Run

There was only one rule: don’t open the door.

It didn’t need to be watched, guarded, or even locked. They couldn’t come across the threshold without an invitation, no matter their might.

And oh, they had tried.

Fireballs conjured at the flick of a finger, cannon shot summoned from thin air, cruel axes trying to slice the old pine that barred their entry; a silent protector.

Nothing worked, and the inhabitants remained safe, as they had for centuries.

It had been opened just once before, and that had been both necessary, and enough.

Night after night, their warped faces would clamber up to the ancient pine, repelled by the scent of something so natural, and try to force their way in.

Burning, battering, bashing, banging; all to no avail.

And then one night, without warning, it opened again.

With a crash, the pine slammed back on its hinges, almost comically so, unmistakeable in the quiet glade.

A young man dashed out and off to the right; a fiery brand clasped in one fist, an iron poker in the other, darting between the trees and seeking cover from the harsh gleam of moonlight.

A shriek went up from a watcher, and the answering call came swiftly, carried on the cold of night; harsh and guttural and scraping.

After all this time, their prey had revealed itself.

Abandoning the door, they closed the distance rapidly, on foul wing and horned foot, far faster than the strides of one desperate human.

The frail fire wavered as they closed in, then darkness took the torch’s light.

Meanwhile, in the silent clearing, for the first time in centuries, the door was unguarded.

Two pairs of feet slipped softly across the threshold, turned left, and disappeared down the path, a bundle clutched in careful arms.