Clearing the Haze by C C Mitchell

Author:C C Mitchell [Mitchell, C C]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-12-16T22:00:00+00:00

12

Found

“What are you doing, young man?”

My eyes flew open, consciousness slapping me in the face at the sound of an old woman’s voice. It was fully dark inside the cabin aside from the dying embers of my fire, and there was no light creeping in through the cracks between the boards yet. Even though I could see through the murky blackness easily, it still put me on edge knowing there were people lurking about outside.

“I could ask you the same, mistress. What are you doing outside your warm bed at this hour of the morning?” a male voice answered, lined with a slight amount of irritation.

“Every numskull knows it is best to harvest mushrooms in the morning while the ground is still cool and moist,” she sneered. Her rude laugh chaffed against the walls of the shed.

The man made an annoyed sound and the grass shuffled against his boots.

“It would be best to stay away from there,” the woman called from farther off. She must have headed back towards the village.

“Do I want to know why?” The man’s voice rumbled in the crisp air.

“Perhaps.” I could hear the grin in her tone.

“Are you going to tell me or not? I don’t have time for games, crone,” he snapped at her. Each word formed the image of sharp teeth in my imagination and I bristled in warning.

“Oh, spoil sport!” she exclaimed and then huffed. “The man who lived there died and has come back to haunt that cabin.”

“What makes you believe that?”

“I’ve seen the smoke from the chimney at night, but there is no one inside during the day and the smoke is gone when regular folk would be out and about,” she almost half whispered, as if speaking normally would provoke the wrath of the afore mentioned ghost.

“Warning duly noted. Good day to you.” The man started to test the door.

The woman grumbled to herself about a lack of respect from younger generations and stalked off down the hill.

I jumped to my feet, eyes wide, and frantically searched for a place to hide. The food box was too small. There were no good corners and the holes in the roof were too small for me to fit through, though large enough to let most of the heat out that my fire produced.

The door made a scraping sound behind me. I leaped up and latched onto the only good beam in the ceiling. My talons sunk into the wood while the toes of my boots slipped a little. I clamped my knees on either side of the beam and pressed against it as flat as I could. With any luck, the man wouldn’t think to look up.

I was barely secured before he ducked through the doorway. He wore a dark cloak much like my own, which I had been using as third blanket that night. I swore silently, realizing that in my panic I had left it in plain sight by the fire.

I swore again when the man noticed it as soon as his boots crossed the threshold.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.