G is for GHOSTLY AVENGER
He hurried into his home and locked
the doors. He paused for a second, back to the door as if worried someone might
try and burst through, and he listened for the sound of footsteps that would
indicate he had in fact been followed.
There was nothing. Just his own
heightened breathing and the susurration of crickets outside.
Already three members of The
Huntsmen Club were dead, and the rumor of the thing hunting them, the figure in
the black cloak with the death’s head, had started to play at his nerves.
Roland Winterburn wasn’t a man who frightened. He was a man who pulled strings;
he was a man who drank pretentious bourbons that cost more per bottle than most
of his employees made in a week; he was a man who owned a yacht which traveled
the waterways of the world, in search of new game, new thrills, new
depravities.
But Roland Winterburn was terrified.
He scurried down the dark hall, into his study. He dared not turn the lights on
in case someone was after him. Even
if they had followed him home, it was best not to alert them of his
whereabouts. With the lights on, the windows became opaque black panels from
within, and he would become instantly visible. Keeping the lights off he could
easily stay obscured in shadow while easily seeing anyone creeping around
outside.
In his panic, Roland ambled through
the dark, bashing his left knee against the scalloped corner of his large desk.
The stuffed owl that sat on the edge, forever staring blankly from a tiny perch
of balsam branch, toppled and landed on his foot. His heart jumped violently.
“Get a grip!” he chastised himself.
Trying to steady his nerves, he
made his way around the desk by trailing hand-over-hand along the edge of the
desktop. He fumbled with the top drawer, noisily sliding it out and extracting
a revolver. If The Huntsmen were being hunted, so be it. But he wasn’t going to
be meek prey for some specter. He was a Huntsman, for crying out loud. He had
his dignity!
“Rooooooooolaaaaaand
Wiiiiinterbuuuuurn!” It came in an echoing whisper that flooded the room like smoke.
Winterburn squeezed the revolver
compulsively. His hand was slick with sweat.
“What do you want?” he begged,
ashamed at the weakness in his tone.
“Your time has come,” the voice
returned. There was such finality in the way it was said.
Roland couldn’t pinpoint where the
voice was coming from. He fired, blindly. A flash of the muzzle and the bullet
went into the corner, near the bookcase. The room filled with laughter—a
deafening cackle that sent an icy shockwave through his bloated body.
He fired again, aiming at random, squeezing
the trigger rapidly until the gun clicked empty.
A white skull seemed to float out
of the darkness of the fireplace. “Death to the death dealers,” the skull said
through its tight ivory rictus. Beneath the skull appeared a shard of
moonlight, the glint of a steel knife. It shot out, plunging hilt-deep into
Roland Winterburn’s chest.
As Winterburn fell, his hands
futilely played at the handle of the knife, trying to extricate it from his
chest. The skull watched as his victim’s mouth made its last silent motions,
uselessly pantomiming a call for help like a fish out of water gasping for
life. Before the life had fully dissipated from the magnate, the skull kneeled
down near his supine face and produced a small photograph, holding it in front
of Winterburn’s eyes.
“A death for a death,” said the
skull. Satisfied by the brief flicker of recognition in the waning Winterburn’s
eyes, the realization of who his killer was, the skull rose and left the house.
There were still two members of The
Huntsmen who awaited punishment, and the night would not stay dark forever.
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