The Black Mist

Thick mist crawled out of the Hagener Forest, a harbinger of doom that hung over the village of Woldenhorn. The leaves rustled in the icy autumn wind of 1623, whispering like the voices of lost souls. The men dragged a frail woman, wrapped in rags, across the muddy ground, which gurgled under their heavy boots.

The rope around Hilja's wrists had cut deep into her skin, blood drying and crusting darkly over her hands. Her head was bowed, but inside, a rage boiled like a hot iron branding her soul.

At the edge of the moor, a silent crowd had gathered. The day was fading fast, the last scraps of light struggling to pierce the heavy gray clouds that hung like a leaden curtain over the sky. Dozens of eyes stared at her as if she were a spawn of the devil himself.

The villagers whispered among themselves, and the air was thick with the suffocating tension of a storm about to break. The distant call of an owl echoed like a funeral bell, while somewhere deep in the forest, a lone wolf howled.

"Witch!" hissed a gaunt-faced mother clutching her pale son tightly to her chest. "You summoned the moor to swallow our children!"

Three children had disappeared within a single week—three young girls last seen near the edge of the swamp. The villagers had searched for them long past sunset, but in vain. They must have gotten lost in the mist, swallowed by the treacherous ground beneath them. The muffled gurgle of the marsh could have drowned out their cries, leaving no hope of rescue.

Hilja's name was on everyone's lips. The solitary healer who lived at the edge of the moor had long been a thorn in the monks' side, and they didn't need to look far for a scapegoat. For years, the villagers had valued her herbs and salves, but now, with death stalking their huts, preying on their children, mistrust had turned into pure hatred.

She lifted her head, eyes gleaming from beneath wild strands of hair like the last embers of a dying fire.

"You seek someone to blame because you're afraid of what you don’t understand," she whispered, her voice cutting sharply through the cold, just loud enough for the crowd to hear. "But the moor only takes what you yourselves have given it. Your souls are tainted. I didn't take your children; it was your own curse, your own greed."

The monastery bailiff stepped forward—a scrawny, misshapen monk with cold eyes that glistened with fear. The torch in his hand trembled as he riled up the crowd.

"This witch has bewitched the moor! She sacrificed the children to her dark lord!" His voice dripped with venom, leaving no room for doubt about her guilt.

Hilja was roughly shoved onto the hastily constructed pyre, the ropes around her wrists pulling even tighter until the flesh beneath burst open. A light drizzle began to fall as the bailiff swung his torch, his face twisted into a mask of rage and triumph.

"Let’s cleanse this spawn of the devil!" he shouted, lowering the torch to the damp straw.

At first, the flames licked hesitantly, then they found purchase and greedily climbed her rags. Smoke billowed like a black shroud over the clearing at the edge of the moor, filling the air with the stench of burning flesh.

But Hilja did not scream.

Her lips moved ceaselessly, forming words that slithered through the air like curses.

The villagers fell silent.

A sudden gust of wind swept through the Hagener Forest, causing the flames to flicker. The dense mist rising from the swamp swirled in bizarre shapes, clawing hungrily at the frail woman on the pyre. Faces—distorted and inhuman—formed within the smoke, and the crowd recoiled in horror.

The flames climbed higher, licking at Hilja’s body, but she seemed not to feel the pain. Instead, she raised her gaze to the pitch-black sky.

"You thought you could break me," she cried, her voice suddenly filled with the force of a storm. "But the moor will embrace me. And when I burn, my spirit will enter the mist. I will return to take your children, to damn your cursed souls!"

Panic spread like a disease, and the frightened villagers scrambled to escape. But the mist closed in like a gaping wound, swallowing their screams and the light from their torches.

Then, with a sudden whoosh, the flames enveloping Hilja's body were snuffed out, leaving her charred remains to collapse into the earth. The smoldering ashes beneath her unnaturally blackened corpse began to writhe. A thick, oily figure, born of smoke and vengeance, seemed to rise from the air itself. Its eyes glowed like embers in the darkness.

A deep, diabolical laughter echoed across the moor before the figure vanished into the mist, leaving only terror in its wake.

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