger.
Something exhaled. The cloth door behind me blew inward and brushed against my back. Every hair in my body stood on end. I watched as two tusks, fashioned from shadow, grew alongside me, until the great body carrying them blocked out the moonlight entirely. Through the sound of blood pounding in my ears, I could hear something scraping and plodding the dirt outside. The air hung still, and the faraway sounds of crickets were subsumed into complete silence. My voice wavered through the air like the hiss of a little snake.
“...father…Father.” The words died before they reached him, unable to breach the veil of death enshrouding the hut. Blinded by the lack of light, I moved towards him swiftly along the wall to reach his table. I felt my left foot brush against the end of Father’s spear, which he still kept beside his table, and I wrapped my left hand around the weapon; it was the first time I had held one.
THUMP.
This one moved the earth. Grains of dirt on the floor scurried over each other, fleeing from the doorway. Something deep in the recesses of the lightless hut fell and scraped dryly as it meandered across the ground. The grass roof trembled and shook, as though preparing to abandon the rest of the hut, and something on the worktable began to clatter. The sound lacerated the silence, shearing through the veil of death; I yelped and shook my father, desperately trying to urge him from his slumber. He didn’t so much as budge, but judging by his breath, it wouldn’t be until morning that he’d be able to see straight anyway.
THUMP. SNORT. RRREEEEEEEEE!
A wretched, bloodcurdling scream erupted outside. I scrambled to reach around my father and silence the clattering mask, now shaking violently in my father’s grip. As I grabbed at the mask I felt one of its freshly-carved tusks slice into me as I wrenched it free. The shadow blocking the moonlight began to twist and dance; a frenzied choreography of shadowy tusks, teeth, and hooves began to flash around the room and the ground thundered in response.
Amid the distorting light, I could see the blood from my hand fill the eyes of the wooden beast with demonic rage and unyielding malice. Another vicious roar blasted into the hut, and I felt my grip instinctively tighten around the spear. I glanced briefly at my father before turning and placing the hatred over my own face.
The air is filled with yips and screams. My muscles burn and my nostrils flare as I desperately try to recover my breath. I can smell it outside, the slender-faced demon with the long stick. It is alone right now, but more are coming. And when they come, they will corner me, they will kill me, and they will eat me.
Cloaked in the darkness of my shelter I am resolute. I will not yield. I lower my head, let out a bloodcurdling scream, and charge out of the darkness into the moonlit embrace of the frenzying demon.
Cover image by Jesse Freeman Arrow of God