On Monday mornings, I send out a story via email: ultra-brief tales of 1,000 words or more, usually in genres including horror, science fiction, and the supernatural. Those stories collectively are called Once Upon A Time. I’ve also published several ebooks and compendium volumes of those stories so far.

I’d love to have you as a subscriber to the weekly free story. You can subscribe via email here. Unsubscribe any time, from the link in every issue.

Here's story 257, of 266 so far.

Mr. Scratch

The man sat down heavily on the stump of a long-dead tree, only half-listening to the night sounds of the riverbank.

The water was flowing quickly, a ceaseless undercurrent of white noise that almost hid the chirps of insects and the rustle of nocturnal wildlife. The man knew that he was surrounded by life, but tonight that fact was a source of pain instead of comfort.

He had lost his family. The senselessness of a fire. He had been away on business, without any idea that he had already seen and spoken to his wife and child for the last time. The last few days had been a blur, urging him steadily towards an inescapable conclusion: that his own life, as it had been, was over now too.

The dark waters looked inviting, and he held the image in his mind. He could just walk into the river, letting it take him away. It was a last resort, but his days were now all a series of lasts anyway. It was time to change that. He took the photo from his wallet, and he focused on their faces. He let himself really feel all of it; the loss and the rage, and the need for it to end. When he spoke, it was in a whisper to the night.

“I’d give anything for another chance,” he said.

When the man looked up, the stranger was crouching on the bank at the water’s edge, peering into the current. He was dressed all in black or some dark colour, but he was perfectly visible. The stranger seemed to know that he was being observed, and after a moment he stood up. It was an odd movement, as if he wasn’t well practiced in it.

When the stranger turned to face him, the man could see that his face was unnaturally pale. Somehow it wasn’t a surprise.

“Life has not been kind to you, my friend,” the stranger said. His voice, though quiet, carried effortlessly to the man’s ears. It was as if he was standing right beside him.

The man nodded in agreement. It was true, after all. It was why he was here.

“It’s been even less kind to those I love,” the man replied, and the stranger took a step closer. There was something about his gait, even within that single step. There was a stalking quality to it; a hunger. But the man wasn’t afraid. Fear had passed him by, now.

“I couldn’t help but overhear you,” the stranger said. “You wanted another chance. You might be surprised what I can arrange.”

“At a price?” the man replied, and somehow the stranger’s eyes darkened further. His face was nondescript, and perhaps it was even a different face from moment to moment; always an anonymous almost-person that you might have met once, just briefly, many years before. There was an echo of ancestral memory to it, but also a note of dread.

Which makes perfect sense, the man thought. As man’s oldest enemy.

“I prefer to use the term arrangement,” the stranger said, and the man nodded. Now they were getting down to it.

“And what’s in it for me?”

The stranger’s eyes flickered, his mind clearly occupied with the same question. “That’s up to you,” he replied. “You’re free to choose. That’s how it works. But be precise, and know that our arrangement will have a fixed term, after which payment comes due.”

The man nodded. It was as he had expected. As he’d hoped, even.

“And if I refuse?” he asked, and this time the stranger almost smiled.

“Then there’s always the river,” he said, gesturing efficiently towards the dark, swift-moving water behind him.

“The term would have to be… let’s see. Thirty years?” the man suggested, and the stranger somehow managed to shrug without perceptibly moving a muscle.

“It matters very little to me,” he replied. “Thirty years will be acceptable.”

The man looked at the stranger for long moments, fascinated by his countenance. As he looked more carefully, he found that he could see what lay behind the dark clothes. He saw that the stranger had been a travelling merchant in the deserts far to the south when the pyramids had not yet been built. He had been a bard amongst the green hills and castles. He had captained a small ship as mankind lurched through its industrial age. And he saw that, now, the stranger had no need of a pretence at occupation, because so many sought him out.

The stranger held a document in his hand now, and the man found that he couldn’t quite tell how many fingers formed the fist that clutched the rolled-up papers. It was no parchment or papyrus; the paper was new and crisp, bleached white and laser printed, as befit this new and equally dark age of technology. Doubtless the words would be the same as ever, though, because the shared language of evil and of law endured down the aeons.

The man took the document, and he reached into his pocket to retrieve the pen he had brought in expectation of this moment. The stranger seemed to know all this, but the man supposed that didn’t matter either.

There was a space on the final page for his signature, across from the stranger’s own, and the man saw that his name was Mr. Scratch. A small part of him — a part that was perhaps blind to the loss of his wife, and his child — found it amusing.

“There remains only the matter of what you want,” the stranger said, and now all the animals and insects and even the river itself had become silent.

“Then I’ll be precise,” the man said. The stranger tilted his head, and for the first time there was uncertainty in it. It was the action of a bird or a beast, assessing what it had assumed to be quarry, but was now not quite so sure.

The man looked at the stranger, pen poised in the proper place, and he spoke as the first stroke of ink found the eager fibres of the paper.

“I want to take your place,” he said.

JINX

KESTREL face a new and terrifying enemy: an all-seeing mastermind who already knows exactly who they are, and many of their deepest secrets. Nothing stays hidden forever, and the line between privacy and liberty is razor-thin…

Book 3 in the KESTREL action-thriller series.

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