The Hunt

“It has to be done” I kept telling myself as I stalked through the Nightmare Forest. The

metal buckler felt heavy in my hands as I continued searching. I thought about my family,

neighbors and friends, my entire village, and what the creature had done to them. We had tried

everything: spears, arrows, clubs, dozens of different traps, and poisoned meat, but nothing

could stop it. Dozens of bloody corpses, human and animal, torn apart and gutted, left by the

creature to rot. Reinforcements were unable to arrive in time and we were unable to leave,

trapped by the patrol of the creature looking for new victims. Now, a small fraction of survivors

hid in some of the few still-standing houses while the creature stalked outside, searching for

them. I only had one option left.

As I snapped out of my reverie, I focused on my surroundings. The forest reminded me

of a graveyard, an endless grid of tombstones that stood as tall and straight as multi-story

buildings and as deathly thin as rotting bones sticking out from under the ground, no wider than

my arm. Dense fog, teaming up with the trees, obscured my vision. The full moon up above lit

the forest floor below and lit my path with a dim glow. Though I was thankful for the light, I

couldn’t help but think the dim glow made this place even more eerie. The only sounds were

my light footsteps against the dry, rocky, lifeless soil. In any other forest, you might hear crickets

chirping or an owl hooting, but not this one. The Nightmare Forest is usually filled with the roars

and shrieks of terrifying monsters that kill anything that crosses their path. But here’s the thing:

they’re intelligent enough to stay out of the way of something stronger. More powerful.

Every full moon, at midnight, the Wendigo awakens.

To HUNT.

After a few minutes, I came to the edges of a clearing in the forest. This was it. As I

peered towards the center, I found nothing. It wasn’t here! But I was prepared for this.

I broke a thick branch off one of the trees. I barely and banged it as hard as I could

against the metal shield in my other hand. The low, booming sound felt like an explosion. I could

feel the sound radiating off the shield and into the eerie forest. It felt like an eternity, waiting for

the sound to fade until there was nothing left except the echoes. The silence was deafening. I

readied myself, glancing in all directions, anticipating the moment it would come out, but there

was nothing. Why hadn’t it come out? I raised the stick once more, ready to try again. But

before I could, I noticed two red dots in my peripheral vision. I froze. I didn’t even have enough

time to blink before it lunged straight at me, its claws extended and skeletal, bloody jaw wide

open, showing an array of needle-sharp teeth.

I barely raised my shield in time before it made contact with the cold metal. I got

knocked back into the air. Hard. I landed on my feet, recovering quickly until I noticed

something. The shield was no longer in my hand. Instead, it was in four bent pieces on the

ground a few feet in front of me. Stained with a few droplets of blood. I lowered my gaze to my

hand to see three deep, crimson, slashes. It must’ve punctured a few blood vessels.

I forced myself to ignore it and my attention to what was more important: the Wendigo.

The nine-foot-tall abomination stood bipedal, though it was hard to tell since its arms were so

long they dragged on the ground. It was covered in a coat of fur with wet blood. Its bloody rib

cage stuck out of its chest and its curved spine stuck out of its back. Its waist was so horrifyingly

thin that I could wrap my hand around it. At first, you would think that its limbs were that of a

deer; until you saw the stitches connecting its oversized hands and feet twice the size of a

human’s with claws the size of bananas and sharper than daggers. Its head was that of a deer

skull much larger than any other with razor-sharp teeth the size of fingers and stained a

reddish-brown. It seemed to have no organs on its head except bloody, mutilated, lips

half-eaten by itself. Deep inside its eye sockets lies a faint red glow. Its antlers were like knives

on swords on spears.

“STOP!” I screamed.

The Wendigo froze.

The chief of our clan, my father, never got sick. He had the strength of two men and a

heart of pure gold. He always had a warm, homey smile that never died. He was loved by

everyone and treated everyone with the same kindness and empathy, whether they were the

poorest or richest, youngest to oldest, sickest to strongest.

Except me.

I was the most important thing in his life, and he cared for me more than anyone or

anything else. Then everything changed. One day he started coughing. On the second, his

behavior changed. He became mindless and rarely spoke. Whenever he was presented with

food, he lost control of his body and ate like a wild animal with no control of himself. Multiple

doctors failed to decipher what was causing this “illness.” On the third, he had a constant

hunger that couldn’t be quenched. That day he visited a witch doctor. When he returned, he

seemed to be back to normal. He was no longer the mindless animal he had been the day

before. His face, however, usually cheerful and beaming, had the saddest smile I have ever seen.

That night, he told me he had been possessed by an evil spirit. It was going to turn him

into a Wendigo. The remedy the witch doctor had given him shut down the effects temporarily,

but by that night, the transformation would be complete. He told me that only a child of the

possessed could banish the spirit. It would end the spirit, but would take whoever it possessed

with itself. My memory of that night was foggy. All I knew was that I could not bring myself to

do it. I awoke the next morning to find the bed where he slept the night before broken in two

and a hole in the wall. I was informed that a monster was found wandering the village late at

night, destroying trees and houses and killing livestock. When an army showed up, it ran away

to the Nightmare Forest. Word spread quickly about what happened to the Chief. Rumors went

around about how my bloodline was cursed and that I was unworthy to take the throne. At the

end of the day, I was refused leadership of the clan and someone else.

“What’s the matter? You haven’t attacked me since last year,” I said.

It pointed to its abdomen, which was thinner than normal, then roared.

“I guess there haven’t been as many Night Mares around anymore, but you’re in luck. I

brought you some food. ”

I took off the backpack I had been wearing and undid the knot. The strong smell of

rotten flesh filled the air as soon as I opened the top. I spilled out the contents, leaving a bloody

mess. It lunged at the pile of bones, flesh, and entrails and began to feast. He finished in three

bites, swallowing without chewing.

“Anyway, a lone Werewolf attacked one of our villages today. We suspect it was from the

pack you chased off last month.” I continued, “We need you to hunt it down and put an end to

it.”

He growled a low, guttural sound and crouched, looking ready to pounce. I immediately

climbed on, using his vertebrae as handholds and footholds. The fur on his back was oddly

comfortable, being shaggy and grown out, like the thickest fur coat you’ve ever seen. Then he

leaped. As we started plummeting back toward the forest, he wrapped his hand around one of

the trees and launched off of it, sending us back flying in the air. Excitement filled my veins. I

always looked forward to this in our past meetings. It was like riding a horse, only through the

air and about three times faster. Although it was exhilarating, I couldn’t help but think about

how the people would disapprove of asking my father for help. But they don’t know him as well

as I do. My father may have turned into a monster, but maybe not all monsters are bad. After

all, he’s my father.