It is dark, midnight draped in cloudy veil, streaking the sky. The wind rushes them along, the full, cold, white face of the moon illuminating the clouds from behind. The remaining leaves on the trees seem tattered, a rustling drape of whispering spirits borne on air. The fields are damp with chill, delicate strands of frost curling across the wild tangle of grass and vine. You hurry, as if you know this is no place to be, not this night.
The trail is deathly silent. No crickets are left to sing, no nightingale, no trappings of the world. It is just you, and the moon, and the relentless hissing of leaves in the wind. And then you hear a horn.
It is quiet at first, then grows louder, more insistent. You want to ignore it. You wonder where it comes from, or even if you are really hearing it at all. When the last blast from its muzzle comes, it is like thunder, a low growling note that makes the earth tremble and the wind rush before its' coming. A shiver runs down your spine involuntarily.
You feel them, before you see them. Eyes, frigid and forbidding, glowing green, gold, crimson. They circle you, watching - if you turn to look you may catch one in the corner of your own, black or white, streaking away into nothing. Slowly you hear them...sniffing, snuffling, growling...then a low baying, the barking of hounds, the piercing howl of wolves. They start low, then intermingle in a hell's chorus, the cry of monsters in the night.
Suddenly they stop. They stand still, become visible, a gathering of beasts surrounding you. Another presence is here, and they attend it. You turn, heart in your throat. HE is directly in front of you, deepest fear and autumn's dying breath given living form. He is the Hunter, and now you stand in His pack.
7 feet of terrible blackness he rides, a creature that is a place where horse and dragon meet. It is clawed and hooved, fanged and horned, flaming and scaled, a hideous twisted creature whose eyes burn like rancid yellow oil. It spits venom at your feet, seeming to bear a jaded grin as its rider dismounts.
He stands there, forbidding, a blackness that all other blackness slides into and vanishes; clothed in rags the colour of the abyss. Over His ragged robes falls a wolven skin, whose eyes still gleam like flint and whose lips still snarl a challenge. He has no face, only a place where shadow may fall on one, and His eyes are those of an owl, all-seeing, shattering your illusions of privacy. His hair is a thicket of dead leaves and raven's feather, hair spilling down His back and around Him to fly in the wind. Antlers flame atop His head, burning like the fire in His mount's eyes; you count seven tines before you can bear no more. You fall to your knees, gazing upwards into his face of shadow with terror-glazed eyes.
His voice is like the last breath of a dying man, woven into the whisper of the shuddering leaves on the trees and the wind.
"No mortal walks my nights and is untouched. Only the foolish...and they make sacrifice."The word lingers in your ears as He mounts His nightmare. He points to the Moon, austere and impassive, hanging like an orb of bone. It sheds its ivory light unchanged, without touching His clawed hand, or the rest of His lightless form. He jerks His hideous mount into a wheeling spin, leaving you far behind as it screeches and leaves flaming hoofmarks in its wake. The hounts give voice and follow, wraiths in the shadows of the trees glowing dimly as they follow their master.
You sigh, trembling in relief. Not many meet the Hunter on His ride and live to tell the tale. You rise, turn to continue on your way, feeling blessed.
You see only a white blur of fur and fang, the eerie glow of green eyes before your throat is gone, and the abyssal blackness claims you.
Blessed Blood Moon to everyone. Third Harvest - blood and flesh goes before the long Winter's sleep of the Earth. Enjoy yourselves. You know where I'll be.
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