Post by account_disabled on Dec 13, 2023 0:27:07 GMT -5
This story first appeared in a USAM contest in the Edizioni XII forum and reached third place. The idea dates back several years. It has been overhauled for the occasion. It is a somewhat strong story, because it talks about mistreatment of children. Lacrimae There sighs, cries and loud woes resounded through the starless air, so that I wept at the beginning. Dante Alighieri – Inferno, Canto III 22-24 The man hurried along the dirt road that took him from the town to his house in the open countryside. He had lingered in a tavern drinking and speculating with some friends about old Mathias and now the shadows on the ground had lengthened tremendously.
As long as he had been in company, sitting in the room Phone Number Data heated by a large fireplace, he had laughed along with the others at the noises and voices that came from the house. The old man lived alone, a man of indecipherable age, always impeccably dressed. It was said he had been a professor, years before, but now he had become a sort of recluse who almost never left his refuge hidden in the woods. Yet sometimes, passing near that ancient building, he heard someone crying. A soft, almost whispered moan, followed by other sounds. No one had ever given a precise description of what he had heard, not even the man who now found himself forced to pass in front of that house with the night pursuing him relentlessly. Rumors. He tried to shake off those senseless stories, but the darkness that was enveloping him didn't make the task easy at all.
Then a branch broke under his feet and the man jumped, stifling a cry. He noticed he was sweating. He breathed in the cold evening air to calm himself and continued his walk. It's all the fault of the night and the wine drunk. When the road turned sharply to the left, he saw her. Even though the bush partly covered it, the old man's house was visible from that point. The first floor and the roof stood out against the darkening sky in the east. The windows, closed by heavy shutters, looked like the eyes of a sleeper awaiting awakening. The silence was total, no tears that night, nor any unusual noises. Yet that isolated house, together with the rumors circulating about it, made him uncomfortable. He couldn't explain why, but every time he passed in front of it he felt an unpleasant sensation and a tingling that went up his back until it gripped the back of his neck in a grip of ice.
As long as he had been in company, sitting in the room Phone Number Data heated by a large fireplace, he had laughed along with the others at the noises and voices that came from the house. The old man lived alone, a man of indecipherable age, always impeccably dressed. It was said he had been a professor, years before, but now he had become a sort of recluse who almost never left his refuge hidden in the woods. Yet sometimes, passing near that ancient building, he heard someone crying. A soft, almost whispered moan, followed by other sounds. No one had ever given a precise description of what he had heard, not even the man who now found himself forced to pass in front of that house with the night pursuing him relentlessly. Rumors. He tried to shake off those senseless stories, but the darkness that was enveloping him didn't make the task easy at all.
Then a branch broke under his feet and the man jumped, stifling a cry. He noticed he was sweating. He breathed in the cold evening air to calm himself and continued his walk. It's all the fault of the night and the wine drunk. When the road turned sharply to the left, he saw her. Even though the bush partly covered it, the old man's house was visible from that point. The first floor and the roof stood out against the darkening sky in the east. The windows, closed by heavy shutters, looked like the eyes of a sleeper awaiting awakening. The silence was total, no tears that night, nor any unusual noises. Yet that isolated house, together with the rumors circulating about it, made him uncomfortable. He couldn't explain why, but every time he passed in front of it he felt an unpleasant sensation and a tingling that went up his back until it gripped the back of his neck in a grip of ice.