So am I, she thought. So am I. But she always justified her murders as being a must, or everyone and everything she loved would falter and die if they were discovered.
Without peering down, Marlena knew a fragile human child would lie in his arms. Steam came from his beastly snout as his warm breaths mingled with the cold air.
And his name was Krampus.
“You aren’t supposed to be doing that,” she snapped, meeting the blackness of his eyes. “It’s only supposed to be one night a year, and murder does not qualify as the punishment you are supposed to give.”
“The sins of the wicked are what keeps this place thriving, are they not?” Kram asked, his fangs protruding.
“So does the good.” Marlena curled back her lips to show her sharpened teeth for him to see that she could be just as dangerous as him—if not more.
“The good may be the seeds of this place”—Kram said, cradling the small boy with hair the color of twilight—“but it is the wicked who are the rain and the sun that keep things alive.”
“You always have an answer for everything, don’t you?” Marlena seethed, taking a step away from him, and training her eyes on the necklace of bells around his throat.
“Go discuss it with the king and queen down below, then.”
“I’ve tried…” Did he think she hadn’t had conversations with them? Without Krampus, your world would die, they said. Without Krampus, you would die.
Marlena clenched her fists, then released them and held out her arms because there was nothing else she could say. “Give me the child.” The boy was already dead and the only thing left to do was feed the land.
Kram’s shoulders tensed and he pulled the still-form child closer to his chest. “I’ll handle it.”
Closing her eyes and grinding her teeth, Marlena turned around and led Kram down the uneven path to the largest ice tree in the woods. It was the heartbeat of this place, an eternal cure to everyone born there. Each gnarled branch was cloaked in snow and icy thorns. Lifting her hand, she knocked three times against the hard trunk.
In answer, roots erupted from the ground, shuffling forward and backward, their heavy groans piercing her pointed ears. Near the front of the tree, a space at its base opened, creating a shallow hole. Kram inched forward to a kneeling position and tucked the small boy inside.
With more groans and moans, the roots twitched and wiggled, caging the dead body of the boy. The sacrifice became completely covered and Marlena knew the boy was being consumed by the tree.
Fluffy snow fell from the sky at that moment, gathering on Marlena’s lashes until she could hardly see.
After wiping most of the flakes away, her gaze met the blackened eyes of Kram, his body swaying back and forth.
“Did you drink too much of the human’s wine?” Marlena knew he liked to indulge in the drink from the village at times.
“No, I…” Kram’s eyes fluttered before his body collapsed and thumped into the snow. His fur shriveled away, leaving his form naked, besides for the bells around his neck. Two horns, like hers, sat on his forehead—matching pairs were at the sides of his wrists and ankles. His white hair cascaded just past his shoulders, and his pointed ears peeked out from in between the locks.
Marlena’s eyebrows lowered as her eyes narrowed to the thinnest of slits. A small gasp escaped her throat when her gaze connected with three arrows protruding from his back.
“Kram!” she shouted, falling to the snow. Frantically, she reached out with her long fingers and tried shaking him awake.
Isn’t this what I always wanted? she wondered. For him to not exist? Grasping his large arms, Marlena dragged him back as far as she could, which wasn’t very far at all. She pressed her hands against his temples and twisted his head to the side so he wasn’t suffocating in the snow.
As she yanked each arrow from his back, she didn’t try to be nice or gentle. Kram didn’t twitch or jerk, only stayed perfectly still. He should have been more careful, should not have let himself be seen, should not have been hunting small children who really don’t know right from wrong. Earlier, the man who had entered her territory was a person who knew the difference between those two things, even if he had wandered in by accident.
Kram’s wounds didn’t heal right away, and he lay still against the ground. Scrunching her nose, Marlena picked up one of the arrows and touched the pointed tip. She let out a shrill shriek and tossed the weapon down. Iron. They know.
Fear, deep and wretched, entered her heart. Someone from the village knew what Kram was, but did they know where he hailed from?
She dropped beside Kram and placed a hand against his cool cheek. It was the first time she had ever touched him. She always stood far from him, never wanting to get close to the child murderer. “Wake up!”
His eyelids flickered open, and specks of white glittered against the obsidian color of his eyes as if the night sky were buried there. Studying her for a brief moment, he then yanked his head away from her palm and scurried to sit up. Kram’s naked form was pebbling over with gooseflesh.
“I think you should come inside.” Marlena didn’t really want him in her home, but she didn’t want to anger the king or queen either if he died.
“I can go home.”
She wished he would.
“No”—Marlena motioned him to follow her—“you are coming inside. We have much to talk about.”
She didn’t offer to help Kram to stand as he struggled to push himself up from the ground. After walking several paces away, past icy foliage and sharp bushes covered in ivory berries, they came to a stop in front of her cozy cottage. Her home rested just below the inside of the tree. The tree’s snowy leaves and branches reached to the skies, and her image reflected in the sheen of ice frozen to the trunk. Producing a golden key from her hidden pocket, she unlocked the door at its base.
Marlena opened the secluded door and walked down the few steps to the open area. She crossed the room to her nest of twigs and dried leaves that came from outside her woods. Kram’s heavy footsteps echoed behind her. Snatching the folded silk blanket from her bed, she tossed it to him. Kram struck the blanket with his hand as if she were giving him poison. It fell to the floor in a puddle of wrinkles.
She ignored his strange behavior. “You need to warm yourself while your body tries to heal from the iron.”
Kram glanced toward the back of her home at the small lake. It glistened a pale-blue and twinkled with specks of white. Then his gaze peered at her golden objects hanging on the walls—cups, spoons, forks, plates. She liked the way it looked—Kram appeared not to. Before she yelled at him to pick up the blanket, he did so, and wrapped the soft blue silk around his large body as he sat on the ground beside her nest.
“How are your wounds?” Marlena asked, folding her arms over her chest.
He flicked his hand in the air as though he hadn’t put his life or her woods at risk. “They’re already gone.”
“How did they know what you are?”
“Because one saw me.” Kram kept his gaze focused on the wall of her collections, not meeting her angry stare.
“And you didn’t kill this human?” Marlena spat, crouching down in front of him so he would have to look at her.
Kram sighed and turned his head to meet her icy stare, their faces only a whisper apart. “I only kill the ones I have to.”
“We are going into the village tonight,” she said, pointing at him and then herself, “and if you won’t kill this human, then I will.”
When he didn’t respond and glanced away, she snatched his chin to make sure he didn’t look away again. “What is it? Will you only murder children?”
“Let me show you something first,” he whispered, his dark eyes hiding whatever he was truly thinking, “before you start your rampage.”
“Fine.” Marlena let go of his chin and walked away to gather the necessities that she would bring with her to stop the threat.
When the ice village turned dark, and the
trees glistened under the pale moonlight, Marlena and Kram made their first move toward the village. She lit a piece of ice with blue fire, and even as they exited the woods, it stayed lit by the magic.
Kram had changed into what she called his demon form, cloaked in his thick white fur, and his blue horns appearing longer than ever before. Perhaps it was only her imagination about the horns.
The town’s village grew near, with its rows of homes in neat lines, going on and on. Reclining his head back, Kram wrinkled his snout and took a long sniff of the air. He wiggled a finger for her to follow closely behind him. She pressed her hand against the blue fire and snuffed it out.
Keeping as silent as they could under the night sky, they padded through tall weeds and entered a village. After passing several stone cottages covered in ivy, and warm light in the windows, Kram halted in front of a small hut with a cracked window. Marlena stopped behind him, watching him place a furred finger to his snout. He unlocked a bell from around his neck and cracked it open, bits of dust falling into his palm. With a quick thrust, he tossed the dust into the air on her.
The strange dust glittered bright white for a moment before fluttering out. “Will this keep me quiet?” she whispered.
“If only it would keep you quiet to me,” he said, reaching for the door.
Her anger only intensified but she didn’t say anything else.
With slow movements, Kram opened the door and stepped inside, Marlena trailing behind him. The house remained silent as they peered around, the occupants presumably asleep throughout the hut. Decapitated animal heads lined the sitting room walls, along with wooden furniture draped in furs. Marlena shuddered to herself because she knew if this human ever found out about her woods, there would be the snowy creatures’ heads on the wall, too. Two candles flickered in the hallway, as though hinting at the human’s life coming to an end in moments.
Up ahead, down a narrow hallway, rested three doors, two completely shut and the other cracked open. Kram pushed open the cracked one and stepped inside, the bells around his neck jangling.
Something in the bed stirred and made a light, muffled sound. Kram held out his furred arm to prevent Marlena from moving forward. The noise receded into light breathing, and Marlena slid out the knife of ice from her belt. She edged to the sleeping human until her knees pressed to the bed, to where she saw … a child. Long, golden locks framed her innocent face.
Marlena’s head twisted to Kram, her lip curling and her hand gripping the ice so tightly it started to crack. “This is the person who shot you?”
“No…” He didn’t look at the child, only at her. “But she’s the one calling to me.”
“You brought me here so I can watch you kill a child? You truly are demonic.” If he wasn’t so greatly beloved by the royalty underground, she would have stopped his heart right then and there.
“No, Marlena.” He reached out to press a hand to what she thought was her shoulder, but the fury on her face must have made him think better about it because he brought it back down to his side. “The girl’s father is the one who shot me, but I’m going to show you something. And you alone. You have to understand why I do what I do. Do you trust me?”
Before she could give him her answer, which would have been never, Kram’s claws extended, and he stabbed one directly into the child’s heart. The young girl’s eyes flew open and a choked sound escaped her throat, gasping for air. Marlena straightened her spine as she watched the human child fade back into what appeared to be sleep, but was not.
With her brows furrowed and lips curled in disgust, Marlena watched as Kram peeled open the girl’s mouth and drew out the tongue. Using his long claw, he cut open his hand and let his blood spill against the tongue. To Marlena’s horror, he handed it to her.
“Eat it.”
Once more, he shook his hand at her when she didn’t retrieve it.
“What?” she screeched, no longer disgusted but angry and possibly a bit fearful. “No.”
“If you want to know my secrets,” he murmured, almost melancholic, “then eat it.”
There was something in his expression that made her eyes narrow a bit less, her jaw slacken a bit more. She still didn’t trust him. But if there were secrets hidden behind those large black eyes of his, then she wanted to know them.
She swiped the small piece of human life from his furry hand and quickly placed it into her mouth. At first she tasted a certain sweetness from his blood, but something foul lay beneath as her teeth chewed. She could only imagine it to be rot, and it became worse, so much so that she could barely breathe. Her hands flew to her throat. “You tricked me!”
Kram didn’t reach out to help her. Instead, his demonic eyes only studied her.
Dropping to her knees, Marlena spat out what she could of the tongue, but it was too late.
Visions flashed through her head.
The girl in bed, Livy, is no longer dead, but instead, grows into a woman of around eighteen seasons. Livy has become more horrid with the passing of each year, stealing from others while letting innocents take fault. A friend of hers has fallen in love with a boy who Livy is infatuated with. She secretly murders the girl and lets the boy find comfort in her.
On a hunt, Livy finds her way to the snowy woods, where she encounters Marlena. An arrow from Livy’s bow strikes Marlena’s chest and another her skull. Marlena falls from her perched position in a tree, her body and neck at awkward angles in the snow below.
The images vanished, pulling Marlena back to the present.
She rubbed a hand repeatedly against her own tongue to rid herself of the bitterness and the image. But the foul taste still lingered.
When Marlena’s gaze connected with Kram’s, he said, “The human who shot me is down the hall.” He didn’t say anything else as he lifted the girl, Livy, into his arms. Marlena didn’t stop him.
She remembered there was still a man she needed to find, so she padded down the hallway, and flung open the door. A man beneath a thick blanket lightly snored, but there was no one else in sight.
Despite trying to brush off the thoughts of the terrible girl, she couldn’t. To distract herself, Marlena crept closer, took out her knife, and pushed it into the heart of the man who could bring harm to her woods. The man’s horrible eyelids opened. She then pushed her blade into each eye so even in death he wouldn’t be able to see her or her snowy home.
Taking a deep breath, she pulled back and held the bloody knife to her chest. For now, everyone would be safe.
In the doorway, Kram nodded, telling her that it was time to leave. The dead child rested in his arms, and Marlena didn’t say a word.
The entire short journey back home, they both remained silent. Marlena waited and waited for Kram to say something, but he didn’t. She couldn’t hold anything in any longer.
“That… that wasn’t a normal human child,” she said softly.
“No … no, it wasn’t.” He confirmed the suspicions that she had gone over and over as they walked in the night.
“You murder them because you know they are going to grow to be monstrous.”
“Yes.”
The thought of what lay beyond the image of where she had died frightened Marlena to her very core. What would have happened to everyone else in my woods?
“Of course,” Kram started, “there are too many in the world to stop, and at times they hide it too well. I can only find the ones who call to me.”
She nodded, yet still wondered so many things, had so many questions. But then the great tree came into their line of sight, its thorny branches shivering in hunger. Even though the thing in Kram’s arms was still a human child, Marlena didn’t think of it as one any longer.
Kram was not the demon, the children he brought back were. Livy was a devious little creature who would grow up to make Marlena’s world suffer.
She knocked on the trunk three times. The tree creaked and groaned, causing the land to tremble under her feet as it lifted its large ro
ots to make the hole appear. Kram placed the fragile body inside, and they watched the hole close back up, taking the child in to devour. With his head lowered, Kram turned to walk away. Marlena now knew he didn’t take pleasure in doing these deeds. Something inside her chipped away and her heart sped up as she watched him.
“Come inside,” Marlena said. “I need to get cleaned up.”
For a moment she didn’t think he would follow her as she made her way toward her home, but then she heard the thumping of his footsteps from behind.
After Kram entered her home, he shed his furred-body until he stood before her in his naked form.
“You really should have more manners.” Marlena’s tone was serious, but a smidge of playfulness came with it. She tossed him the same silk blanket he had used earlier, and he caught it this time instead of fighting it as if it were going to bite him. He wrapped it around himself as she motioned him toward the bathing area.
She removed her fur clothing and pushed her legs into the cool, glistening water before fully submerging her body. Kram sat with the blanket over his shoulders but didn’t touch her water as she washed off the blood from her face and hands, along with the grime.
Marlena squeezed out her hair and stepped out from the water. Kram lifted his arm, holding out the blanket. She stared at the open area beside him while biting her lip, contemplating whether to get dressed first. But she chose to sit next to him and let herself dry a bit. He covered them both with the blanket, and his skin felt less cool against hers, to the point where it was possibly a warm feeling. True warmth was something she could never feel, but a hint of it seemed to be there—between the two of them.
She thought about the image one more time that he’d shown her, and focused on how the vision had included her. There had to be more to it. “You don’t only kill them for the tree and their sins, do you?”
Dearest Clementine: Dark and Romantic Monstrous Tales (Letters Book 1) Page 13
