Hollow

In the time of the hallowed moon, in the season where the chill lingers, the world grows still, and waits. Alone at campfire, I sit, wanting to burn. The firelight draws a sorcerer’s protective sphere around me; I dare not turn my head to see what lies outside. The darkness squirms.

Behind me, the forest exhales. Ashes in the fire swirl into embers, ghost upward into a vampire sky that sucks them gray again. The embers are a surrogate for my soul, fragmented, blackened, lit only by a semblance of heat that leaches quickly away.

I look to the stars. Perhaps they will comfort. Their light cannot be consumed by any earthly hunger. They care not for the concerns of carbon. But their icicle twinkling reminds me too much of cruel laughter. Shrinking, I coil in upon myself.

Nearer laughter swells. It howls in the trees. It cackles in the shadows. The night puts on a cloak of thorns. I close my eyes but my ears are open and stung. A visitor is coming, stalking on tenebrous limbs. I feel the weight of his presence, the surge of air that he pushes before him.

My heart hammers a heavy rhythm; my mouth tastes of venom and brass. Blood drums like the hooves of horses beneath my skin. Sweat crawls like freshly birthed roaches. Stench overwhelms—mold and fungi, toads and spittle-bugs, spider webs painted with tincture of silver.

And now he whispers at my shoulder. Gooseflesh arises as he cajoles me to spurn the light, to gaze upon him, to own his words. He promises a balm for sad fear—if I join him. Perhaps I will accept. Why cling to fire-glow when black-shine offers honeyed freedom from all concerns? Of course, the visitor is lying. Nothing sweet gilts the freedom that he offers.

I’m not sure that matters.

∼ Charles Gramlich

© Copyright Charles Gramlich. All Rights Reserved.