The Puppet Master

The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window.

It happened a long time ago in a small town in Northern Connecticut. There was a carnival passing through and the townsfolk were eager for new faces and exciting strange acts. There were magicians, strong men, trained bears, clowns, gymnasts, a fortune teller, and a puppeteer.

The carnival was set up a couple of miles outside the town center where an ancient forest surrounded a large clearing. Much of the land around the town had been converted to farmland, but the forest on the Northern edge of the town lay untouched. The elders of the town spoke in hushed tones when the forest was mentioned. They said the old gods still lived there and sometimes amused themselves with unwitting humans. When more settlers came to the area, they tried to expand into the forest but with one tree felling accident after another, they quickly gave up, saying that mysterious spirits still lived in those woods.

The townsfolk loved the carnival; their usual routine of farming and resting was interrupted by a week of revelry. Plus, many of the people had never seen a carnival, and they were delighted by the strange and mystical performances that each act brought to life every night.

They loved all of the acts except for one, that is. The puppeteer had a small stand at the back of the carnival which he set up at night. The light from the carnival area faded out behind his small stage. It was draped in dark red curtains except for an opening where you could see the puppets dancing and hear the man’s old voice speaking and narrating.

The children would flood to the stage at night, nervously waiting in front of the closed curtain for the puppeteer to begin. As they waited, they could see the leg, arm, or head of a lifeless puppet peeking out from below the curtain. Then, in a moment of excitement, the curtain would be pulled aside and the puppets would spring to life.

These stories always started nicely and somehow they only attracted children. The adults seemed unaware or uninterested in the quiet performance in the back of the carnival grounds. Here the children heard stories about a happily married couple and their family along with an admirable story about the heroics of a man trying to save his town from a monster, but by the end, each story transformed into something dark and terrifying.

The puppet master’s voice would change as the positive story turned into a tragic one. For instance, the nice husband in the story brutally murdered his family, and the hero hunting the monster realized in a moment of desperation as he lay over his vanquished foe, that he was bewitched and the monster was really his long-lost love.

The children rarely saw the puppet master’s full face, it was partially hidden behind the velvet draperies, and when it did appear it was cloaked with shadow. His wrinkled veiny hands with long bony fingers, however, were always on display which only added to the children’s fright. They were mesmerized by their movement and it was difficult to look away as they seemed to tell their own story.

On the last night of the carnival, several children went back to the puppeteer’s stand. Although they found his stories horrifying, they were captivated by them and wanted to watch his show once more and hear his creepy stories. The closest things any of them had ever heard to these stories were old legends about the woods that lurked behind the dark stage.

As the children waited for the last show to begin, the youngest of them, a young orphan girl whose parents had been taken by typhoid, intently watched the gap between the curtain and the stage. She could make out the face of one of the puppets below the bottom of the curtain; she was sure that the puppet wasn’t only looking at her, but something about the eyes of the puppet made her think it saw her too. She began to turn to ask the son of the family that had taken her in if he saw anything funny, but before she could the curtain was swept aside and the marionettes sprang to life.

His last story included three characters and one prop, a miniature log cabin house that sat at the back of the stage. Inside one of its open windows was a tiny felt candle with an orange flame. He told the story of a couple who lived in the cabin, about a man and his witch wife. The witch was portrayed by a black-haired puppet who had a face frozen in pure and utter terror.

In the story, the witch was not portrayed as an inherently evil character, to the children’s surprise. Most of them had heard stories about the dark magic and evil doings of witches who lived in forests. Instead, she was described as a recluse like her husband who studied old texts and practiced magic in the solitude of the old forest. While the wife practiced magic or foraged for food, her husband had small performances in town with his dolls for money.

The puppet master's voice grew morose and quiet as he continued the story: “One night while the husband was out buying food in town that they could not forage or grow themselves, the wife was trying to summon a spirit, one she knew lived in these woods outside their cabin. It was an ancient spirit of great power, the memory of a forgotten world, one that could influence luck but also was associated with many unexplained calamities, along with other mysterious misdeeds.

She spoke to the spirit first through a trance state that involved writing symbols of summons on the floor of the cabin and placing candles from sacred geometrical figures, all the while consuming divine teas that made her more susceptible to spiritual influence. In this trance state, she was told that she could summon him only if she sacrificed something of great value.

Reluctantly, she settled on the only valuable thing they owned. It wasn’t much but she figured the sentiment it carried may increase its value to the demon: it was her husband’s favorite and oldest puppet. Her husband’s father, said to be the most famous puppeteer of his time, had given it to him when he was a child, and he cherished it greatly. She didn’t relish the idea of giving it up, but she knew the power and insight she might gain from her encounter with the spirit was too valuable, she couldn’t pass it up.

She carefully removed the puppet from her husband’s bag and went back to carry out the summoning ritual. It involved reciting spells and incantations from an ancient text her great-grandmother had passed on to her before she was burned at the stake.

As she recited the alien words from the book, she could feel the energy gathering around her like a storm. Silence. Then, a great wind howled and thick clouds gathered overhead, blotting out the sun. All but one of the candles flickered out and she was almost in complete darkness except for the yellow glow of a candle that sat in the window beside her.

A deep, raspy laugh echoed out from a dark corner of the cabin, and she could see the pale blue skin of a large, round head the size of a giant pumpkin start to materialize from the growing darkness. The rest of the body was shrouded in shadow and wrapped around him like thick, black smoke. His lips became bloated and red like a clown's and curled upwards at the end. The mouth revealed twisted teeth. Above the mouth, there was no nose, only two golf-ball-sized black and white eyes that coursed with pulsing, red veins. As he laughed, his tongue spilled out from his mouth, forked and jet black, resembling a shadow rather than a physical object.

As she stared, the gray-blue skin of the demon’s head began to peel back, and its white skull burst through like an overripe banana exploding through black skin. The witch shrieked as the images became more gruesome and his eyes turned on her, forcing images through her mind of the most horrifying nature. She saw ancient forests with tall trees that were hundreds and thousands of years old being sawed down to make room for a growing population of insatiable parasites. As if in response, she saw bloody flailing limbs, torn from unwilling bodies, then great saws cutting at men and women as they stood still, helpless, screaming out in silent shrieks. She saw bones and bodies being crushed under great pressure. She quickly realized this summons was a grave mistake.

Then the marionette, which lay on the ground beside her, suddenly stood up and as she stared at it, she realized that it began imitating her own movements. It covered its face with its hands and doubled over with sobs, it shrieked. The witch was overcome with the gravity of what she’d done as the images in her head became real, she felt as if her own body was being cut down and ripped apart.

Out of the shadows of the cabin, strings began to materialize and cling to the ceiling. They snaked down to the witch who was writhing on the floor next to her copycat puppet. The strings fused to the witch's body. She cried out in pain and shot up struggling, as she was raised into the air, tears streaming from her face, mouth wide open, screaming, her eyes bulging from her face. The strings tightened, pulling each limb straight out. Looking down at the puppet, she realized her body formed the ancient pagan symbol of the five-pointed star. As the tension increased, each string pulled at her four limbs and head. Then, with a dramatic increase in force and the ghastly sound of flesh tearing apart and bones giving way, her body came apart, each of the five strings removing a body part from the torso it was previously attached to. The candle flickered out and all went silent.”

The children sat with mouths gaping open in fear as the marionettist pulled the stage curtain closed. They did not notice when he collected his bags and left. None of them could sleep that night. They had never heard anything so frightening. Their parents asked them what was wrong and they told them about the puppeteer’s story of the demon that lived in the woods. To their parent's disbelief, they hadn’t remembered any puppet shows at the carnival. But each parent did vaguely recall stories their parents had told them decades ago about evil lurking in those woods. They had always brushed those stories off as superstition and they knew their children’s fears were nothing more than that.

Soon the parents’ disbelief and confusion turned to fear when the young orphan girl hadn’t come home from the carnival and the other children said they’d seen her at the puppet show. The whole town came out with torches and oil lamps and spread out through the town center and searched the carnival grounds for the young girl.

The son of the family that had taken the girl in was reminded of an old story his grandfather had told of a crazy puppet master murdering his wife in their cabin in the woods that was now abandoned. That story had always stuck with him. His grandfather loved telling him tall tales and ghost stories in a hushed, fanciful tone, but the few times he heard this story he always sensed fright and sincerity in the voice of his elder.

With the light of the full moon, the boy broke off from the crowd at the empty carnival grounds and headed for the old cabin. From afar the boy could see a single lit candle in the window of the abandoned cabin. He approached it and looked in from a different side window to see what was going on. The puppet master was there. His face was twisted and wrinkled and he had the wild eyes of a madman. Symbols the boy did not recognize scattered the floor of the cabin as the ancient man lit candles on the floor while reading from an old, tattered book. The black-haired doll sat in the center of all the symbols, and against the back wall was the young girl. She was gagged and tied up and had white strings stitched to her arms, legs, and the back of her head. She was trying to scream but not much came out.

Paralyzed with fear, the boy watched. The old man paced around the room saying unfamiliar words in a desperate tone. The wind howled through the forest as the boy felt a pressure gathering in the air like a sudden storm as the light of the moon vanished behind a blanket of thick clouds. The candles all went out, except for the one at the window. The forest went silent.

The boy’s attention was immediately pulled to a corner of the cabin. Squinting his eyes, the boy could make out pale-blue, ashy skin in the darkness of the far corner. A monstrous face then appeared and the boy felt his legs grow wet and warm beneath his pants. He had never before known fear like this. He said a silent prayer in his head as he watched, frozen in place. The puppeteer cried out in delight and pointed to the young girl who was strung out and tied up and was now shrieking with a blood-curdling scream.

The pale-blue monster in the shadows looked at the puppeteer, his puppet, and the young girl. He tilted his head back and let out a laugh that sounded like thick thunder combined with the roar of a grizzly bear. Goosebumps covered the boy's skin as he watched, still entranced. After the laughter subsided, his great red lips pointed, reaching upwards almost touching his black, white, and red eyes. In an instant, his demeanor shifted, his smile turned into a scowl and his eyes became full of wrath.

A bag that sat on the floor by the puppeteer’s feet began to shake and rattle loudly. The bag tipped over and several marionettes fell onto the floor. With horror, the man stared down at the male puppet. It was the puppet that had vanished along with his wife all of those years ago. It stared back up at him. Something flickered across the old man’s eyes as he came to some realization. The puppet master put his hands on his head and screamed in suffering and horror as the puppet mimicked him. The man began to reach out for the puppet in a moment of desperation, but before he could grab it, white strings materialized from the walls and ceiling of the cabin. The strings pulled at his legs, arms, and head. He rose into the air, now defeated, and locked eyes with the black-haired puppet on the ground. The strings tightened and began to pull, his four limbs and head were torn from his body. The pale blue face in the corner smiled at the boy who was still watching from the window. The light of the candle went out and the forest returned to silence.

The boy woke beside the cabin to his parents crying over him and hugging him and the town sheriff asking questions. The little girl was pale as a ghost but her wounds were minor. The boy insisted on going inside the cabin. He saw the old bag of tattered puppets on the floor, and beside it against the wall sat an old, wrinkled puppet with closed eyes whose strings were tangled with the black-haired marionette beside it.