Short Story: The Cry Of The Owl

Short Story: The Cry Of The Owl

The sound of the owl woke him. It had often woken him, and as before, he lay for a long moment waiting. Yes, there it came again through the darkness. He had envisaged it, winding and twisting between the huge limbs of the old trees and then once it gained the open field rising, fleeting and speeding over the stubble towards his window.

His bare feet found the rough boards and bony toes carried him forward to the window, over the ledge and across the tiles of the lower roof. The old tree was as a staircase; so familiar were the branches and the notches on the bark. Soft earth kissed the skin on his soles as he landed gentle as a baby mouse between the twisted roots.

He didn’t wait and he didn’t need to look, the owl had called and the house would be sleeping. His sister curled under her coverlet a soft fist crushed against her face and her long lashes, like spider legs, laid against the precious skin of her cheek.

Mother would be in a drunken stupor by now. He had heard her earlier, the snores rattling thin walls and the guttural grunts as she shifted her bulk across the sagging springs of the bed.

Now he was away. He picked up speed, his legs flashing in the moonlight the tail of his nightshirt flapping against sturdy thighs. Faster over the grass. and the roadway, and the meadow. Still the owl called to him, the night enfolded him and the mystery formed and reformed filling the world and carrying him away into the magic.

The light was dim through the glassless window and there up in the rafter, the eyes were watching. It didn’t call again, its job was ended for this time and so the owl stared down in silence on the scene. He opened the trunk hidden against the wall and dressed in the shabby garments.

In the damp darkness he waited, the only noise was his breathing slightly laboured now after the run to the barn but slowing as he regained his wind. The night crackled with tension and he felt the desire deepen and then it came; a tread on the gravel in the yard.

A low whistle sounded and he moved like a cat to the door of the barn. A horse with muffled hoofs stood in the darkened corner by the stone wall and alongside was the man. His cloak shifted and billowed in the small wind and the buckles on belt and boots glinted silver in the night.

As the long face turned to him eyes glinted with red fire under a fringe darker than a raven’s wing. Approaching he smiled at the boy, a sinister smile filled with promise and lust and knowing. The boy felt the strangeness come upon him now, he felt the swell of his gums as the fangs shifted and he felt the blood stirring, and he raised his head and he roared the call of the vampire and the cry of the wolf.

The man mounted and then eyes agleam he leaned and grasped the small hand hauling him onto the haunches behind the saddle. Leaning into the hard body of the rider the boy savoured the thrill and the fear and the wonder. They rode out onto the moor and into the town, to the alleys and to the doorways; to the blood.