Twelfth Krampus Night

by Matt Manochio

  Hans had seen his share of cruelty doled out to enemies of the lord to whom he’d pledged himself. He’d heard about ordinances dictating that anyone caught stripping bark off a tree would have his belly slit. A length of intestine was yanked out and nailed to the trunk, and then the unfortunate soul was made to circle the tree so long as any part of his gut was left in his body.

  A twisted dance around the maypole, Hans thought. And that was just for stripping bark. What’s the big deal about stripping bark? Just chop off my head and be done with it.

  Soon the road would cease its decline and open toward a cobblestone-lined village a distance from the mountain’s base. He estimated it to be three o’clock, time enough to dispose of the body and return to the castle before nightfall. Danger grew whenever one lost sight of the castle.

  Instinct prodded him to unsling his crossbow from his back and stop his horse in the middle of the road. He heard and saw no movement, but he knew someone was watching.

  “I am one of the baron’s knights.” He kept the crossbow at a downward angle, ready to raise and aim it. “My lord knows my whereabouts and will be expecting my return. My disappearance will mean my fellow knights will come looking for me, and if you are from the village and they learn this, it will not bode well for you or your family.”

  Hans waited for a reply. Just silence, the kind that stoked uneasiness.

  “I seek nothing more than to return this murdered girl to her family. Walborg’s the name. I shall reward you should you assist in me in finding the parents.”

  “Leave the girl.”

  Hans aimed the bow to where the deep voice originated. He saw nothing but clustered fir trees, enough to shield a body.

  “Unless you are a relative and can prove it, I will not.” Hans pivoted back and forth, listening for movement. “Show yourself.”

  “I only want the girl. She means nothing to you. Leave her and ride back to your lord.” The rough voice seemed angered by having to converse.

  “I’m afraid I cannot do that. I have my orders.”

  “Then I will take the girl and will leave you dead.”

  Hans knew exactly what false bravado sounded like—this sounded nothing like it. Although his face expressed confidence and resolve, he couldn’t help but think that whoever addressed him from within the woods would stay true to his word.

  “Threatening a knight is punishable by death. And when I identify your relatives in the village, they’ll suffer too.”

  Hans didn’t expect amused laughter, or the response that chilled him: “Raze the village for all I care. Kill everyone in it. Give me the girl. Now.”

  Hans heard a few heavy clinks of a chain, sounds that made his horse fidget. “Easy, Hrolf, easy,” he whispered into Hrolf’s ear to steady him, and then to the forest, “If you were serious and a competent shot, you’d have arrowed me by now. You’re bluffing.”

  “I don’t use bows or arrows. Nor swords. Against you, all I need are my bare hands. And hooves.”

  “What?” Hans said, then shuddered when the spot in the trees where he’d aimed his bow roared at him. Hrolf reared, sending Hans, still holding his crossbow, tumbling over Gisela’s body and landing butt-first on the ground. Hrolf bounded for the village but had gotten not twenty feet when a large chain flew from behind tree trunks and wrapped around the horse’s neck. The wielder yanked back the chain, and the sound of the horse’s neck snapping echoed through the branches. Hrolf collapsed on his side, pinning Gisela’s lower body to the ground.

  The wielder dropped the chain. Hans saw an immense figure striding behind the trees, making its way toward the shaken knight.

  Hans aimed his bow, timed the thing’s movements and fired an arrow the moment the figure strode past an oak tree. The arrow sizzled and hit its target square.

  Hans didn’t attempt to reload. He dropped the weapon next to him and remained seated, marveling at what appeared from the woods with an arrow’s fletchings and nock jutting from a brown, hairy rib cage.

  “Ouch,” the creature mocked.

  Now Hans knew what it meant by hooves, for it stood on two of them, the top of its head hovering eight feet above ground. The two twisted horns atop its skull made it ten feet.

  The creature plucked the arrow from its side and almost flicked it away like a used toothpick, but refrained at the last second.

  “I know you,” Hans said, awestruck by the thing his parents had warned him about when he was a child who had scoffed at the idea of its existence. “But it’s January. It’s over. And I’m no longer a boy.”

  The creature stood in front of Hans, resting its clawed hands on its hips, looking at the knight the way a parent might a misbehaving child.

  “Correct. You’re now an unthinking yes-man. You should’ve stayed a boy. I never came for you then—you must’ve done something right. But that was long ago. Today you turn a blind eye to despicable acts perpetrated by those who employ you.”

  “Take the girl, she’s yours.” Hans dove back to reality.

  “You don’t think I’m aware of that? It’s what I’m planning on doing to you that’s keeping me here.”

  The thing brought the arrow up to its eye level, examining it, and then looked down to the knight and grinned to reveal all of its fangs. It then held up its pointer finger, making certain Hans could see its curved talon. “I have an idea. Let’s you and I go for a walk.”

  The creature’s hand, when placed over Hans’s screaming mouth, concealed almost all of the slowly dying knight’s head, muffling his anguish. It finished with Hans and loped to the horse and used the same bloodstained fingernail to slice the rope binding Gisela. It lifted the horse by the tail and gingerly picked up Gisela, seeing what he’d expected but needing to be sure.

  “And they say I am heartless. You were lucky you were with child a month ago.” It held Gisela by her shoulder, her body dangling from its grasp like a used handkerchief. “The master frowns upon harming pregnant women.”

  It looked at Gisela’s belly. “I must show you to the master. He needs to see the frau’s handiwork. The master is not without heart either. I am certain he shall have me return you to your family.”

  It reached over its head, still holding Gisela, and lowered her body into a tall and fat barrel it had strapped to its back.

  It retrieved the chain from around Hrolf’s neck and lowered the links into the barrel next to the girl.

  It left the horse to be picked on by a mother bear and her cub, both of which would be scared away by knights who would later find Hans, slouched face-first against a tree, his intestines wound several times around the trunk, the gut’s end stuck in place by a crossbow arrow.

  Chapter Four

  “Do you think he’ll come for us?” The girl, Anna, was ten years old, as was her identical twin sister, Sarah. Both girls cowered in the corner of the family’s one-room wattle-and-daub house, the cold and their nerves jiggling their blonde pigtails.

  “He knows when Mother and Father go to the village—he counts on it,” Sarah said. They scrunched themselves into little balls, covering themselves with a big woolen blanket, their knees tucked under their chins. Waning daylight filtered through two small, shuttered windows, which both girls focused on, hoping his shadow wouldn’t cut the sunlight.

  “It’s been a while since he last visited. Maybe he no longer fancies us,” Anna whispered. “We’ve been good girls, not told anyone about him.”

  “Nobody would believe us anyway. Said he’d kill us. I believe him.”

  “It’s punishment—that’s what it feels like to me,” Anna said.

  “That’s not the way he sees it. He enjoys it, laughs at our pain.”

  “But why us? Of all the children who live in and around the village, why does he pick us?”

  Sunlight flickered through the latched shutters, fast enough so that the girls coul
dn’t tell if a bird or their imaginations caused it.

  “How do you know we’re the only ones?” Sarah pulled the wool up to the ridge of her nose so that only her blue eyes peeked above the blanket.

  The knock on the door caused them to bounce on their bottoms.

  “He never knocks,” Anna said.

  Sarah knew it wasn’t him either—he always opened the door, unannounced, and snatched them up one by one, leaving the other too terrified to help. Neither moved to answer the knock.

  “Anna? Sarah? Are you in there?” came a grandmotherly voice.

  “Who do we know who sounds like that?” Anna whispered to Sarah.

  “You don’t know me at all, but I know you,” the reply came cheerfully.

  The girls stared at each other, each thinking, How can she hear us?

  “Or were you expecting someone else, my dearies? I think you’ll prefer my company over anybody else’s. I understand you’re both good seamstresses, like your mother. I’d love to see your work.”

  Anna swept the blanket aside and stood.

  “No,” her sister pleaded.

  “Maybe if he sees someone in here with us, he’ll skip our house.”

  Sarah thought about it and enthusiastically nodded yes.

  Anna walked to the wooden door, which rested on hinges and had no lock. It took some effort for her to push it open and see standing outside an old woman holding a bucket and sack.

  “Which one are you, little one?”

  “I’m Anna.”

  “May I please come in, Anna?”

  He could be making his way through the woods now, the girl thought.

  “Please do.”

  The old woman hobbled inside, nudging Anna aside. One lighted candle, centered on a small wooden table, lit the home. Straw had been strewn all over the floor. At night the girls’ parents would bring in the family’s milking cow so that it wouldn’t get stolen, and because its body heat would help warm everyone where they huddled on the floor to sleep. Father slept with a dagger close by because he had built the thatched-roofed house—with the baron’s permission—in the woods, away from the village’s relative safety.

  “That’s a wonderful blanket, Sarah.” The old woman placed aside her belongings “Bring it here. May I please see it?”

  Sarah rose and bunched up the scratchy blanket in her arms and brought it to the woman, who snapped it open to admire it.

  “Did you both sew this?” She ran her hands over the blanket, admiring how tightly it’d been stitched.

  “We took turns, yes,” Sarah said. “It’s our first one without Mother’s help.”

  “And what a fine job your mother did teaching you.” She handed it back to Sarah and turned to Anna. “It’s nearly dinnertime. Where are your parents?”

  “Bringing fish back from the village. It won’t take long to cook.”

  “A fine choice to eat on Twelfth Night, would you agree?” the old woman extended her gnarled knuckles to Anna and gently stroked her cheek. “I have something for you.”

  The old woman reached behind her back to retrieve a silver coin for Anna, who stepped back, not knowing what to expect. “I’ll put this on the table for you.” She slapped it facedown, a loud clack reverberating off the wood. “And I’ve not forgotten about you, Sarah.” The old woman repeated the process, leaving two silver coins side by side for the girls.

  “I’m very pleased with you both, how hard you worked this year on your first blanket. And I’m sure you’ll be making more in the year ahead.”

  “We’ve already started,” Anna said. “Each of us is working on our own.”

  “That’s what I like to hear.” The old woman’s pleasant demeanor vanished. She looked around the room and shushed the girls when one appeared about to speak.

  “Go sit in the corner, the way you were when I first got here. Take the blanket. Now.”

  Anna and Sarah scampered to the corner and resumed their positions, now terrified because they too felt someone else’s presence.

  The old woman stooped and blew out the candle, and the girls lost sight of her.

  The door was still open, but neither girl had seen her slip out. Sarah gasped when a large figure stood in the doorway.

  “Didn’t think I was going to arrive, did you?” came a male voice. “How could I pass up such an opportunity? I’ve been gone so long. I’ve arranged for your parents to be delayed in the village. They’ll be none the wiser. Who would like to be first?”

  Neither girl knew which of the baron’s sons did unwanted things to them. He never gave his name, only orders to refer to him as “my lord”.

  “I can never tell you apart, especially in this dark. How your parents do it mystifies me. I suppose parents know their children best. But it’s still light enough out so that I can see what I’m doing.” He popped open the closed shutters to allow for a little more light. “So, who would like to take off her clothes first?”

  The girls knew this was coming. Each wore a dirty cut-down tunic over a simple skirt. Anna began to cry.

  The lord slipped off his leather gloves and laid them on the table. “I just want to hold one of you to start. Cuddle a bit. Make you feel nice and warm.”

  He walked toward the girls, who turned toward each other and hugged, soon sobbing onto each other.

  Just as the lord prepared to pounce, the shutters seemed to slam shut at once, followed by the door creaking back toward the house, sealing them into darkness.

  The lord and the girls heard a soft cackle coming from the closed door, followed by “I think it goes without saying that you will not be getting a silver coin.”

  He puffed out his chest. “I’m one of the lords of the castle. Leave this instant and speak nothing of this or I shall have you killed.”

  “Is that so? Well, I’m not setting foot from this house for the foreseeable future, and when I do leave, I have every intention of informing the villagers of what a vile pervert you are. They’ll never quite look at the baron the same way.”

  The lord reached for his knife but realized he’d left it in his horse’s saddlebag outside so as not to frighten the girls.

  “What? A helpless old woman makes a statement of fact and your reaction is to grab a blade?”

  Without thinking, the lord barreled his way forward, flipping over the table and breaking through the weak door. Wood splintered outward, spooking his horse tied to a tree. He freed his ride and charged through the woods to the main road, looking for his brother.

  “Make sure you find your coins, dearies,” the old woman called to the quivering girls inside the home. “Now the hunt begins.”

  The creature, crouching within a bramble patch—the last place the hunters, especially this prim and proper bunch, would dare tread—unfurled its parchment and glanced at a name that hadn’t been stricken from the list. One of the men straddled a horse in the middle of the road, waiting for the rest of the hunting party to return. The beast reached behind its back and slowly drew from its barrel a chain, gingerly pulling it so the links would slink over the barrel’s lip.

  The lord clearly heard it.

  That was part of the plan. Let the cretin hear a noise out of place within the woods. While technically not on the list—the creature knew not why—the marked man appeared long overdue for punishment.

  Typically the brothers were never far from a knight for protection, but both considered themselves skilled fighters and keen bowmen. The lord circled his horse around the road, scanning the trees and bushes.

  “Otto? Mathias? Are you there?”

  “Yes, my lord.” Otto, followed by Victor and Mathias, galloped to meet him. “Your brother’s not far behind us. He was looking for you.”

  “As I was him. We all seem to get separated so easily. And I see we’ve not had any luck.” The lord saw no kills tied to
the knights’ horses.

  The brothers reunited, and the five men trotted the trail up toward the castle, resigned they’d find nothing that day. Victor held up his hand to halt the procession.

  “My lords, up ahead, two bears, eating a—Good God, that’s Hans’s horse.”

  They lost all interest in hunting and charged the bears, chasing them into the forest. “Damn things should be hibernating.” Victor climbed off his horse and caught sight of Hans, gruesomely lashed to a tree by his own entrails.

  Without being ordered, Otto dismounted and cut the last gut link tethering Hans to the tree. The intestine trail sickeningly unraveled. Otto roped the dead knight to his horse for the ride home.

  “My lords, we must leave here, now,” said Otto, who, like Victor, remounted his steed. Mathias had drawn his crossbow and stayed close to the baron’s sons, looking for any movement.

  “I checked his horse. The saddlebags weren’t touched. He still had his weapons,” Victor said. “Outright murder. This wasn’t a robbery.”

  Mathias swiveled on his horse and spotted something in the brambles.

  “We’re being watched, my lords. Move.” A thick iron chain exploded from the brambles, smashing Mathias’s face, crushing his nose into his skull, penetrating brain, killing him. The chain snapped back into the woods just as Mathias hit the ground.

  The brothers drew their longbows and fired a succession of arrows from whence came the chain. Otto, fearless, jumped off his horse and unsheathed his broadsword, waited for the lords to stop firing and immediately hacked into the brambles.

  A man screamed from behind them. Otto and the lords turned and gasped when they saw Victor’s stomach gushing blood onto his panicked horse’s saddle. An old woman in black straddled the horse from behind Victor, holding one wrinkly hand over the knight’s forehead while removing a dagger from the man’s belly with the other. She lithely pushed herself off the horse and scurried into the forest. Victor fell and hit the ground while trying to push his innards back inside his body.

  A furious roar nearly knocked the lords off their horses and forced Otto to step back from the brambles. He spotted an animal’s furry face, unlike any he’d ever seen: black, beady eyes that looked strangely human but couldn’t be; and a mashed, crooked nose and mouth, out of which sprang curved yellow teeth. And the putrid smell!