Author's Note – Ah, hello, hello! I have finally got around to rewriting the story, fixing paragraphs, et cetera.

Please note that, although the stories take place in the mid Middle Ages, I am using the Gregorian calender for dates to prevent confusion on my part.

I will use a time system I made for the characters' city along with the AM-PM (12-hour) clock.

Cheers! Please review, give constructive criticism, and in general advise me. I welcome any chance to become a better author.

These stories are written so that they could potentially take place in the real world. Therefore, no creepers, or at least they're not commonplace.

Date: July 10, 1027 AD

Low midnight | 1:21 AM

Wind blows gently through the open window, carrying with it the smell of the wet grass outside; it has only now stopped raining since it began a day ago. My wife, Hannah Bailey, is sitting next to me on a small bench, her arm around my shoulders as we stare into the fire in the fireplace. Our precious daughter, Alexandria, is sleeping on my lap, her sunny orange hair, so much like my own, falling over my legs in long curls. She will be four years of age later this month.

"I'm going to bed, darling," Hannah says to me drowsily, rising from the bench and stretching. "Good night."

"Good night, love," I reply, kissing her cheek. She smiles and walks to the room to my right, where our bed is. I look down at Alex and scoop her up into my arms, putting her over my shoulder and carrying her carefully to the small bed in our room. I kiss her goodnight, brushing the lengthy locks of hair from her peaceful face.

Exiting the room, I take my pipe from the mantelpiece affixed to the wall above the fireplace and walk outside, ducking my tall upper body below the door's frame and the freshly sharpened sword hung decoratively above it. I take a seat it the wooden chair on the covered porch. Puffing smoke from the pipe, I look around the prairie. Lighnning bugs light up the darkened land, bathing the grass in faint, soft yellow glows. Chimes on my neighbor's trees are blowing in the wind, letting out sounds like bells. The effect is beautiful. The large oak tree planted near my house creaks quietly. The night is unusually but not uncomfortably warm.

Distant howls echo across the plain. The cry of the noble wolf. Answering howls, much deeper in the forest a few miles to the west, make their way to my ears. My own property is fenced off to keep animals like them out, away from my sheep and cows. Something tall flits in and out of my vision, silhouetted against the sky where the moon would be visible if it wasn't a new moon, but when I look up it's gone. I shrug and take another whiff of my pipe. I grow my own tobacco in the acres behind my house; the stuff sold at the marketplace tastes like a fresh meal of dung.

I look between the timber frames of two houses that haven't been finished yet and see something very strange indeed. A small area of dirt is shifting, uprooting the grass upon it. A terrible stench like a days-old corpse finds my nose.

The hairs on the back of my neck rise and chills go up and down my spine. A hand has dug its way out of the earth. It stops moving for a few seconds, and then resumes with speed and strength that would never be found in any human. It swiftly widens the hole, allowing a pair of greenish, misshapen arms to push out and continue to dig.

I open the door, reach inside, take my sword from above the frame, and close it again. Holding the weapon in front of me two-handed, I move shakily closer to the hole.

A head has popped up. It's the most hideous thing I've ever seen, and I've seen terrible things, I can tell you. It has large chunks of flesh missing, and the entire thing seems decayed. The mouth is open wider than humanly possible, showing cracked and yellowed teeth. Its eye sockets are empty and dark. It's coated with clotted blood.

"Who are you?" I call to it, trying in vain to keep my voice steady. "What are you?"

No reply aside from a horrific gurgling groan. It's stepped all the way out of the hole now. It's even worse below the head: I can see straight through a gaping, bloody hole in the front of the torso, although the view is blocked by shattered ribs and organs, and the entire body is twisted and crooked, as if mangled by a horse and carriage. It takes a disturbingly reptilian stance, raising its head and sniffing the air, making sounds like an utterly insane man being gutted. It turns, laying an empty gaze on me.

Oh, shit.

It begins to move toward me, shambling and dragging its feet, one arm outstretched as if in invitation. It trips and falls, but pulls itself along with its long, talonlike fingernails, the same color as its teeth. More bloodcurdling groans and growls, which sound disgustingly wet. The smell is overwhelming, and I resist the urge to vomit as I take in every detail with horrified fascination.

"Don't come any closer!" I squeak with fear. "I - I'm armed!"

It doesn't seem to notice. It's about three meters away now. By the light of the stars and the lightning bugs I can see little bits and pieces of the eyes, lying in the bottoms of the sockets with the bodies of long-dead flies. Two meters. I get ready to strike.

One meter.

I swing my arm, the sword simply an extension, utterly interconnected with my thoughts.

The head is chopped off far more easily than would be possible with a human; the sword carved the neck like a freshly-cooked turkey. It tumbles off the shoulder and down to the ground, leaking fluids that I've never seen before and don't want to know the purpose of. There is no blood coming from the wounds. I stand there, hands on my knees, finally allowing my stomach to relieve itself via the mouth.

Good God, I've killed. Lord, help me!

I've broken my own personal law. I'm ashamed of myself - no, that doesn't even begin to cover it. I hate myself. I want to die. I begin to cry silently, letting out dry heaves from my stomach, now devoid of contents. This could have been a sapient being, even though it looks and smells like a corpse. I have no way of telling now.

Sadly, I start toward the tool shed to get a shovel. I'm the killer, so it's only proper that I dig the grave. I don't look forward to taking the body to the graveyard. I don't even know that it was hostile.

That's one doubt that gets resolved quickly.

I hear shuffling behind me. "What the hell?" I say quietly, turning. Good God. The headless body is crawling along, dragging itself closer and closer. I feel something closing around my ankle.

It's the head, trying to bite my foot off. I yelp and kick it off me, stabbing it with my sword. The body is still moving. I leap forward and drive my sword into its heart. I'll make sure to clean the blade extra well.

No use. The left arm reaches out to me, a few bones jutting out of the rotten flesh and skin at odd angles. Acting quickly and instinctively, I start chopping it to pieces. I keep going until it's just a wet, bloody pile of gore. The head. The head is still going. I do the same to it. Stab. Stab. Stab. My clothing is covered with bits of flesh and bone and brain, but I keep going, oblivious.

I've finished. The pieces of muscle are still twitching slightly, but they can't harm anyone now.

A few hours later, the pile has been buried in the graveyard, and I have places a large, unmarked rock on the grave. I fill in the hole as well; it appears to have dug a very long way up. The bottom of the hole is not visible, and it looks a bit like a mining shaft.

I will never tell anyone what transpired tonight. If you want my opinion... I think it was a demon. A hellish beast, a servant of Satan.

Nobody should ever see anything like that again.

Nobody.

What did you think? Please tell me! As said above, I welcome any chance to become a better author! :D

Please review and criticize!