The Creature of Bramble Wood

Slay the dragon. That’s what the witch said, that’s what Eluric was told. And so, Eluric journeyed deep into the wood.
Dead leaves broke and crackled under his boots. A cold fog hung over the night air, obscuring the grey thin trees until they were but a stone’s throw from his face. Eluric led his horse, a large beast that winched and wined as it squeezed in between the trees, breaking branches along the way.

Eluric could see his breath in the air, and he used it to lead him. Legends tell that even the wind flees of the great devil, at least, that’s what the face in the trees told him.

Curtains of silver light leaked through the thick canopy, illuminating a flowerbed that covered the ground. Eluric walked through the flowerbed, as he planted the first boot into the thicket, it doesn’t find purchase. Eluric’s right foot fell through the ground. He instinctively grabbed hold of his horse, Berwyn, and it at first leans down as if he were leaning her downwards.

With his left foot, Eluric tried to leverage himself from the more stable ground and push himself up and yet he could not. His foot was trapped, and moments after being trapped, something sharp started to scratch his boot.

The colour in Eluric’s face washed out as he stared in horror at the hole in the ground that threatened to swallow his foot. And after that moment, he doubled his efforts. He smacked Berwyn and held on as she pulled back in pain. But his foot would not come free.

In these moments, a chuckle broke the relative silence. No, not a chuckle, this sound was more vindictive, a cackle that resonated with the teeth in the ground. These teeth had finally broken past Eluric’s boot and had found their way into his skin. The shock and pain rushed up his leg, and the hair on the back of his neck stood up on its end.

The source of the laughter hid, with only the queer yellow glint of its teeth and eyes piercing through the veil of grey.

Red started to trickle from Eluric’s ankle, and yellow, down his legs. Berwyn fought to break free of Eluric’s grasp, the beast doing everything it could to flee from the harsh hungry sound.

The creature jumped down, landing on the horses back with a thud so heavy it felled the beast.

The slippery, neckless creature was a swampish green in colour. Its long thin limbs wrapped around the white mare and its thick torso weighed Berwyn down.

Its mouth ran from one side of its torso to the other, and as the creature pulled its head back over its shoulder, opening its mouth and exposing the black well within. Its mouth was bordered by rows of teeth draped in vile red threads.

It sunk its teeth into Berwyn, and it shook in ecstasy, excreting a brackish fluid as it began to feast on the horse alive. The screams of the horse were quickly drowned out, both as it chocked on its own crimson, and as the heavy breathing of the creature overshadowed all other sounds.

In this moment, Eluric, who at this point was certain that his foot was lost. Took his up the sword that lay attached to the Berwyn’s saddle. The naked blade sang in the air and even that was muffled by the creatures horrid swallowing of flesh.
Eluric took up his sword, pointing it at the creature he thought, was too absorbed in its meal to notice his intent. Of course, the creature was watching him with its bulbous unblinking eyes. And as soon as Eluric pushed to stab the thing, it threw itself out of his reach, dragging the horse up with it, into the trees.

More of Eluric’s leg sank into the ground, and with that reminder, he took his blade to flesh.

He clenched his teeth and severed the limb with a single swing. Finally, free Eluric dropped to the ground and pushing with his left leg he moved as far from the flowerbed as he could. The whole time he watched the canopy above.

Next, he started to rip at his cape, a pool of red started to form beneath him and his strength was draining with it. He used the pieces of the cape to seal the open wound and it quickly turned red. The scent of copper and iron filled Eluric’s nostrils. His grew cloudy and his breathing, shaky. Few whimpers escaped his mouth as the cold took him and his body shivered.

The cackling began anew, the creature was not gone.

For a moment, Eluric heard something whistle through the air, his eyes widened, and he threw himself to the side. Where Eluric had been sitting, a massive projectile exploded past him, thundering against the trees so hard that they started to fall before being caught by their neighbours.

Eluric looked down at the mass, sure enough, it was Berwyn’s mangled head, severed from its body with a jagged uneven cut.

Eluric would prop himself up with his sword and he looked out into the grey night air, looking for the glint of yellow but found none.

“High King Lugh,” Eluric muttered, “May your spirit guide Thunorglad, may Thunorglad slay this wicked thing.”

With the prayer, Eluric steadied himself against a tree and readied his sword facing the direction his horses head had been thrown from.

That’s when the creature came before he knew it, the creature was upon him, pushing him back through the branches and in response, Eluric stabbed at the creature.

His blade bites into the creatures’ flesh, through its bones and out again on the other side. Eluric landed on the ground with broken leaves and branches under him, the creature above.

He observed his disbelieve at the lack of injury his swing had brought and strained with great pain under the creatures’ great weight. It threatened to crush his chest as it sat on top of him. His sword arm was pinned under the creatures’ webbed feet. As it peeled its head back to open up the black well once more, and at that moment, Eluric took his free hand, grabbing a branch from under his head.

And as it dove down, Eluric propped the branch up into the roof of the creatures’ mouth, past the rows of teeth into the grey flesh of its mouth. In its enthusiasm, the creature impaled itself on the broken branch and unlike the sword, this wound drew blood. Eluric was bathed in its thick brown oily blood.

With the last of his strength, Eluric squeezed out from under the creature and lay by its corpse until sleep finally took him.