The shadows around me screamed and howled, not with wind, but with a sinister flavor the likes of which I had never heard before and have yet to hear since. A sickening, deathly sound, which I could only liken to a woman's moaning wail pleading to the heavens and hell alike to take her from some unseen torment.

The sound threw my heart into my throat and I turned frantically, searching desperately among the dark figures that represented the leafless trees. But the world around me was dark and still as it had always been, a dead and lifeless swamp, but somehow not silent. Save my rapid breath and the dying wail, there was nothing but me and the darkness that never ceased.

Then in a flash, like a wave, the stories of the old men from the pub and the widows left crying on their swamp shack porches flooded my consciousness. Stories of great horror and despair, and in that very moment a dread unlike any other dulled my senses and heightened my nerves. My body tensed, pupils dilated, and the first glimpse of light flashed before my eyes. I was frozen. The mud and grime rose to my knees. It held me captive, even if I had tried to flee, it would've been fruitless. I was dinner for the beast, a caged sheep before a wolf so sinister, the devil himself would have soiled his britches. The light grew into a mighty beam, fueled by another breath-taking scream. The trees themselves shuttered in its wake, leaning away from the mighty cold wind that the creature brought with it, red eyes descending from the trees. It moved so quickly, its form was blurred, beams of light trailing into streams and rivers of blood red doom. Fangs flashed and another wail hit me so hard, I could not breathe, for there was no air, only this beast and its darkness.

I braced myself for the inevitable, cursing my curiosity. What a fool for testing the fate of an old wives tail! No drunken dare was worth this torturous demise.

The cold wind blew, the sound grew strong, the air in my lungs hot with the creature's breath...

and then, just like that, it was gone again, leaving nothing but a shell of a man in its wake. Never again would I venture into the swamps alone. Not at night... not for all the fame and fortune in the world. That swamp belonged to the Red Tail. I would not be testing its patience again.

---

Ellie the wampus. :3
Spur of the moment thing I ended up liking way too much.




Wampuses belong to muh bbcakes <3  kaylink
View their species sheet here, they are awesome. http://browse.deviantart.com/?qh=&a.....ampus#/d2wn89r

fiusdhfiudshfudshfushfuhdsfdu why do I always forget to add whiskers? ><