#OctoberFrights Day 3: Drabble Wednesday With Monsters

Welcome to Day 3 and the October Frights edition of Drabble Wednesday. Enjoy.

Don’t Be Curious

“Don’t go down into the basement.”
The caretaker warned me, but I didn’t listen. The murky space beneath the winding staircase was too tempting. What secrets did it hold? What adventures?
I was always the curious sort. Mother said it would be the death of me one day.
I guess she was right.
But I never expected a monster to be living in my basement. Monsters weren’t supposed to exist. I was wrong about that, and this creature had sharp claws and jagged teeth. Now I was shredded and bleeding in the basement, while my killer escaped into the world…

Chameleon

Sometimes it wore the face of a child, sometimes an older lady; once it pretended to be a clown. Whatever shape lured in its prey. It hunted the vulnerable, the outcasts, the ones in pain.
For that is what it liked best. Pain.
The mental anguish of fear and despair. Seeing the hope fade and the inevitability of death descend within its victim’s mind. Then it fed, sopping up emotional juices like thick gravy, relishing the miserable anguish. It would keep them, drain them until they dried as brittle as discarded corn husks, before scattering their ashes to the wind.

Payment

The crows heralded the culling, blackening the sky with the flight and piercing the air with their harsh cries. Doors and shutters slammed shut as people fled, as if mere wood would keep out the hungry beasts rising from the earth to claim their due.
A few sacrificed each turning, to hold the hoards at bay, remuneration sealed in an ancient pact, woven in blood and oath, unbreakable until the world’s end. With the crows came the ritual, villagers huddled in houses, praying to be spared, relieved when the screams sounded elsewhere, or watching the horror unfold in their home.