Introduction to this two-part story. It begins in the Fantasy genre and was initially intended as a stand-alone, but I couldn't bring a definitive ending. It felt lacking and unfinished, and after taking the advice of one of the editors, I decided to keep it as a continuation and do a crossover of genres. The second part of this tale will be written as a Horror rather than Fantasy. One story spanning two separate genres. I hope it works out as well as it does in my mind.
Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoy it. I am still new to writing, this being only my second ever attempt.
PRIMAL INSTINCT - Part One
It had been snowing all afternoon, and the clouds were low. It was the first fall of winter, and it seemed to have arrived with a vengeance. Cain felt he had no option but to give up for the day. It was pointless trying to hunt for deer when you could barely see through the whiteout. Trudging home, he felt a little unnerved, and his inner senses were on edge, he felt as if he was being followed. Cain continued walking steadily forward, not wanting to look behind him, fighting the urge to run.
The cabin was only a few hundred feet away, and he would be able to make it before his fight or flight instinct took hold. On opening the door, he finally allowed himself to turn around and look behind him. Nothing. Just an empty forest. Cain laughed; his mind was playing tricks on him again. Of course, there was nothing; there never was.
Inside the cabin was a welcoming warmth; the fire was still glowing enough to rekindle. Cain placed a few small pieces of wood on top to slowly feed the flames while looking around for what he had in the kitchen to feed himself. He spotted the rabbit he snared yesterday, which will go well with some of the wild mushrooms he had picked this morning. If this snow continues, Cain will have a much harder time finding food. He began to skin the rabbit carefully, not wanting to tear the hide. Starting at the back feet, he quickly cut around them and worked his way around and lengthwise down the body until reaching the head. Taking the rabbit from its hook, he placed it on the work surface, removed the head and feet, and set the fur to one side. He quickly gutted it, then took the innards, head and feet outside to the back of the property, leaving them on a log for whatever critter lucky to pass.
Walking back around to the door, he felt it again, that prickling feeling on the back of the neck, the feeling of being watched. Once again, he looked out into the dense woodlands, peering through the snowflakes, yet he saw nothing out of the ordinary.
Re-entering the cabin and closing the door, this time, he went to the window and looked out, trying his hardest to focus through the heavy layer of dust on the pane. There was something out there. He could feel it. He had a keen sixth sense, honed from all his years of hunting and living in the tail end of nowhere.
Then a quick movement caught his peripheral vision. He turned his head towards it. Was that a shadow he saw next to his old pickup truck? He watched for a few more minutes, but soon decided it was pointless.
Turning away from the window and convincing himself that his eyes were playing tricks on him, he went back to prepare his dinner. After butchering the rabbit and wrapping a few pieces up for tomorrow, he threw three seasoned chunks into the frying pan hanging over the now blazing fire and lowered the chains until the meat started to sizzle and soon the aroma of cooked rabbit filled the cabin. He quickly prepared and threw in the mushrooms and a bit of butter towards the end, a few minutes later, it was ready to eat. Eating directly from the pan, he savoured the flavours as his mind drifted to the failed hunting trip for today. He had hoped to have been able to catch that roe deer he had seen a few days before, she would last him a good week before needing to go out again, and he did like a nice bit of venison. Never mind, he would try again tomorrow.
Throwing the now-empty pan in the sink, he quickly washed away the food residue, but not scrubbing, for fear of losing the conditioning built up over the years. He hung it back on the chains over the fire, pulled them back to the highest position, and it was ready for the next feast, which with luck would be some roe deer.
Standing in the main room and looking around, Cain reminisced. The cabin was one left to him by his father. He had been killed in a mining accident a few years back, and it had taken the lives of over a dozen men from the small town community of Broderton a few miles East of the cabin. His mother had never been one for the wilderness, so it was only ever Cain and his father who came here every second weekend throughout the year. It was here that he learnt to handle both the gun and bow. His father taught him to catch his dinner and to forage for vegetables, fungi and herbs. If you didn't hunt, trap or forage your food in the mountains, you didn't eat. They never brought anything with them apart from some dried beans and condiments.
He glanced at the memories that covered the walls, various skins from his first kills, a few cleaned skulls of rabbit, deer and squirrel. There were some very impressive antlers over the door that his father had taken from a stag he caught only a couple of years before he died. He was incredibly proud of that kill, and they ate well for over a week. Some photos of himself and his father were on the mantelpiece, one rather poignant one from when he was given his first real hunting rifle for his 13th birthday. Against the far wall was the bed he built with his own hands from an old birch tree that had fallen just behind the cabin a few years back during a rather impressive storm. It was much sturdier than the old camp bed upon which he used to sleep. The cabin was somewhere he always felt comfortable and had recently stayed for more extended periods each time. This time he had already been here ten days with no plan on returning home anytime soon.
Cain wasn't your average entrepreneur; he caught a lucky break towards the end of the 1990s with a good business model, and over six months, his internet-based luxury vacation company was soaring. He made a point of marketing his website to attract the myriad of tech companies that had appeared over that time and benefited greatly from it. By the year 2000, the company was taking in an easy seven figures every month in revenue. In 2002, due to a stockbroker friend's foresight, he noticed that the tide was turning. He sold his business to a larger holiday company and made a handsome profit from it, not much longer after that, there was a market crash. The "dot com bubble" had burst. He no longer needed to work and lived quite comfortably from the monthly income brought in from a few choice investments.
He had never found anyone with whom he wanted to make a lifetime commitment, so he was still single at the age of 51. At 6 foot 2 inches in height, Cain was the prime personification of a man with a healthy weight and a slim but fairly muscular physique which he kept in reasonable condition by following a quick but gruelling morning fitness regime. Sporting a military-style cut to his dark hair, he found it was easy to self-manage, so had not felt the need to change it since the vanity of his youth. He was incredibly handsome with gentle deep blue eyes the colour of the mountain lakes, a corona of amber flecks encircled the pupils, adding warmth and kindness. A chiselled jawline with a trace of unshaved shadow and a bashful but alluring smile hinted at the inner sensitivity often missing from an alpha male like Cain.
He had never been short of female attention, but he was looking for that special companion, and thus far, she had eluded him. There had been one or two that had got close to being the one. A girl he had gone through high school with had come back into his life about six months before he became successful. Zoe was exciting, a girl of action. She liked similar things to him and was looking for a way to leave Broderton behind. Sadly, this small-town girl got the taste of the big city and the money that came with it. She became materialistic, selfish and greedy in a very short space of time and would be out with friends shopping and dining daily. Cain was ready to end this toxic relationship when she did him the favour of running off with a wealthy hedge fund manager. He wasn't very good at finishing relationships, so this action of Zoe's did him a great favour. After that, he became very suspicious of female attention.
The night was now drawing in, so he tended the fire, made sure no logs could roll off during the night, checked the lock on the door and turned down the light.
Laying in his bed, Cain thought he could hear snuffling outside the door, claws clipping on the small porch. It was probably a fox, he thought, coming to look for extras after finding the remains of the rabbit left on the log, and with that, he drifted to sleep.
--------X--------
Cain was awake early the following day, ready to resume the hunt, hoping to bring home that beautiful roe deer. He had already checked the weather conditions, and they looked favourable, at least for now, but could change with each passing hour in these mountains. Dressed in his favourite camo hunting jacket, with deep pockets to carry extra ammunition without needing an additional backpack, he left the cabin and took the well-travelled path into the forest.
The air was crisp, and the leaves crunched underfoot where the morning dew had frozen before the sun had fully risen. As he traversed along the track to where he last saw the deer, he began to realise that the forest was eerily quiet. Usually, it would be a cacophony of noise; insects, birds, rodents, but today it was silent. All he could hear was his footsteps on the frosty floor. Stopping, he breathed a little shallower and listened. He couldn't hear anything, but something had undoubtedly spooked the natives. Continuing on his way, he became more in tune with his surroundings, and then that recognisable prickle started on the back of his neck, that feeling that unseen eyes were watching him, following him, hunting him!
He stopped again, turned and looked behind him. Nothing there! This time though, he readied his gun. He would not be caught off-guard.
As he moved deeper into the forest, the trees became denser, and the canopy blocked out more of the sun. The floor became damper and softer; the snow wasn't thick here because of the heavy cover above. Cain decided on a whim to take a less travelled route through the forest, not so well known but led to a small lake with a waterfall that hid a little-known cave system. Following the path down the side of the mountain, he could hear the distant whisper of the cascading water. It was a magical place that never failed to capture him each time he saw it.
--------X--------
It was approaching noon when he finally arrived at the waterfall. The sun was high and was dappling through the canopy. The beauty of this setting was never lost on him; it was a magical place with myths and legends attached to it. Stories of witches and ancient shamanic circles that Cain had heard about as a child but paid no attention to. There was almost an ethereal glow here that didn't exist elsewhere in the forest.
He was sure that this is where most of the local fauna came to drink, so he searched around for a good spot downwind that he could sit and wait. He was convinced that the deer would come here, and as there was only one way into this glen, he was in prime position to keep watch.
Cain sat just behind a hawthorn bush for about 45 minutes, watching the path to the watering hole when his periphery was triggered. He moved his eyes to look, and he swore he saw a glimpse of something, the shadow of a tail disappearing behind the waterfall.
He tensed!
What was that?
