Hunter in the Dark

He stepped lightly, respecting the sanctity of the forest even now, after all pretense of stealth was no longer needed.  The hunt was over, and now the search had begun. 
It had been a tricky shot, the hardest he’d ever made, and at first he was certain that he’d missed the buck entirely.  He’d waited fifteen, maybe twenty minutes, twenty- five feet up in that tree, his cramped muscles complaining all the while.  He didn’t hunt from a stand, and no sitting either, he stood, stock still, still as a rock, still as death, until the moment was just right.  On this night, it had taken that moment over three hours to arrive, and his legs and feet were screeching in protest. But still he waited.  When you shoot a deer with a bow it runs.  Even if your aim is precise and you land a perfect kill shot, the beast will still run.  If you give chase it will run for miles.  Bleeding and dying all the way it will run until it’s lifeblood has all but drained out and it will die between steps.  But if you wait, practice patience, it will only run for a short while, and then find somewhere safe to softly die.  You see, it’s not the dying that the deer fears, it’s the hunter.  John knows this well, and so he’d waited cramped and uncomfortable, up on his branch, until death had come for the buck.  Death, evidently, was a much better hunter than himself.
When he’d finally come down from his lofty perch, he’d found his arrow with ease.  It was stuck almost perpendicular; tip first into the dark earth.  He’d sighed in disappointment and grabbed the arrow, only to be surprised to find that it was covered tip to fletching with blood.  Evidently it had blown right through the deer.  He checked around, and with a fair amount of ease considering the failing light, he’d found the blood trail.  There wasn’t nearly as much blood as he’d expected from what surely must have been a vital hit, but he wasn’t worried.  Sometimes the wound would close up on a shot like that and the deer would bleed out on the inside.  It meant a much harder track, but the deer usually lay down faster.
He stepped again, scanning the ground for the next drop, still quiet, just because it felt wrong to make noise in the woods at night.  He’d been tracking this deer for hours now and had lost all sense of direction.  John wasn’t overly concerned though; he’d brought a compass for just such an occasion.  There was a trick to this, tracking at night with little sign.  He’d locate a drop, bright and sparkling under the glare of his flashlight, and stab his arrow into the ground next to it.  Then he’d begin searching for the next one.  It was slow and tedious, leap froging through the woods like this, and John hoped it would be over soon.
It was dark now, painfully dark with no light of moon or star able to pierce the dense foliage overhead and John was beginning to grow uneasy. It was harder tracking at night, but he was sure he’d find his prize.  Death had no trouble hunting in the dark.  In fact it probably preferred it. With his flashlight pointed straight at the ground it was as if he were encased in a small shifting dome of light, the only man alive, completely alone.  The gentle rustle of the nights breeze brought goose bumps, the crackle of newly fallen leaves brought shivers, the scream of an owl made him jump.  Something was not right.  He’d been in the woods alone at night many times before and there had never been this sense of disquiet.  It was like a stomachache, slow and ponderous, but prevalent.  It sat in him, way down deep like a lead weight, slowing him further and growing by the minute.  He reminded himself that there weren’t many things in these woods that he couldn’t club to death with his flashlight, but not surprisingly, the thought brought no comfort.
And then, just like that, he discovered the reason for his fear.  It came upon him from one step to the next.  Between steps.  John swung his flashlight up to check the trail in front of him and there it was.  A house.  Old, peeling whitewash peeked through the gaps in the moss that clung to every facet of the house.  It was a simple thing, one story with wooden shingles and two chimneys running up either side like devils horns.  Mossy shutters flanked glassless windows and in the center of the house a frame lacking a door.  A porch spanned the front of the dilapidated domicile, sagging and slumped by its weight of years.  And in its center, shining crimson and brilliant, a large drop of blood. 
John’s reluctant fear suddenly grew a vitality that he’d never experienced before and without even knowing it he was terrified for the first time in his twenty three years.  Where had this house come from?  He’d been coming into these woods his entire life and it had never been here before, of that he was certain.  And had his buck, not a trophy but certainly a prize, had it really gone inside.  Sweat broke out all over John’s body, even though at this late hour the October air had turned close to freezing.
“What’s in the house John?”  The sound of his own voice broke the silence of the night and frightened him even more.  He’d never been one to talk to himself but the words just kind of spilled out.  He realized that he’d been standing frozen like a camouflaged statue, nearly at the foot of the porch, for what seemed like hours, and so forced himself to some modicum of ease.
This didn’t make any sense.  Why would the deer run into the house?  Where had this damn house come from!  Before he knew what he was doing, he’d taken a step and then another.  Like moth to flame he moved, half entranced, until his right foot landed on the first step leading up to the porch.  It was spongy with age and moss and it gave more than a little under the weight of his body.  The reality of breaking through the step brought John back to his senses and for a moment he stopped himself from going into the house.
“What’s in the house John?”  The words sounded like thunder in the absolute quiet that surrounded the house.  He hadn’t even known he was going to say them until they’d left his mouth.  He stepped onto the stair, lost again to the house.  The step somehow held and he climbed all three and crossed to the door.  He leaned his bow and arrow against the wall.  He felt split, half of him screaming in terror, wanting nothing more than to bolt into the woods and run like his buck, the other half, numb and resolute, slowly plodding toward the interior of the house.
He stepped through the entrance and the sound of the breeze fell away, replaced by the raw grating of his labored breath.  His hands were shaking, and his knees were clattering off of each other, making the fabric of his camouflage rustle. The vibrating light of his flashlight illuminated the small room he was in. There was no furniture or decoration, nothing save for a carpet of leaves and small twigs that had come to call this place home over the years. And leading through the center of the room and down the hall, blood.  He barely paused in his surveillance of the room and in a matter of moments he was walking again.  He passed a couple of doors and then followed the trail into the kitchen.  The drops of blood led past a caved in fireplace and the remnants of a counter and directly to a closed door.  Which of course didn’t make any sense whatsoever.  Deer don’t close doors.  He stopped, dead in his tracks, and made up his mind right then and there to get out of this awful house as fast as his feet would carry him.  He’d half turned around when again he spoke.
“What’s in the house John?”  What was going on here, he thought wildly, as he turned back to the closed door.  Why did he keep saying that?  What was happening in this ancient misplaced building that could steal the words right from his mouth?  Seemingly of its own volition the hand not holding the flashlight grabbed the tarnished brass knob and pulled the door open.  The screech of rusty hinges was horror, too much really, but by now there was no turning back.  A stone stairwell led down into darkness.  John descended and as he did so the flashlight began to flicker, almost seeming to match the frantic pace of his madly beating heart.  The stairwell led to an earthen-floored basement, every other step spotted with blood, and John followed his trail down into the earth.
The room was littered with the bones and carcasses of all types of animals, big and small.  In the center lay his prize.  Or rather what was left of it.  Ripped up and bloody lay the six point that had come so far.  It looked mangled and chewed on.  The smell of blood and earth filled John’s nostrils, gagging him.  On the far wall, across the room from the stair, was a mirror.  Grimy and soiled it hung cantered off to one side.  John, not even fighting it anymore, crossed the room.  The bones of the fallen cracked and crunched beneath his feet, as he marched to the mirror.  He could hardly see in the failing glow of the flashlight, but what the mirror showed made sense.
“What’s in the house John?”  He asked.
And with a voice that he barely recognized as his own he got his answer.
“I am.”  The flashlight went out and all was dark.  Which was exactly how Death preferred to hunt.